Phoebe wasn’t sure how to feel as she watched the dinky, unassuming transport depart for the upper atmosphere, leaving her behind in a cloud of displaced dirt. Its fake driver hadn’t spoken a word to her on the way to the surface, nor could he apparently be bothered with any parting words of support. 

She stood on an unfamiliar dirt road, looking over a hilly alien forest sprawling endlessly in every direction; she stood in bright, unfamiliar shoes and an unfamiliar frilly yellow dress, almost offensively cheery-looking considering the harrowing occasion she was dressed for. She stood, white-knuckled hands clutching a single flowery suitcase, with her back deliberately turned to her new place of residence for an indeterminate (but hopefully very short) amount of time. She really didn’t want to look- as if standing here, facing the untouched wilderness, she could pretend for a moment that she was simply stranded alone on an alien moon, and not mere moments away from attempting to infiltrate a hive of mind-breaking space invaders.

The forest was beautiful, maybe the most beautiful thing Phoebe had ever seen in her life. She’d never seen so many trees in one place. The grim reality of her situation killed the vibe a little, unfortunately; not to mention that years of being under constant threat from hostile sapient plants took most of the magic out of greenery. She fiddled with her collar- “an essential part of the disguise,” her lieutenant had told her, while simultaneously trying to silence the derisive laughter of her “comrades” with a death-glare- and tried to figure out what critical misstep in her past had led to her current position.

She wanted to say it was the beginning of the invasion, only a few short years ago, the longest years of her life. After the stars-damned Treaty had been signed, Phoebe had panicked and impulsively joined the last-minute Free Terran Rebellion recruitment effort; it was the only escape she could afford. She’d been spirited away from her dilapidated apartment and the only celestial body she’d ever lived on, and she realized too late that she would never, ever return.

Maybe it was her assignment to the Tereus-2 covert moonbase by her former ship captain, an old douche who liked to slap her on the back and loudly reminisce about his violent history in the Cosmic Navy. He had told Phoebe she’d “be a good fit there” and that “they’ve got a need for soldiers like you” but had declined to elaborate on what that was supposed to mean, considering she’d barely been trained and didn’t really have any skills to speak of. Being anywhere other than on a ship– and a fast one– as a Free Terran was essentially a death sentence, but as long as they kept quiet and under the radar, she’d likely be fine.

It was definitely when Phoebe had been brought into the cramped office of the twelve-person base’s commander and told she’d been selected (by a unanimous vote of two, she imagined) to carry out an undercover reconnaissance mission on Folia-1, the single habitable moon of the nearest planet in the system. The formerly uninhabited moon was also under the control of the Affini Compact, the only other presence of life in the system, and the Tereus-2 base had been built on a frozen wasteland of a moon, a full planet away, explicitly to spy on it.

“Just scope the place out,” Phoebe’s lieutenant commander (the worn-out skin of a previously meaningful title) had drawled, apparently preoccupied with some other business on his desk and not selling the significance of a suicide mission particularly hard. “Most of the weeds have already boarded to leave on that warship, and thanks to the spy that went before you we have a believable cover story for you. If we’re going to raid this hive, there won’t be a better opportunity than this.” Phoebe had asked him what her odds of surviving the mission were.

“Probably,” was all he had said, and seeing her expression he added a half-hearted, “You’ll be a hero, Private. Do you need more motivation than that?” 

The Affini were responsible for everything- the end of the world, the loss of her home- and one more addition to their list of crimes was easy enough to believe. But Phoebe could no longer escape the feeling that the only way things could have gotten this bad, for her specifically, is if she was responsible for it herself.

A softly rising cacophony of leaves signaled the arrival of a gentle wind. From off in the distance, it rolled slowly through the vast canopy like a wave, swept through Phoebe’s dark hair and deposited a single yellow leaf in her scalp, a symbol of the total disinterest the trees had in her predicament. Assholes. 

The sun, just a tad redder than the one she was used to, was already in its downward arc. Maybe the only thing that could make this worse was having to do it in the dark. She gave up, turned around, and immediately felt the color drain from her face.

In the distance, looming over the ocean of trees like a grassland predator, was the largest structure on the entire moon (and one of the very few). It spiraled into the sky, the synthetic trunk of a titanic branchless tree, wide windows woven between patterns of bark and foliage. It shimmered hypnotically in the low sunlight, the central ruby of a fae crown: The Grand Folia Hotel.

