Stolen By An Alien Read online

  A grunt from him that sounded suspiciously amused had me slowly turning back. He gestured to the bucket. I sent him a spinning motion with my finger, and he frowned, cocking his head. Slowly, I reached up and gave a hesitant push on his shoulder and eventually he let me turn his body, but his head followed me.

  I, hesitating only slightly now, reached way, way up – and couldn’t reach his face.

  I scrabbled at his shoulder but found nothing to grip onto. He bent a little, enough that I could poke a finger into his cheek and turn his head.

  The sound he made could have been a bark or a laugh. But the important thing was that he stayed averted, and I did my business.

  “All done,” I said, and I used my foot to carefully scoot the bucket towards the bed, but he stopped me with two grumbles. I imagined they meant, “Leave it,” or “Maid gets that,” or “this hostel sucks and I don’t care if the owners have to clean up four bodies and our piss bucket, they deserve it because there’s no continental breakfast.”

  “Alrighty, then. What now?”

  He bent to grab up his satchel. He retrieved the empty water bottles, shoved them inside his bag, and when he came upon the soiled rag from last night he tossed it in the middle of the room. Then he bent over it and blew fire from his mouth – until some of the fibers slowly lost their color, curled, and turned into ash. Some of it turned shiny, looked hot, and got brighter. Weirdness. But, then again, what wasn’t here?

  He approached me, and gently took the blanket from my shoulders. I started to step away to give him room to fold it back up, but he stilled me by holding up a hand. Then he shook out the blanket, twirled it up and around my shoulders and began to fit it around me so that it resembled a... dress. As a final addition, he took what I’d thought to be decorative trim, and pulled it free and stretched it. He wrapped this around my neck and across my chest, kind of making an ‘x’ shape between my breasts. This wrapped around to the back and held it all in place and gave it shape I guess. Without a mirror, from what I could tell, this really was now a dress.

  “Nifty trick,” I commented. Then I bent my knees and reached my hands up under the blanket to shimmy-peel my filthied skirt down. I threw it on top of the ashes and asked him, “Can you burn that too?” I mimed a “poof” motion with my hands against my mouth.

  He nodded solemnly. Then he did so. It was freaking impressive to see.

  “Thank you.” I said quietly. I sniffed and wondered why the fuck I felt like crying again. His arms were suddenly around me, and giving me a squeeze. I pulled away, but I was steadier all the same. I patted his arm. “Thanks.” He took my hand, leading me to the door.

  There, he tilted his great horned head back, and scented the air.

  Satisfied, he opened it and led me down a hall.

  In minutes, we were outside and among a row of sale pens. I couldn’t say for sure, but I thought some of these had been empty when I was dragged through last night. But now, many pens were stuffed full. Some creatures were pressed like sardines, smashed against each other with nowhere to move.

  Distracting me from my horrified staring, the alien bent down a little so he was closer to my eye level. He said something to me. When I only looked at him blankly, he pointed to the line of cages.

  My stomach dropped so low I think it landed on my feet.

  “No way! I am not going back!” What? Did he have plans return me? Resell me?

  “You—!“

  His had ahold of my shoulders before I could bolt. He shook me a little. Growled a lot. Then he seemed to think better of this and sighed as he ran his knuckles over my cheek. And tugged me in for a hug against his hard chest.

  Hmm. Officially, I was confused. Was he saying goodbye? Apologizing that he couldn’t keep me?

  He tugged the ends of my hair - the snarled part hanging past my shoulders - in order to tip my face up to his. He made more noise, and firmly clasped my hand in his. Brought it to his heart – or at least where a heart would go on a human – and growled.

  I shook my head. “You know I don’t understand.” His lips firmed and he looked off in the distance. Disappointment was clear on any planet apparently. Not knowing what he wanted, I attempted to do something I needed to do. I tightened our hand grip and started down the cage row heading to the big stadium pen to see if any of my group’s members were left.

