Their Human Vessel

by Lizzy Bequin

  Grekh crouched nearby, arms resting on knees and eyes focused intently on his brother’s masterful work.

  After a few more strokes, Vorne set the whetstone aside and held the falchion up for inspection, gripping the long blackwood handle in his fist while using his other hand to test the sharpness of the heavy blade. He thumbed the edge, frowned behind his beard, and picked up the whetstone again.

  Grekh took advantage of the moment of silence to continue their debate.

  “I’m telling you brother, I know what I smelt, and it was a female.”

  Vorne didn’t answer. He simply set to work once more caressing and honing the falchion blade. Grekh dropped his horned head with a sigh.

  “You still don’t believe me, do you?”

  Vorne didn’t pause his sharpening, nor did he take his eyes from his work as he spoke.

  “I believe you, little brother. It is your senses I mistrust.”

  Grekh raised his head.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You say that you smelt a female, and this is no doubt true. But as we know, our senses sometimes tell us lies, brother, and a wise man never trusts those who have lied even once.”

  Grekh snorted. He kicked his legs out and sprawled out on his back, lacing his fingers behind his skull for a pillow.

  “I know what I smelt.”

  Vorne went on sharpening the blade. On the outside, there was nothing to betray the welter of thoughts swirling inside his skull and the emotions churning within his breast.

  What if it was true, what his brother claimed? What if the humans really had brought a female to Terramara? It could change everything. It could be the one opportunity to turn the tide against their human oppressors.

  And hadn’t the Listener predicted that a woman would come? A woman from the stars…

  But Vorne couldn’t allow himself to hope.

  Hope was dangerous, a demon that infected the mind.

  “The humans are many things,” Vorne said. “They are cruel, deceitful, weak, and greedy beyond measure. But they are not stupid. They would never be so foolish as to bring a female to Terramara and risk destroying everything they have built by robbing our people of our seed.”

  Now it was Grekh’s turn to stonewall his brother. He lay silently on his back, his expression unchanging as he stared up at the constellations of glowing spores scattered over the stone ceiling of the grotto.

  Vorne continued.

  “Besides, assuming that the humans did bring a female here—which they didn’t— there’s no way to know if she would even be compatible for mating.”

  That got Grekh’s attention. He propped himself up. Even in the dimness of the grotto, his green eyes were bright with eagerness to debate.

  “But we do know it,” the younger Terramaran insisted. “It’s been done before, back when the humans first came.”

  Grekh spoke true. At the time of the first arrival, there had been females among the humans. Most of the Terramaran males cared little for the small, frail creatures. At that time, they had had their own Terramaran females, so much stronger and more attractive, so much better suited for receiving a male’s hard prong.

  Still, there had been stories of some Terramaran males taking human lovers. Supposedly, so the stories told, these couplings had even resulted in offspring.

  “But those are just stories,” Vorne said. “Nothing more.”

  He set down the whetstone and tested the blade once again. This time, a black-ruby bead of blood welled on the pad of his thumb. The cut was so perfect it didn’t even sting. Vorne grinned with satisfaction. His teeth shone brightly amid his beard.

  Grekh, meanwhile, pulled himself upright again.

  “Forget the stories then,” he said. “What about my body’s reaction to the female’s scent. I’ve never felt such intense desire, brother, and I had no control over it at all. It was pure instinct. I’m telling you, she is compatible. Her womb is fertile. It will accept our seed.”

  Vorne lay the well-sharpened falchion across his lap and looked across the grotto at his younger brother.

  Grekh was so different from him, both in appearance and demeanor. Yes, they both shared the same dark blue skin and glowing green eyes, but Vorne was much taller than his younger brother, more heavily muscled. While Grekh’s face was youthful and clean-shaven, Vorne’s jaw was lined with a dense beard, and his horns were nearly twice as long as his little brother’s, a symbol of his age.

  Vorne had once been hopeful like his younger brother, but the long years of human oppression had crushed it out of him.

