by Li Hill
Table of Contents
Universal Chemistry
Book Details
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
About the Author
Universal Chemistry
LI HILL
In the aftermath of the First Contact Skirmishes, all Tom wants is to practice law and forget about aliens. Instead, he gets Iilo, an alien who comes to his office with a shoebox and a mystery.
Iilo, smart and determined, persuades Tom to help figure out why Iilo's people have gone missing—by way of promising to reveal something Tom doesn't know about himself.
Universal Chemistry
By Li Hill
Published by Less Than Three Press LLC
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission of the publisher, except for the purpose of reviews.
Edited by Cora Walker
Cover designed by Kirby Crow
This book is a work of fiction and all names, characters, places, and incidents are fictional or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people, places, or events is coincidental.
First Edition September 2018
Copyright © 2018 by Li Hill
Printed in the United States of America
Digital ISBN 9781684313464
Print ISBN 9781684313938
This book is dedicated to my friends, Helene and Adrienna. Thank you for your sleepless nights helping me in this project and for telling me to kill my darlings. To my editors at Less Than Three Press, thank you for making my debut novel one of the highlights of my life and for toning down the amount of times I mentioned Iilo's blue skin and freckles. Lastly, thank you to my family. It is you who encouraged me to look up at the stars and dare to dream for more.
Chapter One
"There's an alien in the waiting room."
When Tom Raddoc had opened his private legal practice, he hadn't imagined ever hearing that sentence. He knew the I'na would need legal help just as any human did, but he'd never thought he would actually see one in his tiny waiting room. Six years since they'd come, and he hadn't seen one yet.
Until today.
"Carlos? In here?" Tom jerked his head toward his office, and Carlos followed. Carlos always followed.
A thread pulled between them, never letting either venture too far away from the other. When the thread tugged, they both felt it. Tom liked to think best friends all had invisible threads holding them together. Their thread was made of iron, and when it pulled, Tom knew something was wrong.
Right now, it pulled.
"Amigocho?" Carlos quirked a brow at Tom. He crossed his arms over his chest, a frown aging his boyish face.
"I—I just need a moment." Tom clutched his desk, the only thing in the world that wasn't spinning. Whatever he felt for the I'na, they'd earned it during First Contact. They'd been the bad guys. Tom remembered it—the running. Sweat and fear stinking up the air.
"Take your time." Carlos brought him back to the present, his hands over Tom's. "I remember it too."
"I shouldn't be so scared. I know it's over, and yet I can't stop feeling my gun in my hands."
Carlos squeezed Tom's hand. Carlos had the kind of soul that could reach out and touch someone. His very aura was a salve against broken skin.
"You haven't seen them since First Contact. It's totally okay to be a little nervous." He grabbed a bottle of water from the mini fridge Tom kept in his office, which had Maurer School of Law written across the front, and nudged it toward Tom.
He could hear the whisper of claws scampering in the night. First Contact. First fucking Contact. All because some guy with a rifle had shot an I'na in his backyard.
"And his name's Iilo."
"Iilo. There's an Iilo in my waiting room. An I'na Iilo."
Carlos laughed.
Tom had taken an oath to serve justice and help people, to combat injustice in the community. He'd written that in his admission statement. The notions sometimes seemed so far away when he had bills and taxes to pay.
Carlos reached a hand out, squeezing Tom's shoulder. "You want me to tell him no?"
The I'na were on humanity's side now. Maybe Iilo could be a reminder of why Tom had become a lawyer in the first place.
"No. I had my moment." He slipped his eyes closed and leaned into Carlos's hand. Thank whatever god existed for Carlos and his unending patience, his profound goodness. Whatever Tom had done to deserve a friend like Carlos, he still wasn't sure, but he was damn glad of it.
"I told him you're not taking walk-ins today and he didn't take well to that. Did you know when they get angry, their faces flush pink?"