  When I’d woken up yesterday afternoon, I’d found myself in a pen with other women -only women, not one dude among us. But there was a seeing eye dog. That poor dog. And his girl. I didn’t know what was worse: seeing her trying to control her panic while attempting to comfort her freaked out partner, or watching the emotions play across her face as she struggled to believe the insane situation a bunch of strangers were describing to her.

  Yesterday, the aliens lining up outside of the pen were worked up in quite a frenzy. All kinds of aliens. And the immediate consensus among the ladies was that we were indeed facing alien life forms. Not that it was plausible, but in the face of – well, them – it was hard to come up with alternative explanations. Aliens. Aliens. Big shaggy ones, ones covered in feathers, some had slime coats and a couple looked like things you’d reel up from the sea… if you were fishing out in the ocean while tripping on LSD. The pen was roughly hexagonal in construction, and the substance under our feet looked pretty much like dirt. The walls of our prison were made of odd bits of metal, strange planks and was cobbled together with such a mishmash of materials it looked like it’d been cannibalized from a dozen crash-landed spaceships. Who the hell knew? It could have been.

  But despite the oddness of it all, the shape and presentation was distressingly similar to a livestock pen. Like the kind at the fair, where the great animals go up for bid at the end. Where I came from, there were two types that came to auctions. People looking to buy animals for food, and people looking to buy animals to ride.

  I bit my lips as I looked at some of the very large aliens that surrounded us.

  As some of them locked eyes with us and touched their crotch regions suggestively, making horrifyingly unmistakable gestures, something in me was very concerned that they had a different type of ride in mind entirely.

  We stayed huddled together, and we quickly compared notes. Just about all of us had been frozen by a ray of really bright light, and then poof! We woke up here. Some of us unlucky bitches had gone to bed the night before, never saw a light, and just woke up here, not a coffee in sight and sharing the really not-so-good feeling about what was about to happen to us.

  Knowing what had gone down to me a few minutes later, I worried about the other women’s fates. And frankly, I didn’t even want to think about what had happened to that dog.

  In full daylight, even without the bright spotlights glaring down, the auction pen still managed to look terrifying. Maybe more so because a few scant hours ago, I’d been the object of a heated bidding war where bunches of creatures began banding together to exceed the alien equivalent of high-roller bids. That’s how I’d ended up with four motherfuckers. I’d seen them, pointing to me and pooling their weird money together. I’d already witnessed a few girls before me get carried off, and with each woman that was dragged from the dwindling group, the crowd only got crazier.

  I was shaken out of reliving my ordeal by an unearthly squeal. Barreling towards me was a fluffy creature with six arms - and it was waving them and pointing. To me.

  Suddenly my alien was snarling. It was so loud and so frightening that I jumped. He clamped down on my hand and tugged me into his side. He growled words at the fuzzy creep.

  But the fuzzy one touched my arm.

  And that quick - my alien had him in a headlock and snap! Neck broken; he dropped the six-armed furry freak.

  “You’re a badass!” I shouted, a shot of adrenaline hitting my system and making me weirdly giddy as I wrapped my arms around his hips. But it wasn’t a hug. A hug implies that the hugger eventually releases their grip on the huggee, and that wasn’t happening. I wasn’t going
to risk getting pulled away from my alien hero.

  Breathing heavily, my alien threw me what I imagined was his version of an amused glance. I smiled tightly at him and we moved forward.

  We reached the big pen and I pointed and said, “I was there last night. With a lot of others like me.”

  He studied me then glared into the pen as he inhaled. Then he stared at me, shocked. He began to rumble low, dangerous sounds. He turned us then, and scanned the cages. He didn’t seem to find what he was looking for. He started walking. He modified his steps so that I could keep up – yes, still awkwardly hugging his hips as if he was my lifeline. So far, he was.

