CHAPTER 2
ZAREK
All archivists must abide by the laws of the Intergalactic Unity Senate, as well as the protocols provided by the Tetheh; I will not lie, I do not have a good track record for adhering to either.
I am alive.
Every molecule in my body aches, but I am relieved to be conscious. It is short-lived when I realize I have no idea where I am. Cortisol courses through my bloodstream, and I force myself to remain still, trying to listen to my surroundings.
It is eerily quiet. That’s a good sign, I think. I’m hopeful there are no humans around. The ground beneath me is velvety and cool. Could be travertine, could be limestone. At least it seems the human government hasn’t seized my body and placed me in some awful containment cell.
I should be out in the country, looking at mountainsides and fields of flowers, but I must have miscalculated and crashed somewhere underground. It’s my fault. I was supposed to fly my spacecraft to Wendover, Utah.
My problem is a tale as old as time. I hate my job.
As an Earth archivist, I’ve been tasked with documenting the history of the human species toward the end of their existence.
But Homo sapiens sapiens bore me. Spending most of their hours staring at screens, they ignore the natural beauty of the outdoors.
And they seek to destroy the very things keeping their species and planet alive.
My parents say I should be grateful my government trusts me with such an important position, following in their footsteps, but I want to forge my own path. I dream of phytology, not archaic rocks, documents, and the human condition.
So, I changed my coordinates. Instead of landing in the salt flats of western Utah in the North American continent, I pivoted to the French Alps, which host a diverse array of protected flora, including the one I’m looking for.
But the air here feels damp and chilly, and most definitely not like the French Alps.
My head is pounding, but I open my eyes, my vision adjusting to the darkness as I take in my environment.
There are skulls stacked on top of one another in neat rows and columns, and it seems to be some sort of burial ground.
There’s a chance this is Rome, but given my attempted coordinates, I think I’m in Paris.
Taking a deep breath, I finally sit up, my eyes trailing toward the yellowed light three steps ahead.
Human.
That’s a human. A real, actual human, and not a dead one.
The human stares at me with wide eyes covered by large, square glasses.
From her long, braided hair and the way she’s dressed, she looks like a researcher.
There are so many questions I’d love to ask, but they would all give away that I’m a sapphiro.
Even with my human coverup, it’s not worth the risk.
My government gave me the tools necessary to disguise myself, but I am on specific orders to keep my distance, and never interact with humans directly.
With trembling hands, I move to search through the debris and rubble for my DIRC.
It will have instructions for proper protocols when encountering this species in close quarters.
How to talk to them, what not to do in order to avoid suspicion.
If she doesn’t get a good look at my eyes, maybe she’ll just think I’m a human scientist.
“Stop. Don’t move,” the human shouts, shifting further away from me.
English. I’ve never been so grateful to hear someone speak English.
Where I’m from, we all speak Terilian, but many people are fluent in languages from other planets within The Milky Way as well.
English, KIIV8, Mandarin Chinese, and Phid are all common second languages on Terilia.
I learned English, followed by Diné and Spanish, in preparation for my first assignment.
French was never even offered to me. I guess it makes sense, given I’m supposed to be in Western North America right now, but I’m admittedly a little grateful I have someone to communicate with, even if it’s against my direct orders.
“Are you American?” I ask, recognizing the patterns in her accent as I continue my search to find my DIRC.
“Unfortunately,” she answers, her tone sharp. “Hey! I said don’t move.”
Lifting a broken piece of alloy, I can see the tiny text that reads Digital Information Retrieval Console, and sigh in relief as I brush the dirt off it.
I look up to see her holding a knife, and that’s when I process I don’t have my BLEND chip activated to human mode. My skin is blue.
Oh, fuck.
That’s why she was telling me not to move. I just figured she was bossy, or a little possessive over her research site. She must be terrified that I’m going to kidnap her and take her to my leader to get probed, or whatever the film industry has brainwashed her into believing about other lifeforms.
Due to a lack of advanced technology and a penchant for war, Earth has not earned its place in the Intergalactic Unity Senate. Though they have their theories, humans aren’t even aware that there are other forms of sentient life in the Milky Way. I can’t even fathom how shocking this must be.
I lift my arms up, opening my palms on both sides of my head, just as I’ve seen done in human films. It’s a gesture that I hope she understands means I intend no harm.
“What is that?” she asks, gesturing to my DIRC sitting at my feet.
How do I explain this to someone with no concept of our level of technology?
“It’s like a fancy computer. I need it for my job…
it’s very important,” I say, hoping my answers dispel some of her unease toward me.
The tension in her body seems to loosen, her knitted brows returning to their natural resting spots, and I think maybe she believes me.
I am both surprised and grateful over how easy that was.
“Okay, let’s see if we can get it working,” she suggests, her voice even and calm.
“Let me try.” Pressing the power button, nothing happens, and my throat tightens the smallest bit as cortisol floods my bloodstream anew. This device is not only how I store and retrieve information, but it’s also my only way to contact headquarters now that my pod is destroyed.
Without it, I am trapped here with no way home.
“It’s not turning on,” I say, and flip it over, trying to see what’s wrong. The processing chip is bent at the corner, and I sigh with frustration.
Lifting my head, I actually get a good look at the human now.
Humans and sapphiro are the mammalian equivalent to Philodendron and Monstera.
Similar, but there are key differences. Her skin is a cream, almost beige tone.
Wavy, messy brown hair falls into her face, framing her countenance.
