Page 85 of Guardian's Destiny

Dread formed in my gut. We had been suspecting this, speculated about it, but now, as she was about to confirm my fears, I didn't want to hear it. I didn't want to know.

But she forged on before I could stop her, "They were filled with Space Guardians, in all stages of development."

I swallowed. She placed her hand on my chest. "Vraax, I'm sorry."

Dizziness overcame me as the room began to spin around me, and I think my heart stopped beating for a moment or two. I leaned heavily on Sloane. Test tubes, biological engineering, vat grown, artificially incubated… those words flooded my mind, creating bile in my throat.

I closed my eyes and took a deep, steadying breath. Did that mean I wasn't a real person?

I felt like a real person.

I felt pain.

I felt joy.

I felt sadness.

I felt love.

Love!

"Sloane," I pressed her against me.

"It's okay, Vraax; this doesn't change anything."

Warmth spread through me. She knew. She had known even before we made up last night. She loved me, no matter what, no matter where I came from or how I had been created, and that meant everything to me.

But she was also wrong. This changed everything.

SLOANE

The days passedway too quickly, and yet with the time constraint we had, it didn't seem to pass at all. One night, while Vraax was sleeping, I snuck into the breakroom to grab a drink and ran right into Ella.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't know anybody was up," I apologized.

"Can't sleep either?" She asked, stopping me as I was about to make a swift exit.

"Some nights, it's not easy," was all I said, grabbing the drink I came for. I wasn't an insecure person, but I didn’t know how to talk to Ella. I mean, I had thousands of questions burning a hole into my stomach, but where do you start? I couldn't just come out and go like, hey, so you're dating a legend/god/something that shouldn't exist? How is that going? I also wanted to know about the other women; how had they ended up there? What had the Ohrurs done to them?

"Yeah, some nights are hell," she replied with a haunted look that reminded me of myself enough that I took a seat on a chair across from her.

"The Ohrurs?" I took a shot in the dark.

"The Ohrurs, the Cryons, the Pronex… take your pick. All of these aliens are fucking blood thirsty."

"Not all of them," I tried. "The Pandraxians are okay."

She shrugged.

Silence spread out between us. Usually, I was good with silence and waiting other people out, but Ella was different. I thought she and I could have sat there all night without saying a word.

It seemed like she needed some space and time to say what she had to say, so I gave it to her. It wasn't like I would have been able to sleep anyway. "You should know about the Ohrurs and their experiments. So you can take the information to the Pandraxians."

I sipped from the juice I had ordered, finding it too sweet and put the cup down. I indicated for her to continue.

"The Ohrurs took me prisoner and brought me to Ohrur." She saw my question—why would the Ohrurs take her prisoner if it had been the Cryons who invaded—and shook her head. "My story has nothing to do with this and is none of your business."

"Fair enough." I wasn't sure about her hostility toward me, but it was possible that she was just a private person. Either way, I respected her wish and didn't press for anything more than she was willing to divulge.

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