Chapter 6
CHAPTER SIX
He looked down at the small female in his arms, his thoughts a confused mixture of protectiveness and a wrongness that kept scraping at the edges of his awareness like sand against scales.
Her skin was too smooth. He kept noticing this, running his thumb across the back of her hand where it was still clasped in his. No scales, just soft, vulnerable flesh that seemed designed to be damaged. How did she survive? How did any of her kind survive with such inadequate armor?
Her kind.
Another thought that seemed both right and wrong.
Their differences were obvious, but it felt as if she belonged to him.
That she was his kind despite those differences.
He sighed and carried her back to the soft patch of moss next to the water vines, studying her sleeping face as if it would reveal the answers he sought.
The odd shell she was wearing had opened slightly at her throat. Another wrongness—her clothing. It covered her completely, sealed her away from the air and earth. Unnatural. He longed to remove it, to feel her soft skin against his, but he suspected she would object.
He cradled her closer and tried once again to remember. Why am I here? And perhaps more importantly, who am I? A few more memories tried to surface, but they were only scattered fragments, most of them tinged with unmistakable sorrow. Perhaps it was better not to remember.
He wasn’t sure how much time passed before her eyelids fluttered open. A smile curved those soft pink lips as she looked up at him, but then her eyes widened and she pushed herself upright.
“Oh my God. I can’t believe I actually fainted. You… you didn’t have to hold me.”
She was trying to push herself away from him, her efforts no more effective than a bantha cub, and he found himself smiling.
“Good,” he said calmly, and she gave him an exasperated look. He might not understand her words, but her expressions were clear enough.
“No good.”
She tried to wiggle free again, but given her position, all she succeeded in doing was rubbing her soft little ass across his cock. His body immediately responded to the sensation, and her eyes went even wider, a wave of pink creeping up her neck and over her face.
“What are you… You can’t… I mean, we can’t… I mean, no. No!”
He reluctantly lifted her free, although he kept one of her hands tucked in his. Her mouth dropped open as she glanced down and saw the effect she’d had on his body, but this time he wasn’t sure about her expression.
“Good?” he asked hopefully.
“No good.”
No good? Was he deficient in some way? He frowned down at his cock, but it seemed normal enough.
“No good?” he repeated.
She was staring at him, not at his cock but at his face, her expression both horrified and fascinated. He didn’t understand her response, but he didn’t like it. He wanted to please her, and he sensed he’d failed.
Before he could explore the thought further, she turned her back on him and started digging through her pack with her free hand.
Now what? He’d awakened to nothing but a few vague memories and the cave and the plants that surrounded him. And this small, soft female who unexpectedly filled his thoughts. Had he felt this way about a female before?
There was a sudden spark of memory, but it was gone before he could grasp it. In its place was an overwhelming sense of loneliness. He suspected he had not, but whatever his life had been before, he had no intention of giving up his only source of comfort.
He would not let her go.
She emerged from her pack, her cheeks still flushed, and held up what appeared to be a writing device of some kind.
“I definitely think we need to work on our communication skills. Let’s see if you remember any other words.”
She carefully avoided looking at his cock and he bit back a sigh. His desire to please her would have to wait.
“Okay. Let’s see…” She looked around the cavern, gesturing with her free hand while he refused to release the other. “Cave. This is a cave.”
Cave. The word unlocked something buried deep in his mind, releasing meanings he shouldn’t know, and yet somehow did. Underground space. Shelter. Home. But his kind had rarely dwelt in caves. They had preferred—
The memory flickered and died before he could grasp it. Frustration coiled in his gut.
“Cave,” he repeated obediently.
“Plants.” She pointed to the vines that crawled up the walls. “Those are plants.”
Plants. Living things that grew from soil and stone. He remembered tending them once, or—no. Someone else had tended them. Someone whose memories now tangled with his own in ways that made his head ache.
“Plants,” he said. Then, because the word felt incomplete: “Life.”
Her eyes widened again. “Yes! Plants are life. Living things. That’s excellent…” She broke off and sighed. “I wish I knew your name. Are you sure you don’t remember? I’m Alina and you’re…”
“Rhyx.”
His name emerged from his lips before he realized it. Yes, that was it. Something inside him relaxed a little as he reclaimed another part of himself.