Though her body appears soft, her facial features are as intense as the stare she’s trying, but failing, not to pin me down with.
As I watch her balance a knife in one hand and a flashlight in the other, I wonder if she’s mentally debating what to say or do next, just like I am.
There’s nothing I want more than to fix my DIRC, find my way to the French Alps, and complete my personal mission. I can ask my government for forgiveness once I have the flora I need to help protect my species.
But none of that can happen if this human reports me to one of their authorities and I wind up captured.
At worst, that could lead to my death. My epinephrine and norepinephrine levels spike, and my heart rate accelerates, my mind filtering between a hundred different options, before I settle on bartering.
I need to get out quickly and find a replacement chip.
“I would like to leave here without being reported. I don’t have any currency. What service or piece of information can I provide to you so that you’ll agree?” I ask, hoping she just wants to ask weird questions about my planet or species.
“I’m not going to report you to the police.” She squints. “Are you trying to bribe me?”
“Yes,” I say nervously, hopeful she’s being honest, and her brows furrow. “No? I don’t know. Please don’t kill me.”
Her head cocks to the side. “Why would I kill you?”
“You are literally holding a knife.”
She looks down at her hand and pockets the sharp, small blade. A handful of dirt falls from the small opening in the ceiling, and she brushes it off her shoulder. “It’s for my protection. I was being cautious. You probably hit your head when you fell, and I’m not sure what your intentions are.”
“My intention is to collect some plant samples in the French Alps. But something went wrong with my spacecraft, and I ended up crashing here,” I explain.
“Sure, yeah, that makes total sense,” she says, her tone sounding…off.
I guess I can’t expect a human to understand why someone from another planet would need a flower from Earth, but it’s important to me—important enough that I disregarded direct orders.
My mind flashes to the last thing I can recall before waking up.
Pumped full of adrenaline, I was giddy that my pod was approaching Earth when an error projected on my inertial navigation screen.
A long stream of code followed. While I searched my DIRC to see if I could fix the issue, one of the accelerometers broke, and the pod began to freefall.
Desperate, I pressed every button imaginable as heat engulfed my spacecraft, bright lights flooding my vision.
And then I awoke inside this…burial tomb.
“So where are we?” I ask.
She steps a few feet closer, looking at me with a concerned stare. “The Paris Catacombs.”
My guess was right. My mother, an archivist before me, worked on projects involving Western Europe. She’s the one who told me about the catacombs in Italy and France, and I’m a little agitated that her ramblings are actually helping me.
“I promise I am not going to hurt you. Please, come closer,” I say. As much as I wasn’t interested in studying humans while I was on Terilia, it’s different meeting one in person. Academic books and lectures can’t compare to seeing something with your own eyes. “My name is Zarek.”
“Zarek?” she asks, and I’m not sure what’s confusing about that.
“Yes.”
Her features portray some emotion between surprise and annoyance, but I maintain a polite smile. “You are an alien from another planet, and your name is essentially Derek?”
“I am a sapphiro from the planet Terilia, and my name is Zarek,” I clarify.
“Uh-huh.”
“Would you like to tell me your name, or is it better for you if I don’t know? We can part ways and pretend as though we never met.”
“Ellie,” she says with a huff.
It’s not a name I’m familiar with, but it has a similar cadence to many popular names in modern-day North America. “That’s…pretty. It reminds me of an elephant.”
From her reaction, that was not the correct thing to say.
She turns away from me and begins pacing. “What the fuck do I do about this guy? I can’t just leave him here,” Ellie mutters under her breath.
My muscles still ache, but I push my body up and stand, grabbing my DIRC as I do.
I don’t know exactly what’s going on in this human’s head, but she looks distressed, so I need to be prepared for anything.
If she decides she’s going to report me to her officials, I will have no choice but to make a run for it.
There are fragments of alloy and other materials—my poor pod—mixed in with the rubble, and the human’s foot slips on something shiny and smooth. Lunging toward her, I grip her arm, stopping her from tumbling forward.
“Thank you,” she says and looks down at her arm, brows pulled together. Her eyes shift back up to look at me, and I can finally see they’re brown and radial.
At a little over nine hundred jbits tall, I’m average height for a sapphiro, but an entire head taller than Ellie. The difference makes me feel an amusement I can’t quite place.
“What do you do for work?” she asks. The question is unexpected, but not unwelcome.
In the media portrayals I’ve seen, humans always appear to be more focused on the otherness of intergalactic lifeforms, rather than learning about them as individuals.
I’m impressed by this one. Ellie seems more open and accepting.
“I am an archivist,” I share, hoping maybe she’s willing to help me. “What about you?”
“That’s so interesting,” she says, her head cocking to the side as her hands move dramatically toward her chest. “I’m an archaeologist.”
Earth archaeologists study humanity through the lens of material culture, which explains why she’s here in the catacombs. From my research, most modern humans work desk jobs, and I’m intrigued by how different this one seems to be.
Her lips curve up slightly. “Your computer must be vital to your work.”
I nod. “It is. I would show you how much information is stored on it, but obviously it’s not working right now.”
“Right. Maybe I can help. What if we go back up to the surface and find a repair shop?”
I smile, grateful for how generous she’s being. “Yes! I’d really appreciate it.”
Having studied humans my entire life, I’ve made a lot of assumptions about them, but I was wrong. If I make it out of here, maybe I’ll suggest to the Intergalactic Unity Senate that they reconsider accepting Earth.
Maybe humans really can be tolerant and understanding of alien species.