Chapter 33:

MISSING PERSONS - PART IV

THE RETURNERS – ISEKAI RESCUE AGENCY

As I race through the gaps between cubes, slipping on their flat laminate surfaces whenever one is slick with water or oil, Merlin’s voice croons to me through one of the hunting idols.

“Keep going straight...” we’re coordinating a pincer movement of sorts, “...she’s about five cubes ahead and to the left, my dear~”

We’re closing in, but Álfhildr has been here longer. She knows the terrain, even if it is forever shifting.

“Do you think she’s trying to lure us into a trap?” My work-shirt is sticking to my back from so much running, and falling, on precarious roofs and sliding down walls.

The residual warmth of Merlin’s bountifulness in competition with the cold of our exposed altitude and my own rising body heat.

There’s an extended silence as she considers the possibility, “Perhaps...”

Her only word on the matter does not fill me with much hope. I’d rather avoid conflict or – more specifically – avoid being the one targeted, but I have faith in Merlin’s power and wisdom. The strategy has worked so far.

Although some people end up in other worlds and it doesn’t matter either to their original or new timelines, like with Jun, we mostly deal with missing persons who cause a ripple effect in their home OR host timeline. In the case of Álfhildr, she’s kinda messing with both.

An anti-Jun!

By leaving her original, there is a power vacuum that will cause a catastrophic civil war, killing millions outright, then followed by a dark age which will last centuries, leading to more death and despair. Not what was meant to happen at all, except for in the dimensions where it is. She was meant to become a leader of hero level renown, bringing a golden era of prosperity and peace, and if she were doing that here, it wouldn’t be such an issue. However...

“Fu-” I nearly slip off another plastic-steel compound cube.

This is the most depressing architecture I’ve ever seen, and I’ve worked on contemporary – for me – building sites!

The reason is simple, no one goes out anymore.

They’re just born then decanted into their own 2m-by-2m cube to live out their days in virtual bliss. Floating on the breeze or at the algorithmic behest of storage need.

I do not want to plug myself in anywhere to find out if it is pay to win, but considering they were already considering using your sleep as time in which to do corporate training in my present, I wouldn’t be surprised if the future has micro-transactions up the wazoo.

Anyway, we followed the history, went and found out about Álfhildr’s past to track her down across the multiverse, which led us here.

“Oh shi-” I dive from one level to another – falling down a cube, and winding myself – to narrowly avoid being pancaked by two others, “I thought they had sensors and repulsers to avoid that?”

Merlin is quick to reply, “It’s her.”

“I should have guessed... if she’s using magic to link consciousness’s together to make a planet sized biological computer, then-”

“She’s there!” I’d misinterpreted her meaning, the urgency of it.

As I finally recover my breath enough to stand, Álfhildr drops between cubes that close up behind her. The depth of green from her hair, as it swirles about on unseen winds, and that which emanates from her eyes, is like staring into turbulent waters within an ancient forest. Nature unbridled and all powerful.

I’m dead.

The cubes around us configure into a casket. Locking me in with her.

“Merlin, please help-” the idol at my ear begins to scream.

It spazms and twists, as the fabric it was bound in becomes a noose, then bursts into flames, vanishing as ash.

At the flash of light, I see Álfhildr’s face contorted, snapping back from the embers to meet my own gaze.

So much pain and sorrow... then darkness.

I feel like we circle each other in the black for eternity.

The cubes shift and moan as boats do moored too tightly packed.

“I-I’m sorry...” a sniffle. Her voice strained and sincere, “...th-they made me-”

Then strangled and cut short.

They? There are others?

Odd streaks of light, single beams, break through the uneven tessellation of cubes that make our coffin.

In such dire motes, Álfhildr is briefly illuminated, at first standing, then splayed on her knees… the rags sticking to her emaciated figure, caked in filth and grime, as are her hands and feet.

A pitiful sight if she did not still radiate such a fearsome aura.

With no way to contact Merlin, no powers or equipment of my own to employ, and only a couple of shifts as a confined spaces rescue worker under my belt, there’s little I can do other than keep calm, feel out the space, and wait to be rescued myself.

At least I won’t run out of air.

“We can arrange that.”

Álfhildr’s voice barely even sounds the same.

Like I’d be used to it after half a dozen words anyway, but her tone is more unnerving, as if her vocal chords had become so taut they could barely vibrate, her breath just passing over them.

The cubes cease their perpetual motion upon the air currents.

The few gaps between them, the minimum amount allowed by their sensors to avoid collision, disregarded. They magnetize together so that no light – or air – gets through. In one of the final rays, Álfhildr is thrown into stark relief near the middle of our cell... no longer statuesque, skeletal, and emanating power.

She lays crumpled on the floor.

Bereft of consciousness.

Completely spent.

“Then who-” my words extinguished with the last of the light.

All is darkness.

