by Lisa Lace
“The Nine,” the man repeated like it was the most obvious thing. “They’re here already. They’ll bring their plague and their madness and it will consume you all until there’s nothing left and they’ve had their fill. I’ve seen it happen.”
Heather saw someone reaching for their phone and knew they were either calling the police or about to record a video, and before she knew it, she was stepping in. “Okay,” she said. “That’s enough of that.”
“Heather? Do you know this man?”
She sighed and nodded. “Uh, kinda. He’s an actor. He’s doing performance art here in the town. I uh...met him at the hospital.” God, she didn’t even know what she was saying. “He’s very method. Totally into his role. But he has to leave now.” She grabbed his arm and pulled, but it was like trying to pull a freight train, and he didn’t even budge. “Jesus,” she huffed. “Will you come on? You can practice more later.”
“I don’t understand,” he said, looking at her curiously. “Don’t touch me.”
“Hey, you touched me first, buddy, okay? Can we stop making a scene now? Please?”
Maybe it was the please that did it, or maybe it was something else, but either way, it had the effect she wanted. The behemoth inclined his head and allowed her to pull him towards her car.
“Look,” she said, once they were out of earshot of everyone else. “You’re clearly hurt, and maybe a little raving, but you can’t go screaming in the streets, okay? That’s how you end up in jail.”
“Jail.”
“Yeah. Jail. Heard of it?” Heather huffed and put her hands up in a gesture of peace. “Okay. I’m a nurse, alright? I can help you with your injuries and then we can figure out where you’re supposed to be. Does that sound okay?”
There was a look of sadness in his strange eyes for just a moment, and then he nodded. “Alright.”
“Good,” Heather replied. “Good. So get in the car.”
Part of her couldn’t believe she was doing this. This was how women ended up on the news, abducted or killed or worse in their homes because they invited strangers back with them. Especially strangers who looked like they could bench-press her without so much as breaking a sweat.
Heather didn’t even know how he’d found clothes to fit over those broad shoulders and well defined arms. His chest was muscular, and she was willing to bet that his abs were just as well defined as everything else. Strong legs, thick thighs, calves that were hard as rock, she was sure.
And wow. She clearly needed to get laid if she was staring at this injured and still possibly crazy man like he was an all you can eat buffet.
He got in her car without further complaint, and she got in next to him in the driver’s seat, watching as he bowed his head to keep from smashing it against the top of her car. “Someone ate his vegetables as a kid,” she muttered under her breath and got the car moving.
“What does that mean?” he asked.
“Don’t worry about it,” Heather replied quickly. “Uh...what’s your name?”
“Sabin,” he responded, eyes locked on her face.
She kept her eyes on the road, fighting the urge to look at him while he was looking at her. “Sabin,” Heather repeated. “I’m Heather.” Knowing his name was a good start. She still couldn’t rule out a concussion, but at least he knew who he was.
“Heather,” he said. “What does that mean?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Something about a plant, maybe? I never checked. What does Sabin mean?”
“Pride,” he answered, voice soft.
“Oh. That’s nice. Probably hard to live up to, but nice.”
“Yes,” he said and turned to look out the window. They drove in silence for a long moment before he spoke again. “Where are we going?”
“Well, I was going to take you to the hospital where I work, but I don’t think that’s for the best right now. You seem a little...addled, and they’ll just pump you full of drugs before they find out where you belong. I’m going to take you to my place so I can patch you up first.”
“Your home?”
“Yep.”
“You don’t know me,” he pointed out.
Heather laughed, and it was dry. “Yeah, I’m aware of that, okay? Don’t make me regret this.”
“I’ll...try not to?” Sabin said.
She sighed and just focused on getting them to her house.
Nurses made more money than Heather had been expecting them to, and with her salary plus her savings plus the money her dad had left her in his will, combined with the fact that small town living didn’t cost nearly as much as it did to live in the city, Heather had been able to buy a nice house, conveniently located and already furnished.
Rumor had it that some older lady had died in the house, and while that part wasn’t confirmed yet, it was clear that there had been someone with questionable taste living there before her because everything had been pink and covered with pictures of cats.
Heather didn’t have anything against cats in general, but that didn’t mean that she wanted them all over her house, so a lot of her money had gone into redecorating the place.
Now it was home. Filled with overstuffed, comfortable furniture and pictures of her family and friends. It was cozy and warm, and she was just a little bit wary of letting a stranger into her house now that they were there.
They stood on the porch and Heather bit her lip, unsure of what to do.
In the end, it was the kicked puppy expression on Sabin’s face that made the decision for her, and she sighed and unlocked the door, ushering him into her living room.
“Sit down and try not to bleed on anything,” she said, going for stern, but just ending up sounding tired.
That got a reaction out of Sabin at least, and defiance flashed in his eyes. “You do not get to give me orders, woman,” he said, folding his arms.
