***
Kyrena was about to step back onto the platform and try the Mount Ashi course of the snowscape surfing sim when she saw the approach of sober-looking men in dark uniforms with a giant fist emblazoned across their chests. This sucks. No way. I disabled the tracker. How did Gulnara’s blowhards find me so quickly?
She turned uncertainly, her whole body tensing as the lead man approached her. She noticed that his five companions fanned out to surround her and her two alien acquaintances.
"Kyrena, your father is very concerned about you, and you know that he gave no authorization for you to leave Jeylani Dome. Omega Station is a dangerous place. We’re here to take you back home."
Kyrena bit her lip, feeling the pull of rage, wanting so badly to give in to a yelling fit. She wanted to tell this high-priced babysitter that she was a grown woman by all the biological standards that mattered, and that he could you-know-what himself. Diplomacy was Dad’s thing, but it hadn’t ever seemed to get her anywhere, even when she did have the patience to use it, and she didn’t think it would do much good for her now either. She glanced at Spook and Zelky, wishing that they were her bodyguards instead of just random strangers who seemed like promising ‘people’ she’d now never get to know.
She shrugged, letting out a long sigh of frustration, and turned to Spook. "Sorry…it looks like these killjoys have my number. My Dad’s kind of a VIP with a stick up his you-know-where."
"Sorry to hear that," Spook replied with a wink, "but speaking of numbers, I’d like yours, if you don’t mind." Spook’s voice contained a double helix mingling eagerness and hope, and taking Kyrena off guard. He took her astonishment as reluctance, and plowed on with an alternative. "Will you give me your address at least?"
Kyrena almost blushed. This guy seemed pretty serious about becoming at least friends. It was kind of cute, actually. Her thoughts were interrupted by a rigid hand clasping her arm and yanking her off balance.
"No time for chatting, girl. Let’s go," the head babysitter said with a clipped, nervous tone.
Wait a second, who is this guy? That was when Kyrena noticed that he wasn’t Magnis. Magnis was the head of the security detail her father had assigned to Kyrena, and usually it was Magnis who came to apprehend her when she was off doing something she wasn’t supposed to be doing. She’d never really bothered to learn the names of the rest of the guards; why bother when she hated them for the lackeys they were? But this guy didn’t even seem remotely familiar. A sixth sense sent waves of tension through her body.
"You can take your hands off me, big guy. Who in the twinkly stars are you, anyway? Where’s Magnis?" She gave him a cold stare and yanked her arm free of his grip as she took several big steps back. His eyes narrowed, and he seemed to be growing angrier by the second.
The one to Angry Guy’s left gave his partner a warning look. "We don’t have time for this, brother. Let’s go."
Time for what? What was he talking about? As Kyrena glanced about, she realized suddenly that not a single one of the uniformed agents gave her any notion of déjà vu. The lead guy with graying, close-cropped hair and chilled eyes suddenly left Kyrena with an awful premonition.
"I don’t know who you guys really are, but you’re making a big mistake. My Dad is the Jeylani director on Omega Station. I don’t think you know who you’re messing with."
"Oh, but we do," Angry Guy replied, and suddenly a silvery sphere was rolling across the floor. Several others were thrown in other directions at hapless customers as the fake Jeylani guards activated the protective fields on their uniforms by pressing a button on the faceplates of their helmets.
Kyrena glanced at the sphere which rolled to her feet, confused, until she heard Spook’s gasp.
"Stun grenade!" Kyrena tried to lunge backward, already knowing it would be too late. She watched in disbelief as Zelky burst into half a hundred chunks of flying goo, reverting to his whirlwind form as several large gobs of pinkish flesh smothered the grenade half a second before it went off. A muffled burst told Kyrena that Zelky…whatever he was…had a pretty awesome ability.
She and Spook were already running toward the rear exit, and Kyrena wasn’t sure who was leading who. She had only half a moment to glance back and see that Zelky’s fleshy gobs were now smacking against faceplates and certain exposed body parts of her would-be abductors. Two of the fake Jeylani guards were doubled over in pain, and the remaining four were trying their hardest to bat away projectiles made of alien flesh.