  “You’re still assuming that this female is not a mere figment of your mating-starved brain,” he said at last.

  Grekh growled with aggravation. “She exists. I wasn’t imagining it.”

  An unexpected third voice spoke from the darkness, bringing both Terramaran warriors to their feet in half a heartbeat, their muscles striped with tension, their bodies poised in fighting stances.

  “The youngster is right. The female does exist. I’ve seen her. Smelt her too.”

  A lean but massive Terramaran warrior stepped from the shadows at the grotto’s entrance and into the soft light provided by the bioluminescent fungus. He was wounded, one hand clutching his side where the skin had been blasted away, revealing the purple muscle and pale white rib bones beneath. The skin below and down his thigh was streaked with dark blood and caked with the dry dust of the wasteland.

  He had to be in intense pain.

  “Who are you?” Vorne snarled.

  The wounded intruder staggered forward, and yet, even in his obviously weakened and exhausted state, he managed to move with absolutely silent steps. His head tilted, green eyes taking in his surroundings until at last they landed on the freshly sharpened blade of the falchion that Vorne held at the ready.

  The intruder’s mouth tugged back in a grin.

  “You won’t be needing that, friend,” he chuckled.

  A moment later, he collapsed into a seated position on the floor with a grunt. Still clutching the grisly wound on his side, he simply looked at Vorne and Grekh, unthreatening and unthreatened.

  “I’ll repeat my question,” Vorne said coldly. “Who are you?”

  “My name is Xalleus,” he answered. “Xalleus of the Western Canyon Tribe, though I have been held by the human overlords, I know not how long, in the seed-farm to the north.”

  Vorne studied Xalleus, still hesitating to hand over his trust to this stranger. These were dangerous times. The Terramaran society had fallen to pieces, and not all wanderers—what few remained—followed the old laws and traditions of honor.

  But Xalleus seemed to be telling the truth. His mane of thick hair showed that he was indeed a warrior of the Western Canyon, and the notches on his one good horn declared that he had passed the Trials of Manhood over a hundred cycles ago.

  “How did you find this place?” Vorne asked, easing his grip on his weapon.

  Xalleus jutted his chin toward young Grekh, who was still tensed and ready for a fight, his blue muscles wound like steel springs ready to explode into action at the slightest hint of violence.

  “I followed the youngster’s trail from the human facility.”

  A bit of tension went out of Grekh’s muscles, as if he had been deflated. His face took on a dejected look.

  Xalleus laughed weakly.

  “Don’t worry, youngster. You hid your trail well enough. The humans with their half-blind eyes and useless noses would never have been able to follow you. But I’m a Terramaran hunter. Nothing escapes my senses.”

  Xalleus winced. It was the first time he had shown any indication of pain.

  Vorne lowered his falchion, but kept it in his grip. He motioned toward Grekh to relax. Together they stepped forward and crouched near Xalleus.

  “You are badly wounded,” Vorne said.

  Xalleus nodded.

  “Human gun. It strikes from a distance. A coward’s weapon, but powerful.” He grinned. “H
owever, it didn’t kill me, did it? I’ll get better soon.”

  It was true. Terramaran males were quick to heal. Much quicker than their human enemies. It was an adaptation to the harsh world they inhabited.

  “We have supplies,” Vorne said. “Bandages and salve will hasten the healing process.”

  “Thank you, brother,” Xalleus said, extending his hand.

  Vorne accepted the proffered hand in a firm and hearty shake.

  “I am Vorne and this is my brother Grekh. We are the last free warriors of the tribe of Ashlar. The rest of our tribesmen are being held in that same facility from which you escaped.”

  Xalleus’s face grew dark at the mention of that place.

  Vorne leaned closer.

  “What you said before,” he whispered, “about the human female. Is it really true?”

  Xalleus nodded.

  “I swear it. I touched her. I looked into her face. She did not look the way that the elders of my tribe described human females. In fact, she just looked like a smaller, more fragile male of the human species. But the scent...the scent was unmistakable.”

