Alien Forces Of Affinity: Episode One

by Cher Hollis

  Balice saw Ramon’s dark eyebrows lifting in surprise, while she decided that he was handsome for a man of his age. He was a welcome change from the standard gray-haired and pale-skinned Variant men she’d been surrounded by for the last six months, and while the men were all fit and muscular, they were also very bland.

  Balice knew that the doctor had been forcibly kidnapped by Korpal from the Makkars planet, and he seemed to be taking the trauma well; hiding it like a wise man would.

  “And you are his enchanting paramour, I take it?” Ramon asked, then he gave her a genuine smile.

  Balice returned his smile. “Korpal fought off many men to capture my affections when I first arrived at Duvall Station,” she said. “I would have been passed around by many men, if he hadn’t saved me. Colony internment camps are known for their violence.”

  Balice held onto Ramon’s arm, and gave it an intimate squeeze, as they walked. “Please, let’s not talk about that now—not when I have the man I’ve most wanted to meet my entire life, right here beside me.”

  Balice remembered Korpal’s strict orders; she was to use her charms to become friendly with Dr. De La Fluenta, so she flipped back a long strand of her snow-white hair, which allowed the doctor a better view of the diaphanous green material that clung to her cleavage. She’d fashion her outfit that day, especially for meeting him, because it matched the green color of her eyes.

  Balice knew most people, especially women, thought of her as a vamp. She liked to tell the story about how the latter day Variant scientists had told her they’d woven the female Variants DNA, in the year she’d been produced, into feminine works of art. Balice particularly remembered one technician had pointed out all her enhancements from her ivory skin, voluptuous curves, to her green colored eyes, and pouted pink lips. He’d called her a masterpiece.

  “Balice, you are charming. I’m flattered that someone as young and vivacious as you would aspire to meet me,” Ramon said, and he had a serious twinkle in his dark eyes.

  Balice patted his arm. “Doctor, the value of age is more seductive than you think. I’m just honored to meet you ... I want to convince you of that.”

  “I would never deny anything spoken from a lady with such lovely green eyes,” Ramon declared.

  Suddenly, Balice’s smile faltered when she watched Ramon’s gaze turn into a wince, because the Variant male on the other side of the doctor roughly jerked Ramon’s arm.

  “Dante, don’t be so rough with him!” Balice exclaimed, and it stopped all three of them. “I swear I won’t go one step further, unless you stop abusing him.”

  “I’ve already taken away his gag. What more do you want? He’s a prisoner, remember?”

  Dante’s voice was pure irritation with a whiny quality that Balice detested. She didn’t like him; he was a puny excuse for a Variant man, and she wished Korpal had chosen some other Variant as his confidante. She was certain it was Dante’s shrewdness that kept Korpal’s interest, after she’d watched Dante sidle up to Korpal so many times with subservient manners. It was the lord and minion style relationship that Korpal seemed to crave.

  Korpal had told her about his early fascination with reading ancient books about past kings and emperors. How after his artificial birth from an incubation tube, he’d filled his time with reading.

  It was the same with all Variants; Korpal had been synthetically born, fully grown, at the estimated age of thirteen, and then he’d been placed in a Variant Developmental Center. There he’d spent every second, of the free time allotted him, reading ancient accounts and daydreaming as a way of filling “the void.”

  Every Variant experienced the void when they were first birthed. It was a place where parents love should have been. All of them were obsessed by an insatiable need to fill it with something ... anything.

  Balice had filled her void with the attention she’d gotten from her physical appearance. Men vied to be in her company, and she craved the attention. She learned that by using her feminine wiles, she could easily manipulate them.

  “You heard Korpal’s orders,” Balice exclaimed. “I’m supposed to go with you to the Doctor’s cell. You cannot go without me, and I insist you treat Dr. De La Fluenta with some courtesy.”

  “Courtesy? Are you insane? He’s a foul scum of natural born humanity and that’s the way I’ll treat him!”

  Dante had punctuated his declaration with another wrenching of Ramon’s arm.

  “Oh you puny excuse for a Variant,” Balice cried.

