Hive Mind Business

Do not touch the brain slug. The outer membrane is sensitive to pressure, temperature, and various chemicals; it can easily survive rain and even full immersion in water if the host bathes or swims, but physical contact will often trigger stress vocalizations, and damage can take weeks to heal. Physical trauma or damage can kill both the brain slug and the host.
—Slug Sutra, Chapter 1

By the time Mel crossed the threshold of the Cosmic Fill-Up, his foot felt like it was going to fall off. He clocked in with the dullness he hadn't felt since he had stayed up an entire weekend on a bet. Yet when he saw the look in Ha-Yoon's eyes, he stopped short.

"Who died?" he asked.

Ha-Yoon sniffed and wiped her eyes. "Oh, it's not that. They discontinued my favorite dildo."

Mel was not prepared for this conversation, yet Ha-Yoon rose from her chair and guided him to the cafeteria tables. He learned, in a level of clinical detail he had never imagined, her deep and abiding perfection for Amadeus Singing Pleasure Rod, which was designed by a blind lesbian artisan inspired by various mammalian but non-humanoid penises, covered with a very particular type of synthetic skin with raised microbumps, and a variable vibration mode that synced with the music on her smartphone.

As she spoke, she mixed together a drink from three different dispensers, which was greenish-black and smelled oddly tropical and earthy, and set it before him with four pills, two white and two brown.

"Aspirin and ibuprofen," she said. "And I can give you an expired first aid kit to change the dressing on your foot when you get home. Let the others handle the swifter; you'll be spending most of the day behind the counter. Drink up, you need the caffeine."

He drank and swallowed the pills. She discussed the ruinous secondary market prices for unused sex toys—there being, he gathered, absolutely zero market for used ones unless they were of historical interest, a line of thought that Mel did not want to inquire about. By the time she was finished and the sickeningly sweet drink was half-gone, Mel felt a little more aware, a little less tired, and stupid enough to ask a question:

"But you've got two lovers—what do you need a sex toy for?"

Ha-Yoon's gaze was pitying. She patted him on the head like a puppy that had sniffed to close to a hot pan and burned its nose.

"When you have a relationship, you'll understand. Other people don't exist solely to get you off. Sometimes, you still need—and want—to handle things yourself."

Which segued into a discussion of how she had clipped her labia with the electric razor and, while it healed, had taken a back seat and let James and Autumn entertain themselves for a while, while she watched.

"It's like a spectator sport where you love both teams," she said. "I love to watch them just go at it. Sometimes I want to put on a cheerleader uniform or act like a director and shout directions. But the important thing to learn about making love is that it's not all about control and making yourself feel good, it's about making other people feel good, fulfilling their needs."

For Mel, whose sexual education so far consisted of one high school class, two pornographic magazines, an ancient documentary, and jerking off for two naked women to swallow his seed, this seemed profoundly wise and probably more than he could process at the moment.

The door chimed as someone entered. Ha-Yoon shooed him toward the counter. The break was over.

It was a long shift. Mel realized he'd only been away from work for a couple of hours, and the events back in the apartment building seemed somehow unreal. As if he had never left the Cosmic Fill-Up at all and had only dreamed it. Yet his foot still hurt whenever he shifted his weight; there was still a tear in the top where the knife had gone in. The heavy eyelids and drag on his muscles were real. He wanted to sleep, but he was awake, and thanks to the caffeine, alert.

About an hour into his shift, the brain slug host came in. Hot one he had seen before. She wore a long brown coat with a high collar, and her long dark hair fell down to her waist. The coat his her figure, but it couldn't do much to hide the width of her shoulders, the suggestion of breasts, the bare legs that ended in what looked like rubber-soled slippers. Her brown eyes caught and met his for a second as she stepped inside. The brain slug on her neck was the largest he had ever seen, based on how far its head was extended. Mel could have sworn its sensory tentacles waved at him as it stepped over to where Tomie was running the swifter over the floor to clean up a spill.

Immediately, Blair stepped from behind the counter. The woman in the coat held out her hands, palms up. Each of the other employees took a palm and held it. If they had been purely human, Mel would have said they looked like they were praying. Then Blair and Tomie both turned their heads and looked at him, the horned brain slugs on their necks extended.

