Текст книги "The Alien's Handler"

Автор книги: Gemma Voss

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 10 (всего у книги 12 страниц)

Chapter 20

ELLA

A week later, Kila and I have perfected every sex position known to man (and perhaps a few of our own invention). He spends every night at my apartment. I’m positively glowing with joy from all the orgasms. I’m baking cookies for the fun of it and distributing them around the office like a well-fucked fairy. Kila pays attention to everything, and I mean everything. I’ve never had a more attentive lover. I’ve never known a man to study ways to please me in his spare time, but Kila walked up to me one morning and interrogated me on the G-spot.

“Why have you not brought this up?” he demanded, showing me an infographic on his tap-pad from a defunct fashion magazine’s website. “I’d like to discuss this erogenous zone. Theoretically, I find it fascinating.”

He then proceeded to make his interest not-so-theoretical, and finger fucked me to his heart’s content. Every day we come to work more like honeymooning lovers, meanwhile Pakka and the team watch us like Puritans sure we’ll burst into flame for our fornicating ways.

It’s Monday, and after a weekend of pure bliss, Kila and I are reluctant to be parted. Today is the day the Kar’Kali have been anxiously awaiting all month. The Alliance’s top chip surgeon is finally on site and ready to remove the malfunctioning hormone suppressors.

“Kila is going first, but we will all have them out by the end of the week. One surgery per day,” Pakka explains to me while Kila is getting strapped into a gurney and covered in weird little wires.

“How do I know you’re not gonna slip in some new chip without telling him and he’ll be zombie Kila?” I demand. The panic I feel as they prep Kila for surgery is not entirely rational, but I can’t help but imagine the worst-case scenarios. This surgeon is supposed to be the absolute top of the line guy, but I imagine it only takes the slip of a hand and my baby is a vegetable. That is if he’s even using his hand. Do these high-tech surgeons just operate a machine that does it for them?

Pakka has an odd look on his face, one I haven’t seen on him before. “Ella,” he stutters. “Is your opinion of me so low that you think I would lie to you and trick Kila into something against his will?”

Are his feelings actually hurt right now?

“I don’t know what a zombie is,” he says, frown deepening. “But I suppose that it is derogatory. Is that your true opinion of the rest of us?”

“No,” I breathe out immediately. “No, Pakka. I don’t… I don’t know what you’re capable of, I’ll admit that. I know you said to Kila that you’d fix him and he’d thank you for it. But I also want you to know that I realize that in your mind everything you’re doing to antagonize Kila is out of love for him. You think you know what’s right and what’s going to make him happy in the long term. You want to force that on him because you care for him.”

“So… you do realize I am right?” He draws his eyebrows together, hopeful.

“No! Just because you care about him and your intentions are good– That doesn’t mean you’re right. You don’t know what’s best for Kila. Only he can decide that. He doesn’t want the suppressor anymore. I can only imagine how happy he’ll be when that chip is out of his head for good,” I say.

“Yes,” he admits sadly.

“Then will you give up this craziness and just let him be free of this? I know he still wants to work on the project. He wants to make it for the other survivors, and for you guys.” I sigh and move in to touch Pakka’s shoulder. When I glance back at the gurney, Kila has turned his head to watch me. Our eyes meet, and he smiles at me.

Pakka shakes his head, but surprises me by saying, “Yes, yes… I believe this has been a doomed effort on my part since the beginning. I hope you realize that I have every respect for you. I admire you. But the death of our people is not the end of our laws, the end of our culture… At least, I had hoped it would not be.”

“When Kila told me the story of why the Kar’Kali began suppressing your natural hormone responses, he really emphasized the fact that it was an adaptation to the Azza invasion. Is that how you see it as well?”

“Certainly,” he agrees.

“Then maybe it’s time to adapt again. Have you ever considered that?”

He becomes pensive and turns to stare across the way to the gurney and the others gathered around Kila. Finally, he closes his eyes and says, “Perhaps, Ella. Perhaps.”

Mori beckons us over to them, and we stall our talk to join them. “He’s ready to go,” Mori tells us. “We’re going to wheel him down.

Kila is grinning, boyish and bright-eyed. It’s adorable, ridiculous combined with the skinny tubes protruding from his forehead via dot-sized orange stickers. “Give me a kiss, my perfect mate. As humans say– for good luck.”

We usually hide our affection from the other Kar’Kali, but I cannot help myself from diving into his lips. His arms twine around me, gently stroking over me. When we break apart, his eyes flicker over my face rapidly, as if memorizing each detail.

“Good luck,” I whisper. “Catch you on the flip side.”

