"I kept you alive," Tau answered without looking in her direction, hurrying her along, "I will continue to do so."
"Why?" Penny stopped, tears stinging her eyes, rolling down her cheeks and shattering all her attempts to maintain a respectable diplomatic air, "From what?"
Tau removed his helmet at once, concern in his compound eyes as he moved closer, reaching out to wipe the tears from her cheeks.
"Tone of distress. Is this normal? Are you injured?"
"No," Penny hiccupped, crying harder, "It means I'm scared and upset and I don't understand what's happening. Please, just explain things to me!"
Tau was frozen for a moment, but then he put his hands to her cheeks as he had before, looking into her eyes.
"I will, Penny Allyn," he promised, "I will explain. I will find a way. This is my promise."
She reached up to put her hands over his and closed her eyes, willing herself to trust him. He'd given her no reason not to believe in him so far.
When he released her and put his helmet back on, she followed him silently as he brought her back to the holding cell where the rest of her team was anxiously waiting for news. He left her at the door, taking her translator chip before he went, and Penny couldn't help wishing he could stay.
She told the team everything she had learned, though it didn't amount to much. The leaders of these people thought the humans were responsible for killing their queen, and they had only seven days for Tau to prove them wrong.
As soon as she'd told them all she knew, she collapsed into one of the beds, thinking that she'd like to sleep for a week if she wasn't certain she'd wake to an execution.
Chapter Six
"The good news is," Rivera was saying when Penny woke, "We probably have longer than we think. Days are longer here than on earth. We're not certain by how much, but it's extra time and that's what matters."
"But what are we supposed to do with that time?" Ian asked, tense with worry, "They won't let us out of this room. How are we supposed to prove it wasn't us? We can't just rely on that Tau guy."
"Guys, Penny is awake," Salome interrupted the chatter as Penny left the bed behind with reluctance.
"No, it's fine," she mumbled, rubbing her eyes, "You guys can keep talking. Did I miss dinner?"
"Here, I saved a portion for you," Rivera handed Penny the partial contents of one of the silver packets, which were currently divided into thirds to stretch out their food supplies. Penny accepted it gratefully, sitting down to eat with an expression of tired thoughtfulness on her face.
"We don't know anything about this Tau guy," Ian continued, "We can't even understand how he thinks. Only Penny can even talk to him. We can't leave our defense up to someone like that. If he's defending us at all and not just looking for evidence of our guilt. We don't know how justice works here."
"He's defending us," Penny said quietly, "He promised me. And I believe him. He's doing his best to help."
"Well then, convince him to let us out of here," Cho suggested, "Let us figure out what happened on our own."
"I don't have to be a diplomat to think a bunch of humans running around an alien city that thinks we killed their queen is a bad idea." Rivera scoffed and shook her head, "We can't do anything but cooperate."
Just as Penny was settling down on the floor next to the others, the door opened. Penny stood, expecting Tau, but it was only the soldiers with no sign of the commander.
"Where's Tau?" Penny asked, moving closer, thinking he would be behind them. Instead, with a buzz of alien language, they closed around her and began shuffling her towards the door.
"Hey, not this again!" Rivera called as the others got to their feet.
"I'll be fine!" Penny insisted quickly before anyone could get hurt, "Just wait for me!"
With that, she was hurried out and down a series of corridors that grew narrower and more winding with every step. Soon it truly began to feel that she was descending into a hive. The walls were no longer inoffensive waxy white, but bare comb, warped and wavering, carved with holes where corridors branched or rooms were dug. It felt like being in a cavern. At last they brought her to one such door in the comb and led her through it.
The room beyond was too dark for her to see in, but the lack of light didn't seem to bother them as they pushed her forward, sending her stumbling ahead of them. Trying to straighten up, she found the ceiling too low for her to stand.
She expected them to grab her and begin moving her once more, but instead, she heard only a metal click and the sound of feet retreating. Beginning to suspect what had just happened, Penny turned after them and was quickly met with cold bars. She felt her way around the walls and found bars on every side. She'd been locked in a cage.
It felt like hours, sitting in the dark, waiting to find out what would happen to her, what was happening to her team. She cried more than once. The bottom of the cage was well lined with soft, mossy feeling squares that seemed to be some kind of pillow and she clung to them for some kind of comfort, unable to help feeling constantly on edge, waiting for something to come out of the dark for her.
After what seemed like forever, she heard the quiet rush of a door sliding aside and the lights returned. She squinted in the light, waiting for her eyes to adjust, until the silhouette of Aiten Tau swam into view. He was removing his helmet, setting it aside.
"You have been performing the upset gesture again," he said, frowning as he looked at her tear stained face.
"Of course I have!" Penny sobbed, close to crying again, "You left me in the dark with no explanation for hours! I was told your rulers want to execute me this morning! Do you have any idea what I thought was happening?"
Tau's frown deepened.
"This was not what I intended."
"And how can I understand you?" Penny asked, scrubbing at her eyes, finding absolutely everything upsetting right now, "I don't have a translator chip."
