Kayel waved as the sleek, shiny silver car sped off, then made his way down the pavement, towards what was now essentially his second home. Sure, Kayel did rent a tiny apartment in the Skyavok sub-district of Salla, but these days, he mostly lived with the three freaks that made up his house fighter gladiator team. However, Kayel was just on his way back from a date with Psiksi, a fellow house fighter, and now it was time to go home.
As Kayel reached the small path up to Retvik’s place, he spotted a familiar 4×4 truck parking in the lay-by next outside. Nyssi had also been on a date, she’d gone clubbing with another house fighter. Kayel found it pretty amusing that all the top Temthan and Skyan house fighters were perfectly happy to just sleep around rather than settling down with partners and stuff. Kayel liked it. It was liberal and freeing. It also seemed to lead to less drama as well, since there was little jealousy to be had, everyone just slept with everyone else.
“Heya, Nyssi, did you have a nice time?” Kayel asked, leaning by a lamp post, watching as Nyssi fumbled with her keys and her phone and locked up her vehicle. She was clearly hungover, but in high spirits.
“Kayel! I had a fucking awesome time! Finally got to go to The Rainbow and it was… well, it was honestly just a very fancy club but everything was rainbow coloured and overly exclusive and honestly I think people only go there because it’s exclusive and stuff but I had so much fun! Had to stop by the pharmacy though. Just in case, you know?” Nyssi finished locking everything up and joined Kayel on the pavement. “What were you up to?”
“Oh, nothing much. Went to the pub with Psiksi, met some Ξ-Class guys who thought I was cute and went back to Psiksi’s place with him and two of the guys I met, Eksi and Efarksi. Psiksi’s got this awesome Spast gaming system so we just got drunk, ate pizza and played video games. Was nice, making some new friends since I lost the handful of L-Class friends I had.”
Nyssi smiled, patting Kayel on the back as she led him to the front door. “Glad you had fun. Tenuk messaged me, he’s found some friends as well, even if they’re not Spasts, said he’ll be back later.”
“Nice!” Kayel beamed. He was going to get his keys out, but Nyssi already had hers and was about to open the front door. “Speaking of later, I know Retvik said we could all come back at 11am, but I thought I’d give him an extra couple of hours, you know? He and Kuta seem to really get along.”
Nyssi opened the front door, still smiling. That smile turned into a massive grin, followed by a very quiet “awwwww” of adorableness as she and Kayel stepped inside. They both expected Retvik to have cleaned up already and be sitting on his own, reading the news or looking at funny pictures like he always did, but no, right now, Retvik was sprawled across the largest sofa, fast asleep, with a familiar fanged Rethan lying on top of him. Kayel also noticed something else. Normally, even in bed, Retvik wore a long piece of fabric around his stomach (often called a tummy wrap), as well as a short loin cloth, and Kayel knew that most Rethans very rarely took their tummy wraps off. However, both Retvik and Kuta were both completely naked and dozing quite happily.
Well, Retvik was. Kuta had immediately noticed Nyssi and Kayel’s presence and was staring at them both, but not moving, clearly having no idea what to do about having been found in a compromising position. However, after a few seconds, Kuta’s eyes drifted to the coffee table, to their communicator.
“Oh hey, Kuta, you’re still here!” Kayel did his best to not be awkward. Neither he nor Nyssi really knew what to do to make the situation more comfortable. Doubly so because the two Rethans had clearly had a good time and hadn’t cleaned up their mess. “I take it you two had a nice date?”
Kuta glanced at Kayel, but looked back at their communicator again. They then proceeded to not answer Kayel at all. Instead, Kuta immediately woke Retvik up.
“Retvik, we have a problem.”
Retvik blinked, then stretched his arms out and yawned, before putting an arm around Kuta. “We do?” It took a moment for Retvik to notice Kayel, who had brought over a blanket for them. Nyssi had remained by the door, not really sure what to look at. Sure, she’d seen Retvik naked before, but part of her wondered if seeing a naked Rethan General was a minor crime or something.
Kuta removed Retvik’s arm from themselves, then sat up straight, still staring at the communicator. They glanced up at Kayel, briefly looked at Nyssi, then turned back to Retvik. “Your home is not secure.”
“What do you mean?” Retvik asked as he also sat up. Kayel gave up with the blanket he was holding and decided to put it down. Clearly both Retvik wasn’t that bothered about being seen naked, and Kuta was worried about other, unseen things.
With a brief snarl, Kuta got up and reached for their loin cloth, which was lying on the floor, and wrapped that around themselves, before making their way to their familiar black satchel on the sofa to Kuta’s right. Kuta rummaged through it, then pulled out a small, metallic device. Kayel recognized what it was, as Kuta tapped some buttons on the device, placed it on the table, then waited several seconds. The device beeped twice, then fell silent.
“Well, the good news is that the place has not been bugged…” Kuta frowned as they put the device away again. They then proceeded to put their tummy wrap and some of their lighter armour back on. “But someone entered your home while we were asleep, and I do not know if they took any of your belongings. The contents of my satchel seem intact, but I have not memorized the premises enough to know if your own items are intact.”