His perplexed smile is the last sight I enjoy before Mori and Kiva wheel him out of the lab. Vala trails them, lifting his phone to his ear before slamming the door behind.

Pakka immediately turns back to me. “Now, our conversation…”

“What else is there to say? We’re in a bit of a stalemate,” I say, making my way back to my computer to check on some emails I need to respond to. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’d like to finish some things up so everything’s done by the time Kila comes out of there.”

“A deal,” he blurts, following me to my desk. “I do not know what stale mate means but I can guess. And I’d like to propose a deal.”

I grasp one of my pens and start clicking it nervously. I have no idea what kind of a deal he could possibly have in mind, but I’m feeling confident that Kila and I hold all the cards in this equation. Pakka doesn’t want to lose Kila– that much is clear to me. I was so busy hating him for his close-mindedness and his hardheadedness that I forgot that he has emotions buried in there, just like Kila did. He’s in mourning. All of the Kar’Kali are. I know Pakka is burdened by their loss and I get the feeling that he thinks he needs to be the new leader of their whole race. I can’t imagine how hard that must be.

“Tell me what it is. If its within my power, I’d do anything to convince you to put the whole Deviant Exile thing behind us.”

“I do not know if you realize this, but you could very well hold the future of Kar’Kali in your womb—"

Wow, well, not the direction I was imagining this conversation would go… I blink at him, stunned.

“And I would beg you give us the opportunity to fertilize and freeze a number of your eggs with Kila’s seed,” he continues, gravely serious in tone. “We could conduct this each lunar cycle and store them for the event that the surviving Kar’Kali can begin a new colony. To think that we could begin anew with ten to twelve healthy young warriors in just a year’s time—”

“Hold the fuck up,” I say. My voice is like steel. I’ve never felt so angry.

Pakka watches my expression curiously. I can tell he doesn’t understand the meaning of my phrase. Furthermore, I can tell he doesn’t realize just how insane his suggestion is. He’s surprised though, surprised that I would forgo the polite, friendly tone with which I usually handle disagreements.

“You really think for one second that I would give you my eggs? My eggs? My… my… hypothetical precious fucking baby? Or should I say babies since you’re planning on extracting every possible offspring?”

“I see now that I have… not said the right thing,” he says slowly. “This is an insult to human women? Do you not rejoice over each retrieved egg? Was it not you that suggested we explore human female eggs as a resource for our prior study?”

“The only thing you’ll be retrieving,” I grit out, fingers tightening on my pen, “Is your head from your own ass, Pakka! No, I would never allow my offspring to be frozen until they’re useful and ready to be trained from birth for battle!”

He’s shaking his head at me. “Ah, this is because you don’t wish to have your children become warriors. Have you said this to Kila? Because warrior-hood is very important to all Kar’Kali.”

“You don’t get it. You don’t get what I’m trying to tell you about Kila and you don’t get what I’m saying about my eggs—babies– whatever!” I chuck my pen across the room and stand up angrily, palms down on the desktop. I take a deep breath and whip towards him. “Kila deserves to choose his own life path. And I’d like you to let him do that without all the guilt. He doesn’t deserve that guilt and you know it. As for my children? My children? You better fucking believe that they’ll have every choice in the world and be allowed to do whatever they want. They might be Kar’Kali, but they’ll be humans too. And human women don’t stand for it when their kids are jerked around like puppets… Like sacrificial lambs… Like fucking numbers on the battlefield!”

“Ella,” he starts. “I—”

“I’ve had enough. I need some fresh air,” I say, grabbing my jacket off the back of my chair.

“I see. I should have better calculated how this discussion would go,” he says.

“You might not want to think about your own feelings. And that’s your prerogative. But as long as you’re on this planet, you better start considering the feelings of others,” I sniff, trying to force the tears away until the moment when I’m alone.

I don’t wait to hear a response, hustling for the door before he can say something even more infuriating. The walls and floors blur. My vision becomes foggy with tears as I begin to run towards the stairwell. I shrug on my jacket as I go, thankful that I haven’t encountered any other workers. I pass the spot where Kila pinned me against the wall and kissed me so many times. I practically trip myself sprinting up the stairs. My chest is tightening. I begin to sob as I slam open the roof access door.

A gust of cold autumn air slaps my cheeks.

I am in love with him. Why couldn’t I admit it to myself and say it to him when he was saying it to me? Why didn’t I say it before they wheeled him away? I knew it the moment I imagined that something horrible could really happen to him when he goes under the knife. I knew it the moment I imagined our child, some hypothetical little concoction of the two of us– and what I would feel if it was taken away. The joy of my realization swirls with my tears and my anger. It bubbles out of me in a manic, blubbery laugh.

