Chapter 14 #2
Instead of finding the warm, molten energy of my home planet, I imagined a silver hot energy, something different but still enough to connect me.
I was here on the surface of this moon, a small animal crawling across its surface, connecting to it.
I imagined that energy flowing up through my nervous system, rising until it reached out through the top of my head into the sky.
Then I imagined pulling down from the glowing pool at the top of my head, letting that flow down through me.
Up and down, I moved the energy, matching it to my breath.
In and out until that manic need of mine to go find Zale faded, calmed.
I stared up at the unreasonably high ceiling. The ceiling itself was light, softly glowing to illuminate the room. I blew air up towards my forehead, causing the stray hair that had fallen into my eye to fluff up and to the side. The whole ceiling, being one giant light, seemed like a waste.
There was no way to anchor rig points to create a climbing apparatus, which was something this room absolutely begged for. What was the point of giant ceilings if you couldn’t hang a big ring or some silks or something of the sort to play around on?
I turned and headed towards the door.
Speaking of playing around, I didn't feel like just sitting around in this bedroom, even if I was feeling a bit tired.
There was a giant fishbowl for me to examine and possibly dip a toe into and see if the aliens freaked out about it or not.
The door slid open just as I got to it.
Zale stood in the doorway.
My heart did a backflip in my chest, all my previous work of processing my overabundant crush energy going right out the door as I skidded to a stop a short distance away from him.
"Why are you-" I didn't manage to finish my question.
Zale covered the distance between us. One moment, I was standing there looking at him; the next, his hand was around my back, lifting me up off my feet and spinning me around.
He lifted me high enough that my face was lined up with his, and then he pressed me back against the wall, keeping me lifted and pinned there with the hard length of his body.
I parted my legs instinctually, letting his abs press in between them.
My arms went up around his shoulders before I could think.
Heat flared in me as I felt his full, rock hard strength.
He leaned his face close to me, his eyes holding mine as if he was going to kiss me.
But he didn't.
He just hovered there, his lips mere inches from mine, his eyes flicking from my eyes down to my lips and back up again.
I couldn't take it.
I closed the small distance between us, my lips meeting his.
He didn't devour me.
His kiss was hesitant, barely touching me.
I wanted this so much it burned. Fire was racing through me, demanding that I melt against him, fall into him like I would if he were human.
But he wasn’t human.
He was an alien who I had no real way to communicate with while I was in a vulnerable physical and emotional situation. That thought pressed against the heat flowing through me, chilling it slightly, just enough for me to hesitate.
I stiffened in his arms.
Without warning, I was down on my own two feet, the absence of him a shock as I caught my balance.
"Wait," I said softly, but the door had already shut behind him.
What was that?
Why did he do that?
More importantly, why did he stop?
He didn’t stop just because I stiffened, did he?
Or was it something else?
I walked back over to the bed and flung myself back onto it, face down. For a moment, I lay still, and then I couldn't take it. I pummeled the bed like a toddler, smacking it with my fists and feet as I let out a shriek into the fabric.
He did that because he wanted me.
I knew I shouldn't assign meaning to an alien male's actions, whose culture I didn't know, but at the same time, I already knew these guys could have sexual desire for us. Arnina's interactions with her Boy Toy had made that perfectly clear.
I didn't know why Zale’s desire for me caused him to run away, but it likely had something to do with me being a different species. Unless his species had a long history of mating with other species, the likelihood of public opinion being chill about it was pretty low.
I couldn't be sure about any of that.
Not until I could speak, read, and write in his language.
The heat in between my legs was too much. I needed to take care of it.
I sat up and stared at the door.
How much time did I have before Arnina came back?
The door slid open, and Arnina walked back into the room.
"He gave me a ladder," she said.
I forced a smile and crossed my legs.
I was going to have to find some alone time tomorrow to take care of myself. I couldn't keep getting this revved up without a release, and Arnina and I didn't have the type of relationship where I could do that with her in the room, no matter how much I joked about other stuff.
Arnina grinned and held something out.
She had two poles with ropes strung between them in even segments, like a rope ladder with solid poles instead of being fully rope.
The ceiling was high enough, so she showed me how to use it by pressing a button on the side of the poles to extend them.
It had little hooks on the end of it that would help us anchor it to a higher surface…
like one of the platforms in the weird climbing hallway shaft.
This ladder would allow us to get up and down the shaft without being carried!
Now we had both car keys and a ladder that would allow us to climb out.
