Page 41 of Evan and the Alpha

12

Evan

I’m nervous, which, when I think about it, is kind of ridiculous. I’ve spent how long with the kroakka now? I’m screwing the alpha who tried to sell me. I’ve watched him kill another alpha, and I’ve asked him to put his hands around my neck and choke me, even knowing just how quickly he could snap my neck, break me, kill me. Two weeks ago, I had a weird fever that the kroakka called a “heat episode,” but I seem to have recovered. Mostly. I still feel kinda weird.

None of that makes me nervous. Nope. I’m nervous because Darwin’s talking about getting theColumbiaback here sooner (somehow; I don’t really think it’s possible, unless the ship breaks orbit and reverses course against gravitational pull of the planet, which would cost them too much fuel—if I understand everything correctly) or maybe getting them to call for aid from one of the satellite stations.

Darwin thinks we need to get off this planet, stat. I couldn’t disagree more, but it’s my own goddamn fault that he knows about any of this. I was the one who insisted we had to go find him. I was so worried about Sobek after the fight with Nojak, I couldn’t think of anything except getting the alpha help. Darwin’s no doctor, sure, but he had all our stuff—first aid kits, medical scanners, more. And the communications equipment. Darwin could get in touch with theColumbia’s crew. He could try radioing a station. We could get—I don’t know—maybe a real doctor or a surgeon. Maybe they could bring stuff for a blood transfusion or an organ regeneration kit or—

It didn’t even occur to me at the time that kroakka blood is probably different than human blood, and we don’t know anything about their organs. It’s possible none of our equipment, our medical procedures, would work for Sobek. Even if it did, it might take time to recalibrate it.

Anyway, I insisted we had to go find Darwin, so we did, and he was super cool with contacting theColumbiaor getting a message back to the nearest station, but not because my alien mate got stabbed.

No, Darwin is worried about me. He wants me to go home. He thinks I’m a little fucked in the head—sympathetically, of course—and that I need to get off Veda-3.

And, like, I can see why he thinks that. Heck, I even agree that I probably am a little fucked in the head. Like I said, I’m fucking the alien who kidnapped me and tried to sell me into slavery. Darwin probably thinks I’ve got Stockholm syndrome or something. And like, maybe I do (except that theory’s been totally disproven by research).

But the last thing I want to do is go home. Maybe that makes me messed up. I don’t know. What I do know is I like it here. Well, maybe not on Veda-3, really, but with Sobek.

With my mate.

I don’t really know when I started thinking about him like that, but it’s hard to stop now. He’s my mate, plain and simple. I want to be with my mate. I want to make sure my mate is okay. I don’t want to leave him.

Which, yeah. I can see why Darwin thinks I must have hit my head or something. That I’ve lost my marbles and need to go back. I get that he’s just concerned about me, but all this talk of needing to go home …

It makes me nervous.

We haven’t managed to make contact with theColumbiayet, and I’m a little relieved. Maybe they’re out of range. Maybe our communications devices are busted or there’s interference from the planet. It might take us time to contact them, if we ever manage it at all. We might be stuck here.

And I’m strangely okay with that.

Sobek’s recovering just fine, so the danger has passed. Darwin’s been in the city now for maybe two weeks, and I’m hoping he’ll be convinced not to leave. He’s a researcher at heart; is he really going to give up a chance to study an alien species, to live among them and learn about their people? Just because one scrawny kid maybehas a couple of screws loose?

Sobek’s been pretty incapacitated, although he’s healing up well. His father—his alpha parent, or phapha as he calls him—has been pretty obliging, taking Darwin and me out on excursions around kel-Akurr. Darwin is smitten with the place, I can tell. It keeps hope burning at the back of my throat. Hope that, if and when we do make contact with theColumbia, he won’t make me go home.

We’re out and about now, both of us under shawls to hide our skin from the burning glare of the two suns. Darwin is picking through some items at one of the market stalls, muttering to himself about how it’s all fascinating. I’m not paying much attention, thinking instead about getting home and seeing Sobek again. Both Terek, his phapha, and Tek, his omom, have been telling me I’m still “in heat,” whatever the hell that means. Sobek said it too.

Whatever. If it means Sobek keeps fucking me like he has been, I’ll roll with it.

Maybe that’s got a little bit to do with the nervousnessburning in my gut, nipping at my throat right now. Or maybe … it’s more like anticipation. Excitement. It’s weird.

I allow myself to be distracted by a kroakka a couple stalls over, also draped in gauzy fabric. He doesn’t need protection from the sun; his outfit’s to protect him from the wandering gaze of alphas. He’s haggling with one of the vendors. At his feet, a couple of tiny kroakka are playing in the sand, chirping at each other.

They’re so cute. I want to melt into a puddle. Adult kroakka are terrifying with their crocodilian eyes and their teeth and their claws. Who knew their kids would be so tiny and cute? I just want to squeeze them. Maybe steal one of them for my own.

My gut twists unpleasantly. Steal one? Keep one? Earth to Evan, you don’t need a kid to look after.

I blink, then turn my attention back to the table Darwin’s still pondering. Maybe I did hit my head. Maybe I did knock a few screws loose. I’m a twenty-three-year-old, gay, male human. Not supposed to even be fathoming kids at this point in my life, and especially not on a planet full of crocodile aliens.

Even if …

My fingers drift over my abdomen, and then I yank my hand back forcibly. Nope, not going there. Not even in my own private thoughts. I’m not entertaining that.

Terek approaches us, a stern look on his face. He glances side to side, then says, “Come along. You’ve lingered here long enough; people are beginning to notice.”

“Just a moment,” Darwin says, then goes back to musing over a piece.

“Just buy it already,” I spit at him. “You can study it when we get home.”