In truth, the Novai ship was a masterpiece of technology. The docking bay alone was so advanced I couldn’t even begin to imagine how anything worked. When we’d approached the sleek, disc-like transport—which Zuran told me was classified as a “heavy cruiser,” whatever that meant—and rounded to the loading port, I’d pictured a garage door of sorts opening to allow us entrance. What happened instead was a feat of Star Trek abilities. We soared into the port, a small unmarked hole in the side of the ship, at a cautious and leisurely pace before suddenly being sucked straight up like we’d accidentally wandered beneath an enormous vacuum. Instantly, I felt crushed, compressed, like I was racing through a gravitational pull at hyper speed. Then, with a jolt, we popped up through a hole in the ceiling and found ourselves in the docking bay.
I didn’t even want to think about how we were supposed to get out of this ship.
The Novai circling our craft were brandishing slender silver wands that looked like the handheld metal detectors airport employees used at security. Below their feet, ropes of yellow light illuminated the floor panels every time they took a step. I watched with an uneasy mixture of fascination and apprehension.
“Do you know what those are?” I murmured to Zuran, gesturing subtly to the wands.
He shook his head and softly replied, “I have never seen such a thing, but I imagine they are using them to take data about our ship.”
“And we’re just going to let them?” I hissed.
“What choice have we?” he whispered. “We are guests onboard their cruiser, and there are far more of them than there are of us. Our only option right now is to stand by until they are satisfied.”
“Is that why Venan isn’t telling them to take us to their captain?”
Zuran narrowed his eyes sharply as if to tell me I better not dare do such a thing, which I couldn’t even if I wanted to since the Novai couldn’t speak English. “Venan is establishing trust. He wants them to see his crew does not simply board and barge in, nor do we pose a threat.” He wasn’t looking at me while he spoke, preferring to keep his eyes on the Novai nearest us. I could feel in the way his hand gripped my side that he was as tense as I was in their presence.
A very tall, ghostly alien walked up to us then. In his hand was a wand exactly like those being used by the Novai examining our ship. I immediately looked at Venan, hoping he’d speak on behalf of all of us.
The Novai screeched. I wondered if some blood vessels in my ears had burst because, at this proximity, its voice stabbed as painfully at my senses as a blade stabs skin. I was the only one who seemed pained by the language, though, as the rest of the crew was A’li-uud and they were able to understand what he said.
Venan spoke back to the Novai, taking a single step forward to address him. He, too, was screeching, but it didn’t sound quite the same from his mouth. I figured it was probably like how the A’li-uud spoke English: fluent, but distinctly non-native. I tugged on Zuran’s fingers to urge him to translate.
“We are to be inspected,” he muttered.
I eyed the wand. If he planned to scan it over my body like at the airport, I didn’t have a problem, but the device was rounded on both ends and relatively slender, and I couldn’t help remembering all those stories from people who lived in the boondocks claiming they’d been captured by aliens and probed. That thing looked very capable of probing somewhere I definitely didn’t want probed.
Venan stood very still, and the Novai approached him. He held the wand aloft horizontally about a foot from Venan’s body and began skimming it downward. I relaxed. This, I could handle.
One by one, we were each inspected with the mysterious contraption. When the Novai was finished, he stood back and screeched once more at Venan, who replied in kind with an inclination of his head. The Novai didn’t return the gesture, probably because it wasn’t part of their culture.
“We are going to see the captain,” Zuran said quietly to me.
My pulse quickened, and we began walking in a clustered group behind the Novai. He guided us toward an open, portal-style exit leading into a very narrow corridor. At first glance, it was nothing more than a circular doorway without a door, but, as I stepped through, I yelped. It was like I’d stepped through a sheet of ice. The hairs stood up on my arms, and a massive shiver rocketed through my body, but, when I turned around to see what I’d just walked through, there was nothing there. I could see straight into the docking bay, and the temperature was comfortable again.
“What was that?” I gasped.
Zuran looked grim. “I do not know,” he admitted. He was clearly as unnerved by the invisible ice as I was.
We were led through a maze of corridors of varying widths, some broad enough to host grand galas and others so narrow we were forced into single-file, and our shoulders brushed both walls. The Novai had not looked over his shoulder at us once, nor had he spoken since our inspection had finished. I watched his curtain of inky hair swaying as he walked, grateful I couldn’t see his blank, terrifying face. I hoped the captain was less frightening.
He wasn’t.
Chapter Fifty-Nine
Zuran
The focal point of all A’li-uud ships was the command center, which was where the captain and the control crew were located for the majority of a mission. There were stations for each role: navigation, communications, defense, and so on. The captain was ordinarily seated in the center of the room to optimize access to each station, and his chair offered the best vantage point for visibility out of the viewing window. It was a clean and simple structure.