  Dante made her furious, and she tapped her foot in anger, then swept her gaze as she searched for a way to get what she wanted.

  “It’s all right, dear. Much better than I expected,” Ramon said.

  Balice watched with irritation as Dante straightened his gray uniform, while his hands shook. She didn’t know if they were shaking because of impatience or because she had attempted to coerce him. He was very short for a Variant and his hair wasn’t the normal gray, instead it was jet black with only a swatch of silver-gray, which ran from his forehead back to where it lay limply on his shoulders. His skin was pale and his features were too delicate for a man.

  Balice knew she’d never be able to use her normal sweet talk to get what she wanted from him, so she decided there were other ways. She looked at Dante with a challenge in her eyes, while she reached past her bare midriff into the low-cut waistband of her flowing skirts. She pulled loose a tiny translator she carried, and then she put the small probe into her ear. It was an Esa translator, invented by the Makkars.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” Dante asked, and he looked nervous.

  “I’m going to boot you from this duty you’re mishandling, by asking one of these Esa around us to help me escort the doctor.”

  Balice waved her hand at the group of enormous red-tinged aliens that had started to make a crowd around them. All of them stood like tall red sentinels.

  The Esa had been collecting since they’d stopped, and Balice knew they were gathering because of her. They would take any chance they could to see a female up close. She also knew she could easily persuade them to do anything she asked. It was a very intoxicating feeling and she loved it, even though she was still getting used to it.

  So with the languid lift of her hips, she sent the flare of her sheer skirt swinging wide. She knew the huge Esa would raptly watch each of her movements. The steady droned hum she could hear coming from them increased with the swing of her hips.

  “Balice, now w-wait a minute,” Dante stammered, and he looked around as if he was distressed. “Korpal won’t be happy if you try that. He specifically ordered me to keep the doctor away from the Esa as much as possible.”

  Balice gave Dante an innocent look. “Did he? Then I wonder who he’ll be angry with if we don’t do exactly what he ordered?” She knew the power of Korpal’s anger, and she watched as Dante’s expression changed, because he knew it too.

  “You’re infuriating, Balice!” Dante shook his head as if he was defeated, but he glared at her. “I give up. I promise not to handle your precious doctor roughly, if we can just get this over with.”

  Balice smiled because of her victory. “There, you see, I knew we would see it the same way. Besides, where could the doctor possibly escape too on this Kalic? We’re in the middle of space, surrounded by thousands of Esa.”

  Balice looked at Ramon then she wound her arm through his, being careful not to pull on his wrists, which were manacled in front of him.

  Dante scowled at her with his eyes pinpoints of distrust, as he warned, “Don’t underestimate him, Balice.”

  Balice ignored Dante as she moved forward with Ramon through the sea of fierce looking Esa. They were monstrously tall and powerfully built, but they parted without trying to stop them, letting her pass with Ramon by her side.

  As the heavy bass drone of Esa faded behind her, Balice put a purr in her voice when she asked, “Now, doctor, would you mind terribly if I called you Ramon?”

  “I wouldn�
��t have it any other way, lovely lady,” Ramon said with a smile. “I’m very grateful for your help.”

  Balice felt more than Korpal’s orders pushing her. To think Ramon was the man that had created the Variants, and she genuinely thought she liked him. But unfortunately, she had work to do—

  “It’s really a shame we have to lock you up, Ramon. If it was up to me, it wouldn’t happen,” she said, and she realized that she meant it. Maybe she was more impressed by the fact he was “the father” of her race than she’d thought. Then Ramon surprised her.

  “Promise to visit me, Balice, or I’ll never survive,” he said, with his accent curling around his words.

  Balice patted Ramon’s arm, and then she intimately squeezed it. “Every day, you darling man. I will visit you every day, and make sure they are treating you fairly.”

  After her pronouncement, Ramon turned his head to look around, then his gaze tipped back to her. “I am curious, Balice, I’ve heard you mention the word Kalic. Is that an Esa word?”

