by Marie Dry
"The forestry department hasn't paid me either, but there's no reason for help to come. What's the news in town?" She tried to keep her breathing even but she knew he could feel her pulse racing.
"A rumor is going around that two spaceships came to Earth. James swears one crashed and another one landed somewhere up on the mountain."
"Oh, that's interesting, but--"
Zacar made a cutting motion with his hand and she quickly spoke into the TC, wishing she could see her friend's face. "I think my cell is about to give out. I just wanted to let you know I'm okay, Julia. I'm prepared as I meant to stay here this winter anyway. No need for help from anyone. I'll try to call again next week."
"Okay, my friend. I'm a call away. Don't let your memories of Adam--"
The young alien cut the connection before Julia could finish. Maybe it was better that way. From what she'd seen, being in town wasn't much safer than living in the cave. She and Julia both knew Adam would never try to come up the mountain to help her.
"Who is Adam?"
She gestured vaguely with her hand. "Nobody important."
He leaned down. "Who?"
"He's the sheriff in town. The authority who catches the bad guys," she said, tempted to add that he caught aliens, too.
"Did you come in two spaceships?" Would he tell her the truth?
"No." He didn't try to elaborate but simply looked at her with that expressionless face of his. He leaned over and touched her forehead briefly and she jerked her head away. He stared down at her for a moment before turning away and growling orders at the others.
Natalie turned to the TC COMM on the chest, with the holo menu hovering above it in glorious invitation. If he thought he could grab her around the throat then think she would allow any forehead hanky-panky, he had another think coming.
The aliens returned to their tasks, taking over her cave. Some of them pointed instruments at the wall, while another stacked away what looked like more equipment. Zacar took a sphere out of a pocket in his pants. He growled something her translator apparently didn't catch, because she didn't understand a word he said, and an image of the Earth hovered above his hand.
Natalie sidled closer but Zacar turned his shoulder until all she saw was his broad back. Again, she tried to inch around to see what he was doing. Her instincts told her that even if they had crashed and never meant to come to Earth, they were still dangerous to humanity.
Zacar walked away and she didn't have the courage to follow him.
At a loss as to what they expected her to do, she touched the 3D image above the wooden chest and chose an old Sci-fi movie. She preferred ancient movies that appeared flat, instead of three dimensional. Her grandmother told her that in the old days they used to show them in what they called movie theaters. That stopped when SoftCell introduced the first touch cell device.
Sinking down onto the red cushion, she sat with her knees drawn up and her chin resting on her arms.
A few minutes into the movie, Zacar's body enfolded hers and she jumped in fright. How did he manage to move so fast and never make a sound? His irresistible spice-and-pine scent surrounded her and she tingled everywhere he touched her. Delicious heat seeped into her back and into her legs where his thighs caged her.
When he did nothing but hold her, she relaxed and after a while almost managed to lose herself in the movie again. Though, his arousal, pressing intimately into her back, was rather distracting.
Sometime during the film, she became aware of the other aliens, sitting cross-legged, a little behind Zacar. Not one emotion crossed their faces as they stared at the TC movie. Did they secretly laugh at the human idea of what a spacecraft looked like? She couldn't blame them. It was a very old movie, after all.
She bit her lip, but simply couldn't resist saying, "You know, Darth Vader is Earth's strongest ally."
Four expressionless faces turned toward her. No one said anything until Zacar lifted her chin with a finger, his claw thankfully retracted. "We are not stupid." His voice was even more gravelly than normal, and his black eyes shot red sparks at her and his anger came as a surprise. He'd hissed the words right in her face and now he was glaring at her, close enough for her image to be reflected in his.
Natalie froze in place, not daring to breathe. "Uhh--I'm--Zacar, I never thought that. What I mean was, well, I was just teasing you." She'd never make that mistake again.
"Explain teasing."
"Well, humans like to tease each other, poke fun, you know." His blank look had her frantically searching her mind for a better way to explain it to him. "Normally, when we are comfortable with someone or like someone a lot, we tease them." She cast around in her mind for an example. "Like me saying Darth Vader is Earth's strongest ally, but he's not even real." She tried to move forward without seeming to.
His arm tightened, bringing her flush against him again. "You like Zacar?"
She stared. Was he serious? "Well...uh, you got me extra TC hours and you promised to protect me, so I guess I, uh, appreciate that. But normally, you have to know a person for a while before you get to like them." Honesty wasn't her friend in a situation like this.
"You will like me now," he said firmly.
"Ooookaaay." She wanted to tell him that you can't force someone to like you, but stopped when she noticed his irises were the black of a dark mountain night when only a sliver of moonlight cast a dim glow. Staring into them, she had that familiar feeling of falling into an endless void when she tried to see deeper. "Why are your eyes black now?"
Well, black with red flickering in there. She didn't know what was creepier, that they were red, then an endless inky black, or the fact they changed color at will.
"Red eyes are warrior eyes," he answered after a short hesitation.
"So when you fight, they turn red?"
Once again, a short hesitation. "Yes, warrior color."