Heather blinked, counted to ten, and then let out a long breath. She should have known that anyone that good looking and muscle bound was going to be rude as heck. “You listen to me, buddy,” she said, folding her arms and drawing herself up to her full height. “This is my house, and I could have let your weirdo butt get dragged to jail or the loony bin because that’s what would have happened if you’d kept shouting in the street like that. So you’ve got two options. You can either sit down and try not to bleed on anything like I said, or you can leave. Either way, you’re gonna stop talking to me like that.”
Her usual careful speech patterns were slipping because she was tired and riled up, and she just wanted to go back in time and slap herself in the face before she brought this ingrate home.
They stared at each other for a long moment, his strange golden eyes raking over her face and then sliding down to the floor. “I’m sorry,” he said and then sat down on the couch, head bowed.
“It’s fine,” she said, dragging fingers through her hair. “Just don’t let it happen again.”
Sabin nodded, but didn’t look up. He was such a strange person. Riled up one minute, feeling sorry for himself the next. Heather didn’t know what his deal was, and curiosity was prickling at the back of her mind no matter how much she told herself that this wasn’t any of her business and she didn’t need to get involved. More than she already was, at least.
But there had to be a reason why a stupidly attractive man with white hair and golden eyes and biceps the size of her head was wandering around like he was lost. And so injured to boot.
Her stance that she was staying out of it lasted the whole way to her bathroom to fetch her first aid kit and then the whole way back to the living room, and even the whole time it took her to sit down and open the kit up to pull out the things she needed.
And just when she’d been about to open her mouth and ask what his deal was, Sabin shifted and pulled his shirt off.
Any hope Heather thought she’d had of asking questions and attempting a coherent conversation was immediately killed as she looked at his broad chest, and yep, absolutely amazin
g abs. Even with gashes and dried blood everywhere he was gorgeous, skin tanned, making his white hair stand out even more.
His chest was hairless, and Heather was definitely staring at his pecs and his abs and the breadth of his shoulders.
“Do I look that bad?” Sabin asked, and it took her a good minute to realize he meant his wounds.
“No!” she said, and then realized she sounded like a teenage girl all over again. Sweet Jesus. “I mean, no. It’s not that bad. I um. Yeah. I’m going to get started cleaning these, okay? Okay.” Heather forced herself to stop talking and got to work cleaning the gashes, using her hands to direct him to move this way or that so she could get all of them.
She was a healthcare professional for crying out loud. She could manage to treat one (extremely attractive) man without losing her head.
When she thought she had herself back under control, she spoke again.
“So how did this happen?”
“I jumped out of a speeding ship,” Sabin responded, no inflection in his tone.
Heather blinked. “You did what?”
“Jumped out of a speeding ship. I needed to get away from the Nine so I could warn your people about them. They didn’t know I was on board, and I didn’t know where they were going, so as soon as I could, I jumped.”
He sounded serious, and Heather didn’t know whether or not that made her feel any better. She kept her hands moving. “What are the nine?” she asked. “You were talking about them earlier.”
“They are a race of...creatures. They feed on fear and chaos and leave destruction in their wake.”
“Uh huh,” Heather said. “And there are nine of them? Or is that just a fancy name?”
Sabin narrowed his eyes at her and flinched when she dabbed one of his gashes with antiseptic. “You mock me, but that’s only because you haven’t seen what they can do. You haven’t watched them tear your people apart and leave no one you love left alive with you helpless to do anything to stop them.”
Well, the bitterness in his voice sounded real enough, as well as a little bit of self-loathing that she thought she understood, even if nothing else he was saying made any sense to her.
“I wasn’t mocking you,” Heather said softly, her bedside manner kicking in. She was also well aware that this man could probably kill her with one hand if he wanted to, though she really didn’t believe he would do something like that. “I know what loss feels like.”
He watched her silently as she finished up, bandaging the worst of the gashes as best she could and covering the others with gauze.
“These wounds will heal,” he said, gesturing to his arms and chest, and Heather knew he meant that these were the superficial ones while the ones carved in him from losing those he loved would be there forever. She understood that.
“Of course,” she said, and sat back, blowing her bangs out of her face. “Are you hungry?”
Those golden eyes went wide, and Sabin nodded eagerly. “Yes. Very.”
Heather couldn’t help but laugh at that. “Okay. I’m going to order some pizza.” She stood up and then took in the size of him again. “Possibly three pizzas. The bathroom is through there if you want to clean up.”
She turned to head for the kitchen, pausing when Sabin said her name.
“Heather.”
“Hm?”
“Thank you. I hadn’t thought to find kindness on this planet.”
And just when she was settled with him being there for a bit, he went and said something weird like that. “Uh, sure,” she replied. “There’s kindness everywhere if you know where to look. Even here.”
Chapter 7: Something Worth Defending
There was kindness everywhere if he knew where to look, but Heather’s couch was a far cry from his bed back on Samis, but it wasn’t like he was likely to see that bed ever again, so he tried his best to make himself comfortable where he was. Heather had tried to make sure that he had everything he needed, which was very nice of her. There were pillows and blankets, and she’d pulled the couch all the way out so it turned into a bed of sorts, which was honestly more clever than he would have given humans credit for.