  Then we rounded the hexagon (that… just… sounds weird but you know what I mean) and on the other side – to my absolute horror – there were more pens. Rows and rows of imprisoned aliens. He made a sound and I looked up to see he appeared as distressed as I felt. Then he began to go down the first aisle way, checking both sides to view the occupants. Up and down we walked and I was sickened to see cages full of creatures. Talking, crying, pleading. These weren’t cages full of carnivorous feeder pigs that seemed to have no idea what waited for them. These were terrified sentient beings, clinging to loved ones, and it didn’t look like their presence here was any more voluntary than mine and the girls’ had been.

  Another onlooker viewing auction contents caught my alien’s attention. He hailed this other smaller-and-not-as-nice-guy-looking being. When the other guy leered at me, I squeezed my arms tighter around my alien’s hips, and he responded by cupping the back of my head and pressing it into his side protectively.

  3

  AROKH

  I reassured her as best as I could without words since they were virtually pointless. Extending the fingers of my other hand to Arvalt, I tapped fingertips to his in greeting.

  “You looking for the Rakhii whelp?”

  My hearts began pounding. I think the Gryfala noticed because she looked up at me sharply. “Where?”

  Arvalt smirked. “You have a chance at finding her before she is sold.” He drew out his pause, never taking his eyes from mine. “But we both know it’s an absurdly small chance. Or… I could collect myself a promise that seating will be full the next time I schedule a pit match.”

  I swallowed. Arvalt was a duplicitous, heartless, inveigler - but his gladiator games were perhaps the most successful of all.

  They were certainly the most brutal.

  The victor that walked out became famous, guaranteed to pull in a sold out crowd wherever they fought next. When I had been the last gladiator standing at his stadium, I promised myself I’d never step into that pit again. I wasn’t sure I could fight my way out twice. Stiffly I uttered, “Lead the way, and I’ll owe you a fight.”

  His grin shriveled my insides.

  But we fell into step behind him.

  It was worth it to promise, because I don’t think that I would have found her on my own. There were so many smells, so many bodies, so many voices, the odds of me picking her out were infinitesimal. No matter how conflicted I felt about owing anything to Arvalt, I clapped him solidly on his bubbling shoulder and knew that no matter what he had collected in repayment, it was worth it.

  I got to her in time.

  She had spotted me too, and was squeezing her way to the side of the pen, crying and calling out to me. My haste was so great that I had to stop myself from dragging the Gryfala behind me. Instead, I startled her by grabbing her up and carrying her as I raced.

  Raced towards the girl that was the jewel of my family, the one my brothers and I had been so desperately searching for.

  4

  ANGIE

  I didn’t know what heck was happening, but one minute my alien was running hell bent for leather towards a group of incredibly unlucky soon-to-be auction victims, and the next minute I was squished between his hard body and an alien that he’d just ripped out of a pen.

  He just – he just yanked it right off the ground and over the side of the pen like it was no big deal. Hot damn, we could have used his help last night! I squirmed between them, wriggling until I broke free and dropped to the ground. I wobbled back a step then could only watch their embrace in stunned silence.

  The other alien looked a lot like… him. And… it looked like a ‘her’. It, she, whatever, was sobbing, and his hands were rubbing reverently along long spike strands coming out from under her horn buds. He dragged her back when the other aliens that were still stuck in the pen made a desperate attempt to escape with her.

  Okay, so he saved me last night but he had no intention of helping anyone else…

  Except for this female.

  I crossed my arms and tried to identify the emotions struggling inside of me.

  The irrational, irrational emotions. Like… Jealousy? After a handful of hours? What?

  Why? Just because this stranger had been nice to me?

  Psychological reasons. Clearly.

  There was also a definite feeling of fear, with the intensity level of nuclear. Because what would happen to me now that my alien had what he had apparently been looking for all along?

  I gave myself a mental kick. My alien? I was possessive of a guy I couldn’t even talk to.

  That’s when he whipped out a cell phone.

