Kitty vs Alien (Feral Aliens)

by Loki Renard

“Well, now you’re scaring me.”

  “You should be scared,” he says, flashing his teeth in a broad, predatory smile. “A little human, out here on her own in a world she doesn’t understand the beginnings of, throwing her knowledge away the moment she receives it? That will not end well for you, Kitty.”

  “How do you know my name?”

  “You told me.”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  Again, the back of my neck prickles. This creature is dangerous. Maybe not in the same way the others of his kind are, but in some kind of intangible yet completely concerning manner. I do not need him to tell me that I know I need to get away from him.

  I can hear him laughing gently to himself as I back away and move toward the walking wall. Danger might very well be waiting for me on the other side, but it is also here with me now.

  “Thank you, again,” I say, battling the urge to people please, or in this case, grimalkin please. It’s hard being conditioned to be polite. It doesn’t translate at all to navigating a world of wily feline aliens.

  I let my fingers pick a destination at random. By now, I’m half hoping that I simply end up where I started. Yes, Skoll is going to skin me for having fled, but that might not be the worst that happens to me.

  I close my eyes as I step through the wall, feeling the strange tingling all the way deep inside my very bones as it envelops me and moves me. I think about what Garbage said in the instant I am inside what I suppose might be called a transportation field. Can I be plucked out of this? Or interfered with? It would make sense if I could. It is a kind of perfect limbo.

  Bzzzzzz….

  A mechanical hum greets me.

  I am in a relatively small area with a whole lot of pipes. Big pipes, small pipes, round pipes… well, they’re actually all round pipes. Some kind of pipe maintenance chamber, I guess. Good. I am alone and relatively safe.

  This time I have long enough to try a new combination, but I can’t remember the numbers at all anymore. There was a ninety-nine, I think. And a forty-two. I punch both those numbers in, then guess the third set before stepping through the wall.

  I’m starting to get comfortable with the technology. It’s just like a landline phone number, except instead of calling someone, it takes you to a location. It’s fine. Perfectly safe. Nothing to worry…

  “GET DOWN!”

  I step through the shimmering wall, and am immediately faced with a very large, very armed grimalkin pointing a weapon right at my face.

  “GET DOWN ON THE GROUND! NOW!”

  I do as he says so fast I more or less slide across the dirt. Even on an alien planet, a military facility with a hyped up guard who thinks he's a temporarily embarrassed general has a familiar feel.

  “I’m on the ground! I’m on the ground.”

  “STAY DOWN!” he screams at me before speaking into his radio. “We have an intruder on restricted space. Some kind of alien spy, presumably female, wearing a wedding dress.”

  Oh shit. I stole that lady’s wedding dress. Now it makes sense as to why she was so pissed. Huh. I’m kind of causing chaos, and that’s not good. That’s going to get people’s attention, and when I say people, I of course mean Skoll.

  It’s too late to fix my fuck ups now though. I can’t do anything besides lie where I am and wait for the inevitable to happen.

  A moment or so later it does happen, because it is inevitable, and that is what inevitable means.

  Big, rough hands grab me and drag me away from the shimmering travel wall. The hands are attached to soldiers who place me in a much less shimmering room. It is small and the walls are smooth and the only source of light comes from an incandescent bulb which hangs from the ceiling much like bulbs used to hang back on Earth before we all changed to those other bulbs that take two minutes to actually do anything.

  I’m distracted by the light because it doesn’t fit, just like I don’t fit. I shouldn’t be here, and all I’m trying to do is find my cat and get back home. It’s such a simple thing to want.

  They don’t say a word to me, neither of my captors. They’re wearing blue pressed uniforms with gold trim around extended lapels and flying buttress style shoulders. One of them has a great deal of hair about his face, a righteous silver mane which suggests age and experience. The other has shaved his face and head clean, which is actually rather creepy because it makes his head look small and angular and shows the very strange melding of animal and human DNA.