  Vorne stared at him for a moment. Was Xalleus delirious? Mad with pain and exhaustion?

  “Unmistakable,” Xalleus repeated as he lay back, his green eyes closing as he slowly succumbed to his tiredness. He had run for miles with a grievous wound. He needed rest.

  Vorne sprang to his feet, still clutching his falchion in his fist. He strode across the grotto toward the exit tunnel that led to the surface.

  “Grekh,” he called over his shoulder. “Get the bandages and salve from below and tend to Xalleus’s wounds. Provide him clean water and food from our stores. He needs to rest and heal.”

  “And where are you going brother?”

  “To the human facility.”

  Vorne didn’t need to explain why. Grekh already knew exactly what Vorne was looking for.

  CHAPTER 6

  A pair of beefy guards led Corrie into Waylon Burgess’s office on the upper level of the facility. Her shoes had fallen off during the excitement earlier, and now her socked feet slipped on the marble tile floor as the guards scooted her along.

  The room was as massive as it was ostentatious, far too lavish for a plant manager. But this was no ordinary plant, as Corrie had just discovered, and Galen was no ordinary company.

  The entirety of the eastern-facing wall of the office was taken up by floor-to-ceiling windows opening onto a panoramic vista of the planet’s surface. It was dawn, and between the swirls of volcanic clouds, the angry, orange sun was just stepping over the crags of the distant mountains on the horizon. The windows automatically adjusted to the new light, becoming tinted like a massive sunglasses lens.

  Warm dawn light illuminated the opposite wall, which was lined with the mounted trophy heads of about a dozen different alien creatures, most of which Corrie had never even seen before.

  There was one that looked like a giant-sized tardigrade, and another that resembled a purple komodo dragon. As the guards led her down the length of the ridiculously long office, Corrie noticed that beneath each mounted head was a photograph of Waylon Burgess. In each picture he was squatting beside his kill, his long-range plasma rifle propped at his side and a big grin plastered on his face beneath the shade of his cowboy hat.

  As they neared the end of the room, the last trophy head made Corrie gasp aloud.

  It was vaguely humanoid, but much larger, with a ridged brow, steeply angled cheekbones, and a frightening symmetry to the features. The lips were pulled back to reveal white fangs. Twin horns, little more than nubs, sprouted from the brow. The eyes seemed to be made of translucent jade, lit from behind by electric lights to make them glow.

  There was no doubt about it, this was the same species as the alien that had attacked Corrie less than an hour before. But this one looked a little different.

  “Ah, I see you’re admiring my Terramaran. She’s a real beaut, ain’t she?”

  Waylon Burgess was seated on the far side of his massive oaken desk, which was hand-carved with a fake rustic charm. It had undoubtedly cost a fortune.

  The plant manager was not dressed in his usual cowboy attire this morning. His dark hat sat on the desk, and his fleshy body was wrapped in a dark, velveteen bathrobe. He was lounging back in a rich, leather chair, and a barber droid was lathering shaving cream onto his cheeks and chin with an old-fashioned brush.

  The guards brought Corrie to a halt a few feet in front of the desk. They held her arms in their vice-like grips to keep her from fleeing. Her hands were cuffed behind her back, and the cold metal bit into her wrists.

  Despite the situation, Corrie couldn’t seem to tear her eyes or her thoughts away from that Terramaran head on the wall.

  “You...you hunt them?” she asked in disbelief. “But they’re...they’re...”

  “They’re what? People?” Burgess shook his head, causing the barber droid to smear some shaving cream across his bushy mustache by accident. “Trust me, they ain’t people. They’re animals, plain and simple. And dangerous animals at that. But you already know that, don’t you, Mike?”

  Burgess gestured toward the Terramaran trophy head.

  “That one there is a female,” he said, matter-of-factly. “Mean looking bitch, ain’t she? Got her way back when there were still females left to hunt. I would have preferred to bag myself a buck of course, especially one with a nice set of horns. But that’s a great big no-no as far as Galen Group is concerned. The males are too valuable, you see. We gotta keep ‘em alive. Farm ‘em for that white gold they’re carrying around in those big swinging nutsacks.”

