by Zena Zion
Alien Commander’s Baby
Alien Protectors Book 4
Zena Zion
Copyright 2016 by Zena Zion
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced
in any way whatsoever, without written permission
from the author, except in case of brief
quotations embodied in critical reviews
and articles.
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to any
character, person, living or dead, events, place or
organizations is purely coincidental. The author does not
have any control over and does not assume any responsibility
for third party websites or their content.
First edition, 2016
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1 – Strange Happenings
CHAPTER 2 – The Stranger
CHAPTER 3 – Plasmosorth
CHAPTER 4 – Memories
CHAPTER 5 – Mind Reader
CHAPTER 6 – Evacuation
CHAPTER 7 – The Truth
CHAPTER 8 – Choosing a Mate
CHAPTER 1 – Strange Happenings
Ruby Farland groaned as the alarm on her bedside table went off for what seemed like the thousandth time. She rolled over and deactivated the device, finally deciding that she had maxed out the acceptable amount of uses of the snooze button.
“What’s the point?” she grumbled, flinging her legs haphazardly over the side of the bed.
Her heel connected with the leg of the nightstand, causing Ruby to release another agonizing groan before she made her way bleary-eyed toward the bathroom.
Ruby was down on her luck.
Worse than that. She had decided that she was the epitome of bad luck.
Twenty three years of perfect normalcy had all been negated shortly after her twenty-fourth birthday. Now, her life was in shambles. Furthermore, she was fairly certain that she was losing her mind.
Ruby turned the shower on, stepped in to the steaming spray, and attempted to let the hot water wash away her frustration. It did not help.
Each morning, her mind raced over the recent events of her life. Each afternoon, as she applied for jobs in her new small-town home, she prayed that she would wake up one morning with some sort of understanding for the chaos that had become her life.
Ruby plunged her face into the spray, the images of her past playing across her mind.
Her first recollection of things that had started to go abnormally wrong were centered on her romantic relationships. Two dramatic break-ups in less than a year.
Four weeks after landing her dream job at a high-tech Detroit research facility, her fiancé, a solid relationship of four years, had left her for some inexplicable reason. Jason had stated that he had simply “changed his mind,” yet, when pressed for a more specific answer, he had given a dazed look before turning to walk out of her life forever.
Not long afterward, she had started a causal relationship with a co-worker. Richard had all the potential for a long-term, steady relationship. When they had finally decided to advance to a more serious level, he had suddenly grown cold and distant, withdrawing into his own work and avoiding Ruby in the hallways between their neighboring labs.
One evening, she had caught up to him as he was finishing a shift.
“Hey, Rick!” She had to jog to catch up to him in the darkened parking lot.
“Hi, uh…. Ruby.” His mind was elsewhere, his eyes had a faraway look about them, as if even coming up with her name had required significant effort. For a man who Ruby knew to be both brilliant, and sharp, this was a shocking alteration.
“Have you been feeling alright?” She remembered the concern in her voice as she had laid her hand on his forearm. He pulled away abruptly. “You seem… out of it.”
“I’m busy, Ruby.” He snapped. “I’m on the verge of a scientific breakthrough and I really don’t appreciate the fact that you don’t seem to realize the amount of pressure that my lab is under right now.”
“I’m sorry.” She was taken aback by his curt response.
Richard ran a hand through his already disheveled hair. The motion exposed the length of his neck where a series of tiny marks marred the skin.
“Rick!” She had cried in alarm. “What happened?”
He slapped her hand away and turned to glare at her with cold eyes.
“I think it would be best if we didn’t see each other any longer.” He spat with a vehemence that scared her. “It is clear to me that this relationship isn’t going anywhere. I think it would be best if you refrained from speaking to me in the future. I’m far too immersed in my project to have time for your constant barrage of questions.”
Rick had sauntered away without a backward glance, leaving Ruby staring after him with her mouth open and tears in her eyes.
She had been devastated. Two massive break-ups in less than a year and neither seemed to have any logical reasoning. Was it something she had said? Something that she had done?
Ruby squeeze a gob of shampoo into the palm of her hand and began to wash her hair. As the suds rinsed in a circular motion around and down the drain, her mind shifted to the most perplexing events of her recent experience.
As devastating as the breakups may have been, they were nothing compared to the inexplicable events that had followed. The events that had prompted Ruby to make an abrupt move to a small town in Northern Michigan in an attempt to start a new life, and regain her sanity.
She remembered calling in sick to work the Monday following Rick’s sudden reaction. She had spent the entire weekend in a miserable, drunken stupor. Nothing a hefty box of chocolates and a constant flow of wine could not solve, she had told herself.