  I gasped. I wanted to point to it and shout, ‘Hey! I know what that is!’ – but I didn’t, because if I had to guess, an interplanetary calling code probably wasn’t a thing, so no SOS signal from the alien cell phone begging earth to drop everything and figure out how to get little old me (and a bunch of others that were who-knows-where having who-knows-what being done to them) back home. Crap.

  He seemed to bark tersely, maybe even a little triumphantly into the phone. When he was done, he did something so odd that my jaw dropped.

  He captured her head in the crook of his elbow, and then he brought the underside of his other forearm to the top of her head and… she thrashed and trash talked him in alien I’m pretty sure. This had to be an alien noogie. It totally had to be. “Huh...” I said to no one.

  She whacked at him with her tail. When he released her, he threw back his head and made a loud coughing set of victory ...clicks.

  Aliens.

  She struck him one more time - affectionately- and shoved back from him. Then she turned to me, sort of folding over like she was... bowing? But that was crazy. Maybe she was hurt. Poor thing. She gave me a smile that looked sort of shy, until she noticed what I was wearing.

  She began barking and jumping up and down and then she reached out and ran her hand along my blanket-dress. I had already sidled half-away when my alien caught her in a headlock and apparently told her to cut it out, because she dropped her hand from the gorgeous fabric, looking disappointed.

  I felt a little better seeing that their interaction, while pretty tender, appeared platonic. And then I wanted to shake myself. What is the matter with you? Why should I care? Then I took a breath, gave myself a break - and an internal peptalk. Yes, my feelings were a messy cocktail of irrational but let me trot out my excuses/traumas of late. I made a promise to myself that as soon as I made it back home to Earth in one piece I’d take a moment and psychoanalyze all of this.

  Because apparently, now would not be the time. Because apparently, hugging with the auctionees was not encouraged. A burly yellow creature approached, its features so roach-like that the hairs at the back of my neck might never relax again.

  Kuh-reepy. He had a whip coiled in one of his appendages. Our guy made a hard gesture and did some explaining, but yellow guy was not interested in hearing what he had to say. My alien’s tail was snapping furiously and the other guy should have noticed that was some kind of bad sign. He made an ugly face, shouted - that’s when my alien lunged, grasping the thing by its… thorax? More auction workers converged on us, and that creepy alien that had led us to the girl he rescued? That guy apparently saw this as an opportunity to make the big bucks - it looked like he was collecting wagers on the outcome of this
skirmish. Some friend!

  Another guy with a whip - I was going to go out on a limb here and surmise that one wicked long whip was standard issue for all evil auction employees - this guy ran up with a space gun and aimed for-

  For my alien!

  No!

  The girl smacked the barrel just as a blast shot out of it.

  The blast took out the idiots standing just on the periphery; the ones embroiled in the dumbest gambling known to… alien, I guess.

  My alien clapped and bellowed… happily?

  No love lost between him and the creepy helper it seemed.

  I was so caught up in the spectacle, that I never saw them coming. I was yanked right off of my feet. These aliens were so freaking strong. I screeched and kicked and bit and fought as hard as I could, the deja-vu so intense my stomach was threatening to bring up my rat brick. “Nooo! No, let me go!”

  My alien dropped the yellow dude and spun, and in one punch he’d downed my main attacker. His tail took out the others. That’s right. His tail could slice bodies in two. My alien pulled me to his chest and I think he was repeating, “SO FUCKING SORRY!” or maybe “You’re okay now, just please don’t start crying again,” - who knew – but I was grateful and clamped to him like a barnacle. Quickly, he turned back to the girl he’d been trying to free. But it was too late. The yellow guy had shoved her into a chute packed with other aliens and was trying to direct her down into the ring. He uncoiled his whip, shaking it out.

  Uh oh.

  But my guy snatched it, roaring as he did and threw a loop around the roach head, pulling it tight. I let his side go and gave him space to choke the thing unconscious… or dead. I didn’t know, and I didn’t care. I just wanted out of here and off this planet and on the next ship to Earth, please.

  My guy grabbed my arm and brought me to his side, steadying me there like a moment, a clear stay close.