by Sy Walker
“So, what?” Nevaeh asked, already getting annoyed with his friend. “Where would you suggest I keep her if not here? The commander already made it clear he didn’t want her using national properties.”
“But that didn’t mean keep her here,” Bjorn growled. “Her kind has been nothing but a thorn in our sides, and they are weak and frail, without much intelligence or skill in battle. She will do you no good Nevaeh. I think you should just take her back to the wasteland and let her fend for herself, if the Gregor don’t get her first.”
“You expect me to take her out there to be eaten by wild animals? What kind of Thraxian are you?”
“The kind who doesn’t sympathize with the enemy,” the man blared.
“Keep your voice down,” Nevaeh said and looked towards the stairs that led to Aurora’s keep.
“What, so now you are concerned about her sensitivity?” Bjorn asked. “She shouldn’t be here,” he deliberately said and shouted down the hole.
“Hello?’ Aurora called.
Bjorn pushed Nevaeh aside and stormed down the steps. “Bjorn, stop!” He shouted after his friend, but it was useless; he was next to Aurora in seconds.
Bjorn stood there looking at her, the dark cloud on his face transforming to a thunderstorm by the time Nevaeh stepped before him and shoved him aside.
“What are you doing here?” Bjorn asked Aurora.
“Wait, you think I want to be here with you?” she asked him angrily. “I want to go home, but he doesn’t want me to,” she told Bjorn and they both looked at Nevaeh.
“You agree with that?” he asked Bjorn. “What do you think will happen if she goes back home? She tells them what she saw here, our strengths and our weaknesses, and then they use it against us when they attack next.”
“Excuse me, but how exactly would I see that from a hole in the ground?” she barked. “All I want to do is go home, but he won’t let me.”
“Yeah Nevaeh. Why don’t you let her go home?” Bjorn asked. “I get sick of just the sight of it,” he spat and scowled at Aurora.
She looked at him and all that had been reserved in her spilled out in an onslaught of words as her anger grew by leaps and bounds. “Why does it sound like you think my kind is the enemy? The Thrax have terrorized the galaxy for decades, and we are just united in our front against you. You are the monsters!” Her rage was all consuming, and when she had spewed her venom onto unsuspecting victims, her chest heaved as she tried to regain control of her emotions. But she realized they were looking at her like she was crazy. “What?”
“We are the monsters?” Nevaeh asked, and then he looked from her to Bjorn. “We are the ones who have been constantly attacked, or did the Inter-galaxy police forget to mention that part?”
“No, that’s not true,” Aurora said as she tried to make sense of the truth that had become a part of her; the truth that had been instilled in her ever since she was a child.
“See, there is a difference between the truth and what you were told, and it is no different than the stories that have been spread across the galaxies,” Nevaeh told her.
“Yeah, you got it twister woman from earth,” Bjorn chimed in. “You listen to half-truths and go around the galaxy defending what you think is true. We only defend against those who persecute us, and that has resulted in our attacking planets such as yours. Planet Nirvana was the latest, because they got entangled in an invasion they couldn’t see their way out of. They, much like the people of earth, are weak. They didn’t stand a chance against us.”
“I don’t understand,” Aurora said. “I was there during the repeated invasions. I know nothing of our people first attacking. I lost my brother during the battle three years ago. Are you telling me he died defending a dream? That he died for nothing.”
“He may not have died for nothing; he believed in what he died for, which was not true, which does not…”
“Okay, man you don’t need to justify anything to her,” Bjorn interrupted. “Whatever happened was their fault anyway. Just get her out of here.” Bjorn waved her off and went back upstairs, and she could tell he had left by the slamming of the door.
Nevaeh was just following in his wake when Aurora stopped him. “Is any of that true?” she asked him quietly.
He sighed and kept his back turned to her. “Yes,” he answered. “We are not the people you make us out to be. You have been misled.”
Aurora’s head begun to spin as the world she had known capsized and she was left stranded with another reality she was unable to appreciate. When she became quiet, Nevaeh turned to her, and the sight of her with her leg bandaged, her hair unkempt and her head held down moved something within him, and despite what she was, he could not leave her to rot in a hole.
“You can stay up top if you like,” he told her and then moved off.
“Could you help me up?” she asked. “I think the wound is festering,” she said and grimaced.
Nevaeh walked back to the strange creature from another planet: the woman with the long red hair and green eyes, and skin without markings. She was different from the women he knew, in more ways than one, and she intrigued him. That was his sole reason for taking her home-to study her and perhaps find secrets about the enemy that kept attacking his people. But he learned quickly that she was as much a victim as he was, and that they were not so different after all.
CHAPTER 6
“Ouch!” Aurora cried out as Nevaeh applied an ointment to her wound.