"The cage is equipped with the translator technology. As long as you are within it, I will understand you."
Once again, Penny was reminded of just how different 'understanding' was from 'comprehending.' He understood her words, but not what they meant in context, or the feelings she was trying to convey.
"Why am I here?" she asked with a weary sigh, exhausted by the stress, "Why have you put me in a cage?"
"The regency was concerned if we kept you with your swarm, you might organize against us," Tau explained, "It was decided that the best course of action was to separate you. And as my primary objective at this time is to learn your motivations for the attack, the most prudent course of action seemed to be to store you here in my quarters. This is also safer for you, as many have taken offense to your continued existence."
Penny felt dizzy. So not only did the government want her dead, people who disagreed with the government wanted her dead even faster.
"This is your room?"
Penny latched on to the only information she felt she could do anything with, peering past him at the room around her. Her cage appeared to be in the center of a wide room.
One of the cradle shaped beds filled one corner. A counter like surface folded out of the wall on another. It was all very bare. She saw nothing that looked personal or decorative. Maybe they didn't believe in that sort of thing here. They didn't seem to be a society that encouraged individualism.
"This will make protecting and interrogating you much more efficient," Tau answered, and then stood, crossing to one of the walls, "Is the cage sufficient? Is there anything you need?"
He slid back a section of wall and a cabinet came forward into the space. He began removing his armor a section at a time.
"I need to go back to my team," Penny replied, shaking the bars in front of her, "They're going to think you've killed me! They understand what's happening here even less than I do. Your people don't even talk to them! You can't just leave them in the dark and expect them not to try something."
"They are not in the dark," Tau frowned, pausing in
removing a jointed section of his shoulder armor, "The cell is well lit."
Penny pursed her lips in annoyance.
"No. It means being left in confusion, not knowing what's going on. Humans hate that. The last they heard, I was scheduled for execution and they weren't going to be far behind. They WILL try something dangerous if they think their lives are in jeopardy."
Tau had removed most of the armor from his torso by now, laying the pieces carefully in drawers within the cabinet. The underside of the armor appeared to be padded, and beneath it he wore a simple white tunic, the fabric loose and shimmery, presumably made of the same stuff as the robes he'd given her for the trial. His frown deepened as he struggled to understand her words.
"But you are their leader?" he said, confusion in his tone as he began removing the lower part of his armor.
"No, I'm not," Penny rubbed at her temples, taking a deep breath, "We're a team. We work together. Rivera is more in charge than I am, but she defers to me for matters of diplomacy, because I'm the ship's ambassador."
"Ambassador," Tau repeated, pausing with a chitin plate in his hand, "This word is not translating well."
"I'm someone who's trained to help different groups of people get along," Penny tried to explain, "Your queen is your leader, right? Are there other queens, in other parts of the planet?"
Tau looked baffled.
"No," he replied, "There is only one queen. She has different bodies, different shells that she works through, distributed across the planet. But there is only one."
That rather disrupted Penny's metaphor.
"You're commander of the military, aren't you?" Penny tried again, "Who do you fight?"
"Anything that threatens the hive," he answered at once, "The Wasp-kind. Off worlders. Rogues."
"Well, say you wanted to make a deal with the Wasp-kind," Penny tried, "An ambassador is who you would send to talk to them, to make sure you could make a deal without fighting."
"You cannot deal with Wasp-kind," Tau seemed just as confused, "They are Queen-less animals."
Penny sighed.
"Off worlders, then," Penny begged Tau to understand, "The person you would send to talk to and understand the offworlders. You, Tau, you are your people's ambassador."
Tau stared at her thoughtfully for a long moment. He'd removed his armor completely now. As Penny looked at him from this distance, just far enough away not to be able to see his hands or the compound cells of his eyes or the strange texture of his hair clearly, she could hardly tell he wasn't a human man, broad shouldered and strong jawed. Nothing like the delicate winged males at all. He looked powerful.
On earth, she was certain he would have been all too popular. He was looking at her with those intense, reflective eyes, shining almost amethyst in the light.
"We are the same." he said, the words loaded with meaning Penny didn't understand.
"Yes," she replied, then realized they'd gone off track and hurried to recover, "Which is why it's pointless to separate me from my team. They can and will operate just fine without me."
"I see," Tau blinked, straightening up and setting the last piece of his armor in the cabinet. He removed another set of plain white clothes from the drawers, then closed it, the wall sliding back into place again, "Then, we must separate them all from each other."
"No!" Penny huffed in frustration, "That will just make them even more desperate!"
"How can they do anything if they are alone?" Tau asked, frowning.
"Trust me," Penny hung onto the bars, her expression serious, "If you divide us we just fight harder. That's what humans do."
"Interesting." Tau said without emotion, then turned and opened a door that blended so seamlessly with the wall Penny hadn't even known it was there.
"I am going to bathe," he said, "If you wish to bathe as well, I have restraints."
"No thank you," Penny shook her head, not wanting to find out what his restraints were like, "I had plenty of bathing earlier today."
