Tarq stops at the glass door and turns. Smiles. “It’s cute how clueless you are. Ya know that?”
“What?” And then he turns to leave again. But I grab his arm before he can escape. “Wait. What are you talking about?”
He laughs at me. It’s not a mean laugh, but it’s still a laugh. “You really have no idea about anything.” He taps my nose with a clawed fingertip. “But you’ll understand soon.” Then he turns away, and really does leave.
I just stand there with my mouth open, unable to process all the many confusing things that just happened. And I’ve only been here like ten minutes.
“What. The actual. Fuck?” I mutter.
“Don’t let him get you down. He’s always gruff and growly in the mornings.”
I turn, looking for the source of the voice, and find a lovely wood nymph chimera peeking out at me from across the lab.
“Hi.” She waves at me, then steps out from behind a tall shelf. “I’m Talina. Your assistant.”
“Assistant?”
And then I relax a little. Because she is a wood nymph, just like me.
Only she doesn’t look anything like me. She is wearing a white lab coat that is buttoned all the way up to her neck and dropping all the way down to her… hock, or whatever it’s called. The fur on her face, hands, and lower legs is all a rich, chocolate brown, but with a patch of white over her right eye. That matches her white hair piled up on top of her head in a bun that sits between two gazelle-like horns.
Her smile is warm and bright as she walks towards me, her hooves clip-clopping across the polished tile floor. She has huge green eyes set in a petite and sweet face and she is very tall and slim—like a ballerina, if ballerinas had hind legs and hooves. She points at me and I notice her fingernails are long, white, and glittering with clear, tiny stones. I think I could look at her for ages and never run out of things to marvel at. “Where did you get those lovely clothes?” she asks.
I look down at myself, then back up at her. “Oh. I have a monster—a… satyr chimera—at home. He’s really into fashion design. He made this for me.”
“It’s really nice. Like the stuff you find in the mall.”
“You have a mall here?”
This makes Talina giggle. “Of course. This is Vinca City. We have everything here. Where are you from?”
“I’m from…” Hm. What do I say? Earth? Did I leave the planet? Or is this just some alternate reality? I’m not sure, so I just say, “Pennsylvania.”
“Oh.” Her eyes widen until they are big saucers. “Where’s that? I’ve never heard of it.”
“It’s, um… between New York and Ohio.”
“Oh,” she says again, her eyes still huge. “I’d love to travel one day.”
“Well. Yeah. OK.”
We stare at each other for a few awkward seconds, then she says, “What should I help you with?”
“I wish I knew. I’m supposed to make the bloodhorn open the portals. But—”
“Oh, good! I’ve been working on that.”
“You have? Any luck?”
“Unfortunately, no. I have run hundreds of experiments and none of them work.”
“Whew. Thank God.”
“What?”
“Oh.” I smile at her. “Nothing.” But I’m secretly happy that she’s not having any luck.
“Personally,” she says, “I think we’re missing something critical.”