"I know a place!" Spook shouted between heaving breaths as they sprinted down the back stairway, three steps at a time, and then ran through the dank corridor. They hauled butt, running past the restrooms and heading for the shimmering emergency EXIT sign at the end of the corridor. But instead of continuing outside into the alley, Spook suddenly slammed his elbow into the wall, and a panel slid to the side. "Come on!" he shouted. Though it was dark, Kyrena let him shove her through without thinking, and soon he was right behind her with his hand-vid flipped open to light the way. She heard the panel fall back into place behind them. It had been textured to look flawlessly like the rest of the jagged asteroid rock which lined the unfinished exit corridor.
Where the hell are we going? She didn’t know if she could trust Spook, but she damn well knew she couldn’t trust those people in fake uniforms trying to kidnap her. I guess that saying about the devil you know being the better choice is a bunch of crap, she thought with odd amusement. Kyrena had to admit that the adrenaline surging through her veins felt surprisingly good…and different from anything she’d felt in what seemed like forever. The way was narrow, and they hunched and then had to crawl up, down, left, and right, until the turns destroyed what little sense of direction Kyrena had. It looked like this had once been a ventilation system, possibly to a building that had once existed below where the gaming store now stood.
A faint light finally seemed to be illuminating something ahead. She narrowed her eyes and found herself at the door to what seemed like an underground lair. There was a soft blue glow along the outlines of the numbers Spook punched on the keypad. The door gave out a small hiss, and Spook pushed his way through.
Kyrena stepped in behind him, letting out a deep breath of relief as the door sealed shut. She walked to the center of the room and did a 360 degree turn.
"Welcome to the Bunker," Spook said with pride. Kyrena admired the burgundy velvet couch, wanting to sink into its softness and forget that she was being hunted. The perimeter of the circular room was filled with screens showing security camera footage from various parts of Berengi Dome. A comfortable-looking bed covered one expanse of the room, but across from it was the place where Kyrena guessed that Spook spent most of his time. There was a large desk dominated by a master screen, its high-resolution view divided into rows upon rows of yet more security camera feeds.
This was a spymaster’s paradise.
"This all started out as a hobby, but it kind of grew into something else," Spook said with a shrug and a smile. "I’ve always liked poking my nose where it doesn’t belong, and having an addiction to hacking is sort of like having the perfect enabler."
Kyrena sat on the couch, staring at the constant action on the screens. Some of it was dull stuff, but Kyrena could also clearly see that parts of Berengi Dome were run-down, and a few of the camera feeds were definitely depicting crimes in progress. A woman being mugged. A four-man team with weapons primed, ready to ambush an unsuspecting courier and his bodyguard. Two kids trying to hack the keypad to someone’s apartment.
Spook settled on the cushion beside her, tentatively reaching for her hand. "It’s OK. You’re safe here. We can sit tight and wait until those guys get tired of chasing their own tails." Kyrena nodded, but her eyes were still glued to the camera feeds.
"So what…are you the ultimate voyeur?" She said it with a mixture of shock and discomfort, but her expression melted as Spook explained.
"No. I’m not sure what you’d call it.
I try to keep tabs on what’s happening all over Berengi Dome, and if I can make difference, I do what I can. Believe it or not, I’ve saved people this way. A lot of them. I can’t save everyone, that’s for sure, and the more spontaneous the crime, the more powerless I am. But the cameras and I have a good relationship." Then he added with self-conscious hesitation in his voice, "That’s how I met you."
Kyrena flinched, softening with surprise at the vulnerable expression on his face. She rested her hand gently on his. "What do you mean?"
"I saw those creeps shadowing you on the street camera feed. It gave me a bad feeling. When I realized how close you were to my base of operations, how could I not try to help?"
Kyrena laughed. "Base of operations? You know that we normal people use the term ‘home,’ right?" He really was sweet. Yes, Kyrena, but how are you going to get back to Dad safely with armed kidnappers looking for you, ones who probably know you have only one way back to Jeylani Dome?
As if he’d read her mind, Spook chuckled at himself and nodded. "Sorry, force of habit. When you live constantly seeing other people’s secrets, it changes the way you talk about things." Kyrena grasped his hand tightly, watching the color of his cheeks. As crazy as it seemed, she had the sudden urge to kiss him right now. True, he was a guy she’d only just met…but he had saved her from being abducted. She turned toward him, putting her other hand on his chest, and felt the heartbeat thudding to a rapidly increasing rhythm underneath.
"So let me see if I have this right. You’re some sexy superhero who goes around saving girls from armed goons on a regular basis?" she asked with upraised eyebrows. He must’ve known she was teasing him, but he seemed incredibly nervous all the same. Spook opened his mouth, but words wouldn’t come. He was definitely blushing. Big-time.