The room into which the Novai led us was so drastically different I first wondered if he had brought us to the wrong location. If there were stations, they were arranged so haphazardly it was impossible to distinguish one from another. The walls were richly brown and reminiscent of the walls in the rogue lair, cave-like and rock-textured. The floor was the same material as the walls, and strange mounds protruded up from the floor, some merely ankle-high while others easily reached my chest. From the ceiling, stalactite growths staggered downward toward my head. Had it not been for the massive viewing window arcing across an entire side of the room and displaying the starry speckled blackness of space, I could have been convinced we had been transported out of the ship to a cavern on an unknown planet.
Novai were scattered about the room just as they had been in the docking bay. While I saw no strange oblong scanners, there were a number of other foreign gadgets being used I could not have imagined into existence. One Novai carried a square of glass no thicker than a piece of fabric upon which unrecognizable symbols scrolled in glowing blue. Another was prodding a palm-sized silver octagon embedded in the wall amongst the rock. Several were hunched over the various mounds with blue light illuminating their white faces. Everywhere I looked was a contradiction between the primitive and the technological.
Our guide left us wordlessly and blended into the horde, but a new Novai took his place. I recognized him as Captain before he even spoke. He was as tall as the others and equally as eerie in appearance, but he was dressed differently and carried himself with staunch confidence. The crew in this room wore the brown tunics donned by the Novai colonists back on Albaterra, but this male was adorned in gilded carmine armor down to his matching boots. Additionally, his hair was pulled back high on his head with a shimmering golden band. He may have been hideous, but he was unequivocally regal.
“Welcome,” he said. I was conscious of his screech, but I was able to understand him despite it. Phoebe, however, flinched as if in pain, and I pulled her back against me to allow for slightly more distance between her ears and the Novai’s voice. “I am Captain Arguute Hett.”
Venan inclined his head. “Captain Venan Et’Haren Vastitribus. Thank you for allowing my crew to board your vessel.”
I bent down slightly and began whispering translations to Phoebe. She was completely still against me; I could not even feel her lungs expanding and contracting with breath.
“I understand from your transmission you require our assistance?” Captain Hett asked.
“Yes,” Venan confirmed. “It is my sincerest regret to inform you your colonists are not well. It seems they have contracted a disease neither our healers nor the humans have seen before. We have brought one of the humans who have been assigned to the case with us to speak with you today. She will be able to enlighten you to the details of your colonists’ status, and hopefully, you will have some information to impart to aid in finding a cure.”
He turned slightly to extend an arm toward Phoebe. She shrank into me, having not the slightest inkling what was said about her until I interpreted. The Novai turned his eyeless face toward her as well. A creepy feeling crawled up my spine seeing him look at her without actually being able to see his eyes. I preferred the nightmarish red orbs of the sick Novai over the blank ones of the healthy.
“Are you to be her translator?” he asked. I did not realize he was addressing me for a long moment, as his head did not move to indicate where he was looking.
“I am,” I said hastily.
“Very good,” he replied. “Please tell me about this disease.”
Phoebe began talking when I cued her, and I heard a distinct tremor in her voice. She sounded even more nervous than when she had gone before the Council at Venan’s trial. I could not blame her, of course; though they appeared to be occupied with their various technologies, the throng of Novai in the room had become rather quiet, and it was unnecessary to see their eyes to know they were listening.
“Our observations show the illness begins in the brain. The first symptoms to draw attention from those tending the colony were drastic behavioral changes, primarily relative to aggression and ability to reason.” Hearing her speak, then reiterating her words in Novain, was an awe-inspiring moment I had not expected to experience. Despite her nerves, she was polished and concise. She sounded just as medically educated as any doctor or healer who could have been sent in her place. It was difficult to restrain myself from beaming with pride and wrapping my arms around her, but I satisfied myself with knowing I would be able to rave about her in the privacy of our own ship soon enough. “Affected Novai responded to high-pressure situations with violence initially, and, as the disease progressed, that threshold became lower and lower until violence became the sole response to anything or anyone they encountered.”
Gauging Captain Hett's feelings regarding Phoebe's description was impossible. He did not sway slightly from side to side as he stood, nor did he knit his fingers or tap his foot. Without eyes, the only source of facial expression was his mouth, which remained closed and still. I would only learn if he was alarmed or angry or indifferent when he spoke.
“The second stage is physical in its development,” Phoebe went on. I was translating for her while she talked, but I was able to hear her clearly over my own screeches. “Growths resembling scabs formed on the eye pockets. They spread outward and left the skin they previously occupied disintegrated, causing an opening that revealed the eyeballs beneath. These growths extended to the rims of the eye pockets before halting in their progression, and they are still present in all the patients under my care, essentially bordering the eye sockets.”
Captain Hett was now beginning to respond in a manner I could identify. He had lifted his hand to his chin and pressed a finger to the space just below his bottom lip, and I imagined his red irises beneath hazy with consideration.
“We also observed during this stage a great deal of skin discoloration, notably darkening. The dermis appeared to remain intact rather than disintegrating as it did over the eyes, but it developed semi-transparency as if it was chronically atrophying,” Phoebe explained. Her voice was no longer quaking with nerves, and she sounded confident in herself. I did not know if her growing confidence was evident to the Novai, if he was perceptive to human vocal inflections, but it did not go unnoticed by me. I squeezed her arm with gentle praise.
