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All the women looked so healthy and happy that I wondered if it was a façade. Surely, they couldn’t be happier here than living with our own people.
They separated us newbies into groups and took us on separate tours, starting in different areas of the stronghold. Two dozen of us all piling through the narrow hallways and into small rooms was a bad idea. Apparently, some of the corridors were narrow, just big enough for a single Kadrixan male to pass. It made defending parts of the base easier.
I ended up in a group with Julie, Michelle, and three others.
The stronghold was a lot larger than it looked from the outside. We were in the largest section of the sprawling base. There were six sections in total, each area reserved for one of the ships that had settled here. They were similarly built except for the one we were currently in, which was the largest and held the great room where we’d started the tour, as well as the Kadrixans’ command center.
The great room was large enough to hold all of the Kadrixan warriors at once for special events.
“How many warriors are there?” asked Julie.
“I haven't actually counted,” answered Penelope, the blonde tour guide closest to us. “Several hundred maybe?”
Each section had living quarters for the warriors as well as a separate living area for the women.
“You get your own place?” I asked, confused. For some reason, I’d thought everyone just bed-hopped around. Then again, I was going off the garbage the colony had fed me.
“We’re allowed to divvy up the rooms however we want. Some of us have roommates and some of us have our own rooms,” Penelope replied.
“And those of us who are mated stay with our mates,” said a brunette in front of us, turning to join the conversation. She was the other of our two tour guides.
I perked up. “You’re mated. Did one of them drop to their knees in front of you?”
She beamed. “It happened a few weeks after that first rut. They’d just done that big trade mission with the natives, and I snuck into one of the ships to check out the cargo. He caught me sneaking around and nearly dropped a crate of fruits on his own foot when he went down.” Her eyes sparkled as she talked about her mate. She was clearly very smitten with this crate-dropping alien.
“Don’t get Tasha talking about her mate. She’ll never shut up.” Penelope rolled her eyes and continued the tour.
The smell of cooking meat wafted down the hallway, which, like Krxare’s room, was formed of a mix of smooth metal and natural rock. Every room and corridor was lit by long, narrow lights set into the metalloid areas of the wall, about a foot down from the ceiling. Occasionally the same gothic-looking sconces with flickering fire-like lights as I’d seen in Krxare’s room added an ambient glow.
“And here we have the kitchen. One of six kitchens in this compound. It's a little excessive, but when you realize they are doing full-on barbecues indoors, you see why they need it in six different places and why each one is thoroughly ventilated.” Penelope stepped through the door, and we followed her through one by one in a long line.
I saw something moving out of the corner of my eye, but when I turned my head to check, there was nothing. It must be my nerves playing tricks on me.
“Against that wall are the food replicators,” Penelope continued. “We have a class on how to operate one tomorrow, so don't miss it. It makes a mean faux-cappuccino.”
“Isn't what we have at the colony a faux-cappuccino already?” Michelle asked.
“Alright. So it's a faux-faux-cappuccino. But it's really good. I promise. Replicating teas and coffees is the first lesson of the class tomorrow, so I can't give anything away yet.” She grinned. “Trust me. You don’t want to miss it.”
I made a mental note to make sure I was present for that. I hadn't had a good coffee since I’d lost my job a few months ago.
I’d thought Penelope was kidding when she said they barbecued meat indoors. In a large open space, I understood, but inside a stronghold set inside a mountain? I inhaled deeply, but the air was only a tiny bit smokey, nothing like I’d expect with giant hunks of meat roasting away on the other side of the room. They must have great ventilation, though I couldn't see the vents at all.
The next stop was the training room, which was shared by all six sections. When Penelope had first mentioned the training area, I thought it was going to be an indoor gym; imagine my surprise when the door opened to the great outdoors.
We were in a valley, and a large area had been cleared away for use as a fighting ring. Two Kadrixan warriors circled each other with their wings folded. They fought with each other, lunging, kicking, and fighting. Their physiques were top-notch, and the women around me had their eyes glued to the two perfect specimens, but somehow they didn't look nearly as impressive as Krxare.
Behind them was something that resembled a large jungle gym, except instead of the single-level one I'd gone on as a kid, this one was multi-level and huge. There was a woman on it, swinging from bar to bar. A thick mat had been placed under her section.
The kid in me screamed to go try it, but the adult in me told me I'd probably fall on my ass and pull muscles I’d never known I had. I hadn’t done anything like that for years.
In another section were a bunch of obstacles. A few warriors leaped over, crawled under, and sidestepped them as they made their way across the course.
Farther off, there were rows of plants in a garden. The Kadrixans ate mostly meat and fruit, but Penelope explained that they did season their food with herbs and spices and supplemented with the starchy stems of what we lovingly called the tatertot plants. I’d never had this mythical “tatertot” before, but I’d had fried tatertot stems many times. Apparently, they were supposed to taste similar.
Returning back indoors, they showed us the rest of the section, which were the warriors’ living quarters, the women’s quarters, and storage areas. The women had commandeered one of the extra rooms and turned it into their own little rec room. A few heads swiveled as we walked in, and we were greeted by genuine smiles.
As the tour continued, I lost track of all the different rooms, but I was sure I’d eventually figure it out. Every so often, something in my peripheral vision had me turning my head, but it was gone when I looked.