* * *

After Merlin crashed through the wall and dispelled whatever foul magic was at play, we revived Álfhildr, and brought her back to the Returns Agency to fully recover.

She had no recollection of how she’d gotten to the planet, but as thanks for being saved, she wanted to make me her husband.

Her and I to reign as queen and king, with the added bonus of my being allowed a harem, due to only being a consort and her country a matriarchy. All the perks of royalty with none of the responsibility.

I set about recruiting all the girls I could from the agency, starting with Merlin, as she had been so good to me, and who could pass up the chance to own those curves.

Then came Meganie. I’d basically been unofficially dating the scientist for nearly a year anyway, so as a point of normalcy, a palette cleanser between all the exotic beauties I would be indulging in, I needed a perfectly crafted vanilla to keep me grounded by comparison.

Nya’lah, of course, became my third concubine, as if she would have given me a choice. Although nothing had happened on the occasions where we shared a bed previously, she was keen to consummate our own bonding after the accidental proposal.

The next few days were spent walking the halls, picking and choosing any fine female I wished to add to my cohort, my elven queen on my arm. Álfhildr approved of all my choices, so wise in the ways of women she voiced her own desires to join me in my pleasure seeking.

Janus and Chris helped us identify timelines where the many girls I’d worked with back home would not cause issues by going missing. We turned up, growing entourage of ladies at my back, bringing Bonny, Kia, and others into the fold.

By the time we had satisfied my initial cravings, we had nearly a hundred names, but Álfhildr encouraged me to take my time, even after we were wed. I searched the stars – all of time, space, and every dimension – for as many lovers as I could ever hope to satisfy.

We bade farewell to the Returns Agency and began our new lives in an Eden of beauty and indulgence.

“We can offer you this...”

SOLD!!! I mean...

“Who said that?!.” I strain my eyes in the darkness. There isn’t even a hint of black on black, of shadows moving in the night, just a void. The sound of the cubes pressing together around us, the groan of metal and warping plastics combined in a constant undertone. “What do you want?!.”

I am terrified.

Even with visions of a life I’ve not lived, the love of many, and all I could ever ask for echoing in my mind... there is no comfort in the voice that offered them.

“We want what the Demon Kin wants...”

“We want the Demon Kin to join us...”

“We want women and wealth for the Demon Kin...”

“We want to be with the Demon Kin...”

Hisses and howls.

Like the throats of the dead played as pipes.

Deep booming mechanical notes.

Commands as if from a father.

Animal growls and twitters.

The softness of feminine seduction.

Such horrific cacophony... yet, such temptation held within.

The promise of so much, but at what price?

“How do you know who I am?” I try to push back, but from the abyss about me comes sensation.

Hands grip at my wrists, limbs coil around my own, lips soft and moist take to my neck, breath warms my ear, tongues... well, you get the picture.

“We know the Demon Kin...” a boyish voice emanates from below me like a child is at my feet.

“We have always known the Demon Kin...” this time it does not change, but continues as one incarnation.

“We seek the Demon Kin wherever he may be...” an itch in the back of my mind, scratched at by every syllable, peels away a scab I never knew was there.

That’s my voice!

In the dark, something talks to me as if it were me, the child that I once was, begging its future self for better days.

“We know how hard it was for the Demon Kin. We know how the others hurt and tormented the Demon Kin. We know how even the Demon Kin’s parents did not understand.” suddenly it flips to a second voice, cool and expressionless, that tickles at my cheek like a kiss that refuses to land, “Who can know such greatness as the Demon Kin. Who could understand the Demon Kin’s potential. What could mere mortals, as sheep and cattle, comprehend of the Demon Kin’s import.”

Meganie.

Again the voice switches, plying me with sweet words, nibbling at my earlobe, clinging to my body in places too graphic to describe, “Mrrrrrrr... We ny’know what the Demon Kin truly is. We ny’know that the Demon Kin wants to ravish many. We ny’know how hard the Demon Kin fights his urges.” A firm hand grabs me through my clothing, strong arms cross my body, the thick pheromone funk of carnal lust.

Nya’lah.

“Our darling Demon Kin deserves better. Our dear Demon Kin should have everything he desires. Our strength is yours, Demon Kin, at a price...” Softness and sensuality. Tenderness and temptation. A kindly kindling against my chest as motherly warmth and nurture lifts my face up to meet it.

Merlin.

Yet there is nothing but the dark.

The voices continue. The motion of bodies writhing about me.

A growing pulse, an expansion of something deep within, rising like the comforting waters of the womb... enough to drown in.

We can arrange that.

The words come back to me.

I try to push against the current, but whatever has trapped me in the void pulls me back under.

You can have her too...

A cooler mass is pressed against me. The words reverberate in my mind as if speaking to myself.

You can take her now...

Slithering under my shirt, loosening buckles and buttons, the electric contact of skin on skin.

You can join us as one...