  I don’t think these aliens emerged on their own. I think they are a chimera species. It would make sense, and explain as to why they could mate with humans, plant their seed inside us, and grow new life.

  I’d almost forgotten about the fact that Skoll came inside me with the purposes of making me pregnant. I don’t know if he was successful, but I know he wanted to claim me with a baby. I don’t think he’s even thought about what an infant’s life would be, living with a captive mother and a domineering bounty-hunting father. Skoll strikes me as all action and very little foresight. His values are so remote from mine I don’t even recognize him as having any.

  Sitting on the floor of the cell, I think about the choices I have made over the last hour. I have been reckless, irresponsible, and desperate. But what choice do I have? The only way I will learn about this world is by trying to explore and then escape it.

  The soldiers go outside, leaving me to my thoughts, regrets and hopes.

  “She’s wearing a chain,” one says. “Do you think she could be chain-kept?”

  “Impossible. Who would want to chain-keep a human?”

  I can hear them talking about me, because they’re talking about me right outside the door which has a slot in it. I am guessing the slot is for food, but it makes a handy listening hole too.

  “True.”

  “She could be a spy.”

  “She looks human to me. Humans still think they’re alone in the universe.”

  “Or maybe that’s just what they want us to think they think.”

  “No, their governments released information about interplanetary visitors years ago.”

  “Chaos must have ensued.”

  “No. Not even a little bit.”

  “Oh. Are you sure?”

  “Very. They were told aliens visited their planets, and they did nothing.”

  “Maybe they were distracted at the time.”

  “Maybe. Humans are strange. If this is human, we’ll have to be very careful.”

  They’re afraid of me.

  I’m half their size, I have no fangs. I don’t even have decent claws, but they’re afraid of me because I am different and out of place and there’s no explanation for me that they understand.

  “My cat was stolen,” I say as they enter the room.

  They exchange looks, then the one with the mane speaks. “What?”

  “My cat. Was stolen. He’s been brought here, and I’m trying to get him back.”

  “That does not sound like a likely story.”

  “Not my problem. It’s the truth.”

  They stare at me, as if staring will help them discover something I’ve already told them.

  “Who stole your cat?”

  “A bounty hunter named…” I trail off. If I say his name, they’ll call him. And if they call him, then I can forget about escaping again. He’ll chain me so long and so hard I won’t see daylight maybe ever again. “I forget his name. You all have weird names.”

  “We have proper names,” the one without the mane says, clearly insulted. “What is your name, human?”

  “Kitty.”

  He shrugs. “Not bad.”

  “Thanks.”

  “What are you doing wearing a grimalkin wedding robe?” the one with the mane cuts in again. He is watching me with a very still, fixed stare which I do not like. It makes me feel like prey waiting for a predator to strike.

  “I, er… don’t know?”

  “Who are you waiting to marry?”

  “Nobody? Wait. I thoug
ht grimalkin didn’t get married.”

  “Just because we don’t get married doesn’t mean we cant have wedding dresses,” he replies with logic so impeccable I can’t argue with it.

  “Who are you working for?” He continues to question me.

  “Well, I was working for myself.”

  “You are a mercenary, then,” my interrogator says. “We begin to approach the truth.”

  We begin to approach fucking nothing of the sort, but as long as he is happy, I’m happy.

  “If you will not tell us what you are doing here, then we will have to torture you.”

  I’m not so happy at hearing that.

  “I already told you the truth, why won’t you believe me? And if you won’t believe me, why do you keep asking me questions when it won’t matter what I say anyway? It’s a waste of all our time.”

  The one with the mane leans in, and when he speaks, it is with a low, frightening growl. “I like torture,” he admits. “Playing with prey is the most entertainment I get.”

  His words make ice form in my belly instantly. He is terrifying. One moment he seemed almost genteel and refined. The next, he is casually explaining that he intends to hurt me for his amusement.

  “Take her outside.”

