by Erin Raegan
Gruffff. It spoke low and calm to Mohawk, eying the oversized alien wearily. Mohawk growled fiercely back at it, and its grip around my waist tightened painfully. I yelped, and it seemed to distract it. Its grip loosened, and it spun me around, its eyes wild and hands erratic as it inspected me from hair to feet. Its large horns came perilously close to knocking me out, so I gripped the smooth black horns tightly. I froze at its loud groan.
The alien behind us squawked and chuffed loudly behind me. Mohawk gripped me tightly again and shoved its snout in my neck. It sniffed and snarled in my throat.
“Uh, Peyton?” Vivian squeaked.
“I don’t know what’s happening.” My voice shook, and my hands quaked along the alien’s large horns.
“That alien is getting a little too friendly with you, girl,” Colt said wearily.
Mohawks hands gripped and fisted along my hips and rear. Its warm breath ghosted along my neck and sent chills down my back. The alien behind us seemed to be forgotten by Mohawk for the moment as it inched along the wall behind it.
A cold wet tongue laved along the side of my neck, and to my horror a different kind of fear gripped me. Sharp teeth and low growls scraped along my skin, large hands curved around my ass and squeezed.
“Oh shit,” I breathed against its ear. My hands shifted in agitation.
Mohawk groaned low. “GGrrroooooohhhh,” he growled into my neck. “Shhhht.”
“Batman’s copying you,” Colt’s voice shook with rage. “You let that girl go, beast.”
“Wh-what’s h-happening?” I squeaked. Fangs scraped along my neck again, my knees nearly buckled.
“I think he likes you,” Viv said in awe.
“Viv!” I cried. She seemed far too pleased at the prospect.
“GGGGRRRIIIIVVV,” Mohawk growled back. One large hand inched between my ass cheeks towards my center and gripped hard. I cried out and stood on my tip-toes.
“HELP!” I cried out towards the alien inching closer to Mohawk’s back. If it could be believed, the alien, Three, looked exasperated.
Mohawk growled a weird version of my plea. A long sharp claw ran along the front seem of my jeans. I squealed.
“Hey, you!” Colt growled very impressively for his age.
Mohawk bared fangs at Colt and took me to the floor on my back.
“OH shit! OH SHIT!” I cried and beat against his back. He snapped wicked fangs in my face, nowhere near as menacingly as he did Colt though. One clawed hand gripped my wrists and trapped them above my head. Vivian and Colt yelled incoherently.
Black and silver eyes held mine captive. Its tongue lapped along my cheek sensuously.
“Why is he licking you?!” Viv clawed at her restraints. “WHY IS HE LICKING HER?!” She screamed at the alien I could no longer see.
“That giant bat fancies her, I think.” Colt sounded horrified.
Mohawk nipped at my chin to gain back my attention. I looked at it, terrified, and totally horrified by my body’s reaction. It growled something low and soothing to me, all the while its free hand stroked me from chest to hip. I relaxed fraction by fraction, until my body nearly melted into the floor. It was either not going to hurt me or was leading me into a false sense of security. It growled approvingly.
Its mouth went back into my neck and licked again, more firmly. I shivered. One clawed hand gripped my thigh and pulled it up and around its own.
I tensed again, and my eyes shot open wide, just in time to see the other alien bat leap onto Mohawks back and inject it with something into the side if its neck. Mohawk growled in rage shattering my ear drums. Viv and Colt yelled, and Mohawk slumped over heavily on top of me. My breath rushed out of me in one large gust.
Three sighed heavily and patted me on the head. Mohawk was dragged off me shortly after.
I lay there stunned and shocked. What just happened? I didn’t think Mohawk was going to hurt me, but any other option just was not something I could think about.
“Peyton?” Viv whispered.
“Here,” I squeaked and raised my hand.
“Well that was inappropriate in a room full of observers,” Colt huffed. “These aliens have no propriety.”
Three reached out a hand and helped me up. I was too stunned to object. It left me to push a button on the wall, before walking over to its unconscious comrades. It kicked them and growled threateningly.