“Rhyx and Alina,” he said, squeezing her hand.
She shook her head, but she didn’t pull away. “I suppose so.”
“More,” he said, another word that seemed to come from nowhere. “More words.”
“All right. Let’s see. What else can I teach you?”
“Learn Alina,” he said, and watched color bloom across her cheeks. Pink. Soft. “Alina is… life?”
“I’m alive, yes.” She tucked a strand of pale hair behind her ear with an uncertain gesture. “All humans are alive.”
Humans. Another word that felt both familiar and strange. A word that belonged to other memories, to ones that tasted of metal and cold and a world that was not this one.
“Humans,” he said slowly, testing the shape of it. “Alina human.”
“Yes.”
“Rhyx no human.”
Her fingers tightened around his, and he felt the rapid flutter of her pulse against his palm. Not fear. Curiosity, perhaps.
“No,” she said quietly. “You’re not.”
He was something else, something older, something that remembered a different sky and a different world and a grief so vast it threatened to swallow him whole.
But he was also something new. Something that had Alina’s hand in his and her scent in his lungs and her voice in his ear.
“What?” he asked, pointing at himself.
Her small white teeth clasped her lower lip again, a gesture he found unexpectedly appealing. “I don’t know. I’ve never seen anyone like you before. You’re impossible…” She trailed off, shaking her head. “You shouldn’t exist.”
Impossible. Something that could not be. And yet here he was, solid and breathing and holding her hand like it was the only thing making him possible. Perhaps it was.
“I live,” he said.
“You do.” Her voice softened as she looked up at him, and then she reached up with her free hand, her fingers hovering near his face. “Can I…?”
He didn’t know what she was asking, but he leaned into her touch anyway. Her fingertips brushed his cheekbone and traced the ridge of scales along his jaw before brushing softly across his mouth. The simple pleasure of her hand on his skin threatened to overwhelm him.
“You’re so warm,” she whispered. “So alive.”
“Warm,” he agreed. “Alive.”
Her hand dropped away, and he mourned the loss of it. He wanted to demand she put it back, but at least she was still close and her other hand was still tucked in his.
They talked more. Or rather, she talked and he listened, absorbing words with a speed that made no sense. Scientist. Research. Mars…
His whole body went rigid.
“Mars?” The word triggered an unexpected wave of pain, although he couldn’t explain why.
“Yes. We’re on the planet Mars. Humans are trying to make it habitable again.”
Habitable. He suddenly remembered flying over land that was no longer habitable, towards a sun that was smaller and colder than it should have been.
But that was wrong too. He had never flown. He had no wings. And yet the memory was there, vivid and aching, full of both freedom and sorrow.
“Mars,” he said again, tasting the word. It felt like grief. It felt like home.
“Does that mean something to you?” She was watching him, those brown eyes sharp with curiosity. Scientific interest? Or something more personal? “Do you have memories of it?”
Memories. Yes. Too many and not enough, tangled together in ways that made his head throb. He remembered red dust and thin air and a sky that had once been blue. He remembered the feeling of belonging to something vast and ancient and dying.
“I remember,” he said slowly. “But it is… different. Wrong.”
“Wrong how?”
He struggled to find the words. The ones he had learned from her were not enough for the vastness of what he was trying to express. “Before… More air. More water. More… life.”
“Are you saying you remember Mars before… before it died?”
Died. Yes. That was the word. Mars had died, slowly and terribly, over eons he had somehow witnessed. The memories couldn’t be his, and yet they lived in him nonetheless, bleeding their grief into his bones.
“I remember,” he said again.
She stared at him for a long moment, before she shook her head and made a sound that was not quite a laugh.
“This is impossible. You’re impossible.” She waved her hand helplessly. “I’m a geochemist. I study rocks and soil and atmospheric composition. I don’t know how to process this. Any of this.”
“Process?”
“Understand. Make sense of. Figure out.” She shook her head again. “I came here looking for an anomalous biochemical reading, and instead I found you. A living, breathing, impossible creature who apparently has memories of ancient Mars and learns English like he’s been speaking it his whole life.”
Most of the words washed over him, but he caught the most important one. Found. She had found him and woken him from a sleep that might have lasted forever.
“You found me,” he said.
“I found you,” she agreed softly. “I still can’t believe I found you.”