Page 10 of Abducting Sarah

The new alien’s hair was gray and braided, and her skin was black, but had a sheen to it—they all did. Her sheen was blue, so when the light really lit her skin she looked unreal. The same was true of the other aliens, too. All of them looked like a Hollywood creature—human-like, but extremely different than us. They were all around seven feet tall or more. All weremuscled, but some more so. The males and females were easy to tell apart. Broad shoulders and deeper voices for the males, while the females were voluptuous and had softer voices.

Their evolution must have been similar to our own.

I tried to think of my experience as being on safari. I was only a visitor, and I would go home soon, and everything would go back to normal. So, I tried to think of my observations as something David Attenborough would say on his documentaries that I grew up watching with my sisters. It was the closest thing we had to a decent education on animals—rural South Carolina wasn’t big on the sciences.

But whenever she could, my older sister, Elizabeth, made us watch nature documentaries. Elizabeth would make popcorn and we’d study the films, while Jenny would ask why he didn’t do documentaries on fairies, because that would be more interesting.

Thinking of my sisters made my heart ache, and I would have cried, had I been able to.

As the new alien pushed my gurney through the halls, he said, “I don’t think you can hear me or maybe even understand me. Ode Hrimp’s medical credentials are far below my own. None the less, I am Wave Reesk, and I will be managing your care now. I will be taking the straps off of you in a moment. If you struggle against the sedation, you may die. Don’t do it.”

What does that even mean?

We turned a corner and were in a room filled by steam. I saw the straps in her hand as she removed them before she lifted me from the gurney like I weighed nothing. Then she dropped me into a vat of hot red liquid, submerging me completely.

I was almost scared of drowning in it, but I hadn’t been breathing for a while, so I calmed down fast. The liquid sloshed in the vat, before she lifted me from it again.

She said, “You are parasite free now and you certainly smell better.”

The hell?

She placed me back onto the gurney and pushed it beneath a dryer that blew the thick red liquid from me. “Perfect. Now, on to your master.”

Something about that word terrified me more than the rest of my ordeal.I don’t want or need a master! I just want to go home! I would happily take Ryan’s coldness and all the drugs he wanted me to swallow over this!

My mind wandered, trying to sort this out.All the drugs…earlier, I had thought this was all a hallucination…it has to be. No matter who Wave was taking me to, none of it was real.Maybe I overdosed and this is whatever lucid nightmare my mind has conjured up before I die.

I comforted myself with the knowledge that aliens were not real and I was probably just dying on the floor of our bedroom.When Ryan comes out of the bathroom, he’ll hit me with an epi pen or something, and I’ll be fine.

The gurney shifted as we turned out of the door from the steam room and walked down a longer hallway, with my head leading the way as Wave pushed by my feet. Dread built inside my mind with no physical outlet. I wanted to scream and run away and force them to hunt me down on the ship. Even though I knew it wasn’t real, it was like being immersed in my worst nightmare.

This is the strongest hallucination I have ever had, and I want out!

The door behind me opened and I heard voices before I saw their sources.

A deep voice asked, “How is she?”

“She seems well. I don’t know what Ode was so worried for.”

A scratchy male voice said, “Because she’s the best human anatomist in all of Orhon, so you’d do best to listen to her, Wave.”

But she rolled her eyes before she looked down at me. “Sarah Hollinger, this is your new master, Deacon Ladrang.”

Then, she left, and the door slid closed behind her.

The tallest alien I had seen so far looked down over me as he came closer. His skin was deeply tanned, yet had a strange cast over it, like the others. Clearly muscular, his posture was imposing. His eyes were brown, and he had gray hair, which made him less terrifying somehow. It was almost as though he had tried to appear human and failed. When he smiled, I expected fangs or a green tongue or something equally horrific. But it was only a gentle smile.

“You will save my family, Sarah Hollinger.” Then, he waved a hand over my face.

Suddenly, it was as though my body came back online. I felt everything—nothing hurt—and I could smell something…citrusy. I filled my lungs and to my relief, there was air.

I blinked a lot before I tried to speak. “What the hell is this?”

Deacon Ladrang frowned and was soon joined by my human stalker, who said, “He doesn’t speak English. Try your other language.”

It was my turn to frown. “I don’t know any other language.” But by the end of the sentence, my words sounded bizarre and garbled to my ears.

The stalker said, “Better.”

---