Apparently, in its past life, it had been a Stellar Marine Corps missile silo, but had been so cheaply built (despite the massive military budget) that it had failed to fire a single missile before being decommissioned. The marines stationed on the moon had all been drafted into the Cosmic Navy towards the start of the War, and the silo had been left behind without even being demolished.

Why the Affini had partially dug it out of the ground and repurposed it as a… hotel, of all things, Phoebe couldn’t say. To mock the late Cosmic Navy, probably, and the Free Terrans that survived it.

Once she had regained her composure, the second thing Phoebe noticed was the gargantuan, floral elder god chilling in the upper atmosphere. This was the warship her commander had referred to, the Phellos, and the basis for the lie that was going to break her into xenoprison. The gist of it was that the ship, which had anchored at Folia-1 only a month or so ago, had arrived to pick up the construction committee of sorts which had transformed the silo into the Hotel. It had appeared finished for months, but Phoebe just assumed the Affini were sticklers for minute details. 

The terrified dandelion rebel took a deep breath, braced herself, and began fast-walking down the path in the direction of the horrible Hotel. The little metal loops and harnesses of her dumb dress jingled prettily as she walked, ruining her already meager intimidation factor and generally pissing her off. To distract herself from that, she decided to go over the details of the mission in her head for the hundredth time.

The spy data suggested that a particular affini and former resident of the Phellos, one Asterid Inlex, Third Bloom, had recently parted ways with the ship after his slavepet, Amaranth Inlex, Fourth Floret, had died tragically (“Must have played with it a little too roughly,” Phoebe had bitterly thought). The Hotel was not aware of this; as such, Phoebe was to pose as Amaranth under the cover story that her owner/puppetmaster/whatever was currently in the process of “reblooming”, and that Amaranth was to stay at the Hotel until he had finished. The lieutenant did not clearly describe what this process involved, but it was clear by the distant, hateful look on his face that, for the Rebellion, it was a colossal pain in the ass.

Other than that, Phoebe was merely supposed to “scout the place” which could mean stars-damned anything. She had no idea what to expect inside, but unless she was going to be taken on a personal tour of the building’s most secretive, vulnerable areas, her current plan was to sneak about in the shadows and through doorways when nobody was looking. The utter genius of this approach had her feeling very confident, and not at all like a dead woman walking.

Far too little time had passed before Phoebe found herself before a tall, bloom-studded arching entryway that marked the entrance not to the Hotel, but to the large garden leading up to the Hotel, because what this evil alien gulag really needed was more flowers. The dirt path gave way to a synthetic material resembling soft cobblestone, which spread out into the maze of shrubbery in all directions. Here and there the path would widen underneath an extra thick bit of floral growth to form an open gazebo of sorts, and nestled into a wide divan under these gazebos, vines restraining and fondling their helpless, unfortunate slavepets, Phoebe got her first look at the twisted menace that would serve as her personal torturers in the coming days.

The Affini were tall, far too tall; “dryads from hell,” the douche captain had called them once. They didn’t appear to subscribe to any consistent bodily blueprint: some wore bark chestplates, the creases in the wood uncannily perfect and orderly, which (if the stories were to be believed) would split down the middle to unleash a torrent of vines, ready to ensnare many a hapless rebel. Many of them wore their leafier vines over-top of their bodies like shawls, capes or coats, often dotted with an exorbitant degree of flowers in rainbow or monochrome palettes, patterns and gradients. Underneath all of the conceited decadence, their true forms were visible, vines upon vines upon vines woven and tightened into a mockery of the Terran form, like exposed muscle. Every once in a while a stray tendril breached the surface, curling sensually along the striations of their stupid green abs before pulling itself back into place. They were ugly and gross and Phoebe hated them- it was important that she regularly reminded herself of this fact.

Their teeth were wide, flat, sharp thorns, and the stupidly long antennae that sprung from their fluffy hair-leaves probably didn’t even do anything. It was their eyes, however, that Phoebe had a difficult time looking away from. They were compound and crystalline, like hammered metal. Their many colors subtly flowed and blended into one another, sometimes spinning like a slow whirlpool, sometimes quickly pulsing outward and shocking Phoebe back into reality, sometimes quickly pulsing inward and drawing her further in. Phoebe shook her head to clear it- she didn’t like her odds if she was getting this distracted before she even managed to get inside the building. 