Viv shut her eyes. “I want to go home.”
The other aliens roused slowly and looked around dazed. Three shook its head and stomped away after growling at them some more.
It stopped in front of me. Its eyes squinted and ran over every inch of my body. It shook its head again and tapped its chest. It growled something I couldn’t comprehend before tapping me lightly on my own chest. I shook my head and squinted.
It repeated this several times before, Colt grumbled “Its name,” he sighed. “It’s trying to exchange names, girl.”
“Oh!” I tapped my chest. “Peyton.”
He smiled and growled again while tapping his chest.
“Grik?” I asked.
It growled again.
“Grihk?”
It shook its head and sighed.
“Grihk, I’m Peyton.” I tapped my chest again.
“GGRRReeeyyyynnnn.”
I shook my head and puckered my lips exaggeratedly. “Ppp- p sound. Pehy-tohn.”
The next few seconds were equally astounding and hilarious as Viv, Colt, and I exaggeratedly dragged out my name, so an alien could pronounce it.
“GGRAayyttohn.” It beamed.
“Close enough, big fella.” Colt squirmed on the table. “Something’s getting lost in translation, or pronunciation, hell if I know. Let us up!”
“I don’t think they can make the p sound, I’m kind of impressed it did the t,” I said to him while staring at Grihk.
“It’s all those teeth, I don’t think he could get his lips close enough,” Viv smiled at Grihk as he unstrapped her.
“How do you know it’s a he?” I asked her.
“Just look at him, he’s all masculine and growly. Plus, no boobs,” she said simply and jumped off the table.
“Wow, powerful observation skills there, Barbie,” Colt grumbled and rolled off the table as he was released.
“Hey that’s not very nice, Mr. Colt,” Viv sounded hurt. She had always been accused of being the dumb blonde ever since we were kids. To be fair, she wasn’t winning any Nobel prizes. But what she lacked in book smarts, she made up for in kindness and caring. Viv was the nicest person I’d ever known. She made friends wherever she went and would help anyone she could.
“Bat’s don’t have boobs, do they?” I asked no one, but I studied the aliens closer as they went about tying up Mohawk.
“Hell if I know, but that one on the floor was gonna do something to you, girl. I’m pretty sure that identifies his sex at least.” Colt squatted by Bobo and ran his hands through the terrified dog’s hair.
“A female could just as easily be attracted to Peyton,” Vivian pointed out, still smarting over Colt’s comment. I grabbed her hand and squeezed. She gave a small smile in return.
“Ladies, that there was animalistic lust, pure instinct drove that male to breed,” Colt said firmly and hobbled over to us.
I choked on air. “Breed? Me?”
Colt just shook his head and patted my shoulder. “Looks like those other aliens weren’t down for it, so no need to worry now.”
“Oh god, are they going to breed us, Peyton?!” Viv cried and huddled against me.
“Quit the waterworks girl, we gotta focus and get ourselves off this alien space ship.”
I stared at the unconscious alien as the other aliens dragged him out of the room. Colt hobbled after them and with nothing better to do, Viv and I followed. But before we could exit Grihk shook his head, and gently pushed us back. The door slid shut with a snick. Colt huffed.
“Now what?” Vivian asked.
Colt puffed and started rum
maging around the room. “We look for weapons.”
I looked to Viv and gave her a hug. We both needed it. She squeezed me tight. “It’s going to be okay.”
She nodded, and we joined Colt searching the room. Sometime later we managed to arm ourselves with sharp scalpel looking things and long equipment we could use as bats. I had no idea what any of it was used for, but I was ready to fight our way off the ship. There was a lot of strange things hooked to the walls but none of us were brave enough to fiddle with any of them in our new strange environment.
Colt ordered us to stand on the outside of the door on one side, and he and Bobo stood on the other. The plan was to just go full attack when the doors slid open, as nothing we did managed to open them ourselves. We waited what felt like hours before the tell-tale signs of thumps came up to the door. I sighed in relief, it sounded like only one of them was coming.
