Page 31 of Becoming Brandy

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Dressed and cleaned up,Brandy made her way carefully down the path and found the door. Tork had been kind enough leave it open. This was the first time she’d been allowed to roam free. Glancing down the hallway, she slipped out and started exploring.

Han’s ship had long since stopped being a mystery to her. Even though rooms could morph and change in a way that made it feel like the ship was never ending, the space inside was relatively small. She had grown to think of it like a flying shopping mall; that was about how many rooms and areas there were to explore. It helped to change rooms up, but after a while, that wore off and all that was left was a constricted, trapped feeling.

Drake’s ship seemed to be the same thing, long hallways with no markings, rooms that people could “feel” if they knew what they were doing. Brandy pressed her hand to the hallway wall, trying to tune in to its frequency.

This room was larger with several alien workers inside. She walked away a little faster. Farther along, she found a large area that was currently empty. She suspected it was used for gatherings and debriefings, though she couldn’t be sure. Drake had a different way of dealing with his crew than Han did.

Soon, she found another of those terrible jail cells for the aliens who had taken place in the mutiny. It was all she could do not to sprint in the opposite direction.

When she turned the corner, the rooms were smaller, though she couldn’t be sure what was inside. Sliding her hand over each, she got a little bit of the flavor of what was inside. This space was messy and disheveled. Moving down, she found an alien room that had two males inside.

The next room was occupied by a tidy person. It was filled with lab equipment. Slowly, she began to recognize a familiar feeling. The owner of this room was someone she knew.

Pressing her hand flat against the wall, she called inside. “Wrek? Are you in there?”

In a few seconds, the wall disintegrated and Wrek stood on the other side, seeming preoccupied.

“Brandy?” he said, looking confused. “Is it time for our date?”

She smiled at his tousled hair. “I don’t know. I was just wandering around and found your room. Sorry if I’m bothering you.”

“No, no. Come in.” Wrek stepped back, allowing Brandy to enter.

She walked into his dark abode, feeling like she was peeking into his life. The dwelling was small and had low ceilings. On the far wall, a mattress on the ground was covered in a nest of blankets. The rest of the room was dedicated to one form of study or another. The left side had stacks of books and a lit-up wall with alien text glowing on it like the smart boards she’d seen in fancy office buildings in Vegas.

The other side held scientific equipment, but the likes of which she’d never seen. She had no idea what the tubes, beakers, bins, and electronics did, but she suspected something miraculous.

Turning around, she met Wrek’s gaze. He was holding the back of his neck in a sheepish way that made her suspect he was embarrassed by the nerdiness of his room.

“I was working,” he stuttered.

“I see that. What were you working on?”

“Oh, many things. Let me show you.”

He took her hand and led her over to the smart board, where he moved the symbols around by touching them. “I’m trying to recalibrate the defense shields by diverting power from unessential systems. It’s touchy because this whole ship is one symbiotic being. Taking something away from a system it needs could cause the whole thing to malfunction.”

Brandy nodded like she was following what he was saying, but she didn’t have a big science background. She wasn’t stupid. Had actually gotten straight As in high school before she was forced to drop out and start working the streets. But she’d never been scientifically inclined.

“What about that?” she asked, pointing at the table full of lab equipment.

“Oh, that?” His face brightened. “That is something very special.”

He strode over, picking up a vial of what appeared to be blood. He rolled it gently, letting the liquid coat the sides and then slide back down. “I’ve been working on solving our reproduction problem for a while now. It’s kind of my passion project.”

“Your reproduction problem?”

He nodded, his face morphing into something serious. “Our people have long life spans, but it doesn’t matter if we can’t repopulate. Once someone dies, there’s no one there to replace him. The population is precariously low. Which is why we’re all clustered around your planet abducting human females for the chance to pass on our DNA and save our race.”

“I knew it was bad. I just didn’t know how bad.”

He nodded, setting the vial down. “That’s why everyone is so desperate. Males are fighting over human women who can produce like they’re starving and women are the last bit of beef. Frankly, I find it disgusting.” He softened his tone. “Not that we don’t love having human women around.”

“I get it,” she said in an understanding tone. “Most women don’t want to be thought of as pieces of beef either.”

“Right,” he said animatedly, jabbing his finger in the air to annunciate the point. “So, what if every woman, every female, could carry a Cartharian child? What if we didn’t have to hunt and steal for reproductive rights?”

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