AllFreeNovel
Share Us
We spot the flashlights bobbing their way up the beach before the last of the evening light disappears. Not that it’s dark - the two moons provide plenty of illumination over the ocean. It’s a beautiful sight, and I’m a little regretful to be ending my time with Ryle just now. Mainly, though, I’m relieved that we’ve made it.
The girls all hug me tightly, and even grumpy Judd offers a fist bump. Ryle eyes him with a frown, but when I brush his gray shoulder and offer him a smile, he calms. Thank goodness. The last thing we need is major jealousy issues. Survival is hard enough without interpersonal drama.
The girls are more interested in hearing my story than sharing theirs. So I tell them all about the mudslide and everything we saw out in the alien wilderness. I give Quinn the mushroom - now nothing more than a bandage wrapper full of mush. I give her the blue pine needles, the water-filled gourd, some other grasses and flowers that I snagged. Hopefully, she and Viv can figure out if any of that stuff is usable or safely edible.
All the while, Ryle hovers at my back. He touches my shoulder now and then as we walk, as if checking to make sure I’m still there. Still with him. The team gives him some side-eye but they don’t ask questions.
“Tell me about working with the aliens!” I say.
“The Rurim,” Skye corrects me.
“It’s amazing how you found a way to communicate,” I say.
“It’s a start at least,” Skye says. “That dictionary is full of more technical terms than anything else. Their ship is busted, too.”
“I wonder how that happened,” I say. Behind me, I hear the occasional word in Ryle’s language come out of my tablet. He’s trying to listen in. And knowing him, trying to learn.
“They seem to think there was a gravitational error,” Skye says. “Which is completely bonkers. I can’t make sense of it, and the astronauts are too busy to care. Either way, they’re stranded just like us.”
“Crazy bad luck,” I say.
“I don’t know. They seem pretty thrilled about it, to be honest. They get excited when they talk about landing here. Even about being trapped here. They aren’t trying to fix their ship. I don’t think they’re interested in going home at all.”
“Strange.” I look back at Ryle. Where were they headed? Where were they coming from? There’s so little that I know about him, now that I’m thinking about it. I really kind of know nothing. Like, does he have a family somewhere? Is he homesick? He shoots me a toothy grin when he catches me looking at him.
What is he actually doing here?
?????
There is, in fact, a path up the cliff. It’s not too far beyond the ship and the campsite. It’s a thin, rocky, slippery path that threatens to send each of us tumbling. We spend half the climb on all fours. Even though Ryle’s the biggest, he somehow struggles the least, and he keeps up a reassuring string of his words, Rurimish words, at my back.
The camp is a flurry of activity when we reach it. The suns are down, but our construction lights have been set up. They illuminate the entire area around the ship, which, I notice, is finally upright. “Faith and Arjun must be happy,” I say, gesturing at the vessel.
“Not exactly,” Skye mutters, but she doesn’t elaborate. “Most of us have been camping inside the cargo bay since we lost the big tents. We’ll make room for you if you want. Some people prefer sleeping in the camping tents. A few folk are even using hammocks down in the forest.” She grimaces when she says it. “Seems dangerous to me, but no one’s been bitten yet.”
“I was,” I mutter.
“If it was a bug, I don’t want to hear it!” she says, shuddering and pretending to brush off her body. “Yuck.”
Ryle speaks into the tablet, and it translates, “Where my crew? Not here?”
“They moved their camp to the riverbed,” she says, then wrinkles her nose. “Some of them snore very loud.”
Ryle laughs at the translation. “I go,” the tablet says for him while his eyes meet mine. “I help, too. Goodnight, friends. Goodnight Macie.”
His hand brushes mine when he hands it back, and he hesitates. It feels so strange to be parting now. It feels wrong. I’ve got to get a grip.
I do a double-take when I glance at my screen. Ryle is already down the hill and disappearing into the trees, too far away to shout after him without looking like a crazy person. He did it again! He drew a dirty picture! In this one, he’s added absurdly large boobs to my frame, complete with freckles, and he colored in the pinkness between my legs. He’s got us in... I don’t know what this position is. He’s standing and I’m lying on my back on a rock. Honestly, did he need to include so much detail?
“What are you grinning about?” Skye asks with a smirk.
“I’m not grinning,” I say, jamming the tablet back in my front pocket. That image is downright pornographic, it doesn’t deserve a grin! I clap a hand over my mouth to make it go away.
“You know,” Skye says, guiding me towards the breach in the ship where the crew is coming and going, “There has been a little flirting between the camps.”
“That’s... scandalous,” I say, my voice guarded. Oh God, if anyone finds out the things that have happened...
“If you made out with that Rurim, we won’t judge you. But we will want all the details.” She grins and elbows me.