Tom didn't. All he knew is they were from a planet called Inaan and what they looked like. He knew they ran fast, had sharp teeth, and in close quarters, they were dangerous. But that wasn't what they were now. Humans were as dangerous as the I'na. The world might not have known how to handle the I'na, but the world was at least trying. Tom would take a walk-in today, even if he should've been prepping for a divorce hearing.
"Right."
There was no use in keeping Iilo waiting. Tom needed to stop running from his problems. All it ever got him was a laundry list of medications and an ulcer.
Tom straightened his tie, staring at the atrocious eighties wallpaper that someone had had the gall to slap up when the building got its only remodel. He wanted to rip it down. Or disappear into it. He grabbed a tissue before leaving his office to dab his clammy forehead.
"Proud of you, Amigocho," Carlos said.
Tom came out of his office clutching his water bottle. He looked at Iilo, almost surprised by his delicacy. Tom had forgotten that the first thing he'd noticed about the I'na was their beauty. He'd lost it in the onslaught of screams he carried to bed at night.
Iilo had blue skin, a stark contrast to the dull yellow wallpaper around him. Like all I'na, he had exposed bone behind a pointed ear on one side of his head to show off his ID marker—or at least that was the translation. It traced along his face like a human's hairline before disappearing beneath midnight blue hair that hung in lazy waves.
He couldn't stop staring, marveling at how still Iilo was. The I'na hadn't been so still when they were chasing Tom down, threatening him and his squad's life.
Tom sucked in a sharp breath that seemed to startle Iilo.
"Oh. Sorry. Iilo?" His voice wasn't calm or steady. It cracked like it had in high school. He wanted to squeeze his throat shut so that wouldn't happen again. He didn't want Iilo to know he was scared. In every class Tom had ever taken on client relationships, being kind and compassionate was the goal. Being afraid wasn't compassion.
Being afraid was wrong. Tom hated it.
"You're Tom Raddoc, right?" Iilo stood up. His long neck tilted, muscles working as he tried to come up with something to say. He clutched a beat-up shoebox.
Tom couldn't remember how to answer. Iilo wasn't attacking him like the I'na had done i
n First Contact; he was just speaking—like any other person.
"The attorney? The one from the army?"
So much for all those classes. He could see all the words he'd scribbled into his notebooks falling out his ears. "Uh, yeah."
Iilo shuffled forward, his elongated fingers tapping on his little shoebox. Hewas nervous too. It gave Tom the strength to offer a smile and reach his hand out.
He stared at Tom's hand before muttering something in a language Tom didn't understand. "Oh, right! Handshake." Iilo snatched Tom's hand. His fingers were cool. "I'na touch our eu'ee together."
"Your ewwies together?"
"ID. The IDs! Sorry. I just—hate your language."
"Oh, really?" Tom crossed his arms, but he was smiling.
"No, I mean, I'm sorry. I just find it limiting. There's just a lot that we can't translate. But anyway, I live outside of Seward at the I'na compound?" He looked to Tom for confirmation.
"Sure. It's, uh—it's real neat what you all did on that land." The I'na built up compounds, preferring to mostly keep to themselves, and Tom didn't fault them for it. They lived among repurposed spaceships and scraps of decommissioned equipment the United States had no use for. Tom remembered the Seward compound looking like metal teeth jutting from the ground with wires exposed.
"Oh." Iilo's face flushed purple, like ink dripping into water. "Thank you. It was a community effort. Can we talk? Well, we are talking, but I mean about something specific? I have—we need—" Iilo furrowed his brow. His ID mark glowed brighter, and his face deepened in purple. A humanoid chameleon, Tom thought. He looked at Tom with orange irises. The color didn't bother Tom. The black sclera though? That only reminded Tom of how close he'd once been to an I'na trying to kill him.
Iilo—was not that I'na. And Tom felt easier thinking about it like that.
"There's something wrong," Iilo said.
"That tends to be why people see lawyers."
Iilo smirked, rolling his eyes. "Carlos warned you were sassy."