The poor alien never saw it coming. It slid the door open, and we all followed Colts banshee scream and wailed on it. It didn’t go down easy, but I got a good shot on its head and it was lights out.
We wasted no time running out, problem was we had no idea where to go. The halls of the ship were dark with only lightly glowing golden lights to guide us. It was nearly pitch black. We ran and ran, our heavy breathing the only sounds we could hear. At the end of one particularly long hall we saw two large double doors open and stopped. Colt backed against the wall and we followed suit. Bobo laid down at our feet with his ears pointed straight up.
“What do we do?” I whispered into the dark.
Colt sighed, “We go take a look I reckon.”
With no better ideas, Viv and I followed Colt as he inched along the wall.
“Good Lord Almighty…” Colt whispered in awe. Viv and I hurried after him into the great room and sucked in startled breaths. Along the wall, as large as a billboard, was a window. Outside the window all we could see was pitch black and the beautiful glow of the moon.
“I’ve never seen the moon this close before,” Viv sighed. “It’s beautiful.”
It was enormous and covered in dozens of shades of greys and whites. It sucked the breath right from me. “We’re not on earth anymore, are we?” My voice shook as tears pooled in my eyes.
Viv blanched and looked at me with her own tear-filled eyes.
“Negative.” Colt heaved a mighty sigh.
Bobo’s low growl shook me from my stupor. Tentatively we looked to our left. Knowing we wouldn’t like what we found, but unable to deny the urge.
“Shit,” Colt and I spoke together. Dozens of bat aliens sat along a long black shiny table. Unbelievably a hologram of another alien sat at the head of the table. Too stunned to speak we watched the aliens as they watched us for a prolonged moment. The hologram growled loudly but not menacingly. It seemed it spoke calmly. The aliens jolted and jumped from their chairs.
Viv wrenched my arm nearly out of its socket as she ran from the room.
We didn’t get far, a wall of aliens blocked us from exiting and herded us back towards the window.
The alien, Grihk, stepped forward with his hands aloft. He growled low, soothingly, and led us into a false sense of security before he pounced. It took one alien each to subdue Viv and I, but surprisingly three for Colt. The old man put up one hell of a fight. Miraculously this did not anger the aliens, his resistance only seemed to irritate them a little. Bobo was left alone, he followed our captors sedately.
We were back in the lab room and strapped down shortly after.
“That went swimmingly,” Vivian muttered, trying to scratch her thigh. The straps were much tighter this time.
The next few hours went like this. Aliens filed in and out. Machines were turned on. Viv screamed, I screamed, Colt cursed, and Bobo whined. But none of them actually touched us. Harmless lasers roamed our bodies and the aliens growled over whatever the machines read back to them. They seemed particularly focused on our necks and heads.
We were not fed, or released, but studied. I was full of dread, but also curious what they wanted us for. Images of invasions and Earth coated my dreams as I dozed on and off. I had no idea what was going on at home down below us. Dread pulled in my stomach every time I thought of Bryan, my mom, and home.
Viv cried for Hector a lot, and Colt was unexpectedly comforting her from time to time. It wasn’t long before most of the aliens filed out and our stomachs growled. But when the aliens returned, no attempt at communication seemed to work, although to their credit the aliens were trying, it’s just without the use of our hands we weren’t very successful at communicating our needs. Bobo was our saving grace when our bladders would not stop screaming at us. He used the lab as his own personal bathroom. The aliens didn’t like that much. So, we were unstrapped and moved to a sort of holding cell, but not before we were stuck with yet another needle. This time behind our ears. It was so painful none of us put up much of a fight as they carted us to our cell.
It had a bathroom. When Viv saw it she squealed, and we all relieved ourselves. More time passed, and no alien came to check on us, so we fell asleep on the floor. Our sleep was restless, the unknown tied with hunger kept out minds occupied, and full of fear.
When we woke, we had no concept of time, and it was just as dark as when we fell asleep.
“What are we going to do?” Vivian whispered through the dark. I shook my head. I had no answers for her. Instead I crawled closer to where she lay, and we held each other.
