After a while, when she felt strong enough to take one hand off him, she began stroking his fur. She stroked his chest, his legs, his arms. She propped herself up on one arm and tidied his hair, running her thumb over his cheekbones and down to his neck. His tail was on the other side of him and she picked it up to run it through her hands softly, smoothing any ruffled fur.
“I’m glad you’re okay,” she murmured, eyes reflexively going to his face to check for a reaction, but he never moved. “You gave me a scare for a while back there, but you’re going to be okay. I’m sorry you’re back here, but I had to. They say they’re taking you home. I don’t know how I’m going to explain to you how we got there but... I hope you’ll be glad to be there again. They’re not taking me home. They want me to stay with you. I hope you want to keep me.”
Ruth found her eyes tearing up. “If you don’t want me, I don’t know what I’ll do. If you change your mind, or the rules are different there... But you wouldn’t do that, right? You wouldn’t abandon me. You’d at least keep me as a pet or something, right?” She smiled at the image. Ruth had thought herself smarter than Gron at the beginning, then they had become partners, friends, lovers. They kept each other alive, or at least, that’s what she thought and she hoped he thought so too. She knew she didn’t contribute as much as he did, but he wouldn’t just ditch her, would he? Maybe he wouldn’t be given a choice. They were going to rejoin the rest of his people. T’Lax had said his people were ruled by alpha females. If it was anything like on Earth, the alpha might not take kindly to a new female being brought in, and an alien to boot. Ruth knew T’Lax had also said that Gron was committed to her for life now, but would he really choose her over the rest of his people? Ruth couldn’t see it. They’d only known each other for a few weeks. They’d proven that they could survive in the wild, and their chances were even better on Gron’s planet where he would know the area, but that didn’t mean Ruth wanted to live like that for the rest of her life.
She wished Gron was awake to distract her from these thoughts. He never smiled at her and she didn’t understand a word he said, but he looked at her softly, like she mattered to him, and he could kiss her, and stroke her hair. It was silly, she knew. She shouldn’t need to be cuddled like a child, but he was everything she had, and right then she felt alone. She lay her head on his chest and thought about her parents, what her mother would say. She started to cry as she thought about how they would know she was missing by now, and be scared out of their minds, and how eventually they’d have to assume she was dead even without ever finding a body, or live the rest of their lives in false hope that she would come home one day, that she would be found. The best she could hope for was that they would go into denial, and believe that no matter where she was, she was happy.
She fell asleep hoping that would be true.
Chapter 23
They were on the space ship for much longer than Ruth expected, but she guessed it made sense since she’d been in the cell with Gron for almost a week, and he’d been there for longer. Gron was fully healed in a day or two, not that days meant much in space, but they kept him sedated as T’Lax had said they would. In the meantime, they kept Ruth fed, clothed and bathed. They either had a very competent lab technician or a sci-fi replicator, because if she described something to them, and its purpose, they could bring her their best estimation. She described what she liked to eat, what she used to keep clean including shampoo and conditioner, toothpaste and toothbrush, a hairbrush, a loofah, a shower, deodorant and so on. She described what she liked to wear, including shoes and underwear. Nothing was perfect or exactly how it was on Earth, but eventually she was clean, sitting at a table fully dressed with shoes and a bra, with clean brushed hair, eating a steak dinner, so she couldn’t complain. She’d had several full-nights’ sleep on a mattress on the floor, a pallet much like Gron’s, which had been moved into a corner of the sickbay once his arm had healed and he was just being sedated.
Ruth understood their reason for doing it. Gron could decimate them, and these guys weren’t poachers or pirates, but he would think they were. If he woke up and saw them, he would definitely fight, and the aliens would definitely come off the worse for it. Ruth supposed as well that it would be easier for him to fall asleep in one jungle and wake up in another. But still she missed him. She spent most of her time answering their questions about her, humans, and Earth. She refused to answer any questions about her relationship with Gron, which they took notes on at first, which presumably said something about her aggression or protective instincts towards her mate, but she didn’t care. Right now, her survival was riding on them continuing to think Gron could knock her up. She also refused to let them scan her, or give her a medical exam. She explained what she could about her body to earn her keep, but she wouldn’t let them find anything out for themselves, which didn’t mean they weren’t doing it without her permission, but she had to at least try to establish some boundaries.