  I am pulled from the interrogation room and taken to a big outside area. The ground here is concrete, and the walls are the backs and sides of buildings. There is no way out that I can see, though there is a small grassy area with a few bushes. My instincts call me toward those bushes, but I know those instincts are useless at a time like this. There’s no walking wall here. There’s no way out. There is just the grimalkin with the mane and the malicious intent.

  “So, what now…”

  No sooner is the question out of my mouth, than he hits me. Hard. Claws extended in a slap which sends me stumbling across the ground, my head ringing. I stumble dizzily and stay down. My tormentor does not move. He stares at me, waiting for something to happen. When it doesn’t, he bats at me again, another harsh blow which makes me tumble around, limbs akimbo. I am a rag doll in his massive grasp. I am nothing more than a toy. I’ve seen Mr Tiddles do this to a field mouse. I stopped him because I couldn’t watch it. It is even less tolerable being on the receiving end.

  There’s nowhere to run. There’s nowhere to hide. I try to rush for cover, but that is precisely what he was waiting for me to do. He leaps on me with an excited growl, and I feel fangs sink into my skin and flesh, meeting bone as he wounds me, perhaps mortally.

  I have never been this badly physically hurt. I am surprised that I don’t feel pain. It is more like pressure and then waves of liquid heat as I start to bleed. He’s going to kill me. I’m going to die at the paws of this oversized psychopath and there is nothing I can do about it.

  In the distance, I hear a roar. It sounds like the surging of an angry sea, or the cry of a wild beast. Perhaps it is the sound of death coming for me. Through swollen eyelids, I see something falling from the sky. Something big, and powerful, limbs outstretched with primal rage.

  Skoll.

  He must have scaled the walls of the compound, for he is falling from an incredible height, apparently unconcerned with the distance he is covering at terminal velocity just to get to me.

  Time seems to slow as he falls, his eyes locking on me, his jaws spread with ferocious wild fury. He’s going to kill someone.

  I can’t move. All I can do is watch as death comes from above.

  In spite of his cry, my tormentors don’t see him coming. They are too intent on murdering me, taking me apart by slow, painful degrees. They are crouched above me, their fangs in my flesh, my blood spread hot and sticky over my skin.

  FWOMP!

  Skoll lands on top of the maned beast, his jaws sinking into the shoulder of the male. He begins to tear him apart, strips of flesh ripped along with the uniform which bears my blood. The other tries to come to the first one’s aid, but he does not have the feral motivation that Skoll does. Skoll swings about, his claws outstretched, lacerating the face right off my tormentor.

  I have never seen a beast so furious and dangerous as Skoll is in this moment. His body has swollen with rage and he seems to be twice his usual size, his fur puffed out and standing erect in a thick patch which runs all the way along his back.

  “Did you not see my collar!? Did you not read my marks?” He is beating the soldier, emphasizing every question with unspeakable brutality. “She is mine. She belongs to me. She is not unwanted prey. She is CHAIN-KEPT!”

  The soldier cannot reply because he is being turned into a pulverized version of his former self.

  At some point, maybe hours after he begins, but probably only seconds, a siren starts to wail. Apparently, somebody has noticed the carnage and death and whatnot. Soldiers run to the balconies above us and point their weapons at us.

  Skoll grabs me, throws my broken body over his shoulder, and leaps out over the barriers. He moves with a speed and ability which clearly surpasses those who designed these walls to keep him out. Gun fire erupts around us, flashes of light and lead splatting in all directions. I’m sure we’re going to die, but it doesn’t matter because he’s got me. He’s strong and he’s intense, and he loves me. He must love me, because he is risking his life for me when I am nothing but a battered, ruined human who means nothing to the others of his kind.

  9 Broken

  Kitty

  Mlem…

  Mlem…

  Mlem..

  I wake up to a thick tongue bathing me, running over every part of my body in long, tender, lapping strokes. At first, I can’t remember anything. I can just feel the rough, pleasant, sandpapery sensation which feels like being lightly and wetly massaged all over.