  “It is,” she said. She was surprised to be asked a knowledge-based question from him. Then because she was answering a man who was an intellectual genius, she became excited to answer. “Kalic is the word the Esa use for their ships. When the Makkars first gave us translators, communication using them was very simple. But after time, it’s as if the translator is learning to be more descriptive.” Balice tilted her gaze up to Ramon with a sparkling question. “Do you think it’s possible the translator is learning?”

  “The Makkars technology is astounding,” he said. “From what I’ve seen I could believe anything is possible. Don’t you agree?”

  “Yes I do, they’re very foreign,” she said, and then she leaned closer. “I’m trying to learn everything I can, because they are so alien. Did you know that the Esa don’t have individual names?”

  “No, I didn’t,” Ramon said. “How in the world can they tell each other apart? They look like exact replicas to me.”

  “They do,” she said. “But they use deep clicking sounds along with incredibly fast hand and arm gestures to show rank and to tell each other apart. Everything they do seems to be about fighting battles.” Her eyes slanted coyly around the edges. “Except for Talis, of course.”

  “I can see you are a passionate student, Balice. What about Talis? What do you think it is?” he asked.

  “Ramon, you have to know more about it than I do, because you were so close with the Makkars,” she said.

  “The Makkars couldn’t explain it to me—not fully, except for their complete bafflement when they discovered that women can give it to an Esa,” he said.

  Balice touched a long fingernail to her lips.

  “It feels to me like any healthy man watching a woman, and becoming … oh I don’t know—captivated, that’s a good word for it,” she said. “The Esa never try to touch me. It seems to be enough to watch me, whatever I’m doing. But they really love it when I dance for them. That sends them into droning frenzies.”

  “I gather then, that droning signifies they are receiving Talis?” Ramon asked.

  Balice curled a long strand of snowy-white hair around her finger. “I think so.”

  “Then the Esa must chant symphonies for you, lovely lady.” Ramon bowed his dark head.

  “Ramon, you’re a flatterer!” His compliment had made her happy, and she announced, “I think you and I are going to be close friends.”

  “We already are I’m certain of it.” Ramon’s eyes held admiring glints.

  Balice continued to lead the way, while she held onto Ramon’s arm as they moved through the cavernous insides of the Kalic. Korpal had told her there were hundreds of the massive Kalics, and in size, they were twice as large as any United Earth Defense space carrier.

  The Kalics had no space cordoned off enough to be called rooms. There were no separate sleeping quarters, because the Esa never slept, that anyone could tell. There were no galleys, because the Esa used some type of alien substance packet, which they attached to their sides.

  Accommodations aboard the Kalics had been built with openness. It was troublesome at first not having the privacy of a room, and Korpal had had to order a cell constructed to hold Ramon, because there was no room with a door to lock him behind.

  Korpal had finally commandeered one of the Esa bombing Kalic’s, which everyone now called K-10’s, to use as his quarters. It was basic housing, but at least it had a hatch door to close.

  Balice had decided the very first time she’d seen one of the Kalic’s in flight that it reminded her of a shiny and twirling black colored jack.

  Lost in thought she’d been trying to decide what to tell Ramon next, while she guided him forward, when she felt his arm stiffened beneath hers and then he groaned harshly. He pitched forward and fell onto the deck. The suddenness of the fall pulled her down with him.

  “What happened to him?” Dante shouted behind her.

  Alarmed, Balice crawled over to Ramon and put her hands on his chest.

  “Ramon, what is it?” She saw his face was chalky and crimped with pain.

  “Vytor,” Ramon moaned through clenched teeth, while his entire body shuddered.

  “Get out of my way!” Dante shouted, then he roughly shoved her aside. “What trick is this?” Dante demanded as he shook Ramon.

  “Dante, stop that! Can’t you see he’s hurt?” Balice cried.

  Dante gave her an irritated glare, then his attention returned to Ramon. He forcibly pulled up one of Ramon’s eyelids. “What game is this, old man?”

  Dante grabbed Ramon’s chin and shook it.

  “Stop it!” Balice exclaimed. She’d managed to rise to her knees and she tried unsuccessfully to grab the back of Dante’s shoulders, to stop him from shaking Ramon.