The moment passed. The woman in the coat turned toward Ha-Yoon's office and handed the manager a couple of pieces of paper. She turned and paused at the door to stare at the picture of the guy in a hoodie from earlier who had groped Blair. Then she left. Tomie and Blair returned to work. Ha-Yoon brought Mel another sugary caffeinated drink and aspirin. He took them automatically, like he had when the nurse at the orphanage doled out medicines.

"What was that about?" he asked.

Ha-Yoon's lips made a flat line.

"Hive mind business. You said Soong was hurt, right? Bad?" she asked.

"I don't know how bad. She was—she screamed. In pain. Antonio was trying to cut it off her. There was blood. Human and—it was black and red," he blinked. The memory was like a raw wound. "Jordan was taking care of her when I left, but I don't know—"

"Just gave me a doctor's note. Soong's off for two weeks, mandatory rest. Jordan is, too, looking after her. Using employee leave. Most brain slug hosts, they never take leave, so it builds up. Individual hosts each leave separately, can pool and donate it as needed," Ha-Yoon said, then sighed. "Which means I need to adjust the schedules again."

Mel had a sinking feeling in his gut.

"Yeah?" he said.

"So . . . good news and bad news," Ha-Yoon said with a smile. "Which do you want first?"

"Bad news," Mel said automatically.

"You're still on night shift. I need you in here tonight," Ha-Yoon said flatly.

Mel frowned. "That's . . . that's like three shifts in a row. I'm going to be a zombie."

"Yes," Ha-Yoon said, and reached out to pat him on the head. "And the good news is, you get paid for that. This shift is overtime. Plus points to your next level upgrade. You're well on your way to a blue shirt! Not bad for someone here less than a month."

"But I can go home tomorrow, right? I can sleep?" Mel asked.

"Yes. You can sleep. Tomorrow," she said.

It was a Wednesday. Mel spent most it behind the counter. Blair and Tomie were dutiful. They didn't say anything, but when the lunch break came, they automatically sat opposite him at one of the little tables. Not sharing their food, but just—being close to him.

Mel wondered how the hive mind worked. He knew that individual brain slug hosts could operate more or less independently, because he lived with Jordan, and she didn't need to hold hands with Soong for every single action. They did seem to like contact, and Ha-Yoon had said that was part of how they communicated. Mel had seen some of that himself, the way the brain slugs, even the horned brain slug hosts, which were technically a different species, could hold hands and communicate, too. That turbaned woman with a badge hadn't seemed to have a brain slug at all, but she could do the same thing.

He thought about that. Information, thoughts, and being passed along one handshake at a time. How slow and inefficient that was. Was it even appropriate to call it a "hive mind," or was it more like ants, where each individual ant was its own entity, but together they seemed to act with a collective intent? Coordinated by some biological impulse that, across enough ants, looked almost like intelligence?

Kind of an impossible question to answer, Mel decided. And his brain went back to something Ha-Yoon had said. Being a spectator, watching two people having sex. He thought of when he had seen Jordan and Soong shaving. Sharing with their mouths. Tired as he was, Mel felt a familiar stir in his pants. He closed his eyes, chewing his burrito thoughtfully, and thought of the two of them doing other things to each other. A kiss, a touch . . .

Something touched Mel's knee.

He opened his eyes, reverie broken. Tomie and Blair stared at him. It was Blair's long, brown hand on his knee. Yet she wasn't looking at him. She was looking behind him. Mel turned and stared at the turbaned cop from before, her badge still hanging down. The name on it: MacElroy. He raised his eyes—and saw that the turban was off, as were the shades that had covered her grey eyes.

Something very much like a squid seemed to sit on her head, its four dark eyes wet and black, with elongated pupils that reminded him of the eyes of goats. Its skin was rust-colored, oddly textured, dry and scaly in patches, and he saw now where its six tentacles were embedded deeply into the scalp, the reddish-brown merging perceptibly into the darker human skin.

Mel recognized it from the field guide. One of the other alien species, related to the brain slugs. A brain bat. He could see the flaps of skin between the tentacles that would let it glide like a flying squirrel through the air, or swim through the water. The turban had hidden the bulbous, soft-looking head, the tentacles that wrapped around and burrowed into her skin. Yet she didn't have the placid face of a brain slug host. The grey eyes focused on him, and there was an intense impression of personality, focused on him.

"Mister Arkwright," she said, her voice with that same oddly clipped accent he had noted before. "We met earlier this morning. I have a few more questions for you about Antonio Massimi. Specifically, about what happened to him after he left the apartment building."