Growing up hiking the trails around Sedona had taught me to keep track of my surroundings. A big Reptilian ship wasn’t that different. My mind had subconsciously tracked the route here, and I went back that way, drifting along the corridor, keeping an eye out for anything that might be useful. I didn’t see much, though. This level or deck or whatever it was seemed strangely deserted. For all I knew, this was an area kept aside for guests, like ambassadors or envoys or something like that.
Down the elevator shaft, not bothering to wait for an actual car this time. The shaft looked strange to me, its sides curiously bare. There wasn’t any sign of the sort of infrastructure needed in terrestrial elevators — no cables or conduits or anything like that. Possibly the whole thing worked off magnetic energy.
It was the sort of thing my brother Michael might know, and I experienced a sharp, hurtful pang then at the thought that I might never see him again. He’d been preoccupied the last few years, focused on getting his doctorate, but growing up he’d always been my hero and protector, ready to step in to shield me from the inevitable teasing. Callista had never experienced any of that, because she was so damn beautiful that most of her oddities were given a pass. And Kelsey, Callista’s cousin, was human and normal and girl-next-door gorgeous, so no one gave her too much crap about hanging out with what some kids at school referred to as “the UFO weirdos.”
But I’d been kind of an odd-looking kid, skinny and with way too much curly hair, thanks to my mother, and so I was the one the bullies inevitably wanted to pick on. Michael, three years older, was big enough to scare most of them off, thus making him my knight in shining armor ever afterward. I didn’t want to think about never seeing him again.
Actually, I couldn’t think about it, because focusing on anything except what I was doing right then would be a surefire way to fling my consciousness directly back into my body. I had to be calm, yet focused.
The elevator shaft ended, and I found myself drifting through the wall and into yet another of those seemingly endless corridors. I wondered then how big the ship really was, and how many levels it had. Certainly it was orders of magnitude larger than the craft that had taken Earth’s astronauts to Mars. From the little I’d been able to tell as Gideon guided me around the Eclipse, this starship felt almost like a small city. Did it carry troops in proportion to its size?
Probably better not to go there just yet. Besides, thinking of Gideon seemed to draw me toward him. I could hear his voice, and yet I couldn’t understand anything of what he was saying, since he was speaking in the Reptilian tongue, its syllables strange and sibilant. Answering him was Lir Shalan — or at least, that’s who I thought it must be, since his deeper accents sounded strangely familiar.
In my current disembodied state, it would be easy enough to find out. I’d learned from earlier trips outside my body that I was completely invisible, that I didn’t even give off a ghostly shimmer when I traveled on the astral plane. The voices of Gideon and Lir Shalan drew me to them down the corridor, and within a second or two I was inside the room where they were holding their conversation.
It was far more opulent than the one where Gideon had left me, and a great deal larger. Captain’s quarters, I thought, taking in the darkly upholstered furniture, the odd sculptures of beaten metal on the walls, the strange waterfall of pulsing light in one corner.
The two of them stood in the center of the room, however, ignoring the angular couches to either side of them. I found myself studying them both, attempting to see if I could find any similarities in their features, even though Lir Shalan was so obviously alien. But I could find nothing, except possibly the sharp angles of his high cheekbones, softened but still visible in his son.
The alien leader appeared angry; his red eyes flashed fire, and while he wasn’t waving his hands around, from time to time he would make an odd, stabbing gesture with his left hand, as if to punctuate a point. During this onslaught, Gideon stood there calmly enough. From time to time, when his father paused for breath, Gideon would say something, his tone far calmer.
I would have given a great deal to know just what the hell they were talking about. It appeared as if Lir Shalan thought Gideon had done something wrong, although I had no idea what that could have possibly been.
And then I felt it — just a strange little flicker of emotion, come and gone so quickly that I barely had a chance to reach out and touch it before it disappeared. Worry? No, that didn’t feel quite right. Sadness wasn’t right, either.