"Hey! I'm not sassy." Tom bit his lower lip to keep from finding a way to jab back. He'd do it if Iilo was Carlos, but Iilo wasn't Carlos. He was—maybe—soon to be the first I'na client Tom ever had.
"How did you read about me? Google reviews?" Tom knew talking about the mundane often helped clients open up. From the way Iilo stood, his shoulders hunched and his fingers digging into the shoebox, he wasn't ready to speak.
Tom tilted his head to the side. He looked over to Carlos's desk. Carlos was typing away as if nothing was even wrong. But he listened. Carlos always listened.
"Yeah, something like that." He tapped his little shoebox, inching forward. "If I don't tell you what's wrong now, I'll never tell you, so—please?" His gaze slid to Carlos.
Carlos sighed. He knew full well he'd been busted.
"Sure, right this way." Tom started walking. "But I need to keep the door open."
"I don't want—"
"I was part of First Contact. Army."
Iilo's face drained of color to become a somber silver like the moon, but his expression showed no surprise. It was hollow, unnerving. He looked to his shoebox, and the color came back to his face.
Tom had never realized how animated the I'na's whole bodies were. It wasn't just their facial expressions. Their very skin spoke languages far more sophisticated than English. He took a seat behind his desk and watched Iilo sit, still clutching that shoebox.
What was in the shoebox? Tom's immediate thought was a bomb, but he shook the thought away. Iilo showed no signs of wanting to hurt Tom. This wasn't First Contact. This was a new beginning.
"When we found your Voyager, we needed someone to understand it. A team of us began translating it. So I was there when peace talks began. I was useful enough then." His hands sprawled over the shoebox.
Tom frowned. Useful. He picked up on the word, wondering what made Iilo feel useless now. Tom had felt useless after First Contact. Banged up, terrified, and told he didn't have to serve anymore if he didn't want to. He hadn't, but that meant starting a whole new life. He'd felt—useless. Tom jotted a note down to ask about why Iilo felt useless once it was his turn to speak.
"Your government lied to you."
"Come again?" Tom nearly choked on his tongue.
Iilo was silent.
"Usually when someone starts off with the punchline, they gotta go back and tell the beginning. So say that one more time?"
"First Contact wasn't just a skirmish. It was an experiment."
"I'm—" Tom looked to Carlos through the door. He felt sick, too aware of his pulse in his throat.
Carlos was frozen at his desk too.
"Physical differences aside, there's biological and chemical makeup differences in our species. It was a good way to know how we'd react to each other. So certain, uh—what's the word? The group, but bigger than the small group?"
"Platoons? Squad? Troop? Team?"
"Troop! Troops were given various orders and experiments were conducted. Disease contraction. Bacteria. What our technology could do. You name it, someone was studying it."
"I'm a—look." Tom wiped his hand down his face. "If you want a divorce or a will, I can help you out, but this is just too much. I don't wanna hear this." Tom had ranked to Corporal not by questioning authority. He'd left the army broken and terrified. What Iilo claimed now both made Tom question authority and terrified him, so he didn't want to hear it. Ignorance was bliss, and Tom needed that ignorance.
There was a long pause, Tom exhausted, Iilo sulking.
"Coward," Iilo whispered.
"Excuse me?" Tom sat up straight. He'd dealt with disgruntled clients in the past, but hearing the word from Iilo was more than a slap to the face. He felt the bite of a blade hovering at his throat, a challenge unsung, a beckoning. He felt betrayed that Iilo couldn't—or refused to understand—what a suggestion like that meant for a guy like Tom. It wasn't rational to assume Iilo would know anything about PTSD or trauma, but Tom wasn't rational when it came to trauma. "Look around you. Am I in a bunker? Or at Fort Carson? No. I'm in Nebraska with a little shingle out on the door that says Raddoc, Family Law Attorney. I quit the army, and for good reason, and I don't want to hear what you have to say. If you think I'm a coward, fine, but I just—" His voice broke. "I can't."
