“Wonderful, one more reason for the Commander to yell at me. I should have gone with my gut and brought another warrior with me so he could take up the rear guard instead of you.” He shook his head a let out a long, deep breath. “We are going to have to clean this wound and rebandage it, but I want to get across to the other warriors where we will be safer.”
“I am shocked that experience didn’t make you sick. You are much tougher than I imagined a human woman would be.” Zelan was actually paying me a compliment.
“Well, my last five years has brought much worse than a cockroach spewing on me.” I looked down and noticed blood was running down my shoe onto the ground.
“Zelan, my leg is bleeding. Should I clean it before crossing? Will they be able to pick up my blood trail?”
“Possibly, stay right here, I will send the other two across and come back to help you. But keep your pistol pointed down the hallway.” Before walking away, he called to the other warriors across the way to make sure they kept their light pointed down the hall and stayed alert.
“Ok, thanks.” I kept my eyes down the hallway while he helped my friends to cross the warped bridge. He came back with a med-kit and pulled up my left leg to check it out.
“Great, another wound for the Doctor to sew back up. The Commander is going to kill me.” He sighed and shook his head while he cleaned my wound. Then he put that numbing gel on it and wrapped it up tight. He tore the bottom of my pants away so that I didn’t have any more blood dripping on the ground.
“Stand up. Can you walk ok?”
I stood up and bounced on my legs a couple times, “Sure, it seems fine.”
“Alright, let’s get moving. You take the front and I will cover our rear.”
We made our way across the divide with no more issues.
I was only two more levels away from the top when I heard a commotion above us. It was Venay yelling at the warriors. It sounded like he thought I should have already been up there.
I yelled out, “Venay, I am almost there. And I am fine. Be right up.”
He couldn’t wait so he met me at the next level and grabbed me in his arms and hugged me so tight I could hardly breathe. “Venay…can’t…breath.”
He put me back down on the ground and started to kiss me, “What is that smell and taste?”
“Oh, well, I uh… I was attacked on our way over here and I had to shoot a bug in the head while it was close to mine.” I shrugged. “We wanted to wait until we got up here before I cleaned off and changed clothes. Plus, I forgot to bring a change of clothes with me.”
“Well, let’s get you to the doctor for an exam, and then we can clean you up. How do you feel? Where are you hurt?”
“I have two injuries, one on my right arm and the other on my left leg. But I am fine. Zelan patched me up so I will be fine until the doc can look me over. I would prefer to clean up first though. Is there anywhere here I can do that?” I looked around at where we were and there did look to be some crew quarters here, but I wasn’t sure.
“I would feel better if the doctor examined you first. He is waiting on the other side. If you feel ok, we should hurry up and get moving so he can check you out first.”
“I think Lisa and Sheila are hurt worse than I am. He should look at them first.”
“They won’t make it there as fast as we will, so you will be first. Let’s move.”
And we did, we made good time because as soon as we got up to the right floor, he picked me up and carried me as fast as he could go to the doctor. We did have some more climbing to do, which he let me down for, but for the most part it was a quick and easy ride for me. I was just so happy to be in his arms that I didn’t complain about being carried. For the past few hours I had wondered if I would see him again. So letting him carry me was my reward for surviving this time.
Back on Earth I would treat myself to something nice each time I made it through something that may have seriously hurt or killed me. It was never anything big. One time I fought off two big guys who were hurting a dog, which was how I ended up with Lola. She was my treat that time. I missed Lola and wondered how she was doing. I had made a few friends who helped me to care for her. Maybe one of them was caring for Lola now?
I had to shake myself out of those memories. Earth was no more for me. Today was what I needed to focus on. When we made it to the front section of the ship, I saw a sight for sore eyes. There was a giant hybrid, he was almost as tall as Venay, waiting on the other side of a beam that had fallen. He had a huge smile on his face to go with his compassionate eyes, the doctor was waiting for us.
“Paris, it is so good to see you alive and well. I understand you were injured, please tell me what happened.”
As I began to explain what happened and where I was injured, he took out a diagnostic tool and started to scan me. He was listening to me but just barely. That is until I got to the part about shooting a giant bug that was crawling on me. He took his diagnostic tool and scanned my head right away and breathed a sigh of relief.
The doctor looked at Venay and said, “She is clean.” Everyone around us breathed a heavy sigh and smiled.
“Um, what does that mean? I am clean?”
The doctor patted my uninjured arm, “It just means you have no head injuries dear. But I suppose you are quite dirty. Why don’t you come with me and we will get you all cleaned up?”
“Ok.” I followed the doctor and Venay followed me. “Venay, don’t you need to get to the bridge or something?”
“No, I am not leaving your side until this is over. I will stay with you in med-bay until the doctor says you may leave and then you will come to the bridge with me. You are not leaving my side until we are all safe and this planet has been eradicated of those Insectoids. They are too dangerous to leave and you are not going to be near them again.”
“Oookaaayyyy.” I drawled out as I rolled my eyes, “overprotective much” I mumbled to myself.
“Yes, yes I am. I almost lost you today and I won’t go through that again.”