Then it came again.
Guilt.
Definitely coming from Gideon. Guilt over what, I wasn’t sure. Because he had failed his father somehow?
And then a flash, not of an emotion, but more like an image that had sprung from his mind.
An image of me, shimmering, almost unrecognizable.
I gasped, and my concentration wavered for a second. Unfortunately, that one flicker was all it took. With an almost physical bump, I fell back into my body. At once I was aware of the stiffness in my legs, and I carefully unfolded them from the lotus position, running my hands over my jeans-clad thighs to loosen things up a bit. How long had I been wandering the corridors of the ship in my astral state?
No way to know for sure, since I hadn’t been wearing a watch when I came here with Gideon.
Gideon.
That flash — it had shocked me more than I wanted to admit. It was never easy to see yourself as others saw you. In this case, though, I didn’t know what to think.
Obviously, I hadn’t had much of a chance to look at myself in a mirror since I’d gotten here. If asked, though, I probably would have replied that my hair was a mess and the tinted lip balm I’d been wearing earlier that morning was long gone.
In Gideon’s eyes, I’d been a goddess, someone I didn’t even recognize, with a mane of long curls he wanted to bury his face in, skin he wanted to caress, lips he wanted to —
It was insane. He’d been raised among Reptilians, so why would he even be applying human standards of beauty to me?
Yes, I thought then, but he had a human mother. She must have taught him something before she died.
A shiver went through me. I didn’t want him looking at me like that. He might have appeared mostly human, but Lir Shalan’s blood — whatever color that might be — also ran in his veins.
I pushed myself out of the cubby/bed and went to the restroom, thinking it was time for me to get some cold water on my face. If there was even a sink. God only knew what kind of bathroom facilities Reptilians required.
To my relief, jutting from one wall was a square, sink-like receptacle made of steel or something that looked just like it. A wave of my hand to the left, and cold water came out of a pipe in the wall. To my right, and it was warm — instantly warm, unlike the water at my parents’ house, where it seemed as if you always had to waste a good bit before it got to be the temperature you wanted.
Taking a breath, I bent and gathered some cold water in both my hands, then splashed it up against my cheeks. I didn’t have to worry about ruining my makeup because I wasn’t wearing any. The water did feel good, seeming to bring me back to myself.
There wasn’t a mirror, just a blank wall of more steel above the sink. I could vaguely see my reflection in it, but not enough to catch any real detail. Just as well, because I probably looked like hell, Lir Gideon’s inner concept of me to the contrary.
I had to wonder where that had come from. Maybe he had only a hazy idea of what human women were supposed to look like, and that was why he’d immediately slotted me in as his ideal. He had no true frame of reference, except a mother who’d died…when? I didn’t know, but something told me it had been some time ago, when he was fairly young.
As for the argument, well, it was quite possible that Lir Shalan had been taking his son to task for not immediately forcing himself on me and getting the third generation of Lirs underway. The joke would have been on them, though, because I’d been getting once-yearly birth control
shots ever since I turned eighteen. Wishful thinking more than anything else, though, because somehow I’d managed to still be a virgin at almost twenty-two. I tried to brush any self-recrimination aside, though, knowing I had far bigger things to worry about than why I was old enough to drink but still not emotionally ready to get in the sack with a guy.
Okay, think logically. There were hormones you could take to reverse the shots. Maybe the Reptilians had gotten their hands on them, maybe not. If that was the case, then I really would be out of luck. Anyway, since I didn’t have a black belt in judo or training in krav maga, I doubted I could have fought off Gideon if he’d been inclined to follow in his father’s footsteps.
So far, he’d acted like a perfect gentleman toward me, but if Lir Shalan continued to apply pressure….
A strange squeal assaulted my ears, and I started, for a second thinking there must be something wrong with the plumbing. But then it came again, and I realized it must be the Reptilian equivalent of a doorbell, since it was coming from that direction.