Kyrena cupped his cheek. It had been so long since she’d been able to even spend time alone with someone her age. Someone who wasn’t a member of her father’s staff or an employee of Jeylani Corp. She was finally with another human being, no ulterior motives, just someone who was good and kind and…
It happened before she realized what she was doing. Kyrena leaned forward, her lips swooping across Spook’s mouth. Spook groaned with surprise. He’d seemed paralyzed a moment before, but as her tongue dove in, tasting him, his instinct responded, and soon he was leaning into her, his arms encircling her torso and holding her closely to his chest as they made out like hungry sex kittens.
Kyrena wasn’t prepared for what came next. A series of images…no, memories. Spook’s memories. They overwhelmed her, and she broke the kiss, but it was too late, they had flooded her brain, and she was suddenly panting, gasping for air as if she had run a thousand miles in two point five seconds.
"What…what was…you’re…oh god!" Kyrena tried to get up, but Spook’s hands were gently grasping her wrists, coaxing her to sit back down.
"You’re not human!" she groaned. For a moment this feeling of horror had her by the throat. But as she examine some of the memories imprinted on her mind, of Spook as a child, of Spook a little older, then a little older…she realized that he was just another ‘person.’ What other word made more sense?
"I’m sorry, Kyrena. I was hoping to get to that, but I wasn’t sure how to tell you. You kind of beat me to it. I’m a valerian. We were once hunted to near extinction because of our abilities."
Kyrena coughed, her eyes watering as she still reeled from all the information which had slammed into her brain like a tsunami. "You can share memories and turn into whatever form you want?"
"Yes, and not just share memories. Exchange them. I saw your memories just now, Kyrena. It’s as if I’ve known you since the day you were born." He grimaced, suddenly realizing how awful that sounded. "I know that probably creeps you out, but I didn’t mean it in a vulgar way. I meant it with respect, Kyrena. Among my kind, understanding someone, having empathy for someone, is the most important thing."
"My kind have been nicknamed ‘chameleons,’ and that’s what we are, but we’re not defined by our abilities the way human beings think. People call us chameleons as a negative badge, to signify the physical forms we can take as we will; they mistrust anything so changeable. People fear it. But we call ourselves chameleons because like a chameleon we can adapt our behavior to reach an understanding with other intelligent beings, by sharing memories. It’s rare, but any time we have intimate contact with someone, that exchange of memories can happen. In all my years I’ve never found a better way to overcome apathy and indifference than by sharing memories – forcing someone to see things outside of their own skin."
To Kyrena’s shock, she wasn’t repulsed by what Spook had done…nor even by what he was. Almost the opposite.
She’d been isolated from physical and social contact, and all the while she’d traveled the solar systems with her Dad, following him from one executive post to another. She’d seen casts and vids about strange aliens, and things even science couldn’t yet hope to explain. Meeting an alien wasn’t what scared her; secretly, that was the very prospect that made her sneak into Berengi Dome in the first place.
"Sorry, it’s just a lot to take in," she whispered. Realizing that he was dejectedly leaning backward, preparing to get up and possibly walk away, she knew she had to act fast.
The second kiss surprised Spook even more than the first. As their lips met, more softly this time, her hands gently cupped his shoulders and pressed their bodies together. His shocked groan sent a thrill of satisfaction down Kyrena’s spine. She felt his hands press snugly into the small of her back as she enjoyed the long, lingering kiss until, slowly, their faces drifted apart, and Kyrena looked deeply into the valerian’s eyes.
"I’ve never kissed an alien before," she said with a sly grin. "I think I kind of like it." An answering smile slowly lit up Spook’s face, interrupted by a quizzical look.
"You aren’t disturbed by what I am?"
Kyrena realized that many of Spook’s memories were fading from her mind. Her brain just couldn’t retain so much. But enough of who Spook was clung to her, still touching her in the ways that mattered.
"I won’t say I’m not a little disturbed," she replied with a small laugh, "but right now I have this image of you in diapers wondering around the house. It was the first human form your parents taught you. It’s kind of adorable." Kyrena’s giggle was cut off by another fierce kiss, and this time Spook’s nervousness seemed to have melted away like fog under the sun. They stood up as one, their hands never leaving one another as they kissed their way over to the bed.
"Are you sure you’re okay with this?" Spook asked, his eyes pleading and sincere at the same time.
"Shut up and kiss me."
Tales from Omega Station: Abduction Page 3