8. PEACE
PEACE
I t didn’t take long, in the bright morning light, to find the tunnel that descended into the dark, with little more than my light stick to illuminate the way.
The obsidian walls were smooth, as was the floor.
After several minutes in the tight space, it opened above a larger corridor.
We silently dropped into the hallway, cracking a thin layer of ice that covered the floor.
Several more minutes in, a faded line appeared.
I kicked the ice away with my boot to get a closer look.
“What exactly did you say they used this planet for?” I asked, simply to break up the silence that was starting to creep me out in the black void.
Xyrox hesitated to answer a beat too long, and I regretted asking. Maybe I didn’t want to know. Scratch that. I likely didn’t want to know, but it was too late to back out now.
He cleared his throat. “From what I could tell from the paperwork I found, they were doing experiments, mostly on females, to breed them with Pleiadian males. The arrogant fekks managed to make themselves live almost forever but in doing so messed up their ability to reproduce. They haven’t had any babies in centuries, and they’re slowly going extinct.
” Xyrox huffed out a very unhumorous sounding laugh. “Ironic, huh?”
“But you think I’m Pleiadian. And I was only born twenty-five years ago. How does that circle square?” I glanced over my shoulder, only to see him shrug.
“Don’t know. Maybe you’re not. I’m just saying you favor the race with your eye color. It’s pretty distinctive.”
I frowned. Xyrox made the Pleiadians sound terrible. I didn’t want to be part of a race who trafficked in women and children, forced breeding, experimented on people they captured, and were arrogant. So I decided he was wrong, either about my heritage or perhaps about them.
“C’mon, let’s keep going. I’m hungry, and I have a feeling there’s a lot of area to cover in this place.” Placing his hand on my lower back, Xyrox propelled me forward, suddenly in the lead. He took my pack and slung it over his substantial shoulder.
I should’ve been all kinds of pissed off with his cavalier attitude, but, the funny thing was, I didn’t hate it. That surprised me, because I’d never been good at following. I consoled myself that it must be the view of his perfect ass, but there was that giant puffy coat, so no. Shut up, Peace!
“Me, too. Starving.” I pretended to take charge again by pointing my light down the hallway in front of us.
We walked in silence for a while when the tunnel began to illuminate itself. At first, I thought it was an optical illusion from my light reflecting off crystals that appeared embedded in the walls at irregular intervals. But when I flicked off my stick, the glow in the tunnel remained.
Xyrox held up a fist and stopped walking just like I’d seen Zame do when we were on a hike. She had once said it was habit from her military days.
“Do you see something?” I asked, keeping my voice in a whisper just in case.
Suddenly, he flicked out a long, forked tongue, and I jolted. I’d seen that scenting maneuver a million times growing up around Rykantosians, yet it always caught me off guard—especially since, aside from that, they looked so much like me—whatever I was.
“People habitation is close. I don’t scent anyone here, or anyone who has been here recently.” His tongue flicked out again.
At that very moment, my stomach rumbled loudly. Oh, that’s badass, Peace. Real badass. I tried to ignore the smile I could tell Xyrox was fighting.
“Let’s see if we can find some food. Those protein bars I ate while you were chasing me are long gone,” he said.
“Sounds like a plan,” I agreed. I also hoped there might be some beds left, and—if we were lucky—blankets, because I didn’t expect there to be a working heat source.
The bits of ice in the tunnels didn’t bode well for the place having working power and ongoing heat, but I would take whatever I could get.
As we hiked, it felt like we were slowly gaining altitude. Eventually, Xyrox stopped in front of a heavy-looking metal door with a hatch wheel in the center. Xyrox placed his large hands on either side of the wheel and took a deep breath, ready to crank it.
“Whoa, whoa, there, buddy!” Grabbing his shoulder, I tugged on him to face me, but he was immovable. He paused, however, and cocked his head to listen to me. “What if it’s booby trapped or something? We could blow ourselves up.”
He flicked that long, forked, very dexterous tongue, and I felt my clit pulse between my thighs. Goddess protect me!
“No explosives,” he said. “It just smells old, musty, and quarters where people used to live. It’s safe.” With that, he heaved the wheel and pushed.
As the door slid open, I peered over Xyrox’s shoulder and saw nothing but a gloomy, dark room. “Shine your light in here,” he said, stepping inside.
I flicked my light stick back on and held it in front of us.
A few feet from us was a low-slung seating area with cushions in a hideous orange and green print.
I followed my prisoner into the room and shined the light around.
A small OmniChef oven was tucked against the wall and an orange table with three green chairs took up another corner.
Whoever they were, they had horrible taste.“ I made a face. So much for the Pleiadians’ supposed superiority. Suddenly, bright light nearly blinded me. I yelped, covering my eyes.
“You’re not kidding,” Xyrox said, ignoring my cry of surprise and pain. “This is horrible. It’s even worse in the light.”
I blinked, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the sudden change of brightness. “I can’t believe there’s power. Does that mean there’s heat, too?” I rubbed my arms and started searching for a thermostat or heating unit, moving away from Xyrox.
“Found it!” he called from a doorway on the other side of the room.
There was a clank, and then a clunk before the room filled with the noxious smell of burning dust. But then I felt the warm air flowing from the overhead vents. I tilted my face to the warmth and smiled. It was glorious!