I didn’t see any towels, so I wiped my damp hands on my jeans and hurried over to the door. This time when I placed my palm on the panel, the door hissed open, disappearing into the wall.
Outside in the corridor stood Gideon. His expression was far grimmer than when I had last seen him, but he appeared to gather himself as soon as he saw me, and even managed to smile. “I’ve brought some things for you.”
“You have?” It didn’t seem wise to be gazing up into his face, not after the way I’d caught him imagining me, so I looked downward. In his hands he held a black plastic case, about the size of a laptop bag.
“You came to us as you are, and so I thought it would help if you had some different clothing to change into.”
“What’s wrong with this?” I asked, looking down at my jeans and the denim shirt I wore over a tank top. I also realized that I was padding around in my sock feet, since I’d taken off my hiking boots before getting into the cubby/bed. Immediately I glanced back up and prayed he hadn’t noticed. Something about being without my boots felt oddly vulnerable.
“Nothing is wrong with your clothing,” he said hastily. “But surely you will begin to tire of wearing the same thing? And at some point those clothes will need to be cleaned.”
Those words drove home to me more than anything else that they planned to keep me here for some time. I could feel the nervous tension knotting in my belly, but there wasn’t much I could do about it.
“Um, thanks, I guess.” Ungracious, I knew, but after catching even that small glimpse of his thoughts, and worrying about what kind of pressure his father might be putting on him, I didn’t quite know how to act. “Here, I’ll take it.”
He handed the case over to me and then looked on, gaze expectant. The message seemed to be that he wanted me to open it immediately so I could see what it contained.
I let out a small sigh, then took it over to the table. The case latched with a set of tabs that released when I pushed my thumbs against them. Inside was what looked like unwieldy wads of dark cloth, all either deep gray or black. When I lifted one of them out, though, I saw that it was a long dress of some sort, probably adapted from one of the Reptilian-style robes, although this garment seemed more fitted, and the neckline, while not particularly low, did have a definite scoop to it.
“They’re very nice,” I said, since I had to say something. “Do you have a tailoring department on the ship?”
He looked blank for a moment, then shook his head. “No need for that. Everything we wear is replicated in much the same way that our food is generated. Our machines take the components and create what we need.”
Handy. I wasn’t about to ask how those machines had known my measurements. Actually, as I folded the dress I held and laid it on top of its companions, I thought I could tell that the garment wasn’t all that fitted. It would probably slip right over my head.
“Will you wear it now?” Gideon asked.
The request struck me off guard. Were his half-alien sensibilities offended by my jeans or something? But there was something in his face — not really pleading, more that he hoped I wouldn’t argue with him. Why, I wasn’t sure. Maybe this was some sort of odd test devised by his father to see how compliant I was.
Well, I could be as accommodating as the next person…up to a point. However, when it came to choosing my battles, I didn’t think this one was worth the effort. It couldn’t hurt to make them think that I was willing to go along with their wishes. So far I’d seen absolutely nothing that made me think I’d be able to escape this ship, but my chances had to be better if the Reptilians had the impression that I was cooperating with them.
“Sure,” I said. “Just give me a minute.”
Something about Gideon’s posture appeared to relax slightly as I took the dress and draped it over one arm, then went into the bathroom and shut the door. I looked, but I couldn’t detect any sort of locking mechanism. Maybe he planned to come in here while I was half-undressed.
Or maybe I needed to give him a little credit. He’d remained where he was as I entered the bathroom, and even though I still didn’t know exactly what his and Lir Shalan’s argument had been about, it seemed safe enough for me to believe that Gideon wasn’t going to make any unwelcome moves.
Even so, I climbed out of my clothes at lightning speed, then hurriedly tugged the dress over my head. As I’d thought, it was fairly loose-fitting, and probably could have used a belt. But I wasn’t here to win any beauty contests. If Gideon wanted me to wear this sack, I wasn’t going to argue about it.
