The Kiss: An Anthology About Love and Other Close Encounters

by C. A. Newsome

  “Oh dear, the Myreen must have hurt one of our repair bots,” Trell said as she picked up the scurrying metal object responsible for the noise. It wriggled in her hands, making her giggle, until she found its control switch and turned it off.

  Once the bot was deactivated and no longer trying to drag its broken leg behind it she placed it back on the floor. Auraylia watched the alien woman examine the breach and make notes on the pad she had. It was linked to the ship's database so the Captain would be able to see what they were finding from the bridge.

  Before they could move on a crew member she didn't know very well came up behind them.

  “Another one!” He picked up the repair bot and slung it into the box he had propped under one arm. “The Myreen knew where to do the damage. Half our repair bots are broken. It's going to take ages to get them all up and running again and there's too much work for them as it is.”

  “How many breeches are there?” Trell asked.

  “Five in total now, and the bots are only working on three of them. The shields keeping us alive are going to drain the solar cells real fast.”

  “Can we make it to our destination in time?”

  “Maybe, but we might need to seal off a part of the ship to buy us some more time. Beth is working on the details now.”

  Trell nodded, finished her notes, and the three of them moved on to the next signs of damage. Trell and the guy talked non-stop, allowing Auraylia time to herself to think over the last twenty four hours. She'd not slept in all that time and had been on her feet and rushing around almost constantly. When she was doing more mundane tasks, like now, where she pointed out damage and did little else, she felt so sleepy she wasn't sure she could keep her eyes open, but the two aliens with her chattered on like this was normal. Even as a slave Auraylia had never been awake this long in one stretch.

  Two hours later they met up with another squad of the crew travelling in their direction. They helped Auraylia and her companions finish up their sector, as it was the most damaged, and as soon as they were finished a ship-wide announcement from their Captain called the entire crew to the canteen.

  She shuffled along behind the rest of the crew and officers and tucked herself into a corner of the already filling up room. From her vantage point, seated on the edge of a dining table, she could see many of the faces around them. Most of them were human but besides Trell with her fur and tail, the engineer who'd joined them with his almost human features, and the Thorian, there was also an array of small grey aliens that were new to her. She'd not seen them about the ship yet and was fascinated by their small wiry bodies and narrow tall heads. They spoke in a language she couldn't understand and a few of the crew nearby conversed with them in it as well. Before she could ask someone what it was and if she could learn it, the Captain and the Thorian came striding into the room.

  “Thank you all for your hard work. I know many of you have been awake longer than you are used to. The threat from the Myreen is now over and we're not far from Federations space. As many of you are aware, our ship has undergone a large amount of damage and we're still a day out of port. I want all non-skeleton crew to get some rest and I am making that an order. Everyone else should focus on repairs and energy preservation.”

  He waived his arms and ushered them all back out of the canteen and she found herself right next to him as they left.

  “Auraylia, I hear you fought well earlier. Our Thorian says you were useful to have around in hand to hand combat.” He gave her a smile similar to the one he'd given her when she'd listed off her abilities in the market and she did her best to return the gesture, but had no idea what to say in response to praise, although it made her pulse race to hear it from him.

  “Is there anything else I can do to help, Captain? There's a lot to do.”

  “You look shattered. Get some sleep like everyone else.” He motioned for her to go through the doorway to their dormitories ahead of him and then he stood and waited as the crew moved into each of the separate rooms off that. Each dorm room had twelve beds, three on each wall and hers was in the middle of the three identical dorm rooms.

  Her bunk was on the left, and much to her distress, Ben's was the one above and the Crime and Punishment overseer below. She glanced at the nameplate beside the bottom bed and committed Thomas to memory. Both of them were men she wanted to avoid, but with Dylan and the Thorian outside, ushering everyone in, she knew she wouldn't be able to hide from them this time.

  The crew around her were already getting into their bunks and closing their hatches while she pulled over the small cube the people higher up used to give themselves a boost up. Being a slave and never eating that well had left her shorter than most and she struggled to get into the bunk, although she had no intention of staying there.

  Before she could get her hatch open Thomas and his girlfriend came in, followed only seconds later by Ben. Both men gravitated towards her, and in her prone position half in and half out of her bed she couldn't do anything to stop Ben grabbing her around the waist. He gave her a yank and she crashed back to the floor, barely landing on her feet.

  “Careful there, Auraylia,” he said, making it sound like she'd slipped. He wrapped an arm around her which helped steady her but she didn't like being so close to him. “Still having trouble getting into your bunk? Why don't you use mine? The middle's always the hardest to get into.”

  “No thank you. I'm sure I can manage,” she replied and turned to use the cube again. Before she could, he was standing on it and swinging himself up into his own.

  “Suit yourself, but you know where to find me if you get bored of trying yours.” He shut his hatch and allowed her to go back to trying hers.

  “Sure you don't want to try mine, either?” Thomas asked and reached out to stroke her arm. She pulled away but it meant the cube was even further away from her. He moved to stand in between them as she realised everyone else was in their bunks and the pair were alone.

