Page 11 of Protected By the Alien Space Guardian

“Finally!” someone shouted.

“We can’t figure out how these things work, and we don’t even know if we can eat their food,” one of the two soldiers explained as he approached us, pointing at a row of black boxes standing on tables against a wall.

Without a word, only his customary grunt, Raasla walked to the boxes, leaving the soldier and me to follow him.

“Eric,” he introduced himself as we caught up with Raasla.

“Zoe,” I replied just as we reached the boxes and watched Raasla wave his hand over the top of the first box. Instantly, it came to life. Colorful pictures of food choices lit up the screen, and smaller ones appeared on the right side.

“You can add to your selection here,” Raasla said and showed us how to swipe the image to get a new one. Then he put his finger on one of the smaller ones, moved that selection up and down, and tapped whenever he saw something that caught his eye.

When he was done, he tapped at an alien symbol on the bottom, and out came a steaming meal.

“Yummy,” Eric remarked, rolling his eyes dubiously.

I fully reciprocated the sentiment because… the mush on the plate didn’t look appetizing at all. It resembled the gross stuff in the troughs.

Eric stepped to the next box over and copied Raasla’s moves until he too held a plate of steaming mush before him. His was orange, though, in contrast to the blue stuff Raasla had selected.

“All set?” Raasla asked, already turning to leave without waiting for an answer.

“Hold on,” a woman who had been in one of the other cells yelled.

Raasla’s body stiffened, screaming that he wasn’t in the mood to stay and interact with us, but she didn’t care.

“Thank you for saving us,” she said. “Please stay and eat with us. We need some answers.”

I didn’t notice that I was grinding my teeth until my right molar protested in pain. Great, now I had hurt myself without any obvious dental facilities around.

Raasla assessed the woman, who looked to be in her late twenties and so beautiful even the Cryon uniform couldn’t distract from it. Actually, most of the others had been able to take a shower and dress in Cryon uniforms.

“It will be my pleasure,” Raasla replied as his whole demeanor changed from resentment to charming alien. He gave her the same smoldering smile he had given me before we… fucked, and I ground my teeth again.

You knew what he was, my mind reminded me.

I still don’t have to like it when he prances around like this not even an hour after we… ouch, that was my molar again. Fuck.

“So have you discovered anything useful?” Eric distracted me.

“Useful?” Right, I reminded myself, you were gone with Raasla for a while. “There are more dead Cryons on other floors,” I blurted out the first thing that came to my mind and selected random food from the box so I didn’t have to look at Eric—and have him notice my heating face—or Raasla, which would result in more teeth grinding.

Eric led me to a table where my back was to the alien. I didn’t think he did it on purpose, but I was glad I didn’t have to watch Raasla and that woman flirt.

“This is Peter,” Eric introduced the other soldier who joined us at the table. “Peter, Zoe.”

Peter nodded. “Ma’am.”

“Zoe is fine,” I said, pushing my spork through the yellow mush on my plate. My stomach turned painfully, reminding me that I hadn’t eaten in days. With a deep sigh, so I plastered a more courageous smile on my lips than I felt. “Well, here goes nothing.”

I pushed the spork into my mouth, expecting to taste the vilest thing ever, but it wasn’t all that bad.

“Well?” Peter asked.

“It’s okay,” I said, filling another spork, “kinda like mashed potatoes mixed with turmeric or curry or something.”

Eric took a bite. “Mine tastes like mashed potatoes mixed with oranges. Wanna try?”

We took turns taking bites of each other’s plates and decided, yeah, the food wasn’t that bad.

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