“Have there been any casualties?” the captain asked.
I was startled by his sudden leap into the morbid. Based off Phoebe’s depiction thus far, I would not have assumed the worst so quickly. As odd as I found his response, however, it held within it a great deal of promise. I immediately wondered if he was familiar with the symptoms she was describing.
“No patients under the care of my team and myself have died,” she said. “It was disclosed to us prior to our patients’ arrival that several Novai perished on the journey to our hospital, though.”
He nodded, and the finger beneath his lip tapped several times. I did not need to see his eyes to know he was definitely thinking now.
“Do you know what it is?” I inquired without waiting for anyone else to ask.
“I cannot be certain, for I have not seen the symptoms myself,” he replied slowly, “but I believe my colonists are suffering from the sun-sickness.”
Chapter Sixty
Phoebe
I didn’t know what Zuran said to the captain, as I hadn’t offered anything for him to translate, but whatever the Novai responded with seemed to affect him strangely. I saw Zuran flick his eyes to Venan, who met his gaze with obvious concern.
“What?” I demanded. “What did you just say?”
“I wanted to know if he knew what the disease was,” Zuran told me. He answered rather slowly, like he was too lost in his thoughts to focus.
“And? Does he?”
Again, Zuran’s gaze shifted to Venan. “He believes it is something called sun-sickness.”
I frowned. The only thing I could think of that could be semi-related was heat stroke, but the Novai definitely weren’t suffering from heat stroke unless it affected their bodies differently, in which case it really couldn’t be classified as such. “I’d appreciate it if he’d tell us more about this sun-sickness,” I requested.
The Novai started to screech again upon hearing I wanted to know more, and Zuran spoke over him in English to me.
“What you see before you is the result of centuries as a space-bound race. After our planet had been destroyed, we were forced to live as galactic nomads. We have had many brief stints on livable planets, but they were already occupied by native species, and we were unwelcome. Sometimes, we moved on willingly while other times we fought in desperation to claim a home, but every time ended in our return to the fleet.” I’d heard stories of the Novai landing on planets and battling the local races for territory. It was the main reason the A’li-uud were hesitant to allow them to colonize on Albaterra at first. “Over time, our genetics began to mutate to adapt to our new living conditions. We once were much larger than we are now, taller and broader, but our physiques diminished to accommodate to the cramped conditions of ship life. Without proper exposure to sunlight and the elements, our skin paled and softened, and our eyes were shrouded because our lifestyle does not necessitate sharp, alert vision. Even our voices changed.”
I was starting to get a clearer picture of the Novai, both of their past and the mutacorpathy. One of the most shocking cases I’d ever come across when I worked in the emergency room was a child of fourteen who looked no older than six. She was brought in by the police after her mother was arrested on charges of child abuse and neglect for confining her daughter to a closet over the span of eight years. The girl was severely malnourished and dehydrated, but the most startling thing was how underdeveloped she was. Her body hadn’t even begun to enter puberty, and she was so short that she was eye-level with the door handles. After spending so much time in a dark closet, her eyes were painfully sensitive, and she was basically blinded anytime someone turned on the lights or opened the curtains. The doctor treating her had seen a similar case about a decade back, and he said her height and figure would be permanently stunted. By the time she was released, she still had to walk around with sunglasses for visual comfort. It had been utterly heartbreaking to witness, but I realized now the Novai had suffered a similar physical effect.
“The first planet we attempted to coloni
ze is rumored to be the first occurrence of the sun-sickness,” Captain Hett continued, according to Zuran. “It was long before my time, generations ago. Our ancestors recorded symptoms of unstable temperament and flesh disintegration. According to the tale, none of the colonists survived the first bout, and it was assumed to be the result of an environmental incompatibility with our race. “
“But it happened again,” I asserted.
“Yes,” Hett confirmed. “After the third outbreak, it was theorized our bodies had evolved so drastically we would find it difficult to transition back into planetary living. Those who survived the sun-sickness were rumored to have reversed the genetic mutations and reverted to what we once were. Unfortunately, the records indicate most perished in the process.”
Venan interjected. “If you knew your race in its current form to be unable to survive outside of your fleet, why did you send down colonists at all? Were you not just sentencing them to death?”
“As I said, the incidences of sun-sickness were well before any Novai now living were born. We have attempted to colonize dozens of planets since, and, while no attempts were successful, there were no occurrences of the fabled sun-sickness.” Hett’s mouth turned down. “We assumed we had evolved past that particular weakness.”
“Even if you thought you were immune, though, why didn’t the colonists tell us about the sun-sickness when they first started showing symptoms?” I asked. “We might have been able to do something about it a lot sooner.”
“They did not know,” he explained. “The stories and records are so ancient they are no longer widely shared. Only those of us in positions of authority are the keepers now.”
Zuran: A Paranormal Sci-Fi Alien Romance: Albaterra Mates Book 6 Page 24