He nodded and left. Penny heard water running beyond the door and was glad their species had at least things like that in common.
When he returned, not long after, she was examining the mossy pillow things, wondering what they were made of.
Tau went to the area with the counter and opened another hidden cabinet, removing two objects the size of softballs. He handed one to her through the bars, then sat on the edge of the cradle bed with the other.
"We examined your food," he explained as Penny turned the soft, waxy sphere over in her hands, "And synthesized a suitable nutrient replacement. It should be able to be processed by your system and contain no allergens, but we could not do much testing, for obvious reasons."
"Okay, but how do you eat it?" Penny asked, baffled, as she stared at the weird shape. Tau, by way of demonstration, punched a nail through the soft wax surface to make a hole, then tipped the sphere up and drank from it.
"The container is also edible," he explained, licking his lips as Penny scraped a hole into the orb, "And nutritious. Please inform me if you require more."
Penny tipped the sphere up and a sweet liquid poured out into her mouth.
"Tastes like honey," she gave a short, tired laugh, "Why am I not surprised?"
It had an aftertaste of spices, ginger and nutmeg, and tingled on her lips like mint. Not at all unpleasant, and when she'd drunk the orb's contents she felt as satisfied as if she'd just had a full meal. She pinched off a bit of the container and tried it too. It tasted fine, but the waxy texture dismayed her.
"Do you want the rest of this?" she offered it to Tau through the bars and he accepted it with a grateful nod, having just finished his own.
"So," Penny propped up some of the pillows behind her, fidgeting, "When does the interrogation begin?"
"I am still acquiring the means to explain to you your crimes," Tau said, breaking the orb into pieces and popping part into his mouth, "The need for it took time to explain. But there is still time before the hour of rest. We can begin now."
"And how do we begin?" Penny asked, a little worried.
"Please tell me about Humans," Tau asked, "A better understanding of your species can only help."
The question was so polite that for a moment Penny was confused. But he was right. Better understanding each other could only help.
"Well..." Penny hummed thoughtfully, unsure how to word things, "Humans are mammals, if that means anything to you."
"We have many on this planet," Tau confirmed, "But none intelligent. Small furry creatures that bear live young."
"Exactly," Penny was relieved there was a point of reference for him at least, "Humans also bear live young. We live in small family groups, usually a mated pair, their young, and parents or siblings of the mated pair, though that depends. The family groups tend to gather together. So you'll have many family groups living near each other and working together. When one of these collections of groups, these herds, gets big enough, one of the people will become a leader and begin making decisions for the whole herd.
Sometimes there are fights over who will be leader. Sometimes, someone becomes a leader and then decides the herd will fight other herds, for resources or because they don't like each other. But that doesn't happen very often anymore, because the biggest herds have all decided to make peace and cooperate. Almost all of my team came from different big herds, which we call countries, because all of those countries agreed on wanting to follow your signal and find out what your species was like."
"How strange," Tau frowned as he listened, and Penny feared much of it was going over his head, "And inefficient. Why do they fight over leadership? It should be obvious who the most fit leader is. And why do the countries remain separate if they aren't fighting anymore? Wouldn't it be easier to just make all your species into one country?"
"It probably would be," Penny agreed, "But we would lose something as well. Every country is made of smaller groups, which are in turn made up of families, and every country an
d every group and every family has cultures and traditions and ways of living that are completely unique.
For humans, things that are rare and different are very special. We want to preserve all of these different ways of living, so that every person can look back and say- This is what my family does. This is how my people have done things for generations.
This is the art and music and food and lifestyle that shapes who I am. Like this, every single person's life becomes a unique experience, and therefore rare and special and valued. If we all became one country, it might be harder to hold on to those differences that we value."
Tau's frown was growing. Penny could tell he was having trouble understanding.
"How do you manage to do anything," he muttered, "How can you get anything done, when you are all different? You cannot be of one mind. You cannot work as a unit."
"We can," Penny tried to explain, "We can be unique and still cooperate."
He shook his head like that idea was ludicrous and there must be some other explanation.
"Tell me about your castes," he said, "You are an ambassador. Are the others on your team ambassadors as well? They look the same. What is the class that can become leaders? Is it similar to how the winged males can become regents in the absence of a mature Queen?"
Penny shook her head.
"I think you've misunderstood," she said, "We don't have castes. Any human can be an ambassador or a leader or a worker. And at any time they can stop being any of those things and become something else. Biologically, all humans are more or less the same."
"But if you don't have a leader caste, how can you know a human is suited to be a leader? How can a worker have any of the skills necessary to- Your species does not make sense, Penny Allyn."
He seemed frustrated.
"That's probably true," Penny laughed, "But that's how it works."
Tau was quiet for a long moment, thinking.
"So, you have large groups with a leader," he said, piecing things together, "Like a hive. And you have many hives on your planet, as different from each other as we are from the Wasp-kind. And sometimes they fight."
Alien Romance: Caged By The Alien: Scifi Alien Abduction Romance (Alien Romance, Alien Invasion Romance, BBW) (Celestial Mates Book 4) Page 6