  I’m supposed to be dead, but instead I feel soft and warm and ever so comfortable, which doesn't make sense, but I’m not going to complain.

  “Mmm…” I make a low moaning sound. Not sexual, just one of relief and comfort.

  “Why, Kitty?” Skoll murmurs the question in between bathing me with his tongue. He is cleaning me like an animal, licking my wounds with care. “Why did you run?”

  “I wanted to go home,” I moan. I still can’t properly feel myself. I don’t know how badly I am injured. My body has been through more than I ever thought I would experience. I have been mauled by a creature so powerful it almost destroyed me. I don’t think my body knows it has survived as yet. I think it was so prepared to be meat it is still pretending as though it is.

  Skoll

  It has been a day since I last ate, but I cannot leave her side. Since Kitty was attacked I have been here with her, doing my best to tend her wounds with the natural healing powers of my saliva. There were moments I thought she had died, when her breathing became so slow and so shallow that I was sure every one would be her last. But then she rallied, because she is strong, and her will to live is greater than either of us understand.

  There is no option to take her to a hospital on this planet. If I were to try, I would be arrested and she would be destroyed. Returning her to Earth is not an option either. They can hunt her there as easily as they can here. This is the only place out of their reach. My den, located high above the world and far from their city. On some level, I always knew I would need a place to escape to. I never knew why. Now I do.

  I took a life.

  I felt it drain beneath my fangs. I may have taken two lives. I am not so sure of the second. I have never killed another of my kind before, but I would do it again in a heartbeat to save Kitty. I would slay a hundred soldiers to avenge her. Her tender body has been beaten and broken, slashed and bled.

  They treated her like a thing to be toyed with. They ignored the legal protection of the chain. They deserved to die. There is no doubt in my mind that I was in the right. But I doubt the military will see it that way. They like to believe they operate outside the laws the magistrates enforce. They think their weapons and their uniforms, their structure and their power puts them above the law
. Maybe it does. But it doesn’t put them out of my grasp.

  Kitty makes a little whining, whimpering noise as she turns in my arms, trying to get comfortable.

  “Shh,” I say, trying to soothe her. Seeing her in pain hurts me deeply. If only I had confined her more securely, instead of letting her get herself into trouble so I could enjoy watching her writhe on the orgasm stimulator. I did not take her seriously enough. I thought she lacked the courage to try to leave, and that I had frightened her out of bothering to try.

  I have underestimated her bravery and nerve many times. I hope that her inner strength will be enough to see her through the process of returning to her old self. I see glimpses of it when she stirs and looks at me with those very human eyes which hold curiosity and fear in equal measure.

  Kitty

  I pass out and come to again more times than I can count. Sometimes he is licking my wounds. Other times he supports my head and slips a little broth between my lips. The brew is rich and delicious, and seems to soothe my pain. I am wrapped in his arms day and night, and the few times he lets me go, I feel something smaller and warmer against me. Sometimes I think Mr Tiddles has come back to me, then I remember that he’s run away and is lost, just like I am, on this planet named Purr.

  One morning I wake up, and I don’t feel like going back to sleep right away. I feel refreshed. When I move, there’s no pain. I sit up, and my head is clear.

  “Good morning, my pretty Kitty,” Skoll says from nearby. “How do you feel?”

  “Surprisingly good. Those tongue baths must have worked wonders.”

  He smiles. “They are the oldest, and most effective means of healing one another. I did not know if it would work for you. I thought I might have to take you back to your own planet.”

  “God forbid I get to go back to Earth,” I say, rolling my eyes.

  I must be better, my attitude is back too.

  “How long have I been out of it?”

  “The better part of a month,” he says. “I am sorry. They did a lot of damage before I got to you. You had many broken bones in more than one of your limbs, and I believe some organ damage too.” His brows draw down and his eyes become sorrowful. “I almost lost you. You almost died.”