Iilo bit his lip, shoulders shrinking in. He had a way of pulling at Tom's heartstrings, even if Tom didn't want him to. Everything about him was so damn honest.
"You're hurt from it." Iilo's words were a statement. Not a question.
Tom smiled, though the mirth didn't reach his eyes. "I could refer you to some other great attorneys. All of them less—involved than me." He looked out his door at Carlos, wondering what he made of all this. Did he want to hear? Or was he trying to run for the hills too?
"Someone's kidnapping us, and you can help stop it."
"Excuse me?" Carlos's voice asked.
Carlos was looking into the room, face wrinkling in that puppy-dog way it did when his brows pulled together. He'd been hit by the arrow of unconditional goodness, and there was nothing Tom could do to stop it. Tom, whether he wanted it or not, was part of this now. Because Carlos cared. If someone needed help? Carlos would be there, and Tom with him. Because that was just who they were.
Iilo's orange eyes glowed—black sclera a void into nothing. He had nothing to lose. He'd already lost it all.
Tom grabbed a pad and pen. He flicked his gaze to Carlos again, seeing the tiny smirk on his best friend's face. Tom wasn't sure what he could do, but a mentor had once said it wasn't about the signature on the fee agreement so much as just giving someone an ounce of help. A good point in the right direction could save a person if an attorney cared to listen. Luckily, Tom did.
"So you're people are going missing. Have you told the police? I don't want to assume what you know or don't about attorneys, but we're usually not on the crime-solving side. Usually our involvement comes after."
"It has to be you." Iilo's voice
shook. He clutched that shoebox to his cheek like it carried something precious inside.
"Why?"
"Because you lived. You killed one of us, and you lived."
"I'm sorry. What?"
Carlos moved to the doorway, his presence a comfort when Tom broke out in a clammy sweat.
"I don't mean to sound—aii sxue'e—threatening. Threatening. I'm trying to explain it. Our bodies produce different levels of acidity, and mine happens to have corrosive properties. You touched one of us, cut him, and nothing happened to you. Our blood is dangerous to humans."
Tom sucked in a sharp breath. He'd never thought about it that way. Not in a million years would he have thought someone's insides could hurt his outsides. They'd been given an order to keep far away in combat, but no one ever said why. Tom always assumed it was I'na weapons: they shot like lighting and the range was stupid. Tom looked at his fingers, curling them, remembering how they'd once held a knife, and what that knife did.
"I'm sorry," Tom said, because he apologized when he didn't know what else to say. Apologizing for a life taken felt arbitrary. Apologizing for being someone's villain in their story felt almost cruel. Tom couldn't take back what he'd done in the past. "I know we—"
"It was war." Iilo's voice had a hint of steel between the syllables. It flushed his skin, brought his shoulders wide. "People die in war. Both sides took loses."
It struck Tom as ironic in that the species who suffered the most losses was the one trying to comfort him. The I'na lost their weaponry, friends, and family. They'd lost their whole way of life when they came to Earth, yet Iilo wasn't blaming Tom for any of it. Tom had killed them. And one up close and personal. He'd felt the breath leave the I'na's body just before he died. The warmth of blood rushing down Tom's shirt.
As a boy, Tom had once learned a word from his father when they stood before the Vietnam Memorial Wall. Sonder. To look at a wall of names and think about the individual lives each person had. Favorite food. Color. Hopes and dreams. Tom felt that way every time he thought about the I'na he'd killed. Was there a family that still mourned? A lover who went to bed alone?
Tom's stomach turned to ice, and he winced. He should've cared more about his government using him and other military personnel as lab mice. But honestly, he wasn't surprised. It wasn't like it hadn't happened in the past, and he was damn sure it'd happen in the future. Tom didn't owe the United States government anything anymore: he'd fought that war already. But he did owe something to Iilo. To the people who knew the I'na he'd killed. The whole little nation of I'na. Their current population didn't make a dent in America, which only meant each life was that much more precious.