by Anna Lewis
“But why?” Talia pushed, fascinated to finally get at least some of the answers that had been plaguing her for years. She’d never understood anything about this war, and she couldn’t wait to finally have some knowledge – maybe if she ever got the hell out of here, she could use that knowledge to help her survive better!
“We’ve been doing it for a very long time now; centuries in your Earth time. I don’t know the exact reason we do it, only that we do it,” he said with a shrug. “I have heard that we destroyed our own planet a long time ago, but I have also heard that our overlords at the time simply got bored. Rumor also has it that we actually lost our own world during a war. Perhaps I’ll never know the full truth. Everyone who knew is now long gone themselves, as are the records. The only life I’ve ever known is not having a homeworld, trying to find somewhere to settle.”
“So why haven’t you found one yet?” Talia snapped back unhappily. “Why are you here? Why have none of the other planets been good enough?”
“Some of us have settled in other places,” he admitted. “Our race is now scattered all over the galaxy, but most of us want something better. Earth however has everything that we need. It’s the right temperature for us, it has the right amenities, and you humans have built it up well too, so it really is optimum for us.”
“So why do it in the way you did?” she insisted, needing to know. “Why did you pretend that you were humans for so long? And why wasn’t that enough?”
“For a lot of us it was,” he told her, shocking her to the core. “A lot of us wanted to continue living in that way, content to blend in and continue living among you, but those in charge decided that our technology was now developed enough and that we knew the humans well enough to strike against you when we did.” He sighed deeply, shaking his head, suggesting that he was one of the ones who didn’t want this after all. “What they hadn't realized was how strong the human race was, how little they’d actually figured out. We have never been in a war for this long, and I’m honestly not sure if we’re going to win. You humans seem to outwit us at every turn.”
At this comment, Talia couldn’t help but grin back at him. He might have been the enemy, the one that she’d been fighting for all this time, but in a weird way she felt a similar affinity with him in the way she had Bonnie. It was almost as if she didn’t know how to connect with humans, and that she had more in common with the Ec’dua. It wasn’t a comfortable thought, but it seemed to be much too true.
She also felt a bolt of happiness at the prospect of winning. She didn’t want the humans to have fought for so long, just to lose. That didn’t feel right to her. She wanted to be victorious, to reclaim the planet, even if it meant that she wouldn’t be around to see it. She might die in this alien prison, but as long as she knew that the humans were going to win, it wouldn’t feel like such a waste after all.
“I appreciate that you need my DNA,” she said. She decided to try and reason with this guy, wondering if there might actually be a way for her to get out after all. If she could, then she definitely would. Especially if the fighting was going to come to a head soon enough – that was something that she certainly wanted to be involved in! “But this isn’t the sort of place that I should be. I don’t do well with being cooped up. All I know is fighting. I think that you would be much better off letting me go.”
“I know Talia,” he said, in a way that was much too reassuring. “But I have no authority. I’m sorry. I know that this isn’t an environment that suits you, and I appreciate that you want to get out of here. Believe me when I say that I would like that for you too. But it really isn’t up to me. I have a rank and a title, but there are plenty of people above me that would have my head for setting you free. You have the much-needed DNA of a very strong person, so you must stay here.”
“Wait, how do you know my name?” she gasped out angrily, focusing only on that part. “How is that fair? I don’t know yours!”
“Mind reading is just one of the skills that we have… only it doesn’t always work. It only works when there is a bond there.”
“I see,” she said. She thought it through for a second, realizing that in a way that made a lot of sense. There had been times when Bonnie seemed to know what she was thinking, even when it made no sense to what was going on around them. She concentrated so much on that part, that it didn’t hit her that he had just suggested that they actually had a bond too.
“And my name is B,” said the alien.
“B what?” She asked, very taken aback. She couldn’t believe that he’d actually told her, and she also found his name incredibly weird. It was just a letter.
“Just B. that’s it.”
“That’s what you were called when you were parading as a human? What did you tell people it stood for?”
“I didn’t,” he shrugged casually, as if it didn’t matter. “I told them what I’m telling you – it’s just B. I think people liked it because it made me something of an enigma.”
Talia tried to imagine herself meeting B as if he were a human, and she felt like the mystery of that strange name would drive her insane, probably keeping her dangling on the hook for him. He was probably right, it probably did work for him over and over again.
She shook that thought from her mind, trying to focus on the present moment, and that danger that she was currently in, before she spoke out again.
“Right B,” she asked, pressing her full-figured body up against the bars, wanting to try and get a sense of him when he answered this question. “When do you think I’ll finally be getting out of here?”
But the sad look that he gave her was enough to have her certain… she was going to die here. There was no hope, it didn’t matter what she did. This place would be her graveyard.