  Thomas came up close to her so he could whisper in her ear and she froze to the spot.

  “I bet you're not used to sleeping alone are you? I imagine you slept with your masters, warm in their beds. I know Dylan freed you but you must be missing them. Why don't you join me in my bed? I can be your new master.”

  “I think I better obey our Captain's orders and get some sleep. We both ought to,” she said and pulled back from him. He let her go and got into his own bunk, but a familiar feeling crept through the pit of her stomach and she no longer wanted to even pretend to get into her own bed.

  Ever since arriving on the ship she'd obeyed every order she'd been given. She knew she owed Dylan a lot and the hope of a new life had been a risk worth taking. It wasn't the Captain's fault the same sort of men were here as on her home planet, but now she had to try and keep herself safe, just like she had to there. It came down to a choice. Disobey the Captain or risk a repeat of an experience she'd rather forget. No part of her could argue for obedience over safety.

  After checking the room outside was clear, she made her way out of the dorms and headed for the crew showers and toilets. If she was going to keep her body awake she needed to give it a boost and she could think of nothing better than a shower. It had also been several days since she'd had one. So far there had been no good opportunity to use the facilities while she could be sure no one else would enter. Although the men and women had designated washing times, the other gender could still go to the toilet during that time, and she hated the idea of men walking in on her while that vulnerable.

  Despite the heat from the water pouring over her body she stood and shivered the entire time, her arms wrapped around her torso. Thomas had looked at her exactly the way her uncle had. Although, she supposed he hadn't really been her uncle. He'd been friends with her parents and he'd taken her in once they'd died. She'd called him uncle but that wasn't the sort of relationship he'd wanted.

  Once dressed again she hurried down a corridor, trying to look for a good place to tuck
herself out of the way and maybe get a few hours sleep. Or find someone she could work for who wouldn't question why she was out of bed; someone who might think she was part of the skeleton crew.

  She tucked her head around the doorway of the weapon laboratory and couldn't see anyone in there, so wandered inside. Before she heard him the Thorian came out of the engine room behind it and his eyes met hers. She smiled, not sure what to say. He was the second in command and would know she wasn't meant to be up.

  “Are you looking for something useful to do?” he asked while she was still frozen in fear. She nodded and came towards the workbench covered in scattered weapons.

  “You can help me with these then. They need fixing.” He motioned to the assortment of gun parts, wires and battery cells. A few seconds later he asked her to hold something steady so he could solder it in place.

  “So, why are you disobeying a direct order?” he asked. She kept her eyes fixed on the chip she held and tried to appear as calm as possible.

  “I'm not tired and I wanted to help. You're up as well.”

  “I'm a Thorian. I need a lot less sleep. You, on the other hand, are exhausted.”

  “Really, I'm fine.”

  “Of course, and that is why your eyes are bloodshot, your hands are unsteady and you've yawned three times in the last two minutes.”

  She didn't add the headache she had or the way her limbs seemed clumsy and unresponsive, but let silence fall between them.

  “What are you afraid of?”

  Still she said nothing. His question alarmed her in how accurate it was. Fear kept her awake and he must have somehow picked up on it, although, it shouldn't have surprised her. Thorians were different. They were designed to be faster, better, and stronger than any human and she realised it was why she felt safe with him. No Thorian would ever shame their breed and sleep with a normal human. Even the risk of producing an inferior offspring would keep him from considering the slightest physical contact with her.

  Knowing this, she decided to trust him and tell him what bothered her. It might give her the protection she needed.

  “I... You're right. I am afraid. The other men, in the dorm. They scare me.”

  He glanced at her but went back to his work, allowing her to help and talk as she wished.

  “When I was younger, before I was a slave, I lived with my uncle. Well I called him Uncle. He'd been friends with my father. He took care of me until I was a teenager and almost finished normal education. We were poor but I had a job as a shop assistant and gave him most of my credits to help out.” She knew she wasn't getting to the point but even now she wasn't sure she wanted to.

  “He hurt you?”

  “One evening when I came home from work he was waiting for me. He'd drunk a lot of alcohol, he often did, but this time he looked at me differently. He went on about how much I owed him and how grateful I should feel and then he... he proposed I join him in his bed and do... certain things for him, to pay him back. I said no and went to my room to sleep, and I thought he'd left it at that, but I woke up a few hours later...”

  She gulped and paused and they stopped working.

  “He'd tied my hands and feet to the bed and he climbed on top of me and... well, I'm sure you can imagine what he did.” She wiped the tears from her eyes and picked up the tool he needed.

  “I ran the next day. When I was in the main city four days later and starving, one of the slave masters offered me food in return for owning me. I knew things couldn't get any worse so I said yes.”

  “And that's why sleeping scares you?” She nodded and helped him put the casing back on the repaired handgun. “I think it would scare me too.”

  “Please, don't tell anyone. I... I've never told anyone before.”

  “I won't, if you really don't want me to.”

  “No one, ever.” She finally looked at him and let him see the emotion in her eyes.