These aliens were giving us what we needed to feel safe.
At least what I needed, anyway.
I needed to feel like I had a way out, even if it was just the illusion of one.
I sprawled on the bed again.
Oh, it was absolutely silken.
I rolled across it, enjoying the softness of the blankets and pillows. I was in a cushy cozy heaven.
"I love it when you're right," I sighed. "It's the best thing ever because you're so... optimistic that things are going to work out."
"And you're not?" Arnina asked.
"I make jokes," I said. "I don't actually believe things are going to work out for the best. I’m unable to let go of the shit that has happened in the past. I can’t let go of experiences or moments. I can’t let go of people, even when things go south with them."
I glanced over at Arnina.
"I'm glad you couldn't let go," Arnina said.
There was a lot of weight in that sentence, a lot of words unsaid.
I didn't let go of her, even when she didn't believe me that her boyfriend was a creep.
The only problem was that if I had let go and had never tried to meet up with her again after she broke up with him, then neither of us would have been abducted at all.
"Sometimes it's better for me if things don't work out from the get-go," Arnina pointed out.
I sat up abruptly.
"Not this time," I said. "We're up sugar creek in terms of power and ability to extract ourselves from this situation.
The fact that your boyfriend is willing to hand over the car keys and let me keep the other pair I nicked, and then give us the means to get to the car - when we clearly are as prepared to handle the shaft as a person brand new to a wheelchair is prepared to handle stairs - I think you're right on this one. He has our best interest in mind."
That shaft already proved this species didn't care about people who weren't physically set up to handle the obstacles. The fact that the option they gave us was a ladder was a bad sign. Why wasn't the option an elevator?
I knew they had them.
"I wonder how people in a wheelchair get around here," Arnina mused, mirroring my thoughts. "If they have accessibility options, maybe we can use that instead of the go-go gadget ladder."
"They do have spaceships that can get to Earth," I pointed out. "They probably have phenomenal medical care.”
I was in a very bad state when I had come to that vet’s office. I was bruised, broken, infected, inflamed, and definitely had muscular atrophy.
The fact that I was walking around now feeling healthier than ever after being taken care of by a zoo vet was very convincing proof of that theory.
"He's also not my boyfriend," Arnina pointed out, "but thanks for the acknowledgment of my on-point instincts. I'm not really sure how he feels about me. I did try to rip out his throat with my bare teeth."
"Girl, that sounds like foreplay to me." I rolled my eyes. "Do you want me to make a move on him to prove he's yours? The man doesn't ever even look at me."
Ooh, that part of me that liked to poke at sore wounds was mean tonight.
The reason I knew her ex was a creep was because he tried really hard to hook up with me, and I turned him down. He didn't take my no for an answer.
When I went to tell her, it turned out he had spoken to her first.
She believed him when he told her that I came on to him.
My little potshots were zingers.
"No!" she said as I grinned when I realized she wasn't hurting over it. "I mean, you're right, but what if their species mates for life or are seriously xenophobic? Even if he likes me, that doesn't mean he is willing to be my boyfriend. What if he just wants an exotic bang?"
I loved that she was able to take it now.
Maybe one day we'd get to the point where she would apologize to me.
Though I wasn’t even sure she knew the full story, as she hadn’t ever asked me for it. She just came at me, angry that I had hit on her boyfriend. She didn’t give me the benefit of the doubt or hear my side, despite our friendship.
"How about we see if there is a shower behind door number three, and then you go try to talk to him about it?" I pointed to the door at the far side of the bed. "You two have a lot to talk about, and you're only going to be able to do it if you keep trying to figure out how to communicate."
Arnina bit her lip, spacing out again.
Oh, she was thinking about hooking up with him again.
That thought didn’t bother me. Not that I had any right to have opinions on what she did with her body or with whom when it didn’t directly impact me…
other than the fact that our current survival was based on these guys wanting to take care of us.
There was no telling what their views on extraterrestrial relations was exactly, but these guys were clearly into us, and her Boy Toy was definitely into her.
"Or, you know," I rolled to my feet and mimicked the hip-swaying motion that preceded a hug in alien talk. "There's always body language."
Arnina burst into laughter.
I smiled as I rolled on the bed again, stretching my arms up over my head so that my shoulders got a glorious massage as I rolled.
She still thought I had a job as a professional mermaid at kids' parties.
I didn't really feel like telling her the truth yet.
Not until she made the effort to fix what she’d done to us.