In a daze, I stumble to the railing and lean against it, sucking in the crisp air. Clarity rings through me.

Thank God I am alone out here because I must look like a madwoman, crying and smiling. None of what Pakka says matters. Kila loves me and I love him and no matter what they say, we’re going to find a way to be together. As this truth settles over me, each breath feels like new life. My eyes close and I steady my breathing. I’m going to give myself time to get collected, and then I can march right back to the lab, get my work done, and find some special way to tell Kila that I love him.

I’m not sure how much time passes as I bask in the glow of my new revelation. But while I am leaning at the railing, enjoying the October chill, a blaring horn begins to sound. My hands clap to my ears on instinct.

It startles me, and my eyes immediately go to the rooftop access door. Inside, red lights are flashing. When I go to investigate, I peer through the glass panel and find that the security lights at the next landing down are going off. I pull at the handle, but the door is locked.

“Fuck,” I whisper, and jiggle it repeatedly to be sure its locked. I can faintly hear someone speaking through the intercom system, but I can’t make out what they are saying. It must be a security breach, but there’s no way I’ll be able to find out what’s going on from up here. I didn’t even bring my cell phone with me. For all I know, it could be a regular drill. But Jen usually tells me about those in advance.

Knowing the doors won’t unlock until the security system is no longer on alert, I move to the opposite side of the building. There is another railing there, and I am hoping to glean some information from what the security guards are doing. Some sort of chaos is transpiring over at the front gate. The protesters are scattering. Most of the group is running across the lot or getting into vehicles to drive away. Signs and various trash have been dropped where they stood, abandoned on the black top. But a small percentage of them are moving forward to the gates. From up above they look like ant people, but I see two bodies rush towards a security guard who is leaned up against the fence.

Then, the guard slumps and I realize in horror that the two protesters have run forward to help the man. The other people that have stayed are also helping. They fling open the doors to the guard tower and go inside. Am I to really believe that the guards inside there are also hurt? The siren goes on blaring as I begin to panic.

I don’t know how long I stand there, watching the scene out front near the gate. I have no idea what is going on, but I can’t lift a finger to help anyone. At the very least, I feel safe up here, but that doesn’t help my worries for Kila and the others. Kila is under, and he was supposed to be starting surgery when that siren went off. Could whatever happened have interrupted the surgeon, or caused some kind of accident? I clutch my arms around me and suck in air frantically.

On a positive note, it looks like one of the security guards has come to. Off in the distance, I hear more sirens– the familiar sound of police cars and ambulances. They must be headed here.

There’s a crash and a slam from behind me. I startle, whipping around in time to see black clad figures swarm through the roof access door. A scream rips from me before I have any sense to think that being quiet might have been a better course of action.

Immediately, a gun is pointed my way. I clap my hands over my mouth and freeze. All the figures look to be men and they are wearing classic black masks with cut out eye holes. There are six of them in total– three with guns, three holding duffel bags.

“Hands up,” the man with the gun demands. I obey, slowly, trying not to provoke them.

“What do you think?” he says, nodding at one of the other guys. Behind him, one of the men with duffel bags has begun setting up some kind of rope on a propeller on the opposite edge of the building, the side that leads to the small back parking lot.

“Shove her down the stairs. No need to get messy,” the other replies.

Well, at least I’m not getting shot but I might still be dead in about five minutes. The man tucks the gun he pointed at me into his pants and moves toward me. I flinch involuntarily.

“Don’t fuck with me, or this fall will break your head open,” he growls at me. I nod, shivering all over. When he gets close, I see that they’ve even painted black around their eyes where the holes are to fully disguise themselves. “And don’t even think about screaming, or I’ll shoot you.”

He clamps down on my arm so hard I whimper and then begins to drag me to the door. The whole handle is jacked up from their forced entry to the roof. He swings it open and I tense up, bracing myself for the impact—

Then, nothing. He’s hesitating, still bruising my upper arm with his grip.

“Hey, look over here,” he shouts to his crew. “This is that bitch from the news. She’s the one, the one that talks about that bullshit race nobody’s ever seen.”

Then the others all turn to stare me down, and I wish I could disappear. I can’t bring myself to speak, afraid anything I say will result in pain or immediate death. Oh God, I think, stomach roiling. These are the people Vic tried to tell me about. They were planning something and they’ve done it. I almost freaking survived but now I am so dead– dead, dead, dead because I fucked an alien. Hey at least it was the best sex I ever had. These are the sad desperate thoughts of a woman who believes she’s about to die.

