Page 6 of Bred

“Propagated?”

He crouches down on one knee. He’s still taller than I am sitting down, but I can tell he is trying to appear less threatening to me. It doesn’t work. Whatever this creature is, I can sense an intention I do not trust. This is an incredible moment, making first contact with a new alien species. I wish I was bolder, braver. I wish I wasn’t on the verge of peeing myself.

“You are in shock,” he says kindly. “I had you put in here because I wasn’t certain if you were hostile, but I think we can move you somewhere more comfortable. How does that sound?”

“I think you should send me back to Earth,” I say. “I need to report this encounter.”

“No.”

That simple word makes every part of me clench. I need to go home. I need to tell my friends and family that I am alive. They will be mourning me.

This alien does not care about that. He seems immune to my distress as he reaches out, takes me by the hand, and pulls me up from the seat. He’s gentlemanly in his treatment, but I don’t trust that as any sign of true goodwill. He has obviously studied Earth. He knows enough about me and my people to know the best way to keep me calm. Then again, why would he bother to do that if he was hostile? He has full power over me. He doesn’t need to be nice. He didn’t need to save me at all.

I let him guide me up from the seat without resistance and I follow him out of the cell into a glowing passage. He sees me squint and reaches out to tap the wall. It dims by several hundred lumens, allowing me to see more naturally.

My entire life has been spent staring at the stars, imagining what it would be to reach beyond them and make contact with another lifeform. Now it is happening and it is nothing close to what I thought it would be. In my fantasies, I was in control of the situation, reaching out diplomatically to a strange form of life, assuaging its fears, learning about its culture. But I’m not in control of this at all. I’m a prisoner, and judging by his reaction to my request to be returned to Earth, I may be for some time.

We step into an enclosed capsule, which seals around us and begins to move at his behest, descending, not that it matters. I don’t know what is up or what is down. This ship is of unknown dimension and purpose. I could be here forever. I could be turned into food. I could be...

“Let me out!” I slam my hand against the wall as every part of me gets so tight and so panicked I feel as though I am going to implode. “Let me out of here! Let me go!”

“Breathe,” he says. “Do not panic.”

Not easy advice to take from a towering alien whose hands are far bigger than my shoulders. His touch frightens me more. He has five fingers and a thumb on each hand. All twelve digits wrap around my shoulders, keep me in place.

“I’m not panicking!”

“Yes, you are. Your respiration is shallow, your heart rate is elevated, and you don’t even know what we want to do with you yet...”

Oh. My god. “What are you going to do to me?” My voice is breathless and high-pitched.

He smiles, flashing those fierce teeth again. “Nothing you won’t enjoy.”

I very much doubt that. “We have laws! This is against all of them! You should return me to the surface at once!”

“Oh, I don’t think so,” he says with an eerily human smirk. “Now breathe, before you pass out.”

I can’t breathe. I try to gasp for air, but suddenly it feels as though there isn’t any in this all too bright confined space.

“Breathe,” he repeats, wrapping one massive hand around my throat. It is precisely not what I need to make me breathe deeper. I feel the strength of his inhuman fingers. I feel the intention of his eyes. He crouches down and I hear a rumbling sound that is not an attempt at speech, but something else. It is almost like singing, but it isn’t audible. It’s physical. A deep throbbing purr is coursing through me, emitted from him and sinking through my flesh.

I feel my muscles relaxing, my nervous system standing down from high alert. His grip isn’t tight, but it reaches nearly the entire way around my neck forming a connection directly with my spine. It is as if he has hijacked my nerves, taken over from the fear and the panic and put his calm in place. Every part of my body relaxes, muscles losing their ability to grip tight. I release the panic and draw in the first full, deep breath I have taken since my arrival here.

The capsule opens and we are in a room, larger than the first. It contains a soft padded bed and through a door there is a bathroom, including a toilet. Finally I can relieve my tortured bladder...

Wait.

I don’t need to go anymore.

“Time to bathe.”

His suggestion strikes me as strange until I look down and realize the warmth I felt when he was holding me wasn’t in my mind. Oh, my god. I am wet from crotch to ankle. I must have relieved myself when he grabbed me. Humiliation rushes over me, pure hot shame. I could not possibly sink any lower.

* * *

Talon

She’s terrified, and she stinks of pungent fear. This little human who orbits the planet alone never expected to find herself in the custody of an alien, I am sure of that. This is why we do not take mates on board, why we always take the form of the local species, and why we conduct all business on the planets and in the contexts that our mates are used to.

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