The doctor spoke up, “Paris, for the sake of the crew, will you please do as he asks? He has been a zylan since he heard you were first injured. Please don’t torture the crew any more by letting him loose, all alone, ok?” He patted my shoulder again and I could only laugh.
I looked at him, tilted my head, and squinted my eyes, “What is a zylan?”
Venay responded, “It is like your bears, but much more ferocious. The Doctor is implying that I have been attacking my own warriors today.” He looked over at the doctor who cowered a bit, and grunted.
“Alright, fine. I would prefer to be with him anyway. But I don’t want to get in the way of his job. I know how important it is that he stays focused.”
“Trust me dear, he won’t be able to focus without you now.” The doctor took me by the hand and led me to a bed in the med-bay. He conducted some more tests and cleaned my injuries and used their advanced medical technology to close up my wounds.
“Ok, through those doors” he pointed to the side of the room, “Is a shower that is working, for now. Please take a shower and I will send in some clean clothes for you to wear.”
Venay tried to follow me into the shower, “Oh buddy, you can stop right there. I will be totally safe in the shower all alone. Please wait outside.” He looked me up and down and chuckled as he turned around and walked out of the room.
I took a long shower, the water was warm and it felt so good to wash my entire body with soap and hot water. I had to wash my hair three times to make sure I got all of the alien insectoid goop out of it. My mouth was another matter. I used the body soap to clean my mouth out, but I must warn you, it does NOT taste good. However, it was better tasting than the insectoid brains I had in my mouth. Just thinking about it made me shiver, even in a hot shower.
When I stepped out of my shower, there on the cabinet, were some clean clothes and shoes. They all fit quite well, which was rather surprising. Turned out that Venay had someon
e grab some clothes for me earlier in the day. He had always planned on keeping me close to him and had stocked his personal office with items just for me.
Chapter 18
The next couple of days flew by. I never left the bridge unless Venay was with me, but I was kept busy. He turned his office, which is where we slept, into a small triage center. The doctor was so impressed with my field work that he asked Venay to let me help him. Venay had no issues with me helping as long as I stayed on the bridge or in his office. So the doctor set up a triage center there.
If a warrior, or human, could make it to me then I could treat them. He sent the nurse from the holding cells over to help me as well. We made a good team.
“Doctor to Paris.”
“Yes doctor? How can I help you?”
“I need you to get your friends out of my med-bay! They are in my way and are keeping my patients awake, when they should be sleeping.”
“Well, you could tell them that I need their help and send them my way. If that doesn’t work, I will call them myself.”
About an hour later both Lisa and Sheila showed up, looking a bit unhappy with me. Lisa asked, “Why do you need our help? We aren’t medics. We can’t help you. We should be in the med-bay with Rotna and Cazon, not here with you.” Lisa crossed her arms over her chest and actually hmph’d. I almost started to laugh.
“For starters, I can use your help organizing things here. But, more importantly, you need to not spend so much time in the med-bay. You are in the way of the doctor and his nurses. Also, as I understand it, you have been, um…” I looked down at my hands, this was awkward. “Stimulating your men when they should be keeping their heart rates down and getting some sleep.”
Sheila spoke up, “No, we have not been stimulating them. Only lying in bed and kissing them. That is all, neither of us would do more than that in front of the entire med-bay.” She shook her head as though I was the crazy one.
“Ok, but you need to understand that those guys need rest, not kissing. Please only visit as long as the doctor allows, or you might be kicked out for good. I don’t want that to happen. And besides, I really could use your help here. You don’t have to be a medic to help.” I pointed to the stack of supplies that needed to be organized and inventoried.
Lisa and Sheila exchanged glances, “I guess you are the Commander’s mate after all, aren’t you?” Asked Sheila.
I laughed and moved on to the next patient.
“Venay, how many people have we recovered?” I asked him.
“Only 132 of the 200 we started with.”
“That isn’t good. If you combine that with the 36 who have died, we are still missing 32 people.” I wondered where they were and if they were ok.
Venay tried to console me, “I am sure most of those 32 are fine. They have probably gotten far away from here and are safe now. They will most likely live out the rest of their lives here on this planet.”
“I wish we knew for certain, and if they are out there all alone, I still want to find them. If they want to stay here that’s fine. But I want to know that they are ok.” I walked over to him and put my arm around him and rested my head on his chest. He wrapped his big, strong arms around me and kissed my head.
“I am sorry Paris, but we have to wait until we are certain we have killed all of those bugs. I like your term for them.”
We both looked into each other’s eyes and smiled and he was about to lean down and kiss me, but his second in command cleared his throat.
“Yes, Eereen, what is it?” Venay was a bit cold in his response, but Eereen did seem to have impeccable timing when it came to interrupting our kisses on the bridge. We probably shouldn’t do that.
“We have an incoming message from the fleet, Commander.”
“It’s about time, they should have been here yesterday.”
I heard him talking to the other Commander and saw the expression on Venay’s face change from being almost pleasant, to outright rage.
“They WHAT?” I hadn’t seen this side of him before. He was waving his hands all over the place while yelling into the communicator on the bridge. “No, I am not upset with you, I am downright angry with the Zateelians for attacking us like this. They basically declared war upon us. Attacking my ship was one thing, but then to have two space cruisers here waiting for you, that is war.”
