Chapter 2 #2
The main bay was quiet. Normal rhythms. Normal lights. The junior healer looked up from the duty station with the slow blink of someone who’d been staring at screens too long.
“Lead Healer?”
Kellat didn’t answer. He was already past the younger male, already through the door to Delilah’s bay.
The bed was empty, the covers thrown back. The monitors were still running, their leads dangling over the side of the mattress where she must have pulled them off.
“She was there a few minutes ago when I did my rounds,” the junior said from the doorway. His voice had gone high and tight. “She was sleeping. I didn’t—“
“Miisan.” Kellat barked. “Locate Patient Delilah Sawyer.”
Miisan’s voice filled the room, calm and precise. “Patient Delilah Sawyer is not currently in the medical bay. Life signs are strong. She is moving through the station’s main corridor, heading toward the civilian sector.”
Kellat closed his eyes. Draanth.
“She was asleep,” the junior healer gabbled quickly. “I swear—“
“Get out.” Kellat snarled, brushing past the younger male and out into the corridor.
Delilah was awake. Worse, she was unsupervised and loose on the station with a brain that had rewired itself three days ago and legs that hadn’t walked a step in weeks.
Which meant he had to find her before she hurt herself.
She’d bolted the second the healer’s back was turned.
Which was not her finest moment because, from what she could work out, the staff here had saved her life.
She’d woken up in his medical bay with her brain put back together and her cousin gone and the most beautiful alien she’d ever seen telling her she was going to be fine.
And even with all that, the second she could, she’d pulled the leads off her own skin and run.
In her defense, she’d been in that bed a long time. Most of it unconscious, which honestly didn’t count as rest. And if she’d had to stare at that patch of ceiling for one more minute, she was going to lose what was left of her mind.
Anyway. The station outside medical was incredible.
She’d wandered around a bit, following the flow of foot traffic until the corridor opened into a concourse that made the biggest mall she’d ever seen look like a corner shop.
It was all pale metal and tall arches, like the inside of an alien cathedral.
There were silver-barked trees in the middle of the central court, and if she looked up, there were levels on levels of stores and restaurants above.
And there were actual aliens who looked like aliens, not like Kellat, who looked like her dirtiest fantasy come to life.
These aliens had scales and fur. Some glided instead of walking, and none of them paid her the slightest attention.
Standing at the railing, she looked around, her eyes wide. “Oh my god, this place is amazing.”
A passing alien with four arms gave her a sideways look and kept walking. Nobody stopped her. Nobody asked where she was supposed to be. Nobody was looking for her. Not yet. Which meant she was free, and she was going to explore.
She’d pulled on the clothes and sneakers someone had left at the foot of the bed. A sweater and joggers. Nothing fancy. The sweater swallowed her, and the joggers had to be rolled twice at the ankles, but she didn’t care; they were clean and not patched anywhere.
She followed her nose.
Something was cooking. Something that was not hospital food and not protein cubes. Meat, definitely meat. And something else, something rich and unfamiliar that made her stomach growl so loudly that another alien, this time with shimmering scales, glanced at her.
“I know,” she told it. “Just talking to myself.”
The alien kept walking.
Right. Aliens. Not all of them were going to find her charming.
She followed the smell into a plaza where the food stalls started.
Most of them were too alien. Things were bubbling in vats, things on sticks that were still twitching, things that had more eyeballs than she was comfortable with, especially in a meal.
But tucked between a stall selling something purple and jiggly and a bar that was run by a lizard the size of a pony was exactly what she was looking for.
A burger joint.
Well, she didn’t know it was called that. The sign over the counter was in a script she couldn’t read, all blocky, sharp-angled symbols. But the smell was unmistakable and familiar. Grilled meat. Toasted buns. Fries. Her stomach made a noise that was more demand than request.
Shit. She had no money. Not a credit to her name, in a place where she couldn’t even read the prices. Of course, sucked to be her.