By Monday morning, however, she had developed a terrible hangover that had left her curled up in bed for a majority of the day. Claiming a twenty-four-hour flu she decided to wait until Tuesday to return to the questioning eyes of the laboratory.
Tuesday morning she had arrived, puffy eyed, with wrinkled trousers, in the employee parking lot.
Except there was no parking lot. Only a grassy field covered in dandelions that looked like it had not been mowed all summer.
Ruby had rubbed her eyes, certain that she had probably missed a turn somewhere on her way to the site. She drove once around the block. Twice. Three times. Searching for the missed turn or mistaken road sign.
She returned to her house and started the journey again. Only to end up in the same unkempt field as before.
The laboratory building was gone. Not demolished. Not abandoned.
Disappeared. As if it had never existed in the first place.
She had wondered if there was any possibility that she was still feeling the effects of the alcohol but, there could be no explanation for an entire, massive, complex to vanish into thin air.
Where were the other employees who should have shown up at the same time as Ruby, looking for their place of employment? Why were there not others, like her, who had entered the facility only days before?
With a sigh, she had resolved to find the answers. Perhaps in her twisted mind, she had mistaken the location. Perhaps the neighborhoods looked similar, and had identical road signs, and she had merely wandered in the wrong direction.
She knew that she was grasping at straws but needed some explanation to wrap her head around the complete
impossibility that lay before her very eyes.
She called her employer.
The line did not even ring.
She tried a few other employees who had become casual acquaintances.
No answer.
She even attempted Rick’s number, despite his obvious desire that they never speak again.
The line had been disconnected.
Finding a nearby shopping complex, Ruby began to approach local residents asking about the relocation of the prominent scientific Space Research Program.
Not a single person had ever heard of it.
“What do you mean, never heard of it?” Ruby had argued. “It is a major, world-wide corporation that is at the forefront of the scientific community! There are hundreds of individuals employed there at this very moment!”
Ruby knew that she sounded hysterical. She was hysterical.
The shoppers were looking at her as if she were a crazed lunatic as she repeatedly attempted to argue her point.
Finally, an elderly gentleman who claimed to have lived in the area for over eighty years asked her where the laboratory was located. When she elaborated, he gave her a pitying glance before shaking his head.
“In all the time that I’ve been here, young lady, that pile of dirt has never been anything more than an overgrown field. You think the city would build something on it, a park, a mall, anything… but they just let it sit year after year.”
Ruby shook her head.
“That isn’t possible.” She argued once more. “I’ve been working in that building for over six months. Paying my bills, meeting coworkers, parking in lot seven next to the cooling reservoir!”
That was when she heard it.
The whisper that had broken her spirit.
“Maybe she escaped from the mental hospital. Do you think she’s dangerous? Should we call the police?”
With an anguished cry she had fled the scene.
Was she crazy?
Had everything that she remembered from the past six months been a hallucination?
That afternoon, she had decided that she needed a change of scenery. It was not as if she had a job to return to.
She emptied her bank account, packed her sparse belongings into the back of her mid-sized SUV, and drove North, not really caring where she ended up.
CHAPTER 2 – The Stranger
Ruby finished her shower and threw on a comfortable pair of jeans and a pale yellow top that accentuated her curvy body without focusing too much attention on her ample bust.
She did not have any job interviews today. In a town this small, she had pretty much maxed out her applications in the first week. Now, one week later, she was waiting to hear back from any potential employers.
What she really wanted to do was spend the afternoon walking the main streets of the town and familiarizing herself with the area.
Her mind strayed to the grey-eyed stranger and she decided against it.
The stranger. The VERY attractive stranger. The unnaturally attractive stranger.
With the dark features of a Grecian god, the man who often crossed paths with Ruby on her daily wanderings was more than just eye candy. He was a force. Unable to look away, every woman in the vicinity was drawn to him like some super magnet.
Except Ruby, she reminded herself with a slight blush at the blatant untruth.
She was avoiding him.
Call her crazy. Call her paranoid. But the sexy stranger seemed to be everywhere that Ruby was. Maybe it was a coincidence. Maybe not. Ruby had started to question every suspicious occurrence since the disappearance of her previous workplace.
She wondered if he had heard about the crazed scene at the shopping center and was here to take her away to an institution.
Ruby shook her head. She was overreacting. Maybe the stranger was following her. Maybe he was not. Either way, he had yet to approach her directly. He had not spoken to her, even in passing. Though, there were times when the intensity of his gaze, his lingering eyes, seemed to communicate more than words to Ruby’s confused soul.
It was as if he was tracking her. His nature was both stand-offish and possessive, as if waiting. Watching and waiting.
But for what?