A clank startled us, and we looked up at the silver bars to our cage. Grihk stood just outside and grinned happily at us.
“Humans. You understand me, yes?”
Chapter 12
Fihk
“Is it speaking English?” The golden one called Veeveen whispered in awe.
“No, I speak Dahk. We studied your human vocals. I now understand you. Our implant has allowed you to understand Dahk.”
“Implant? Criminy! You put something inside me?” The older male thumped the ship floor and scratched at his rump.
“Do not fear male called Cohlt. It was injected behind your hearing canal. It is harmless, any pain shall fade.”
“Uh, Grihk, when can we leave?” Pehytohn asked with water leaking from her eyes.
“I am he Fihk―”
“You’re not Grihk? You look just like him!” Veeveen squealed, I itched my hima. That one’s voice was unnaturally high.
“No, I am he Fihk, you have just mispronounced my name,” I said to the startled humans.
“Oh, okay.” The golden Veeveen slumped back down against her female companion.
“Grihk? I mean Fihk? When can we leave?” Pehytohn asked again.
I felt unusually sympathetic towards this human. She was my Commanders Pythe. Though she was not our species, she had unknowingly earned my loyalty. As gently as possible I lowered my voice, “You may not leave.”
This did not go over well with the humans. The older male raged, and the females cried. I held my palms around my crown. Their noises were unnaturally loud, quite the weapon for such a weak species.
“Your world is in peril, why do you wish to return?” I asked weakly. I would have hima pains for days if there was any more of this. I would need to see Healer Tohn immediately.
“Let us go!” The male banged against the bars. They were made from Guhuvin steal, he would be injured if he did not stop.
“Are you not famished? Do you not need sustenance? Your bodies will grow weaker.” This seemed to silence them. Hmm, something to ponder further.
“Thirsty,” Veeveen wept.
“Theersstee? This does not translate.”
“Water.” Pehytohn touched her throat.
“Ah, yes, drink. Calm then and I will provide.” They looked to me with moist eyes. Cohlt scowled.
“Fihk!” Yilt called to me. He sighed and caught his breath. “You are not wearing your communicator.” I touched my left hima, ah yes, I took it off.
“What is it?”
He watched the hum
ans wearily and bent closer. “Tahk is awake.” He straightened.
“Dahkish, what will the council Lieutenants do?” I rubbed my brow. We had no choice but to lock Tahk up as he began to show signs of the Pythe rage. Shortly after docking with the warship, Tahk was carried off the ship and moved to his quarters on Dahk One. As our Commander he was charged with the entire warship, as the King could not be here himself to do so.
“I do not know, we cannot proceed with the mission without our Commander,” Yilt sighed sadly. This was a huktbores mess.
“Fine, fine, escort the humans to the great hall, they must eat and drink.” I must comm the warship.
Yilt nodded and I turned to the humans. “Humans, you will accompany Yilt,” I held out a claw to the warrior. “He will provide you with sustenance. You must not wander off, there are many perils on the ship”, this was a lie but a necessary one, we could not have them wondering about, “There is no way off the ship, save for into the vacuum of space. I do not think you wish to die this way.” I held aloft a ridged brow.
They shook their head fast. Strange humans. I took this movement as agreement.
I nodded to Yilt and hurried to the Command Deck. We were running out of time. The Vitat would have the human planet wiped out before we could intervene at this rate.
“Lieutenant Fihk, the lieutenants on council have comm’d in,” Hybolt, our Lieutenant pilot, called to me as I reached the deck.
“I will speak with them,” I said gravely and took Tahk’s seat. It was bittersweet. I had always dreamt of running my own ship since I was a babe. But at the expense of my Commander? Never. There was no greater Dahk than he, and he was chained up.
“Lieutenants. How is he?” I asked without preamble.
Lieutenants in command were Uthyf, Klando, and Jirt. They ran the warship in Tahk’s stead while he ran our first mission. It was to acquire human language, so we may communicate with the human leaders. Not that that would do much good as they hid away in their caves while their species suffered at the hands of the Vitat. Cowards.