“Take her,” one of them says. I didn’t think I could get any more afraid. Wrong again. My fear expands until there’s nothing in my brain but a silent scream, the scream I can’t let out of my mouth. “We’ll see how long she can keep up the lies.”

“No… No, no, no,” I murmur, starting to wriggle and break away from his grip. “I don’t know anything. Please just leave me here—”

The man backhands me so hard that I see stars. The right side of my face begins to pulse as he hefts me over his shoulder. The other man takes off his glove and shoves it into my mouth until I’m choking on it, tasting the sweat. One by one they start to scale the back wall of the building, and the last one to go is my friendly captor.

“Here’s the deal,” he whispers. “If you try to screw around while we go down, I’ll drop you so fast you won’t have a chance to say you’re sorry, okay bitch? In fact, the game from here on out is what I like to call Survivor. The rules are, do what I say and maybe you’ll survive.”

He doesn’t wait for a reply and heaves me into a more balanced position. I’m faced with a wobbly view of the approaching ground as we propel downward. My mouth opens to scream but it only causes the glove inside to tickle my throat. I feel like I’m going to choke to death or throw up and be forced to swallow it. I don’t know whether it’s the fear, the pulsing pain in my face, or the ten stories between me and the parking lot, but I black out then and there.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 21

KILA

I open my eyes, and everything around me is white.

“Ella,” I say, thinking we are in her bed, somewhere in her sea of white pillows and thick blankets. My voice is groggy and the inside of my mouth tastes like rubber.

“Kila.” There is a gentle tug at my arm. “We are in the operating room.”

I narrow my eyes on the face before me and try to make it not so blurry. There’s a blue spot of hair bobbing in front of me. “Oh, Kiva,” I say distantly. “What are we operating?”

A sigh. “It is a human phrase. This is where the surgeon did your procedure. Remember?”

“He’ll need a minute to recover his senses,” a foreign voice says.

“Thanks, Dr. Vaxxon. We’ll handle it from here.” That sounds like Pakka. The brightness begins to fade slightly, so that I can take in the silvery faces surrounding me. My team. All four of them.

I lift my arm, but it can’t quite move.

“Ah, will I be able to move soon?” I ask. Kiva comes into focus. He’s hanging over me, inspecting my face. I feel something tugging at my skin, followed by a little popping sound. It seems he’s removing some stabilizer cords from my head.

“The good news is that the procedure went well. All your brain activity is perfectly normal, and the cut site healed up nicely. Suppressor removed without issue,” Pakka is telling me.

I try to sit up, but I cannot. I try to pick up my leg, but I cannot. “Does this mean there’s bad news?” I say. I can’t possibly be paralyzed, otherwise I don’t imagine ‘without issue’ would be an honest assessment.

There is a pregnant pause while I begin trying to wiggle my fingers and toes. The room is coming into focus. It’s a sterile box with only an equipment cart and a light fixture overhead. Kiva, Pakka, Mori, and Vala are all at my side, wearing matching grim expressions. I realize that my fingers are responding just fine, so I tug at my arms and legs again.

And then it’s clear. I look down at my body and see I’m strapped tight to the gurney. Strong leather cords are crisscrossing me all over. Is this some strange dream?

“What is this?” I demand.

“Take a breath and relax, Kila. We need to tell you something,” Pakka says.

“Let me up,” I say, testing the strength of the cords by straining against them. “Where is Ella? If this is some attempt to take her away from me, I swear I’ll —”

“Please relax,” Kiva insists. His voice has a calming effect, and I realize vaguely that Kiva would never be a party to anything that would hurt Ella. His presence gives me a sense of trust. “This is about Ella, but it’s not what you are thinking. We’ve taken precautions strapping you here because we don’t want you to hurt yourself or others.”

I go limp and suck in a sharp breath. “Tell me where she is,” I grit out.

Mori gets straight to it. “She’s been taken. There was a security breach while you were under, and while a team of six men infiltrated the computer system and crashed the cameras, they also found Ella and took her with them when they escaped.”

I blink for a moment. Then, all at once, rage fills every nerve in my body with electric energy. I snarl and growl, nostrils flaring as I desperately tear against the bonds that keep me in place. Mori and Vala fall on my arms and chest, pressing me down.

“Let me up, you Ka-forsaken spineless Deviant-born bastard shika trash—” I shout curses at them in an unfiltered stream. “Cave-dwelling rat-eating shikava… Ka-forsaken scum worse than the bottom of an Azza boot —”

“Look at his eyes,” Kiva says. “They’re absolutely black! Greak Ka, he’s lost his mind.”