Something else had caught Phoebe’s attention. An elaborate trellis of leafy vines and flowers in shades of carmine, scarlet and ruby stretched and curved over the entire garden, the overgrown bare frame of a low tent that had never been fully set up. Curious, Phoebe scooped a pebble from the ground and carefully tossed it overhead. As she watched it pass through an open area of the frame, several thin vines shot out from the foliage and snatched the intruding element sideways into the mess of flowers. The vines and leaves seemed to quiver and distort back along the lines of the grid and down in Phoebe’s direction until the pebble had been spat back out at her feet. Typical show-off Affini technology.

“Keep tossing projectiles into a Compact-protected space, and I’ll start to assume you’re a rebel, blossom.”

Phoebe screeched and whipped around, her back slamming into the nearby trellis. Standing before her, its arms crossed casually and a teasing grin painted across its (her?) face, was the pinkest affini she’d ever seen.

Her head-leaves were cropped short and floofed to one side, drooping down to her jawline. A singular small vine- single-leaved and slightly curled at the end- hung somewhat lower than the mass of leaves and occasional pink flower, giving the impression of an affini cowlick. Most of her torso was hidden behind ornately woven mahogany wood, the vines of her abdomen visible between the cracks, cut low across the breast and high over the hip like a natural corset. Long strands of vine and conical rose-colored flowers, which ironically reminded Phoebe of her own false namesake, fell from her hip to just above her ankles, leaving the front of her bare feet, shins, and most of her thigh exposed. The upper portion of her chestplate was distended somewhat, and the opening at the top was stuffed full of her signature flower like a planter, in what a red-faced Phoebe quickly realized was a poor (and completely unnecessary) imitation of Terran cleavage. More of those fuschia curtains fell thinly from behind her shoulders down to the small of her back.

Of course, it was her eyes that ultimately drew all of Phoebe’s attention. They glittered and pulsed thickly with a full spectrum of reds, from deep garnet to gleaming quartz. Phoebe felt the right foot that she hadn’t noticed she’d lifted plant itself clumsily before her left, stumbling awkwardly in the affini’s direction while her gaze refused to uncouple itself from the alien’s own. She was quickly righted by a number of vines grappling to her posterior harness rings, jolting her out of her strange stupor, and she immediately threw her gaze to the ground in an effort to hide her humiliated expression and regain some dignity. The plant-alien giggled sweetly with amusement, which did not help.

“You’re an adorable one, aren’t you?” The affini crouched slightly and lowered a leafy hand in Phoebe’s direction, a motion that had Phoebe anticipating a handshake but which actually led into a gentle ruffling of her hair. “I’m sorry for scaring you, petal, I couldn’t resist. Celosia Pulchris, Fifth Bloom, she/her. A pleasure to meet you, ah…?”

“Ph–” Idiot! Complete Idiot! “A-Amaranth Inlex, she/her, ma’am.” When Celosia didn’t immediately respond, Phoebe hastily added, “Fourth Floret. Ma’am.”

“A beautiful name for a beautiful girl.” Phoebe blushed heavily, which was stupid considering that wasn’t even her name. “Where’s your owner, Amaranth? I didn’t see you walk in with anyone.”

Phoebe drew and released a mental breath; it was go time. “M-Master Asterid sent me alone, actually; He’s still reblooming on the Phellos, so it’ll be a while before he’s… ready.”

Celosia frowned, a little surprised. That wasn’t a good sign. “Really? It shouldn’t take him more than a day or so. Surely he’d want you there when he wakes up?”

One day? THAT was how long reblooming took?! Phoebe hadn’t even made it inside and her cover had already been torn to shreds. In a panic she defaulted to aimlessly running her mouth.

“W-well no! I mean, he wants to be really thorough this time. Really, um…” She silently cursed her lieutenant for giving her essentially nothing to go off of. “...get in there.”