One of these days, she was going to confront him. So far, every time that she had considered it, she had changed her mind after one look at his handsome features and chiseled frame.
He made her mind create images that were entirely too graphic, and inappropriate, to be centered on a complete stranger. She knew that these thoughts would cause her to blush and stutter, rendering her completely incapable of basic human communication.
Until she could master speaking to an incredibly handsome male, a trait that had never been Ruby’s strong suit, she would continue to avoid him and hope that he would simply disappear as well.
By the time the evening had rolled around, she was defeated.
Four applications denied and the only two that had yet to respond boasted terrible hours for abhorrent pay.
At this point she would take what she could get, but even so it did not appear that she was going to catch a break.
When had her life gone so terribly wrong?
A few hours later, after half priced margaritas at the local pub and having forgotten to order dinner amidst the entertaining distraction of a local band, Ruby found herself sufficiently inebriated.
She decided to walk herself home, get a good night’s rest, and start again fresh the following morning. Her mood was surprisingly optimistic despite the events of the day and she exited the pub with a cheery hum and renewed spring in her step.
She made it half way back to her quiet hotel before she realized that the biker gang that had congregated at the pub, had left, and four of the men were slinking behind her like cats on the prowl.
Ruby’s heart raced. She glanced over her shoulder and saw that they were even closer than she had realized.
In response to her glance, the men started a series of catcalls that made the blood in her veins curdle.
She glanced up and down the dimly lit street and realized that it was deserted.
The shops and offices were closed for the night. There were no residential homes near enough to hear her cry, should she scream.
Her mind struggled through the alcoholic haze. No realistic solution presented itself. She was alone, and entirely unprepared to grapple with four massive bikers.
“Hey, sweet thing, don’t you want to talk to us?” One of the men called toward her. Ruby glanced over her shoulder while forcing herself to walk faster. The speaker was an over-weight bruiser with a patchy-beard and a green bandana tied around his neck.
Ruby’s eyes had trouble focusing on the other men and her vision swam dangerously.
She needed to get back to the safety of the hotel, and fast.
She broke out into a sprint, kicking off her peep toe heels and running along the cool pavement.
With a series of evil laughs, the men sprinted after her, apparently finding amusement in the challenge.
A hand closed around her upper arm, spinning her around to face her assailant. She stumbled slightly and took a messy swing at the man who easily caught her fist with his free hand.
He was leering at her with broken teeth, a foul smelling man soaked in beer and cigarettes, uncaring that his belly was protruding from the waistline of his jeans.
His three cronies encircled them, laughing and barking lewd comments at their leader.
Ruby felt as if she were about to vomit. More from the fear and trauma of the situation than the drinks that she had previously consumed.
Then, suddenly, the men fell silent. They were looking at something behind her. Their narrowed eyes and hissing breath told her that it was not something that they wanted to see.
“Release her.” Came the command.
The deep voice was unfamiliar to Ruby. She prayed that the speaker was a police officer.
“She’s with us so you better be going on your way then.�
�� Ruby felt a tug on her arm that spun her to face the speaker. She blinked a few times to ensure that her eyes were not playing tricks.
The gorgeous stranger that she had seen about town since her arrival was standing less than ten feet away.
“Is that true?” The question was directed at her and when her captor began to answer, the stranger held up his hand to silence him. “I’m asking her.”
Ruby felt the force of fingers digging into her arm. A clear message about the response that she was expected to give.
She dropped her chin to her chest as her brain struggled to process the situation. There were four bikers to her one stranger. Ruby knew that she was in no position to help the valiant stranger.
“No.” She finally whispered. Her words so low that she hoped the bikers would not hear them. The responding force that was crushing her arm told her otherwise.
It all happened so quickly that Ruby would never have been able to fully recount the following moments.
Two of the bikers stepped forward, blocking Ruby from the view of the stranger. Before she knew what had happened, they were both laying in a crumpled heap on the ground, one groaning in pain and the other clearly unconscious.
The third henchman slipped a knife from his pocket and bounced toward the stranger on the balls of his feet.
Her savior waited patiently for the biker to approach. With a quick flick of his wrist he grabbed the knife wielding hand, twisted the attacker’s arm, and plunged the blade into its owner’s abdomen.
Her captor released her, raising both hands above his shoulders in surrender.
“Listen man, we were just joking around.” His voice, full of fear, had raised a full octave. He took a step back, leaving Ruby swaying slightly in the circle of injured men.
The stranger took one silent step forward, his intent obvious.
Her assailant gasped, turned on his heel, and sprinted into the safety of the darkness clearly unconcerned with the lives of his friends.
Ruby stared at the stranger who now stood only a few feet away from her.