***
Talia would have much preferred to be stubborn and difficult, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself from building a bond with B while he worked with her. He took her blood, ran the tests on her, and even fed her every single night. During that time, they talked, they laughed, they joked, and they actually became closer. It might have been an unlikely situation, but it really couldn’t be helped. She tried to stop herself more than once, to hold herself back, but then he would say something that she liked and the cycle would begin all over again.
She hated being locked up. She felt like she was much more suited to being out in the middle of the empty world where she could fight and defend herself, killing off the enemy in the process, but there was no denying that she enjoyed B’s company so much so. He was just so easy to get on with, and with his amazing human looks, it was hard to remember who he really was. Often she found herself fluttering in ways that drove her crazy. She had to remind herself that he wasn’t someone that she should even like, never mind actually want to be around. He was the enemy.
Sometimes as she stared into his deep green eyes, and she admired the dimples that popped up on his cheeks as he smiled, her brain would become scrambled and confused. Sometimes when he stood near her, with his strong, muscular frame, she felt smaller and softer than she ever did, and she was not a small woman. When he brushed her long dark hair off of her skin; which was regaining its luster from the good food she was eating, and stroked her cheek as he stuck the needles into her body, she felt a little weird and squishy inside. That was something she’d never experienced before. It made her a little uncomfortable around him, but it also made her feel like she never wanted him to leave either. It was all very confusing.
She even started to fantasize about him. Sometimes she found she really had to hold herself back.
Because she’d all but accepted that this place was going to be where she ended up dying, she decided to focus more on her confused feelings about him, rather than her impending doom, because it felt like a much lighter topic. But despite all the time she had on her hands, and all the hours that she spent alone, she still couldn’t quite work it out. Why was she seemingly so attracted to him? What was it about the alien race tha
t drew her in so much? Why did she find them so much easier to connect with than humans?
Was there something wrong with her?
***
“So… what’s happening now?” said Talia, shyly. She wanted to have something else to talk about, something to distract her from the craziness going on inside of her, as he sat opposite her having finished up her tests for the day. “Out there I mean? Is the DNA helping?”
She laughed a little awkwardly, knowing that she was stepping on dangerous territory, but at the same time needing to know. Even if she was going to die, she wanted the humans to win. She wanted to know that her race wasn’t about to die out. If she could go knowing that at least something positive was happening, she felt like she could be okay with it. She wanted to know just how much of an impact these ruthless, endless tests were having on the war effort – she hated helping the enemy, but there wasn’t anything that she could do about that!
“Do you want the truth?” B asked her, giving her a curious look. “Are you sure?”
She gulped down anxiously, not liking the sound of that at all, before nodding quickly. Whatever it was, however bad things were, she would much rather be in the know. She was very aware that knowledge was power, and she felt like that was still true even if she was on her death bed.
“Things have taken a very unexpected turn. The humans seem to have something new, something that can beat us,” he sighed sadly, looking at her with an intense hurting stare. “I really don’t know if we’re going to be able to win this one. And if we don’t, we may end up wiped out. That might be our own fault, but I feel bad about it. I feel bad about the ones like me, the ones that don’t agree with the war effort.”
“R… right,” she stammered cautiously, not knowing how she should react to this. Of course she was happy, and it gave her a glimmer of hope that she might be able to get out of here alive, but somehow it felt bad to rub that in B’s face, when he was so clearly devastated by this. So she simple said, “I see.”
She felt a little bad too about all of the Ec’dua race dying out. Most of them could go to hell as far as she was concerned, but B, and the other good guys he’d mentioned, they didn’t deserve that.
“I just… I like it here,” he told her honestly, staring deep into her eyes. “I like Earth and the human race. This war was never what I wanted. It’s never been what I thought was right. I hate that it’s gotten so out of hand. I don’t want to go back out there, without a home. I don’t want to have to hunt for a new planet because I will never find anywhere that I find so comfortable as Earth. I will never find anywhere that I feel so at home. That’s all I want, a home of my own.”
Talia’s heart pounded heavily in her chest as she considered this. She’d spent so long focusing on getting through the war that she’d never actually considered what it would be like afterwards, and B had forced her to do so.
What would she do when the war was over and the aliens left? How would she go back to a normal life? She did not even know what a normal life was. She had known nothing but fighting and war almost all of her life. And there were millions like her. How would they move on? Would they rebuild some form of society and take on job-like positions to help one another? How would that work for the ones like her who had been kids when the war begun?
Talia wasn’t sure that she could live like that, close to other people, doing ordinary everyday things. She felt like she’d become too ingrained with fighting, too used to battling everyone. How would she recover from that?
All of a sudden, she started to believe that maybe she was meant to die in that alien base, so that she wouldn’t have to face the uncertain post-war future. She started to believe that this had to be her destiny. Maybe it wasn’t what she wanted, but maybe it was what she needed.
“Yeah,” she murmured distractedly back to B. “I know what you mean.”