For a few agonizing seconds, when Celosia responded with nothing but a blank expression, Phoebe was convinced her life was about to end, right then and there at the vines of a frustratingly sexy plant. Then the affini burst into a fit of giggling laughter, which Phoebe despised and wasn’t at all attracted to. “A bit of a perfectionist, is he? It’s becoming for an affini, I’ll admit, but I can’t say I approve of him leaving such a scrumptious young floret all alone and planetside. I’ll be sure to tell the others to keep a close eye on you, okay, dear? Wouldn’t want you tripping and scraping your cute little knees.”

Fantastic. Just what she wanted, more supervision. Phoebe tried to make her smile look grateful rather than mortified. “Thank you, Celosia, ma’am. I’ll, um, be careful.”

Curse that hypnotic smile. “I’m glad to hear it,” Celosia chimed. She took a moment to look Phoebe over again, before smirking deviously. 

“You know,” she began slowly, “if you really wanted to surprise him, you could take this opportunity to… hone your etiquette, so to speak. I’m sure the other staff would love the opportunity to train you.” Something about her smile unnerved Phoebe, but she couldn’t be sure she wasn’t just on the verge of a homosexual breakdown. “Plus, it’d net you a backstage pass of sorts; you could really see everything we have to offer. And you’d look absolutely precious in the uniform.”

Actually, that wasn’t a bad idea. What better way to blend in than to look like she belonged there? More so than she already did in this demeaning dress, that is. The time she’d expected to have in order to accomplish her assignment had been reduced from a few weeks to a paltry couple days, so Phoebe couldn’t afford to waste any potential leads. “Actually, yes, that does sound interesting! Um, where do I go…?”

“Just through the front door, love. Whoever’s working the front desk right now would be happy to show you the ropes.”

“Ah, right, got it! Thank you!” Thinking better of it, she added a quick, wobbly bow and a “...Miss Celosia, ma’am,” before trotting off in the direction of the front entrance. As she turned to go, she spotted Celosia giving her one last curious glance out of the corner of her prismatic eye. It was unsettling, being around an affini; in addition to the teeth and the vines, it always felt like they knew too much.

Walking through the garden, Phoebe noticed some other sophonts that must’ve been part of the so-called “staff”. Due to their location in the galactic context, they consisted primarily of Rinans- fluffy, tube-tailed nocturnal folks who tended to be on the shorter side, and reminded Phoebe a little of Terran mice, or maybe bats- and other Terrans. They were wearing suits and dresses similar to her own, marked indulgently with those infuriating leash-rings, but they were classy; elegant, but almost in a mocking way, like a play-pretend toy outfit. They all shared the same palette, a dark crimson accented with ruby and gold, and design-wise went a little heavy on the ribbons and frills. 

Despite the tasteful uniformity, the little servants universally sported some degree of unique personalization: many bore holographic stickers on their lapels, faces and legs; flowers in all shades were wrapped around tails, tucked under shoulder straps or behind ears, and Phoebe even noticed the occasional signature, always something like “Strelitza’s favorite little waitress” (that particular one she’d seen scrawled upon a naked back that the uniform left generously exposed). 

As she approached the affini-sized front doors a familiar angst crept coldly into her blood, an old hated enemy that Phoebe knew would rear its head sooner or later, and in this case potentially jeopardize her mission. She was not good with people. She liked them- in theory, at least, if not practice- more than she liked herself, but a great difficulty with communicating herself or participating “properly” in social situations had haunted her for as long as she could remember. Her contributions in conversation wouldn’t land, her attempts at even the simplest explanations tended to run overlong and quickly spiral into inanity, and what appeared to be generally considered common sense she’d somehow be completely naive to. 

She worried that the part she had to play would hold up like a dry sandcastle under slightest scrutiny, but it was her hope that the promise of a certain level of uniformity and a “training” of some sort would be her savior here. Phoebe was very fond of instruction, which neutralized a lot of the anxiety that being a functional person tended to involve, and while it appeared to be largely optional, a defined expectation that she could fall back on, or a collective identity to hide inside, would comfort the body-arresting fear she was anticipating otherwise.

Of course, it was that same desire that had contributed to her joining the Free Terran Rebellion, and that had turned out just peachy. There was only one other rebel Phoebe felt truly comfortable around, back when she was stuck on that derelict ship, but they had been unexpectedly assigned elsewhere and torn from her life without so much as a parting embrace.