"Okay. Does that mean you can see better? Like you have X-ray vision or something?" She leaned closer, mesmerized by the depth of his dark eyes. Her vision blurred. Blinking, she sat back. "They're red now. But no one is fighting in here." Hopefully, a nosy human isn't about to be killed. If those were warrior eyes, she was in trouble. Every time he looked at her, they turned red.
"We have breaking news about the ongoing raider problem."
Zacar's attention shifted abruptly from her to the TC image of the newscaster, hovering above the wooden chest. A picture of two women, staring dully in front of them, flashed on the screen before the newscaster, with his whiter than white smile, appeared again.
Natalie turned toward the hologram of the news program. "I wish someone would do something about them. How can they get away with something like that?"
She clenched her fists in frustration. Almost nightly, reports come in of their atrocities. For a moment, she forgot her own situation, her pressing need to escape, not caring that her voice was thick with tears.
"Natlia wish woumbers killed?"
"Woumbers?" He'd used that word before.
"Males with no honor."
"Well, yes. I think the things they've done are horrible and they don't deserve to walk on the Earth." It infuriated her that they could commit vicious crimes against women and get away with it.
"We will go now and kill the woumbers. You wait here. Watch cell." He set her aside and was on his feet before she saw him move.
"No, wait. What about the--" Before she could finish her sentence, they were gone. "--snow?"
Natalie ran to the cave entrance but the metal door they'd installed sealed smoothly in her face before she could follow them outside.
Didn't they feel the cold? Could they really be going to kill the raiders? How could they travel through such thick snow? And how would they even find the raiders?
Please don't let them come back with raider heads as trophies.
She stood on tiptoe and touched the wall where she'd seen Zacar place his hand. The door slid open, smooth and without a sound. Natalie gasped and stagg
ered back.
Cold, that could freeze her flesh in an instant, blew in the door. Snow had changed the landscape until it looked as if several small mountains were spread out before her.
Shivering, afraid she'd freeze before she could close the door, she leaned against the wall, reached up, and pressed her hand against the invisible panel. It slid closed with smooth precision and she sighed in relief.
How could they be out in that? Before the door closed, she'd seen something that had looked like tunnels through the snow, as if their bodies had cut through the snow like lasers. Did they plan on walking to the raider camp?
Natalie rubbed her arms and stamped her feet. With the metal door sealed, the cave was much warmer than she ever hoped to get it. But still, she felt cold.
This was her chance. Who knew when they would leave her alone again? She walked to the TC.
It took her hours, but eventually she managed to call up a grainy image of Julia. Natalie smiled at the image of her friend wavering in the air in front of her. Though, for some reason, she could see her friend's lips move, no sound came through.
Cold drifted over her skin and she looked up. Zacar stood in the entrance, arms crossed over his chest. She could feel the blood drain out of her face.
Her ears rang and, for a moment, she thought she'd faint again. He looked at the wavy picture of Julia then at her guilty face.
With extreme care, she disconnected the call.
Chapter 9
"I thought you'd be gone long--" Natalie slapped her hand across her mouth then tried to pretend she was wiping at her chin.
He stalked her. "That is obvious."
"Please don't hurt her," she said in a hoarse whisper.
In that moment, she knew why people did desperately shameful deeds. She would say anything, do anything, if it meant he wouldn't harm Julia.
"How do I know she didn't see me? That she isn't running to your sheriff to come and catch the bad alien." His voice was more menacing in its gentleness and she was struck by how different he sounded.
"I could see her, but she couldn't see or hear me. Please don't hurt her."
"If she talks, I will kill anyone that comes to the mountain." There was no pity, no hint of concession in his voice. She stumbled back from him. "And I will go into that pitiful town and kill the puny men and their families."
He hunted her with slow deliberate steps, the air thick with raw danger. She had no doubt he would do exactly what he said.
His hands closed over her shoulders and a rotten smell assaulted her nose. Natalie recoiled at the fresh blood splattered over his silvery uniform. Suspicious looking pieces of debris she really didn't want to identify covered his jacket.
He dropped his hands at her recoil but continued to loom over her.
"What have you done?" Her voice was barely louder than the sound of snow blowing through the trees. Had they really taken her flyaway comment seriously? Had they gone off to attack raiders? No, they couldn't have. They hadn't been gone long enough.
"That is not important now. We need to discuss your attempt to contact your friend. I have underestimated your knowledge of the communication device." He pinned Azagor with a fierce gaze. "This time, make sure she can't call again," he said in their guttural harsh language. He didn't wait to see if his orders would be followed but speared her with that red gaze.
"I promise you, I didn't have time to speak to her before you came back. She was trying to fix the connection on her side. I could only see a hazy picture of her and there was no sound." The beat of her heart sounded louder than the thud of an axe against wood while she waited for him to decide the fate of her friend. She trembled, convinced she'd signed Julia's death warrant with a simple call.
"She lives, for now." He turned and walked to the shower.
Natalie wiped her brow and sank down on the cushion when her trembling legs wouldn't hold her anymore, vaguely aware of the others taking supplies out of the metal boxes. They all had blood on them and she noticed they disappeared, one at a time only to reappear clean.