He gave her an intense look, as if a million and one thoughts were circling around in his brain, and for a terrifying second she wondered if he was about to say something that would throw absolutely everything else in the air. Her heart raced, her mouth ran dry, and her entire body began to tremble with anticipation…
Bang, bang, bang…
But then they heard a series of bangs, and they jumped up from where they were sitting, both looking as panicked as one another.
“What the hell was that?” Talia asked, her eyes darting about.
“It’s starting,” B confirmed. “They have come for us.”
***
B grabbed Talia’s hand and dragged her away from the danger that was so clearly heading their way. Her mind was everywhere.
“The humans are here,” he yelled, seemingly not considering the fact that Talia was a human too. “They’re going to destroy everything. We need to get out of here. We must leave everything behind and run.”
Talia was aware that the smart thing to do would be to pull away from B and to go and join her own people, her own race, but she was also acutely aware that if she did that she would never see B again – and for some reason that filled her with an intense sadness. She just wasn’t quite ready to say goodbye yet, no matter how crazy that was.
She didn’t want to analyze it, but her brain was doing so anyway, needing to find a reason why she was no longer acting smart, and why she was allowing her heart to rule out. Maybe it was because she had never really felt the same connection with anyone else before. Maybe it was because she’d spent her entire life pushing everyone else away, but somehow B had managed to sneak his way in. Even if it was because of their intense situation, that had thrown them together. She had still opened up and let him in.
As she finally found herself out in the cold air, reality slapped her in the face once more. Everything came to a head, and the fog simply melted away, leaving only a stark reality instead.
“What are we going to do?” she pleaded with B, unable to stop herself from noticing that he was much more handsome in natural light. “Where do we go now?”
“I don’t know,” he told her honestly, looking just as scared as she felt. She supposed that it was probably worse for him because she was merely a prisoner escaping, whereas he had broken her out.
Then again, if any humans found her with him, they wouldn’t take too kindly to it either. There was no winning here, they both just needed to run.
“Okay,” she nodded, panting heavily and trying to take control. “Let’s just… keep moving. We’ll find somewhere to hide out and make a plan.”
“Sounds good,” he agreed. “Let’s go.” Then he slipped his hand into hers and they ran as fast as their legs would carry them.
Her heart raced as they moved, millions of thoughts crashing through her brain, but she wasn’t trying to stop on any single one of them. This was crazy, it was insane, but she didn’t have any choice now… her decision had been made. She was with B now.
***
Talia quickly led B to a house where she’d hidden out a short while before she’d been captured, when she’d gotten a very bad cold, and she didn’t feel up to fighting. It was hidden in the depths of the woods and she hadn't been disturbed the entire time she was there last time, so she felt it would be safe. It was the only closed-off place that she knew about anyway, so in the heat of the moment, it was there or nothing.
Plus, in a weird way, she liked the house because it was like a shrine to the old world. It had somehow managed to remain pretty well preserved, which meant that it was more comfortable than anywhere else. There were chairs, beds, home comforts, and she’d actually been sad to leave it all behind. It felt kind of nice to be back there again, although strange to have someone on her arm, and an alien at that.
“Wow,” B commented in awe as they stepped through the doors. “This is nice. What a good find!”
“Somewhere pretty nice to hang out while we decide what to do,” Talia shrugged, trying to seem blasé, to hide the crazy emotions that were going on inside of her. Why did she suddenly feel so weird about being a
lone with B? They’d been spending the last few weeks pretty much by themselves. Why was this so different?
She supposed that it was likely because things had changed within her, and that her feelings had teetered into something inappropriate and now they were in a much weirder, closer position where that could quickly become obvious. There were no more bars, no more separations between them. It was just her and him in that house, and they were very equal, able to do anything that they wanted.
That freedom was absolutely terrifying.
Talia honestly had no idea how B would react if she told him how she was feeling, and that was awful. A small part of her was actually afraid that he might like her too, which would leave her in an extremely vulnerable position. She would have feelings for someone, a sizzling chemistry, and he would have it back, and they wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. They were completely different species, and their peoples were enemies. However strongly they felt, however much they wanted to be together, they just couldn’t.
It would also be very crushing to find out that he didn’t like her either – in fact, that might even be a whole lot worse!
“What do you want to do for now?” B asked Talia, sounding about as confused as she felt. “Do we rest? Do you want to eat? Do we start making our plan?”
“My head isn’t in the right place for making a solid plan right now,” Talia admitted, her nerves all over the place. “I just want to…”
Then it hit her! She remembered seeing a bottle of vodka the last time that she was here, and if there was anything that could dull her feelings, and make things a little easier between her and B, it was that. She’d never tasted booze before because she’d always wanted to be completely aware of her surroundings, but things had changed now, and she thought it was right.
She raced into the kitchen and grabbed the bottle, before taking it back into the front room. There she showed B the bottle, and rather than looking bewildered, B nodded.