On the whole though, she was growing more comfortable with T’Lax and his crew. She hadn’t seen anything that suggested they were lying to her, and while she was escorted everywhere, no one held a weapon in her face. They asked if they could give her an interpretation interface chip that would allow her to speak with them and anyone else who had a chip. She wouldn’t be able to understand Gron because of how his language worked, but it would come in useful if any other species entered the conservation zone while she was down there. Eventually she agreed. It couldn’t hurt. The procedure itself was similar to getting her ears pierced. They placed a gun-like instrument against her temple, there was a pop and a little bite, and then it was done. The insertion site healed in a couple of days.
When she wasn’t with T’Lax, she was with Gron. She smoothed his fur and brushed his hair with her brush, and talked to him at length about her day, the aliens around her, her hopes for their life on his planet. She told him stories and made lists of questions she would like to ask him if she ever got the chance.
She had no way of measuring time other than when she slept and when she woke up. She knew her sleep pattern and eating habits had been totally disrupted since she left Earth though. The ship ran constantly on a rotation of four shifts, with no clear distinction between any of them. So she separated her day with three meals, and slept when she was tired.
Eventually, T’Lax told her they were approaching Gron’s planet. There were no windows on the ship, so she could only take their word for it. They had already discussed how T’Lax expected her to report on what she learned about Gandry culture. They would contact her after a period of time she didn’t understand. They talked about it as if it would be predictable and regular, but she had no idea what their measurements of time meant or how they would relate to the passage of days on Gron’s planet.
When the time came, they pushed Gron’s pallet out of sickbay and down to the room they had arrived in. Just like in Star Trek, there was a raised stage area and a control panel, and the aliens struggled to gently move Gron onto the floor, so she helped them and they did it together. She had decided to wear the wrapped fabric rather than any of the clothes they had given her, but she had a bag that contained a change of clothes, her hairbrush, toothbrush and toothpaste, some underwear, as well as food and water. She didn’t want to confuse Gron too much with things she had with her, but they were a few necessities she didn’t want to live without any longer, and she didn’t want to be cold, hungry or thirsty if they had to survive without his people, or if she had to survive without him, she added grimly. She wasn’t taking her shoes, and she was surprised to realise that she was prepared to go back to being naked if it comforted Gron, but she was still taking the bag.
“Gron should wake up within a few moments of arriving on the planet’s surface. We will transport you now,” said T’Lax as Ruth knelt by Gron’s side, her hands on his chest.
Ruth tried to pay attention this time to the teleportation, but it made it even more unpleasant. Thankfully it only lasted a s
econd. She was almost instantly kneeling over Gron on the planet’s surface, wobbling and trying not to lose her stomach, waiting for her body to figure out which way was up.
She could hear birds. The trees around her were huge, like Californian redwoods. The sun was shining. The ground she knelt on was even and dusty, with a soft blanket of leaves. The air was warm and when she breathed in deeply her head span a little.
Ruth turned her attention to Gron, laying her hand on his cheek and stroking his hair with the other hand, smiling. He was going to wake up for the first time in what must have been over a week, and she couldn’t wait.
“Hey, wake up, sleepyhead,” she cajoled gently. She moved one hand to his chest and shook him ever so lightly, stroking down his fur and skin. She felt free again. She could feel the sun and breathe fresh air. She was alone with her... with her lover. He was at least that.
“Gron...” she called. His breathing hitched and he turned his face into her palm, his tail giving a lethargic flick, and she laughed. “Gron, come on, wake up...” His eyes flickered open and he stared at her face as if he couldn’t focus on it right away. “We’re home,” she said.
Slowly, still clearly not fully free of the drug, he held the wrist of the hand on his chest, and nuzzled into the palm of her hand again. She couldn’t help it, she kissed him, just lightly because he was still dazed, but he followed her mouth when she pulled away anyway.
“Can you sit up?” she asked, trying to pull him up with a hand behind his neck. He obligingly struggled into a sitting position with a grunt, putting a hand to his forehead. She stroked his back and waited for him to recover while he said something and looked at her, presumably confused by the way he felt. She wished she could tell him, it felt wrong for her to know what had happened and not share it. He reached out and cupped her face.
“I’m okay, I’m fine,” she said, smiling to reassure him. He dropped his hand to the red fabric she had wrapped around herself and looked at her questioningly. God, she wished she could talk to him, she felt wretched not being able to comfort him or explain. She had no idea what he would think had happened. “I don’t know how to tell you,” she said, hoping he understood something from her tone.
