Page 8 of Drengr
"Good morning! Help yourselves to breakfast. The table on the left has normal human food including cereal, the one on the right has some Vikingr specialities. All of them are safe for human consumption, don't worry. From now on, all our meals will have both cuisines so that you can get used to Vikingr food at your own pace."
I immediately turned right, while Candice only shot a sceptical look at the alien food table before steering towards the assortment of cereal. Several steaming bowls awaited me, together with a plate containing tiny black squares that looked like chocolate, and another plate with what could have been garishly pink sausages. Unless they were actually vegetables. Or fruit. I shouldn't make assumptions. This was all new, and while I could only use my existing framework of the human experience, I should approach every situation with an open mind.
I heaped a little bit of everything onto a large plate and rejoined Candice. She looked from her bowl of cornflakes to my alien buffet and her eyes widened. A little self-conscious, I tried one of the black squares. As soon as my lips closed around it, the square melted, releasing delicate flavours of caramel, sea salt and something citrusy. Again, I chastised myself for thinking in Earth's terms. This wasn't caramel or orange. It was alien. Eventually, I'd learn the actual ingredients - if I decided to stay.
After breakfast, Steff told us to put our dirty dishes onto one of the tables. As soon as they were all stacked together, the air around them sparkled and a second later, they'd disappeared.
"It's like having house elves," Shona muttered.
I couldn't have agreed more. If this didn't turn out well, I wanted to get the same technology added to my house.
We arranged our chairs in a circle, making me feel very much at home - or at school. Steff waited until everyone was comfortable before starting her lesson.
"I thought I'd start today by giving you the chance to ask some questions. You've all had time to process things overnight, so I'm sure you'll have lots of questions for me. First, though, I will tell you that the Vikingar are very excited to meet you. Njal, that's my mate, told me they've been watching you with great interest. To be fair, he used a different word, but for now, let's keep it PG. Wave for the camera, ladies - they're watching as we speak."
"That's a bit creepy," Shona muttered. "Like one of those TV shows."
"I know," Steff said with genuine understanding. "But this was the only way I could persuade them to give us a few days of space. They were so excited to hear that they were matched to human women, it was hard to stop them from abducting you all from your homes."
"Abducting?" Candice repeated, her eyes wide. "They'd do that?"
Steff grinned. "Njal did it to me. It's just one of many cultural differences. If Vikingar want something, they take it. They're known across the galaxy for raiding ships and invading space stations. They're basically pirates. But don't let that scare you. They have a moral code that makes them fairly decent guys - for example, they'd never hurt a woman. They'd even kill to protect you once you've agreed to be their mates. Vikingar are fiercely protective and also quite territorial. Njal still gets annoyed whenever one of the other Vikingar gets close to me. Apparently, that will get better with time. We've only been together for a few weeks."
"A few weeks?" I asked, very surprised. "You sounded like you've been with your alien for a long time."
"It feels that way. When you find your mate, it's as if you rediscover a part of yourself that you'd forgotten. I may have only met Njal last month, but I feel like I've known him my entire life. Don't get me wrong, it's not always easy. But it's totally worth it. Njal abducting me was the best thing that ever happened to me. And now I want to make sure you can find the same happiness with your own alien mates."
"What do they look like?" a gorgeous redhead asked. I dimly remembered her introducing herself as Demelza over dinner.
Steff lifted her bracelet and rubbed the coppery metal. "I could describe them, but showing you is much easier. Let's see if I remember how to do this correctly. I'm calling my mate and if everything goes right, he should appear here as a life-sized hologram. Since you ladies don’t have translator implants yet, there will be an automatic translation – I’ll warn you, it doesn’t always pick up on all nuances of speech, so if it sounds like Njal says something strange, it might be a translation error."
As soon as she'd spoken, the blue-ish outline of a man appeared in the centre of our circle. He was only about a foot tall.
"Life-sized?" Shona whispered. "Is that their actual size?"
"No!" Steff laughed. "This is me being rubbish with Vikingr technology. Let me try this... ah yes, here he is in full size."
The hologram grew in an instant, now over six feet tall. He almost seemed to push seven feet, but it was hard to estimate properly while sitting down.
"Njal, say hello," Steff said with a loving smile. "I wanted to show our ladies what Vikingar look like."
He was bright blue, with long silver hair that was longer than my own. Everything about him was huge. His legs, covered only by black shorts reaching halfway down his thighs, were like treetrunks. His arms were so wide it explained why he wasn't wearing a shirt - it would probably rip at the smallest movement. A wild beard gave him a rugged appearance, but his dark blue eyes glinted with intelligence. In one hand, he held a massive axe that looked as if it could cleave off heads with one stroke.
"Did you really have to bring the axe?" Steff sighed. "You're incorrigible."
"They need to see a Vikingr at his best," he replied in a deep voice. "No Vikingr is complete without his axe. This is how we go into battle. This is how we enter Valhalla."
Steff rolled her eyes. "As you can see, they're pretty full of themselves."
"And pretty," Njal thundered. "You keep telling me."
"That's private." Steff's cheeks darkened. "But anyway, there are small differences in how Vikingar look, but they all have blue skin, don't like wearing shirts and have an ego as big as a planet."
"We like shirts," Njal corrected. "If our mate sews them for us."
"Yes, yes, I know. I've not got around to it yet. I've been rather busy with organising mates for your crew, remember? You'll get your shirt...eventually."
Mollified, Njal smiled at his mate. Even though he was only a hologram, the love in his gaze was tangible. These two really loved each other. And they bickered like an old married couple. Was that what it was like to find one's soulmate? If so, I couldn't wait.