Phoebe put away her painful regrets to be processed later, and steeled herself as the botanical autodoor before her unwound itself in response to her presence.

The entryway of the Grand Folia Hotel was disarmingly understated in comparison to the lavish exterior. It wasn’t particularly large, consisting of two sizable oblong couches to either side of the doors and a modest yet beautiful front desk. The most striking feature of the room, other than the predictable abundance of plant life framing and cocooning the furniture, was an enormous cluster of glowing roots that served as a light fixture, hanging from the high ceiling and obscuring most of it from view.

Behind the desk was an affini in cool colors and a terran in uniform, who was perched casually on what was clearly an oversized cat tower. The terran was thoroughly engaged in one-sided conversation with their alien captor, one hand dipping blindly in and out of a bag of flavored corn chips, and they refused to cease talking even while intermittently sucking the residual powder off of their fingers. The affini was already making eye contact with Phoebe as she walked in, affording her a jocular grin but declining to alert its diminutive coworker to the new presence in the room. Only when Phoebe had already reached the desk did they finally stop and look in her direction, one finger still in their mouth.

“Oh, shoot! Hi, sorry–” The terran quickly stood and enthusiastically threw themself into a low curtsy. “Will you be staying…” 

They trailed off as they took in Phoebe’s incriminating dress, the numerous leash-rings and the collar sending a pretty clear message. “Where’s your owner, actually?”

Before Phoebe could deliver her thoroughly pre-planned alibi, the bluish affini chuckled amiably and lifted a hand to ruffle the terran’s hair. At that single touch they instantly went quiet, an unreserved, glassy-eyed bliss drawing itself across their face. Phoebe had been warned about this: the terran had clearly been drugged, rendering them a helpless pet at the barest affini contact. Belatedly she realized she was sweating; from fear, obviously.

“Don’t mind my darling floret, little one; she’s very enthusiastic about her job. My name is Rosifax Dextris, Third Bloom, they/them, and the sapling here is Becca Dextris, Fourth Floret, she/her. If your owner is on their way, we can discuss setting up a room for the two of you- and any connivents, of course.” 

Phoebe didn’t know what a connivent was, but elected not to ask and skip directly to the aforementioned pre-planned alibi. She led with a bow, for the charm factor. “My name is Amaranth Inlex, Fourth Floret, she/her. My owner, Asterid Inlex, Third Bloom– he/him–  is in the process of reblooming on the Phellos in orbit, and sent me here to… be here, until he’s done. Uh, and I thought maybe I’d, um… get a job? Here? If that’s cool?” Asking if it was “cool” was typically not how Phoebe had landed her several shitty jobs in the past, but being an aimless Free Terran had left her a little rusty.

Her spiel elicited an interested chuckle from Rosifax, the reaction Phoebe expected to receive from the majority of her future interactions with affini. “One thing at a time, petal.” They reached through their flowery shawl and into their torso vines– Phoebe had to suppress an unnerved grimace– before pulling out a minimalistic tablet (the border was the same color as Becca’s eyes, Phoebe noted). They fiddled with it for a moment, scrolling through a number of lists, and soon found what they were looking for. “Yes, here he is: Asterid Inlex, Third Bloom. I’ll send word for a hab to be prepared for you in his name. That is, if you want it, of course; you can always sleep in the reclining room with the majority of the guests. It might help, if you’re feeling homesick already.”

“Yeah, coming here without your owner is a bummer,” Becca cut in, earning a stern look from her owner, which she ignored. “You’re totally welcome to sleep with us, if you want.”

“I don’t remember giving you permission to offer that, pet,” Rosifax playfully intoned, a single flower flexing to reveal a wicked sharp thorn, the tip already running with a mystery substance. Becca shivered and grinned coyly, which was not the response Phoebe would have given. Rosifax returned their attention to Phoebe with a wink and added, “But the offer is available to you, for the record. Now: onto your interview. If you’ll follow me.”

They stood, and by the stars when an affini stands they really stand, and made for a hallway off to the side of the desk, their floret dutifully hopping off of her tower and following close behind. As Phoebe moved to follow them, Rosifax stopped briefly and turned back around, an eager glint in their jeweled eye. “Oh, and Amaranth, allow me to be the first to tell you:”

“Welcome to the Grand Folia Hotel.”