She had an idea and reached for her bag, pulling out some food, something not unlike the loaf they had eaten in the cell wrapped in a leaf. She offered it to him, thinking something in his stomach might help him get over the drugs more quickly. When he didn’t take it, she broke a piece off for herself and ate it to show him what she meant, then forced a chunk into his hands. He obligingly ate it while she watched him, marvelling at how good it was to see his eyes open and his face animated again. She dove in quickly to kiss him again, briefly overcome, and again he tried to follow her, but she laughed and leant out of reach.
“Finish what you’re eating first,” she told him, smiling. God, she loved him. He was so... Good. Innocent. Uncomplicated. Whatever it was, she loved him for it. She felt alright admitting that to herself because she would be the only one to know. She couldn’t tell him if she wanted to. She didn’t know what that meant for their future. She supposed all it would mean was that it would hurt more if he threw her away, that she could be happy making a life here on an alien planet if he chose to keep her.
Next she pulled out the water bottle and took a sip, showing him what to do before passing it to him. It was clear he’d never drunk from a bottle before, but he didn’t spill any and she put it back in her bag. Gron looked wonderingly at her bag too, but she kissed him then, taking his face in her hands. She kissed him softly, sweetly, as if for the first time, but then harder, deeper, tasting his open mouth. His hands went to her hips and he tried to pull her into his lap. She held his hands though and gently broke the kiss, kissing his fingers and palms so he would know she wasn’t rejecting him. She just wanted to establish themselves somewhere before they started making love on the forest floor. He’d just woken up from many days under sedation after almost dying as well. She should probably let him recover for a bit before jumping his bones.
When he seemed to have got the message, she realised that he didn’t seem to have recognised his own planet. She tried to direct him to the trees, the ground, the sky, but he seemed disinterested in everything but her. She chewed her lip to keep from smiling, flattered, and began pointing at him then at the world around them. He still wasn’t getting it, so she laid her palm flat on his chest and said “Gron.” Before she could gesture again to their environment, Gron reached out and did the same to her, placing his large, warm hand over Ruth’s heart.
“Gruth,” he grunted, and she froze. Her happy expression faltered. He wasn’t... He couldn’t be... saying... Ruth shook herself out of it. That was probably just a human concept, associating love with the physical heart. He was probably just copying her because she was confusing him with all her pointing and he didn’t know what she wanted. She stopped herself from hugging or kissing him again, and instead took his hands and stood up. He followed, and she turned him around so that his back was to her. When he looked at her in confusion, she gestured out to the forest around them.
“This is your planet. Your home,” she said. Finally he looked out at where she was pointing. She couldn’t see his face, but after a moment he stiffened, and his tail lashed hard against her legs. He spun and looked at her.
“Gruth!” he cried, seizing both her hands.
She laughed and nodded and cried “Yes! Yes!” He looked so happy, as happy as she would probably be if she woke up on Earth one morning. But if she did that, then she wouldn’t have him anymore. It was like watching a child getting exactly what he wanted on Christmas morning, watching him wonder at the magic of it, while she sat there and knew every penny was worth it. He might not know how they got there and think it some kind of miracle, but it didn’t taint his joy at all to still be ignorant of the aliens watching him and his people. Right now, the mystified joy he felt was worth everything that she’d had to tell T’Lax and his scientists.
Gron picked her up and squeezed her to him in a powerful hug. She wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her face in the mix of fur and hair at his neck, breathing in his scent. So what if he was furry? So what if he was an alien? Right then, he was everything to her.
Gron pulled her away from him, talking animatedly at her. He put her down and cupped her face in his hands, speaking very emphatically. She pretended he was telling her that everything would be okay from now on, that they would be okay, that he would take her home with him and look after her, all that stuff. She kissed him again, and he swept her off her feet and back into his arms.
Find out what happens next
in...
Gron
Ruth and Gron have arrived on Gron’s home planet, but will Ruth be accepted by his tribe? The Alpha Queen is not happy about one of her males Bonding to a small bald female no one understands. The other un-Chosen males are being distracted by her, including Gron’s older brother. Only Gron’s mother, a former Alpha Queen herself, is willing to stand in support of her son’s happiness. And what of T’Lax, the toad-like commander of the aliens watching over them all?
Will Ruth and Gron’s love survive the trails set before them now that they are no longer alone, but still unable to communicate?
Coming Soon
Ruth's Bonded (Ruth & Gron Book 1) Page 13