Before long, the small space was comfortable, and I shed my parka. This place might’ve been used for sketchy scientific experiments, but its construction was solid. I explored the quarters in earnest. It looked like the inhabitants left in a hurry, abandoning most of their things.
Blankets lay in a heap across the horrible couch. Two sets of shoes were discarded near the door. A ceramic cup sat next to some kind of dish cleaning unit in the small kitchen area.
One by one, I studied framed photos on tables next to the hideous sofa. Two women smiled in them, but their smiles didn’t reach their eyes. They seemed haunted. I shivered and moved away from the pictures, wondering what they had gone through.
“I wonder whether this thing works.”
I startled at Xyrox’s voice. He stood before the small food replicator, rubbing his hands together and peering at the buttons of the OmniChef. I choked back a bark of laughter as I glanced up at him. He turned at the noise and I couldn’t hold back a full belly laugh any longer.
“What?” His dark brows knitting together.
“What are you wearing?” I sputtered, motioning at his chest. A bright turquoise T-shirt strained over his bulging muscles.
On the front was an owl in a flat black cap with a tassel, licking a brightly colored ball on a stick.
“Does that say, ‘How Many Licks’?” I succumbed to my laughter, doubling over and clutching at my stomach until I collapsed onto the couch.
Xyrox rubbed his chest and grimaced. Had his skin not already been a dark red, I’m sure he would have blushed.
“It was too hot to keep wearing my coat and there weren’t any other clothes for me in the emergency bag,” he explained.
“This was all I could find that had enough stretch to fit. Would you prefer I take it off?”
“No!” I threw up a hand in protest as he reached for the hem.
Better to laugh my ass off than face all those yummy male muscles again.
“You keep that on. I’m sorry. It just took me by surprise.
That color looks good on you.” I sputtered a little at the last but schooled my face back into a pleasantly neutral expression.
Scowling at me, he dropped his hands. “Fine. Let’s see if this thing works.”
Getting off the ugly couch, I walked up to look closely at what he was doing. “What does it matter? We don’t have anything to use for replication.”
Xyrox looked at me like I was a simple child and pointed to a larger piece of equipment sitting next to the OmniChef.
“This is a Pleiadian molecular rearrangement bot. It can make virtually anything you wish on demand from raw materials. Those materials are in here”—he tapped a large metal cylinder standing adjacent to it with his toe—“But don’t mess with it. It’s under pressure.”
“How does it work?” I didn’t recognize any of the words on the buttons, but, at this point, we were both so hungry it could make Jovinian Mako worm casserole, and I’d eat it. Giving up, I stepped back. “Just make anything. I’ll search for water.”
His eyebrows rose into his hairline. “You sure? I mean, I’m not picky but, in my experience, females …”
Holding up my had, I glared at him. “Don’t even finish that sentence, fugitive. I’m a survivalist. Food is fuel. Just do what you’re told.”
“Okay, okay.” He raised his hands in defeat. “This thing should be able to make water, too, if I can figure it out.”
“ If you can figure it out,“ I sniped. Pushing past him to reach the kitchen cabinets, I searched for some kind of potable liquid. I had just located a stash of silver hydration packs when I heard a ding behind me.
“I think we got lucky.” Xyrox said as he removed two plates from the OmniChef, his tongue snaking out sniffing quickly at the steam. I bit my lip and fought the urge to squeeze my thighs together, like I did every time he did that. Good goddess, Peace, get your shit together!
“Uh, yeah,” I agreed, concentrating hard on quieting my thoughts.
The plates held two stacked discs made up of two slices of some type of bread with a round disc of cooked meat in the middle. I wasn’t familiar with the green and red vegetation peeking out from under the top piece of bread. A yellow sauce dripped off the meat and onto the plate.
Small brown, cylindrical objects sat in a pile next to the meat stacks. I took one and popped it in my mouth. It was crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside, and slightly salty. “Oh, holy goddess, these are wonderful.” My words of pleasure escaped my lips before I could stop them.
Xyrox’s mouth quirked up on one side at my reaction.
I narrowed my eyes, willing him to remember he was my prisoner. “What?”
He shrugged. “They’re good?”
“Yeah, they’re good.” Relaxing, I popped another of the crunchy cylinders in my mouth, sighing as I chewed. My lips curling up in pleasure despite myself.
“You’re pretty when you smile. You should do it more often.”
Immediately, I swallowed and frowned. “You don’t need to worry about what I look like, fugitive. Just eat.”
Xyrox smirked but placed the plate in front of me as we sat.
Part of me didn’t like the intimate familiarity of eating together like this, especially after he commented about my looks.
But after those two little bites of heaven, I decided to let it go and to focus on eating.
I was so hungry, I could eat the ass of a Cretarian rhino.
“Do you know what this is?” I asked around a mouthful.
He swallowed his food and took a drink from the hydration pack before responding.
“I’m not sure, but maybe something from a place called Earth?
Possibly a hamburger’? This whole place looks like something from there.
We studied the planet at the academy believe Jokull is kidnapping females from there.
The intelligent life there is called human, and they look like primitive Pleiadians.
They’re so primitive, they don’t have knowing contact with any other species yet, and humans are on the IGF’s protected list.”
I didn’t respond because I had no interest in humans. It must be nice to be a primitive species unbothered by the problems of the galaxy. Unlike me. I had an entire ice planet full of problems.