  “I'm going to be here for a while, so why don't you get some sleep? The engine room back there's nice and warm.” His gaze moved to the door and then back to her face. She nodded, grateful for his understanding. He'd done exactly what she'd not dared to hope; offered her some protection so she could rest.

  As soon as the door was shut behind her she curled up in the corner, used her uniform jacket as a pillow, and allowed her eyes to close.

  A Captain's Work is Never Done

  Dylan sighed as he went over all the damage reports. His crew was exhausted and sleeping, and his ship was shot up so badly it didn't have the energy to go as fast as he wanted to. On top of that, a planet full of people were relying on him to get there in time.

  With only half his repair bots working and no extra energy to recharge the weapon cells, his ship couldn't take another battle without spending a significant amount of time soaking up some starlight. And they were still almost a whole day away from Federations space proper, where he could hide behind other fleet ships.

  The Myreen had known he was coming. They were responsible for the last ship not getting through to its destination, something the admiral had neglected to mention in his reports. With an untrained crew that couldn't man a full set of stations Dylan had almost lost everything in the last battle, and he knew he had to keep how close they'd come to dying to himself. A lucky shot from an engineer had blown up a small but deadly Myreen vessel before it got too close. If it had latched on and torn another chunk out of the hull, they'd have had too many breaches to patch them up before they ran out of power.

  As he was going through the calculations for energy conservation, he heard a knock on his cabin door. His Thorian second officer came in.

  “Is anything wrong?” Dylan asked. The Thorian rarely came to speak to him alone.

  “I'm worried about one of our crew.”

  “Who?”

  “The slave girl, Auraylia.”

  “What about her?” Dylan sat forward. Of all the names it wasn't one he'd expected. So far he'd only heard good things about her and plenty of it. Her enthusiasm and desire to please her superior officers was something a lot of the lower ranks didn't share.

  “I think you ought to talk to her.”

  “She's sleeping, along with the rest of the crew.”

  “Except she's not, and I don't think it's the first time she's gone without sleep.”

  Dylan raised his eyebrows. The Thorian was a man of few words, but his tale was so cryptic Dylan found himself wanting the genetically modified human to elaborate.

  “She's in the lower deck engine room at the moment.”

  “What's she doing there?”

  “You really ought to go see for yourself, sir.”

  “All right,” Dylan said as he grabbed his outer top and put it on. It wouldn't be a good idea to appear out of uniform even if most of the crew were sleeping.

  The Thorian went with him as far as the corridor and Dylan entered the weapons lab alone. The remnants of work were out on the benches but nothing out of the ordinary. Beyond was the small security door to the engine room, a room off limits to most personnel.

  He opened it, trying to do so as quietly as he could, and stepped through. The engine's hum filled the room and in the dim light he could only make out the outline of it. He couldn't see Auraylia.

  As he considered going back out to ask the Thorian what he was playing at, he noticed someone might be able to hide behind a pipe that stuck out from one wall. As he moved closer he heard the sounds of someone moaning in their sleep and he walked faster.

  On the other side lay Auraylia in the grip of some sort of nightmare. Reaching down, he touched her shoulder and whispered her name.

  In a flash she opened her eyes. The green looked even darker in the low light and the fear was evident. Before he could say anything she shuffled back into a crouched position and drew two blades from somewhere inside her clothes. One was Myreen and reflected the reddish light back to him but the other was dull and rusted.

  As he took all this in, she snarled and launched h
erself at him. It took all his skill to dodge as the daggers sliced at the air where he'd been only seconds before. Undeterred, she rushed him again, and again he moved out of the way just as the metal would have cut into him.

  The third time she flagged and he managed to knock the Myreen blade from her hands, sending it clattering onto the metal floor several feet away. With only one weapon to contend with he managed to grab her wrist and yank it from her grasp. She hissed in pain and lashed out at him with her finger nails instead.

  As they caught him on the side of the face he used his body weight to overpower her and pin her up against the wall, both hands gripped within his.

  At first she thrashed against him, hissing and snarling as she hurt herself in his unrelenting grip.

  “Auraylia, stop this, now!”

  His words registered somewhere in her mind and she went still and limp, her eyes wide and fixed on his face.

  “Captain?” He nodded, but didn't let her go. “I'm sorry. I didn't realise it was you.”

  Attacking him was a crime, but his gut told him something was wrong and her apology was so full of remorse he was positive she meant it. However, she had unauthorised weapons, one of which she could only have taken from the invading forces earlier. As captain, he knew he had to take action.

  “Why did you have those daggers on you? They weren't authorised. No fleet staff on probation are allowed weapons.”

  She didn't answer.

  “I need you to tell me, Auraylia. Why did you attack me?”

  “I thought you were... I didn't realise it was you. I didn't mean to, Captain.” The pleading tone to her voice almost made him melt and relent then and there, but he knew regulations and he had to get to the bottom of this.

  “Who did you think I was, another crew member?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Then who?”

  She closed her mouth and looked away from him. Whatever the reason she wasn't going to say.

  “If you don't tell me where you got the blades and why, Auraylia, I will have to charge you with unauthorised possession.”