He was willing to admit that maybe their lessons on humans and Earth had been a little biased since he hadn’t seen anyone killed in the streets yet, and there was nothing on fire here as far as he could tell. And Heather had brought him to her home and was allowing him to stay for the time being, which was kindness that probably wouldn’t even be found on Samis when it came to strangers. Especially strangers of a different species.
The clock on the wall showed that it was half past two in the morning, which Sabin was realizing meant something different here than it did where he was from, but he didn’t know how to ask about that.
Clearly humans were not aware of the life that existed outside of their blue bubble of a planet. Where Samis Das young ones learned all about humans in their schooling, humans didn’t seem to receive such lessons, and Sabin was unsure how he was going to warn people about the dangers that were coming if they didn’t believe in them.
That was just one of many thoughts swirling around in his head and keeping him awake, even though it was obviously very late at night.
So much had happened since the last time he’d laid his head down to sleep of his own free will without worrying that he was going to be attacked any minute. He still felt the aching pain of losing his mother and Lilera in the same fell swoop, and the overwhelming feeling of failure that came with knowing he’d just abandoned his home.
No matter how many times he tried to tell himself that there wasn’t anything more he could have done, that fleeing and trying to save another planet from ending up like his own was important and valid and worthy, he still felt the guilt gnawing at him.
What if there wasn’t anything he could do for these people? What made him think that he was any more capable of saving humans than he had been when it came to saving the Samis Das? At least his people had known about the Nine’s existence prior to them showing up and turning their lives into waking nightmares.
The humans likely wouldn’t even know what was happening to them until it was too late. This planet would be a feast to the Nine, already so steeped in fear and chaos, and it would only be a matter of time before it increased ten-fold.
And there he was, lying on a couch in a house that was unfamiliar to him, the only thing that probably stood between the humans and their demise.
No pressure, then.
Sabin tried not to think about that part of it for the moment. He wouldn’t be of any use to anyone if he was too tired to fight, and so he sighed and tried to make himself comfortable once more. It didn’t help that his feet were hanging off the edge of the makeshift bed, since human things were apparently not built for people his size.
This world was strange, and he’d barely seen any of it yet.
The people though...they weren’t so bad from what he could tell. Heather was...interesting. She reminded him of Lilera in ways that made his heart ache. Fierce and kind with a smile that lit up her whole face.
She was smaller than him by at least a foot, fair skinned with light eyes and hair the color of warm spice. She had a dusting of sun spots over her nose and full mouth that drew Sabin’s eye and then made him feel guilty for looking.
Her hands had been steady when she’d been patching him up, which seemed to be born of practice and skill. When they had eaten, she’d laughed at his confusion about the ‘pizza’ (and what a strange amalgam of foods that had been), and the light in her eyes had been wonderful.
Heather seemed to radiate a light of her own, and it drew Sabin in, making him feel both safe and puzzled in her presence.
For now, though, she was asleep in her sleeping room behind a door that didn’t seem to have a sensor on it as far as he could tell. She’d grumbled about having to go to work in the morning and then bid him good night with one final smile that was lingering in his mind and making his guilt even worse.
He wasn’t here to be attracted to the humans. And he certainly didn’t deserve it after he’d let the last person he’d been attracted to die right in front of him.
Heather was similar to Lilera, but there were differences as well, and he found those just as intriguing as anything else.
Sabin sighed and shifted on the bed, wincing when it creaked loudly. He waited to make sure it wasn’t going to break and drop him on the floor before settling down again.
He was no closer to falling asleep when the sound of a door opening startled him out of his daze and he turned his head to see Heather stepping out of her room, wrapped in something that looked silky to the touch. Her hair was a mess all over her head, and it made Sabin smile to see it.
She looked annoyed, and she was barefoot, making her way across the sitting room with the deliberation of someone who was trying not to make too much noise.
As he watched, she sniffed and wiped her eyes, and Sabin could tell that she had been crying.
It didn’t set right with him to see her sad like that. He knew it likely didn’t have anything to do with him, but it still made something in him want to reach out to her. Before he knew what he was doing, he was speaking.
“Are you alright?”
Heather jumped, one hand over her heart. “Jesus,” she said. “I forgot you were here.”
Sabin smiled thinly. “No, you didn’t. I’m too big to forget about.”
Her answering smile was tiny and tremulous. “Okay, true. But I was hoping you would be asleep.”
“I can pretend to be if you want,” he offered. Sometimes people didn’t want to deal with their emotions in front of other people, and Sabin understood that. He didn’t even know her, after all, so it was more than understandable for her not to want to get into this with him.
She looked at him for a moment and then shook her head, wrapping her garment more tightly around herself. “That’s okay. I already know you’re awake, and I’m too tired to go along with the acting.”
“You should be sleeping.” Sabin said gently. “You were saying you have work in the morning.”