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The hallway they led us down featured plenty of doors set close together. Down the way, it opened up to a real laboratory, but I had to stretch to see the faint blue lights beyond, more a glow than the warm lamplight I was used to.
Ree held out her hands on either side, like she could corral us all behind her and any one of these guys couldn’t pick her up and set her out of the way if they had half an inclination to.
“I don’t know what the fuck you’re getting at here, but we’re not staying. That Kaelum guy, he can’t just take Lucas, you know. We want to be together.”
The big blue guy, Crux, who’d caught me when I’d been dragged into the ship, curled his lips. He wasn’t human, and maybe I was misunderstanding his expression, but it didn’t seem to me that he gave a damn what we wanted.
“You will be given rooms,” he informed Ree. “You will continue to be fed. You will submit to my testing. I require gametes.”
Kenosi’s breath escaped in a whoosh. I caught his eye and grimaced. Genevieve, who had a ring on her finger and had cried almost the whole way from Earth, let out another pitiful sob, and Monica pressed against her arm hard.
Hiroki swallowed. “We need rest first.”
He was a little guy. Spoke better English than I did, considering my accent and, well—he just seemed to be pragmatic. Thoughtful. My dad would’ve been horrified—a guy with bright pink hair being the voice of reason, like the color of a guy’s hair affected his character.
Crux considered Hiroki for a moment. Tucked his chin down in a gesture that could almost be a nod.
“You should be in prime condition first, yes,” Crux allowed. “This is your home now. This is Thorzan.”
He turned away. Other big blue guys took us by our shoulders and showed us to rooms—little ones, like boxes, with small beds, set up all down the hallway. I felt a set of eyes on me, and looked up to meet the gaze of the single remaining guy with—well, what I’d call human skin. Almost.
I’d seen him on the ship before. He’d brought me my clothes, and he’d been there to make sure we all got off Crux’s damaged vessel after it was attacked. He was a tan color. Enormous, and covered in those silvery markings all the aliens had, though he had more, like every inch of his skin had been tattooed.
What? Maybe I’d been staring, but that was what happened when you plucked me right out of my REM cycle and dumped me on the planet of the unspeakably buff blue dudes.
Or... mostly blue dudes.
Around his elbows, his ears, his nipples, his skin was faintly blue. He was not at all human, but something other than the big blue guys with the rock-hard skin and incredibly thick calluses.
I held his eye until I stumbled forward, crossing the threshold into the room that was now mine. And when the door slid shut behind me, I figured that was it. I’d get out when they were ready to test my gametes or... or whatever.
With a huff, I dropped down onto the cot and ran my hands through my hair. I needed to prepare for that, right? Get on board for some uncomfortable and invasive probing. Try and make it less of a big deal than it felt, hanging over me now.
I fiddled with my dress, twisting it over my thigh.
Since I’d left my clothes on the first ship, hidden under the mattress where no other human could get a clear idea who I was or where I’d come from, this was all I had left.
If it were any color other than beige, I could’ve made this work. I didn’t mind a shift dress, really. Lots of people looked good in dresses, and while I’d been skinny even before food got scarce, this kind of mod look was basically built for guys like me. Straight lines, hanging fabric, bare arms.
Well, beige or not, it was better than what I’d been wearing for weeks outside before the big blue fellas had picked me up. So this was what I had to work with.
I stood and ran my hands down my hips to straighten the fabric. And, you know, really, it wasn’t bad. The fabric seemed pretty good at regulating temperature, letting the heat off my skin in the muggy humidity of this new place.
Thorzan, Crux called it. Their home world? Made more sense for it to be a place than a person.
We hadn’t seen enough to get any firm understanding of the place. I’d seen what looked like trees from way high up, but who even knew how they related to Earth trees? If they were to an oak what one of those big guys was to a human, I didn’t know shit about them.
I paced the edge of my little room, wishing I’d at least put on shoes in case I had a chance to make a run for it. But damn, it wasn’t cold. I just... I shouldn’t have let myself get this exposed, right?
Like I had a choice about my exposure while imprisoned by aliens.
Sighing, I dropped my head against the metal panel that functioned like a door. My hand brushed what looked like a tablet mounted on the wall beside it.
And—fuck!
I rocked forward, having to catch myself on the empty arch as the door whizzed open.
I blinked fast. Had they just... forgotten to lock me in?
