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It had said it was close to dinnertime and my stomach growled.
He grinned and picked up the bag of food, handing it to me.
“There’s more meats and cheese inside. There’s some wine too,” he explained, and I grinned with excitement. I took it from him and dug in. I found a variety of salamis, hams, and a range of cheeses from cheddar to brie. I licked my lips, looking forward to the meal he had procured.
Next, I pulled out a bottle of red wine. I spun it in my hands to read the label, realizing it was a cabernet sauvignon from Italy, aged for a solid ten years. I grinned, knowing this particular bottle was worth a lot in today’s market. It had a cork though, and I didn’t see any way to open it. I pouted a little before Axel must have noticed. He smirked at me and I couldn’t help but stick out my tongue in response. He chuckled softly.
He extended an arm and I handed it to him. He took it and cracked the knuckles on his other hand. Slowly, the nail on his forefinger began to extend, until it was a long, curling talon. Using his newly acquired claw, he stuck it into the cork, twisting the bottle with his other hand. In no time at all, the cork was fre
e of the bottle. Handing it to me, he grinned.
“Thank you,” I said, and he nodded curtly.
“Do you eat?” I asked then, before pressing a piece of cheese in between my lips. Sharp flavors burst over my tongue and I moaned softly, before washing it down with a swig of wine. I felt positively like a cavewoman at that moment, eating and drinking in front of a campfire, but I didn’t really care. In fact, I was enjoying myself.
“I do at times, but it’s not a necessary activity. My body can provide its own food for energy, in order to keep me strong no matter the circumstances,” he answered quietly. I chewed my lip, processing the information, before taking another bite.
I ate and drank my fill, feeling the welcome buzz beneath my skin.
Axel and I chatted deep into the night and the more I got to know him, the more I liked him. He was a man who’d lived a challenging life and not one of his choosing, but he was highly intelligent and strong because of it.
Some things he told me made me feel sorrow for him, other things happiness. The entire time, he kept a strong positive view of his life and I positively adored him for it. I didn’t know if I could have been the same.
He’d been trained to be the ultimate soldier, but he was more than that. He was both alien and human, and despite his slightly modified traits, he felt just like a man to me. My body was calling for him to touch me again, but he didn’t. He knew he could take me if he wanted and I knew it as well, but he had all the control.
Alien. Beast. Human.
He was all three in one.
And right now, he was mine.
That night, we slept together on the mattress, his chest to my back and I’d never felt so safe in my life. I could feel my heart warming toward him, despite the absurdity of it. I didn’t know if we had any chance for anything more or even some semblance of a future together, but I didn’t think about it. For now, I just enjoyed his company and he enjoyed mine.
Over the next few days, we fell into a routine. He would leave the cave and gather food and water for me and I would spend time in the hot springs and tending the fire. He taught me a few pointers since I hadn’t been around fire much in my life and now I felt like a pro. Every once in a while, I’d add another log to the flames and watch the embers drift up above me, hypnotized by its beauty.
After a few more days though, I began to feel restless. Axel would leave after a late breakfast and usually return shortly before dinnertime, leaving a window of time for me to explore myself. Neither of us had seen any sign of Saleos since the very first night, so I began to feel safe, despite Axel’s constant warnings to the contrary. I grew bold because of it.
A week passed by and I began to wander about the entrance of the cave. When nothing happened as a result, I began to venture out further and further. I found a few mountain retreats, getaways of the soldiers and scientists who had once lived here. Most of them seemed hardly lived in. Dust layered atop every surface, with not a spec of it disturbed. It was unnerving. In some of them, the view was astounding. The mountains gave way to forests and far off in the distance, I could see a deep blue lake. It was beautiful.
I found nothing of interest in most of them, until I came upon the largest one I’d seen yet. Completely made of glass and tempered into the mountainside, it was a feature many would miss, hidden and unassuming. Had I not noticed the small clearing outlining the house, I would have probably never found it in the first place.
I licked my lips, hiding in the brush just outside of the structure and waited. Nothing moved. I was alone, just as I had expected. Slowly, I moved toward one of the doors. Carefully, I slid the door to the side, noticing it was unlocked as many of the houses in the area were. They must have assumed they were safe, watched by government satellites and cameras, surrounded by soldiers and a heavily guarded perimeter.
The only reason I had gotten into Echelon 67 in the first place was that the entire human guard had been destroyed. There had been no one to stop me. I realized that now.
I ventured into the front sitting room, finding little of interest in any of the drawers or on the entryway tables. Unexpectedly, I did find another portal, similar to those I had found in the small abandoned dome structure in what felt like forever ago.
I wondered where it led. I chewed my lip, staring at the black and purple glittering object. I turned away and went back to searching the rest of the house, feeling its presence everywhere I went. I found an office, an elaborate bathroom, an exquisite luxurious bedroom, and a gorgeous guest bedroom. Simple elegance was what I came to expect as I explored these mountain homes.
The office had very little to offer. There was a computer station, but without any semblance of power here, I had no hope of turning on the holographic screen. The drawers held nothing but empty digital notepads. It was disappointing.
I did find some female clothes hidden in the closet and gratefully discarding the sheet on my body, I pulled on a pair of gray pants and a black t-shirt. I tucked my trusty laser gun into the waistband of my pants, removing it from its odd uncomfortable position in my boot, where I’d been keeping it for the past several days.
When I finished getting dressed, I sighed. Without power, there was very little I could learn from this place. Except, as I returned to the front sitting room, I stared at the portal again. Even though everything else lacked electricity, the portal was still shining, bright and strong against the mountain views. How?
I’d never been afraid of taking chances in my life. You couldn’t be like that if you ever wanted to succeed in science, or journalism. I’d been born a risk taker. And I wasn’t about to start being timid now. It was time to figure out where these portals went. It was now or never.
I had to find evidence of my story, a primary source where no one would be able to dispute my first person view as the ramblings of a psycho. I needed written evidence, medical records, anything that would document Axel’s species to show the public and expose the government for what had been happening right under the public’s noses.