Retvik continued to blink, finally realizing that he was naked and Nyssi and Kayel could see him naked. “Uh, how do you know?”
Kuta grunted, then pointed at their communicator. “I did not leave my communicator there. I left it on the other side of the table. There is no way my communicator could have been accidentally moved by either of us while we slept, snuggled or played.”
“Hah…” Nyssi snorted. “I forgot you armoured brutes sometimes refer to sex as ‘playing’. Same way you refer to cats as fluffy kitties for some stupid reason.”
“It’s clearly a language thing!” Kayel shrugged. “I mean, you Temthans call both flip-flop shoes and string-panties ‘thongs’.”
Kuta grunted some more. “Linguistic differences aside, Retvik, we need to better secure your home and you need to do a quick inventory check to see what has been stolen…” Kuta paused, then turned to Kayel. “I hate to ask a favour of you, Kayel, but would you be able to search recent image uploads and potential trending uploads in neutral territories, specifically Palaestra?”
“Uh, why?” Kayel asked.
“I need to know if someone took photos of Retvik and I while we were compromised!” Kuta snarled. “I am a Below Twenty General, the last thing I need right now is a case of blackmail.”
Kayel shrugged, then did as he’d been told. He pulled out his communicator and opened an application called Pimage, a hugely popular Skyavok app that collected and aggregated vast, vast amounts of images uploaded onto other social media sites and tagged them appropriately. He browsed through the New Virals section, which showed new but swiftly popular images, then glanced at popular recent tags, but he didn’t see anything noteworthy.
While Kayel continued to search, Retvik finally managed to climb to his feet, and began wandering around the living room, awkwardly eyeing everything and trying to determine if anything else had been moved, like Kuta’s communicator. Retvik’s communicator, as well as his wristbands, were exactly where he had left them. In fact, as far as Retvik could tell, the only things that had moved were Kuta’s communicator and some of the cushions and blankets Retvik and Kuta had been sleeping on, having been knocked off the sofa while they’d been playing.
“Are you sure you did not accidentally move your communicator?” Retvik eventually asked. “Like, you… you do have telepathy? Telekinesis? Both?”
Kuta was still staring at the device, almost too afraid to pick it up. Eventually though, Kuta took a deep breath and picked up their communicator, inspecting it cautiously. Kuta did use a lock pattern on their communicator, as well as a number code, for security reasons, but Kuta knew it was potentially possible to bypass them by connecting it to a secondary device, then factory-resetting the communicator. However, Kuta found that their lock pattern and pin both worked without any problems.
Someone had accessed Kuta’s device though. There was something on their home screen, an icon that shouldn’t have been there. From what Kuta could tell though, it was a text file.
“Hey Kuta?” Kayel interrupted. “Firstly, us Threanics don’t make that many facial expressions but you look hideously concerned. Secondly, I can’t find anything on here, I don’t think anyone came in and took any photos of you both. Thirdly, I forgot how non-existent Rethan porn is.”
“Surely there’s porn of Rethans out there!” Nyssi exclaimed. “You guys have freaky alien dicks and vaginas and you’re not making porn of it?”
Kayel glanced at Nyssi. “Uh, well, there’s very little of it. Same way there’s not much Skyavok porn considering how horny we can get. We’ve got good imaginations, we have both male and female parts that all look the same, all the armour plating tends to get in the way of the fun stuff while filming and, at least for Skyavok, prostitution and friends-with-benefits situations are way more common, meaning it’s easier to be sexually gratified. I think, the more varied the race, the more porn they make, which is why Temthans and Spasts dominate the industry. Doubly so since most of the porn out there that is made by shapeshifters.”
Nyssi stared back at Kayel, rather dumbstruck by Kayel’s statement. Retvik and Kuta were both distracted by Kayel’s words as well. “How the fuck do you know that?”
“I used to teach sex education to kids. I mean, when I defected, I joined L-Class to become a teacher, and physical education and sex education were in high demand, so that’s what I did…” Kayel shrugged as he made his way over to Kuta. “So has your communicator been tampered with?”
Kuta shook their head to clear their thoughts, then grunted yet again, not ready to answer. They opened the text file, expecting some sort of blackmail or other monetary demand. However, it just seemed to be a simple message.
Hi Kuta. Sorry to borrow your communicator, but I lost my copy of the Wyvern installer.exe file and just wanted to grab the copy I gave to you. Please make your next pin more secure, Retvik’s year of birth was too obvious. Also, enjoy dating Retvik, you two make a really cute couple and I’m glad you managed to move on and find love once more. Again, sorry, and I’m doubly sorry if I freaked you out, I kinda have to remain stealthy for a bit longer. Speak to you soon! -Arkay
Kuta read the message several times, then took a deep breath.
“Is everything alright, dear?” Retvik asked as he put his arm around Kuta.
“Hmph. Yes. It seems that the person who moved my communicator was Arkay…” Kuta eventually sighed, showing the others the message Arkay had left. “He could have just asked me…”
Retvik just shrugged, happy that Kuta was no longer troubled. “Well, we all know by now that our friend the Thantophor moves in mysterious ways, I guess.”