Once they emerged clean, the doctor and younger alien erected walls with a thin metal sheet that solidified into a thick wall. They carried equipment into the room they'd made. Fascinated, but afraid they wouldn't want her spying, she activated the TC and pretended to watch the news.
The two aliens enclosed her family size survival tent in another metal chamber and installed a sliding door. She'd have total privacy in there, but would she be allowed to sleep alone? Then they moved to her bathroom area and erected the same silver walls around it. She was about to go and see what they were doing when the irritating upbeat tune, signaling breaking news, drew her attention to the TC.
"This just in. An attack occurred on one of the camps of the notorious raider, Murdoch, a few hours ago. Unconfirmed reports claims as many as three hundred men were killed. However, none of the female captives were harmed. Most of the victims were beheaded. Could this be a rival faction..."
Her ears rang and the newscasters speculation that it was a new special police force formed by the government faded into the background. Chills crept down her spine. Zacar and his warriors had left that morning and come back only four hours later. Could four of them have taken out a large raider camp in only a few hours?
The tingling of her nape alerted her to Zacar's presence. Slowly, she turned until she found him cleaned and talking to the scarred alien at the cave wall to the right of the entrance, very close to where she'd tied him up. The scarred one, Zurian, took out something like a laser and measured the area Zacar indicated.
Squaring her shoulders, she walked up to them. "Please tell me you didn't take on a camp of raiders."
He turned and glanced at the TC before he looked at her. "I earned the right to have you as my breeder."
It took a moment before she understood what he meant. "Are you saying you went and attacked a camp three hundred men strong as some sort of bride price?" She'd never understand their strange brutal culture.
"Yes."
"I would've settled for a few nice dresses and diamonds," she mumbled faintly.
She didn't know if she should feel shocked or guilty for causing so many deaths. Or if she should congratulate herself on helping the government with the raider problem? Everyone was saying something should be done about them but no one, including the government, even tried to stand up to the raiders.
She opened her mouth to continue, but the sound of the newscaster's voice had her whirling to look at the TC projection again.
"We also received this message from Murdoch's spokesperson." The blonde newswoman coughed and briefly looked very uncomfortable, nodding at someone off camera before continuing to read the notice in her hand.
"That thug has a spokesperson?" Natalie exclaimed.
"This is a message for the tall bit--er--woman on the mountain. Give Murdoch what he wants or he'll be coming for you. We have many more men to send to your mountain, bit--woman." The newscaster was red in the face and she fiddled with the papers in front of her for a second before continuing onto other news with a practiced smile on her face and an overly chirpy voice.
Natalie gasped and reared back. Murdoch knew his men were slaughtered on the mountain, and he was looking for her? At least, they didn't seem to realize that the persons who wiped out their camp lived here as well.
Zacar growled and glared at the image winking out. The aliens literally came to attention, with savage growls vibrating in their throats. She expected them to start sharpening their swords any moment now.
"You know this...Murdoch?" Zacar sneered the name and placed a gentle hand on her nape. Natalie tried to move away, but his grip firmed and she froze in place.
"I don't know him." Even if she did, she wouldn't admit to it with him towering over her like this, that accusing tone in his voice. Natalie forced her tone to brighten. "Maybe they weren't talking about me." Even as she said it, she knew they were most definitely talking about her. She sighed and rubbed agai
nst his hand caressing her nape. "I can't imagine why the raiders would be interested in me."
It was difficult to focus on her worry about the raiders when shivers of pleasure coursed through her body. She wanted his other hand to touch her, too, to caress the parts of her that ached for attention.
"We will find out what their plans are." His voice promised torture and mayhem to Murdoch, while his hand continued to gently stroke her neck.
She didn't want to live in fear of constant raider attacks. "What am I going to do? They'll keep coming. What do they want with me?"
"I will protect you." His lip curled, in what she'd come to realize was extreme disgust. "Their warriors are weak."
"They'll come when the snow melts." And they'd come by the thousands. She'd seen on the news once how they'd flattened an entire town that had defied them. How could this be happening? She'd decided to stay in the cave precisely because the raiders were bound to hit the town eventually.
"I am a Zyrgin warrior. We do not wait for the enemy to come to us."
"You can't kill all of them. There are thousands, if not millions, of them. They showed it on the news."
"I earned the right to protect my breeder. You should feel proud that I honor you, Natlia." He stood even taller, fierce pride ringing in his voice.
She slapped her palms against his chest and he didn't even flinch. "How does it honor me that you killed three hundred men? Besides that, the four of you can't hold out against thousands of raiders."
He looked down at her hands, pale and fragile-looking, against his massive chest. "I do not need help killing those woumbers." His whole body seemed to shout disdain at the idea of him being unable to kill thousands of men.
"How did you manage to kill three hundred men with only your swords, in such a short time? Even if you're Superman, you can't move that fast."
His rough hands surrounded hers, warm and warrior strong. "Human men are puny," he said, disdain dripping from every word.