She’d just look at the menu, she decided, as she wandered in. The guy behind the counter looked up.
He was humanoid. Mostly. Two arms, two legs, a face arranged in roughly the right order. His skin was a warm lavender, and his eyes were solid black from lid to lid, and ridges ran down the sides of his neck.
“You look lost,” he said. “And hungry.”
She blinked. “You speak English.”
“Trade translator patch. Standard issue for food service, especially here. It’s coded with all the Terran languages.” He leaned on the counter. His smile was the kind that said he’d been working in customer service long enough to find everything amusing. “What can I get you?”
She bit her lip. “I don’t—how much does it cost?”
“Depends on what you’re having.”
“That’s the problem. I don’t have any money.” She blurted out, her fingers tightening on the edge of the counter. “None. Zero. I don’t even know what currency you use here.”
“Doesn’t matter.” He waved a hand, already reaching for a tray. “What do you want?”
She stiffened, her shoulders tensing. “Nah, nothing’s free. What’s the catch?”
He stopped reaching for the tray and pointed to the logo on her sweater.
“You’re a Mate Program candidate,” he said. “The Program picks up the tab. It’s already paid for.”
“Wait. Really?”
“Really.” He was already grabbing the tray he’d been reaching for. “You’re not the first candidate I’ve fed. You’re just the first one who looked like she was about to chew through the counter.”
She sat. Free was good. She could work with that.
“I’m Delilah.”
He smiled and replied with some sounds her brain could in no way assemble into a name.
“Yeaaah, I’m gonna have to call you Kyle.”
He paused, tray in hand. “Is that a good thing?”
She nodded. “Kyle was the nicest person I knew in high school. He let me copy his biology homework and never asked for anything in return.”
The newly-named Kyle nodded. “So I’ve been promoted.”
“You’ve been promoted.”
He chuckled and went back to the grill.
The food arrived five minutes later, and it was the best thing she had ever eaten.
A burger that tasted like beef but richer, smokier, the bun golden and soft, and the fries crisp and salted with something that wasn’t quite salt but was close enough to make her eyes flutter shut on the first bite.
She made a small noise. The kind of noise that should have been embarrassing but wasn’t, because she was too hungry to care and too happy to be self-conscious.
“Good?” Kyle asked with a grin.
“Mmph.”
“I’ll take that as a yes.”
She swallowed. “You’re my favorite person on this station.”
He shook his head as he wiped the counter down. “And how many people have you actually met on the station?”
She thought about that for a moment.
“Three. But it doesn’t make it less true.” She pointed a fry at him. “So what are you? You’re not human. You’re not Lathar either.”
He shrugged, and the ridges on his neck caught the light. “I’m a mix. Mostly ketalli, a few other things. Even a little lathar somewhere way back when. Makes for an interesting family dinner.”
“I bet.”
She asked him about the station, and he talked.
The levels, the species, the places she should avoid, and the one bar on the lower concourse that served something resembling terran coffee.
She listened as she ate, letting the warmth of the food and the easy rhythm of his voice push everything else to the back of her mind.
She was good at this. Meeting people and making them like her. It was the one thing she’d always been able to count on. Harper had the brains, but she had the charm. It wasn’t much, but it was hers.
Kyle was telling her about a Latharian warrior who’d gotten into a fistfight over the last order of something called roilia cakes when he stopped suddenly, the easy animation draining out of him.
His smile dropped, and he took a step back from the counter as his black eyes fixed on something over her shoulder.
She stopped with a fry halfway to her mouth, then turned, and her eyes widened.
Oh shit. This is not good.
Kellat filled the doorway, the expression on his face tight and furious, and the tension in his shoulders setting off every internal alarm she had.
Oh, fuck.
Kyle was already retreating, backing toward the grill with his hands raised.
“I didn’t touch her. I swear.”
Standing, she slid herself between the furious doctor and the waiter and waved a fry.
“Are you hungry?”