“Aren’t you supposed to be training for your match or something right now?” Psiksi asked as he watched Kayel rummage through his wardrobe. Kayel had his own wardrobe at home, but Psiksi always kept a full wardrobe in his private training area, because he was a very popular person and sometimes needed to sneak out without being noticed. But also, when he wasn’t in his custom gladiator armour, Psiksi also liked to dress somewhat slut-like, at least compared to most other Skyans. After all, he was one of the sexiest Skyavok alive, it would be wrong to hide away his glorious, muscular form.
“It’s a beast fight and a beast I’ve fought before. I know what I’m going to do.”
“It’s a big one though. Specially bred.”
“Specially bred to be fattened up and juicy, because after I kill it, they’re going to cut it up and eat it. The only thing I’m worried about is how easy it’ll be to cut out its heart with the daggers I use, but eh, once it’s dead, cutting out the heart won’t be too hard.”
Kayel continued to go through Psiksi’s wardrobe. He felt bad, even if Psiksi had given him permission to do so. Psiksi was a wealthy gladiator, he worked in Ξ-Class and paid less taxes because he didn’t work for Skyan society. Kayel on the other hand had been somewhat poor for a while, having lost almost all his income when he defected from K-Class, and had spent much of what he had left on reeducating for L-Class. Sure, he made better money now, but he had a lot bills to pay. He’d sold a lot of his belongings to keep up with rent. But also, apparently someone broke into Kayel’s place back in November and stole his printer, all his jewelry and one of his suitcases that contained most of his clothes, but weirdly left Kayel’s computer alone.
“You seem off, mate.”
Psiksi came over and put a hand on Kayel’s shoulder. Kayel stopped what he was doing and sighed loudly.
“I am off. I’m kinda pissed off at Phovos. She doesn’t seem to… appreciate sex work. I swear, a lot of outsiders hear the fact that all sex workers are L-Class and just assume L-Class is the sex Class. It’s fucking not. We’re the family planning and education Class, the Class that makes sure every single Skyavok child is healthy, educated and loved.”
Psiksi shrugged. “Yeah, that’s just your stereotypical anti-Skyavok ignorance. Most people don’t get us.”
“They don’t question the Rethans. They do the exact same thing we do, they lump everyone into specialized, socialist-communist-run groups, they just call them Legions instead of Classes, but they have less social mobility than we do!”
“Pretty sure they face ignorance similar to what we get, but Rethans are way more common than Skyans are so people are more used to them, and they just shrug and get on with their lives if someone does make a mean comment. That and Rethans are massive, armoured brutes, so less people insult them to their faces…” Psiksi paused slightly. “Still, I find it weird that there are literally two different types of Rethans.”
“Actually, apparently, there’s three. Soldier-caste, higher-caste and queen-caste, but queen-caste are like a 1% of a 1%, and, like only the old High General and that Vaksavar guy I hear Kuta complain about a lot are the only publicly known ones.”
Psiksi shrugged some more. He appreciated the new knowledge, but he was more concerned about Kayel. He knew Kayel still didn’t really have any real friends and was still struggling after what happened to him back in December. Kayel was the only adult survivor of a massacre, and whoever had been behind it had never been caught. What made matters worse was that Kayel had been the first person shot, and was unconscious for the entire event, so he couldn’t even provide any usable information outside of a single name, which turned out to be a fake anyway.
“Still, you seem off. And I get being angry at the Raptor. She’s… funny and old-fashioned. She’s overcome a lot of ignorance, but the sexual liberty of the more open races is still slightly above her.”
Psiksi peered into the wardrobe. He spotted something at the very back. Granted, Psiksi had a LOT of clothes, and much of what he had was rarely worn and often forgotten. Which was another reason why he was fine with Kayel borrowing his stuff. Kayel always washed it and brought it back. Really, Kayel was a stupidly nice guy, and it annoyed Psiksi that Kayel was blatantly stigmatized. The bastard helped save the universe, and people still avoided him.
“How about this?” Psiksi asked as he pulled the thing he spotted out of the wardrobe. He initially thought it was just a thin, black stomach wrap, but it turned out to be an entire matching set, still on the hanger, all made out of a soft, mesh fabric. The fabric was somewhat translucent (and thus, to Skyavok, sexy) but it was embedded with lots of tiny crystal hearts.
Kayel inspected the fabric, then smiled. He didn’t need to try it on, most Skyavok were the same height, and Psiksi, despite being abnormally large and muscular, still wore normal clothes, since Skyavok clothes were rather stretchy and accommodating.
“You know what? This could work. It’s sexy, attractive but not really obviously slutty. And I can wear some armour on top of this.”
Psiksi snorted. “I still can’t believe you’re going to try and seduce the Silent Blade on the behalf of the Allbirther.”
“I mean, Arkay took the four of us to the edge of the universe to help him kill some Corruption. Ever since… that day, my life has been utterly fucked. But this task is at least within the scopes of my normal abilities.”
“And Arkay is… paradoxically hot.”
Kayel laughed. “Yeah, he is.“
“He just… wanders around being one of us. I think he was, at some point, actually just a Threavok or something. He’s obviously not quite a Skyavok, but still…“
“We’ve been killed in the thousands because people think we’re related to Arkay. Meanwhile, the Thraki get off without a problem despite all of them being baby Whenverns.”
Psiksi shrugged some more. “We’re easy targets. Small, weird, ugly, blatantly liberal and too kind and friendly for our own good. The N-Class and R-Class being in charge didn’t help us. Things are changing though, at least. And if you do somehow manage to seduce the Silent Blade, maybe he’ll go back to being everyone’s friend again.”
“Well, that’s the plan… Mind if I take these clothes? Like, even if I don’t wear this stuff to seduce Arkay, I kinda want to wear it anyway.”
“I dare you to wear it in the ceremonial Doom Drum battle tonight!” Psiksi laughed.
“You know what? I fucking would, but everything’s already been picked out for me. I gotta wear all the ceremonial stuff.”
“Ah, a shame…”
Both Skyans trailed off again. After a little silence, Kayel checked the clock on his wristband.
“Hm… I have a couple of hours before the match. You, uh, wanna do something?”
“Like what?” Psiksi asked.
“Uh, we could have sex?”
Psiksi smiled. “I like it when you’re blunt. Sure, take your clothes off, and let me see grab some rubbers…”