  “Something is terribly wrong with Vytor. I can’t fully understand it.” Ramon groaned and shook his head, while he looked disorientated.

  “Vytor is no longer your concern, old man. Now get up or I will have you carried!” Dante shouted.

  “Stop it, Dante. He could be having a heart attack!” Balice exclaimed, while she jerked on his arm.

  “Leave me alone, you cloned witch! It’s not your head that will be chopped off.” Dante looked enraged, and then he shoved her again, until she fell onto the deck.

  “Help me,” she cried, and she looked around at the gathering throng of Esa.

  “Back away! Esa to your posts! Now.”

  Balice looked up at the sound of a forceful voice in the earbud of her translator, and then she saw a towering Esa as he shoved through the crowd.

  “Khan,” she exclaimed in relief.

  Khan was a head taller than the other Esa around him, so Balice knew he was the Esa commander that Korpal had named Khan. Korpal had said that the arm gestures used to designate Khan’s rank reminded him of an ancient holograph he’d seen of a famous warrior called Genghis Khan. Korpal had named all the Esa of central command, and he’d given them black armbands to tell them apart from the other masses of identical Esa.

  The chorus of droning that crowded Balice had lessened as the Talis-stricken Esa moved away, and that left Khan the only imposing figure who looked down at her, sprawled humbly on the deck. She could hear his lone bass drone as he stood, turned into honed red marble, while he watched her like a powerfully built statue.

  Dante who hovered over Ramon, looked up and ordered, “Khan, pick this man up and follow me.”

  Balice watched Khan as he slowly turned his powerful red countenance away from her. Then with a clipped utterance, which came through their translators, he snapped, “No. Korpal commands his female to him.”

  “Do not worry now,” Ramon suddenly said. “I’m recovering. It was only a passing thing. Please, one of you, help Balice off the deck.”

  “Oh, Ramon, you are a gentleman,” Balice exclaimed with relief.

  She could see he was still pale, but he looked much better, as he tried to sit. Dante hauled Ramon to his feet, while Khan stood motionles
s as he droned a deeply rumbled sound. Balice knew that Khan wouldn’t touch her, so she daintily struggled to stand.

  Then she looked at Ramon with concern, and took his cold hands into hers, as she wished she could convince Dante to take the wrist-locks off him.

  “Ramon, are you sure you’re better?”

  “Sweet lady, I’m recovered. It was only a passing moment,” he said. “I bonded with the Makkars and I believe it’s taken more out of me than I thought.”

  “I have to go now, Ramon,” Balice said. “But I will come to visit you as soon as I can, to make sure you are all right.”

  Turning to leave, Balice sent Dante a meaningful glare, but he ignored her. Instead, he moved Ramon forward, while he ordered, “Doctor, we have wasted enough time, now move.”

  “Too long from my post. Korpal commands to see you,” Khan uttered, and the translator made it sound deep and sharp.

  Then he turned his massive body away from her and took impossibly long strides in the opposite direction of Ramon and Dante.

  Balice ignored Khan as he left her. Instead, she took a minute to smooth down her airy green skirts then brush her hair back into place. She wondered, with increasing concern, what Korpal wanted with Ramon. Ramon appeared to be such a nice man. He’d been a true gentleman, and not at all, what she’d expected. She thought there were many Variant men aboard the Kalics that could use his guidance with gentlemanly manners.

  Balice looked ahead to Khan’s powerfully built back as he disappeared in the distance, but she knew he wouldn’t move too far ahead, if he’d been ordered by Korpal to retrieve her.

  She thought of all Esa as men, because to her their totally alien appearance showed a male-centered race, and she thought it was curious that there wasn’t any female Esa. She thought that was the reason why the Esa found women so fascinating.

  Khan clicked a sound ahead of her, and she knew it was impatience. It finally made her speed up her pace. The towering, powerfully built alien was nearly seven feet tall and he was burnt red in color. His dark-red color looked as if it was a fuzzy matted texture, which covered a very muscular torso.