This was bad, really, really bad. Looks like we might be here for a while.
“Have you destroyed their ships Captain?” I could hear Venay clearly but I couldn’t hear the other person talking so I inched closer in order to see if I could hear what he was saying.
If I focused hard, I could hear him. It sounded like they were still fighting, but since the V’Zenians brought three ships they were winning the battle. One of the enemy ships was destroyed, but the other one was putting up a bigger fight.
“No, we have no way to repair this ship as it is and our weapons need power in order to work. There is nothing we can do from here to help you. If one of your ships is too badly damaged to help you send them here to our location. We could use the manpower down here to finish off the insectoids who crashed here with us.”
I thought I heard the Captain agree to that, but wasn’t sure. As I tried to get closer, Eereen noticed me and shook his head. I hung my head and stepped back a few paces. Venay would tell me later.
I was right too; as we were readying for bed that night, he told me what happened in space these past two days.
“We should expect to have company tomorrow. The third ship in this system is badly damaged and if they can land, they will come over here to our location and then we will have enough troops to find and squash those bugs. But I must warn you, they are hardened warriors who see humans as either mates or slaves. They won’t understand how I have treated our current residents. They will expect me to hand them over to them to keep locked up, that is if their holding cells can handle the numbers.
“You can’t let them. Most of those who stuck it out here have been helping. And they want to stay on this planet and try to make a go of it here if they can’t go home. Why can’t we let them do that?”
“It isn’t my law or my rules. I won’t have a choice if the other captain demands it. We can’t keep them here in this ship. Most likely we will all go over there and I will be subject to their leader, as long as he is ranked a Commander or above.”
“What else could he be if he isn’t a Commander?” I sat up against the wall and looked at Venay and wondered if there just might be a chance here.
“If he is a new ship captain, his rank might be Captain. After Captain is Commander. You usually make Commander after three to five years as a Captain. Some make it somewhere between two and four years. But if he is only a Captain, and even if we are on his ship, I will take command and he and his crew will follow me.”
“Then let’s pray that he is only a Captain. It would be nice to have a real room again. I can’t say I will miss sleeping in your office.” I snuggled down next to him and tried to go to sleep. We slept on the floor, together, since there really wasn’t anywhere else to sleep. But we had the best accommodations at the moment. Everyone else slept wherever they could find a place to lie down.
Chapter 19
The next day saw the arrival of the new ship. It made a safe landing a few miles away from us during the day and we set off in groups of twenty to fifty depending on who was in the group. Larger groups held the injured and included some of the humans. Venay and I were in the last group. He said the Commander of a ship always goes last and since I was not to leave his side, I was last as well.
Surprisingly, we all made it safely to the other ship. I wondered if the Insectoids knew we had too large of a contingent of warriors for them to mess with. Or, if they were just biding their time.
When we entered the other ship there was a line of all of the senior officers waiting for us. The current ship’s Captain, and he was only a Captain, was waiting to welcome us officially and to hand over con
trol to Venay. I didn’t realize how much I was dreading this moment until I came face to face with the being who was to be the new second in command. My smile must have been a mile wide because Venay nudged me with his shoulder and cleared his throat.
“Captain, I would like to introduce you to my mate. Paris, this is Captain Montgomery.”
I put my hand out to shake the Captain’s hand, “Captain, it is nice to meet you.”
He took my hand but instead of shaking it, he kissed it, much like a gentleman on Earth would do. “The pleasure is all mine, ma’am.”
I tilted my head to one side and smiled back at him and had to work hard to keep from sighing, what a nice surprise. Not that I was attracted to him, but meeting a gentleman way out here in the middle of a battle with mutant insects, was very nice.
Venay looked at me and arched an eyebrow; he would be asking me about that later I was sure.
“Let me show you to your new quarters. We will be here a few months while we work on the repairs we can. Fleet will send some ships along with a garrison of warriors to encamp here going forward. But our engineer doesn’t think this ship will fly until we get the supplies in about five months’ time.”
“Five months, we are all going to stay here for five months?” I looked up to Venay with questioning eyes and I bit my lower lip to keep from saying anything else.
“It depends on what happens with the two ships in orbit right now. If one of them goes home then we will go with them. This is not my ship so it would not be right for me to stay here if there was a way for me to go home and get a new ship to continue my missions.”
“Oh.” What could I say? He wanted to keep abducting humans and I couldn’t say anything negative in front of the other Captain. I just realized that I was going to have to be very careful with what I said in mixed company.
Once we were in our new room, which just happened to be the Captain’s quarters, I heaved a heavy sigh and plunged down on the couch. “Venay, does this mean that we can be officially mated now? There are plenty of troops here to take care of the issue with the vermin population. Can we have our honeymoon?” Over the past few days I learned that I had in fact, succumbed to the pull of the mating bond. I wasn’t sure if I was ready to tell him I loved him, but I was ready to take that next step in our relationship.
Worlds Away: Sci-fi Alien Romance (Alpha Alien Abduction Tale Book 1) Page 14