“Where have they taken her?” I scream. “How could this have happened? Pakka, she was with you!”

“I know, I know,” he sighs. “I am guilty. That I am sure of. We had a discussion that upset her, and she went seeking ‘fresh air’… She hadn’t returned when the security breach began. The building locked down and every door sealed shut.”

“How long?” I snap. “How long since she’s been gone?”

“Two hours,” he says.

I shut my eyes and imagine every horrible thing that could have happened to my precious Ella in the span of two Earth hours. I cease my fighting against the bonds and dig my fingernails into the side of the gurney.

“Release me,” I beg. “If any of you feel any sense of compassion, any shred of loyalty towards me as your crew member, as a fellow male, as a fellow warrior. If you care for me at all or ever did, you will release me immediately.”

“We are doing this because we care for you, Kila, and we are trying to keep you from whatever insanity you are planning. If you go on a rampage and kill humans in the process, there will be nothing we can do to protect you from either Earth or Alliance authorities.” Kiva’s eyes plead for me to cease fighting against them. But I will not.

“If anything happens to her, you should carry me straight to the funeral pyre,” I tell them. “I could not live with it.”

“How can you say that and not see what the hormones have done to your mind?” Mori asks. “We all wish to see Ella safe, and we will do what we can to help find her, but you speak as if your life has no value without her. It’s insanity.”

I let out a cold, angry laugh. Perhaps I have lost my mind, but it happened long, long ago. I realize this now, because Ella has brought my sanity back from the ashes since I’ve known her. How can I make them understand?

“I have been insane. I have always been angry. Do you not realize this? You will all know this truth soon, as you live on without that handy little chip which for so long kept us at some low level of living… You will realize you have always been lonely, or sad, or angry just like me. I have felt this since they day my command unit was left to die on an Azza-run planet. I have felt this since I watched each and every member of my team die screaming. I have felt this since they left me in a desert with nothing but rags to cover me– laughing, laughing at my pathetic cries.”

Now they are listening. Every single face is turned towards me with wide eyes as they realize what I refer to. They have never heard details of this story from my own lips.

“Do you know why I survived?” I shout at them. “DO YOU?”

Kiva shakes his head just barely.

“I SURVIVED BECAUSE I WAS ANGRY,” I rage, screaming my voice hoarse. I rip at the bonds and my arm snaps free. I clench my free hand into a fist. “I survived because every bone in my body wanted retribution. It was the only thing that made me crawl through sand, lick the dew from the top of a rock, eat from a dead carcass and hope it would not kill me… You think that I am like this because of Ella? You are lying to yourselves because I know you feel something deep inside. It’s probably crawling to the surface as I speak.”

I am faced with silence as my chest heaves from my quickened breathing. They stare at me, and I wonder if a single word I’ve said has gotten through to them.

Then with one swift movement, Vala leans forward and cuts the straps with his knife. Kiva’s mouth drops open.

“You are right,” Vala says. “But we won’t let you do anything alone. Promise us that at least. We will work this research team as a command unit.”

I nod. I am surprised, relieved, and energized all at the same time.

“I, too, would like to find Ella-vi,” Kiva pipes up.

I glare towards Mori, expecting his negative argument.

“This is madness. I find your obsession disturbing. But I have nothing better to do, so I am in,” he says with a grimace.

We all turn to Pakka then, awaiting his reply.

He tenses, looking rattled. “Fine! Yes... YES, fine… But what is the plan? What will we do? We don’t know where she’s gone. The local police and the Alliance investigators are already working to find her. And more importantly, we haven’t a single weapon, or armor, or… anything!”

“Actually,” Mori says, “That’s not precisely true. Do you think I would travel to an unknown planet without any?”

“Yes!” Pakka blusters. “Considering that to do otherwise would be illegal and against the Alliance Intergalactic Science Board’s rules of participation?”

Mori grins. “I have a masking trunk that works on all scanners, Pakka. Do you think me a fool? We might be scientists now, but once a Kar’Kali warrior, always a Kar’Kali warrior. I never take a mission unprepared for a fight.”

“There is no time to waste,” I say, gritting my teeth. “Now get me off this thing.”

Kiva jumps in to help Vala cut the other straps that bind me.

“That doesn’t answer the important question of where you think we’re going to go with your illegal weapon supply?”

I swing my legs over the side of the gurney and test their strength by pressing my feet onto the floor.

“I know exactly where we are going,” I announce. “We are going to find a man named Vic Williams.”

OceanofPDF.com