Alternate: 300 years into the future

Chapter 3

It was weird. Zion was hugging me. And not the awkward half - hug he gave me when I was freaking out over being in pretty much another dimension, he actually put emotions into this hug.
You might say I'm overreacting, but from what I've noticed so far, everybody here doesn't know how to feel or how to live properly, except for Zion. Yes, it's alot to say from my second day here but I can just tell.
I heard someone clear their throat and me and Zion both looked at the doorway.
Hero was standing there, half smirking, jacket around waist and arms crossed. It didn't take an idiot to tell he was the 'badboy' type around here.
"Am I interrupting something, sir?" he turned his head and looked at Zion.
Zion sprang back away from me and cleared his throat.
"No. Can I help you, Hero?"
"You wanted me to bring over the last files Spire printed out." he walked over and handed documents marked 'X' on the cover to him. "I figured you'd be in here. I mean, you're always are in here nowadays."
Zion clenched his jaw, the unclenched.
"Hero, bring Queno here. She needs to take Alyssa and help her out with some stuff."
Hero looked me in the eyes.
"I'll do it, Zion."
Zion looked up in shock. He looked at me, then at Hero and then at me.
"That's fine, Hero -"
"No, really. I'm happy to help."
Hero winked at me and smirked again.
Zion shook his head and then looked at me. He sighed.
"Fine. "
Hero gave a full smile and held his arm out for me to take.
"Shall we, Alyssa?" he said confidently and we walked down the corridor, leaving Zion behind.

*

"If you have any questions, I'm here to help." Hero said, hands behind his back smiling at me.
I waited a few seconds and thought about it.
"What is this place?" I asked, looking up at him.
"Why, this is the Tymo headquarters."
I furrowed my eyebrows. "Which means what exactly?"
"We're an army base."
"So.. you guys are like, the police?"
He scoffed, then laughed.
"We are not the police. Malis is the police." his voice got deeper once he said Malis and I furrowed my eyebrows again.
"Malis? The place you people are 'at war' with?"
"Yeah.. But don't let the title fool you. Police are bad. All they want to do is kill humans-"
He tried to end his speech, but the words had already slipped out. I stopped, wide eyes and stared at him.
"What do you mean kill humans? You people aren't human, I know that. But what the fuck did we do wrong?"
"It's, uh.." he scratched the back of his head. "It's complicated."
I shook my head. "Complicated? Try to explain."
He smirked and bit his lip. "Anyone ever told you you're hot when you're angry?"
I could feel my face burn red and my eyes got wider. I would've hit him if I wasn't kind of scared of him.
He laughed and continued walking.
"Any more questions, human?" He asked.
My mind wavered and then I stopped walking. "Who's Dolly?"
He stopped and looked at me in my eyes. I was confused, I didn't understand why everyone was talking about this person, or whatever it or they were. Zion seemed to be moved when Dolly was mentioned.
Hero stared at me for a while. I tried not to stare at him directly in his eyes, they were strict and fierce, like he was constantly ready to fight someone. But at the same time, they were soft and seductive.
He shook his head, speechless. "I'm the wrong person to ask."
I sighed in defeat.
" Well, I asked Zion. He was pretty bummed about it."
He stared at me in shock. "You asked Zion? And he didn't snap your head off?" he chuckled and smiled. "Alyssa, you're a brave character." He put his arm around me and repeated my name. "Alyssa, Alyssa, Alyssa. Such an English name."
I grunted and attempted to shake his arm off my shoulder. He laughed at my failed attempt and winked at me.
"Let's get you to Queno. She'll probably know what to do with you."
We walked down the hall. It felt like hours until we finally reached her room. This place is huge.
He pressed the button for the sliding doors, and spoke into a microphone. "It's Hero and Alyssa. Open up."
I heard her giggling from the inside and she screamed back. "Just a second!"
The doors slid open and she was grinning foolishly. She pulled me into the room and closed the doors on Hero, without saying a word.
She faced me and smiled. "Finally. I've been trying to talk to you all day."
I shook my head, confused. "About what?"
"I don't know. You just seem pretty cool. And you're red now. That's awesome. Oh my god, that's really exciting."
She was pacing and skipping around her room. She seemed like such a happy and energetic person, I was surprised by how quickly she spoke too.
"If you have any questions, you can ask me. I know it's not easy talking to Zion about most stuff. He could be uptight sometimes. But we all respect him here, he's cool when you get to know him - I swear. Just try not to mention Dolly around him."
That name, again. I was getting impatient.
"Anyways-"
"Queno, who's Dolly?" I cut her short and crossed my arms. She looked at me and furrowed her eyebrows. Then she shook her head. It felt as if she was about to cry.
"Nevermind, I shouldn't have brought it up." I regretted speaking.
"No, Alyssa it's fine." I think that was the first time I saw her when she wasn't really jumpy and happy.
"Dolly used to be one of us. In our crew. She, I mean her colour, was red."
I thought about it for a while and put the pieces together in my head. Maybe this is why Nyla was so angry after Zion gave me the colour red.
She waited for a moment then continued. "She was Nyla's best friend. They did everything together. They were so alike, too. Except, of course, Dolly wasn't too aggresive. Dolly was with Zion. I mean, with Zion. In English, I think, she was his girlfriend."
I couldn't understand why, but that news made me disappointed. "Oh." I tried to hide that I wasn't happy with the fact that Zion had a girlfriend. I don't know if Queno noticed, but if she did then she ignored it.
"She was captured by Malis, a few weeks back. Since then, of course, none of us are happy about that. Zion is pretty depressed over it. He still has faith that she's alive, though
But Nyla - she thinks she's dead. Malis is known to killing their prisoners. Even if she's alive, she wouldn't be safe there. She might as well be dead."
Queno's voice went low. For a second I thought she was going to cry.
"Queno, please don't cry, I'm sorry I brought it up."
She shook her head, looked at me and smiled sorrowfully. "Don't worry." She said. "We don't cry."
I looked at her confused. "Only humans cry." she giggled and stood up. She was already out of the depressing state and back to her normal self.
"So, enough about that. Tomorrow, you have to start your training. God, this is going to be so fun."
My eyes got wide, which was probably the fourth time that happened to me while I was here.
"Training?" I repeated.
"Yep. Starting from tomorrow. You're going to have to train if you want to face Malis. I think Feras will help you out tomorrow. I don't know if you remember him - the pink one. He's kind of stelthy, spy-like. It's really cool. Oh my god, this is going to be great. Just until Spire builds the time machine, anyway."
She prounced around the room and grinned, again and again. I had to take in everything she just told me. It took me long to process it.
"Don't worry. It'll be a blast."
She left the room on that note and I ran my fingers through my hair.
What is happening?