  Burgess’s eyes narrowed, and his tone grew cold.

  “But like I said, you already know all about that, now don’t you? Yep, and that’s gonna pose a bit of a problem, it is.”

  Corrie started to speak. The vocoder device, which was still hidden beneath her turtleneck, made her voice come out deep and manly, but now that voice held a tremor of fear too.

  “Mister Burgess, I—“

  “Shut up!” Burgess erupted. “You’ll talk when I ask you a question. Other than that, you’ll keep your trap shut and listen.”

  He shook with anger. His face had gone bright red, and the color was only exaggerated against the bright white of the shaving cream that the droid was slathering on. After a moment, however, Burgess calmed, regaining his old pleasant demeanor.

  “And please,” he said. “Call me, Waylon. How many times do I gotta tell you?”

  The droid finished with the shaving cream and tucked the brush back into a compartment in its cylindrical metal body. From somewhere else, it produced a small basin of steaming water and an old-fashioned straight razor. As the blade moved toward Burgess’s face, the edge caught the gathering morning light seeping in through the massive tinted windows.

  “Easy now,” he said to the droid. “I’ll do that part.”

  He plucked the straight razor from the droid’s metal hand.

  “Never did trust a droid with a knife to my throat,” Burgess chuckled, then to the droid he commanded, “Mirror.”

  As if by magic, another one of the droid’s many arms produced a hand mirror from another secret compartment and held it up in front of Burgess’s face. He started to shave, dragging the blade carefully over his neck.

  “Beg your pardon for my get-up,” he said, gesturing to his robe. “But I was woken up earlier than usual this morning. Turns out there was some kind of kerfuffle down in the extraction facility last night.”

  Corrie struggled to keep her breathing steady. The guards still held her tightly. The razor scraped away the stubble on Burgess’s chin.

  “Yep. ‘Parently somebody let one of the Terramaran bulls loose. Now why in tarnation would someone do that, I ask you? It sure as shit beats me, it does. Anyhow, the big purple bastard caused a hell of a lot of damage. Two guards and a technician dead, and two more injured.”

  He ran the blade over his jowls, swishing it in the
basin of water after each stroke to wash off the cream.

  “Yep, that’s just a whole heap of problems I don’t need. Numero uno, it’s more insurance money we’re gonna have to pay out. Numero two-o, it means more time spent training up replacements.”

  Corrie’s heart was pounding.

  They still hadn’t discovered her disguise, but it was only a matter of time.

  “And on top of all that, the bull got away. Escaped the facility. Ran off into the wild. And I’ll tell you, those big bastards ain’t easy to catch. Quick as greased lightning, they are.”

  So the alien had actually escaped the facility? For some strange reason that she couldn’t quite explain, Corrie was glad for that.

  But the small, good feeling disappeared immediately as she remembered the precarious situation she was in.

  “That ain’t the worst part, though,” Burgess drawled on. “See, we had to temporarily shut down production in that entire sector for a full two hours. Now, I realize two hours might not sound like a lot to you, Mike, but it adds up to a one billion dollar setback in revenue.”

  Burgess rinsed the blade in the basin. He stood and splashed some water on to his face, then took a white towel proffered by the droid and padded the excess shaving cream and water from his chin and jowls. When he was finished, he came around the front of the huge desk and leaned back against it, fixing Corrie with a glare.

  “Billion,” he said. “With B. There’s a reason why we call that stuff white gold.”

  The straight razor was folded in Burgess’s hand now. He patted it against his big belly, which was bulging the front of his robe. A shiver ran down Corrie’s spine and back up again. On either side, the guards were as cold and motionless as statues.

  “Who are you?” Burgess said plainly. “And why were you poking around the restricted area?”

  Corrie stammered, and it took her a moment to find her voice.