The dress was a little lower cut than I’d first thought, though. I tugged it up as best I could and tried to tell myself I wasn’t actually showing that much cleavage. Besides, I really wasn’t that busty; it was only in the last couple of years that I’d graduated to a C-cup. Things weren’t overflowing the way they might have been if I were as “blessed” as, say, Grace Rinehart.
I folded my discarded jeans and T-shirt and set them on the counter, then slipped out of my socks as well. The metal floor was cold against my feet, but for some reason, the thought of wearing thick Carhartt socks and my hiking boots with this flowing dress seemed vaguely ridiculous. If the machines on the ship could produce a dress for me out of thin air, then they could probably manage a pair of flats or something.
Gideon seemed to have already thought of that, because he was holding what looked like two pieces of flat plastic with ankle laces attached. He held them out to me as I approached. “I thought you could use these as well.”
I took them from him, trying not to look too dubious. The flimsy footwear didn’t seem as if it would do much to support my feet. But when I set the “shoes” on the floor and stepped into them, something sort of marvelous happened. The plastic molded itself to my foot, becoming softer and springier, while the laces wound themselves around my ankles and then tied themselves off.
“That’s impressive,” I said. “How does that even work? Nanotechnology?”
“Close enough.” His gaze was approving, maybe a little too much so. At least he was looking at my face, though, and not at the dismaying amount of skin the neckline of the dress revealed. Then he asked, “Are you hungry? You didn’t eat much of that burger.”
Nothing in his tone was even close to accusing, but I still felt a little guilty about wasting food like that, even if it had been conjured from its component atoms and no actual cows had died to provide the meal. Until Gideon had asked the question, I hadn’t thought much about whether I was hungry or not. Now, though, my stomach seemed to wake up, crying out for something to replace all the energy my body had burned while I was traveling away from it. You wouldn’t think that sitting and staying quietly focused like that would count as any real sort of exertion, but in its own way, astral travel was as taxing as if I’d been running uphill for all that time.
“Actually, I am,” I admitted, then began to move toward the panel that held the food synthesizer. “I suppose n
ow is as good a time as any to practice with this thing some more.”
Gideon’s voice stopped me. “I thought you might like to eat someplace other than this chamber.”
I didn’t know whether I liked the sound of that or not. “You mean like in the ship’s mess hall or something?”
“Mess…?” He paused, his head tilted to one side, as if he was trying to process the unfamiliar phrase. “No, the crew does not eat communally, but takes their meals in their own rooms. But I was thinking of my chamber. It is a good deal larger than this one, and might be more comfortable.”
Of course it would be. And it would probably have a bigger bed than my borrowed room, too.
I shut that thought down at once. This might be the Reptilian equivalent of asking me to come up and see his etchings…or Gideon might genuinely think it would be more comfortable for me to eat someplace that wasn’t quite so cramped.
Nothing ventured, I supposed. I really didn’t see the point in refusing him, since I couldn’t think of an excuse that didn’t sound either rude or paranoid. Besides, going with him to his room would give me a chance to see more of the ship, and more knowledge was always a good thing, even if I might not know exactly what to do with it yet.
So I managed to smile, then said, “That sounds like a good idea,” and watched as something in his expression relaxed. Was that a good sign, or….
Too late to refuse now. I held my breath as Gideon opened the door, and prayed I hadn’t just made a huge mistake.
CHAPTER FOUR
Those oddly squishy shoes did a great job of making my journey to Gideon’s room a comfortable one, or at least as comfortable as a walk through the bowels of an alien ship could be. The skirt of my dress was a little long, so I had to hold it up to avoid tripping, but otherwise it wasn’t too much work to follow Gideon as he led me down the corridor and to the elevators once again. This time, though, it seemed as if we just kept going, and going, and I wondered once again how many decks the ship contained, and how many Reptilians were assigned here.
sedona files 06 - enemy mine Page 4