“You have to keep still,” he told her. “Thraxian women are better at dealing with pain.”
“Why do you always compare me with your people? I am not one of you, and obviously would behave diff…ouch!” she cried again.
“Sorry,” he told her and then covered the bottle. “All done,” he told her. “You won’t need this much longer; your wound is healing nicely.”
“I have to admit it actually works,” she said as she flexed her leg. A week ago she was unable to walk without support, and as she stood she barely felt the pinch as her tissue molded back into place. She walked around the space she had grown familiar with over the last week that she had been invited to share with him.
“I need to go out,” he told her and wiped his hand in a rag when he got up. “Don’t let anyone in, and don’t go out either. You may think I’m keeping you here as my prisoner, but there are others who would kill you in a heartbeat, so I’m really doing you a favor.”
“Why?” Aurora asked, and waited expectantly for his answer.
Nevaeh heaved an exasperated sigh and looked directly at her. “Because I don’t believe in killing someone in cold blood, or leaving them to die either. Just don’t thank me yet; I still don’t know what to do with you.”
“I have an idea,” she smiled. She had grown unreasonably and unexplainably comfortable around Nevaeh over the time she had been in his home.
“Don’t even think about it,” he told her. “I’m not sure what to do with you, but I have no way to get you back home either.”
Aurora sighed as he went through the door, and then she went to the window to watch him leave. The streets were made of what appeared to be cobble stones for the most part, with single lane tracks that were used for the mobile vehicles they used. It seemed the people from Thrax were simple when it had to do with their lifestyles, but they were educationally and technologically more advanced than her own people. Thus, Aurora couldn’t understand their simple lifestyle; surely they could afford to make flashy cars and jets, yachts and hovercrafts. Instead, they seemed to do a lot of walking.
She stood there at the window just then, watching a woman holding a little girl’s hand as they walked past the house. The little girl already had markings, and as the woman walked, she waved and smiled to other passersby. When she glanced over and saw Aurora standing at the window, a frown took its place and she scurried her daughter along, as if only her stare could infect the child. They didn’t seem like terrorists, but ordinary people.
And as for
Nevaeh, he lived a very mundane and routine life of waking, exercising, gong to work and walking home. He performed the same routine every day, with the exception being a rescue operative whenever their planet came under fire.
Aurora stood there, calculating and processing everything when he pushed the door open. “I’m surprised you didn’t run,” he told her when he noticed he staring out the window.
“Like you said, where would I go?” she asked without looking at him.
He kicked the door shut and placed some groceries on the counter, before he produced a pan and placed it on the stove. Aurora only called it that because he used it to cook, but there was nothing much, apart from the level surface, that resembled anything she had back home. It was huge and had buttons and commands over a screen that looked like the one on a microwave panel, so all Nevaeh had to do was marinate what he wanted and enter the command into the device. She stood watching him, and was awed, and when he turned he caught her staring.
“It really isn’t that interesting,” he said and laughed. And that was perhaps the first time she really did. It was like a slight chuckle, only it resonated in the room, and seemed to make the air come alive with its melody that she couldn’t help but smile when he did.
“To me it is,” she said when she moved closer to touch it, like it hadn’t always been there. She leaned over to stare at the panels and grooves long the sides, and slid out the drawer where he would place the unprepared meal. “I would have loved this at home,” she said. “My own personal chef.”
“Well, I still have to do this part,” he said, indicating the raw meat still lying on the counter.
“True,” she said and straightened herself. Then she walked over and touched the meat. “What is it?”
“Kushnai,” he replied. “A rare delicacy here,” he said when he saw the confusion on her face. “I think it’s what your people know as steak.”
“Oh,” Aurora replied. “You know about my people?” she asked.
“Of course I do,” he replied. “We know about every nation in this galaxy; it is a school requirement.”
“Then I believe I am at a disadvantage,” she said as she moved closer to him and touched him on the hand. “If it is alright with you, I’d love to know more about your people.”
Nevaeh looked at her hand on his, and then deep into her green eyes. A twinkle emerged there that warmed her on the inside and he covered her hand with his other. “It would be my pleasure to,” he replied. “But I must apologize for my rudeness. All the while you have been here I didn’t take the time to know much about you. I thought you…well, I don’t know what I was thinking. But I do believe I would love the honor of knowing your name.”
Aurora smiled when he spoke, witnessing a gentler, nobler side than the rugged painted man she had seen on her first day on Thrax, and in that moment she was glad it was he who had found her. “It’s Aurora,” she told him, and she removed her hand form under his to formally meet the strange man who was slowly winning her over.
CHAPTER 7
Over the next few days Nevaeh took Aurora out every time he wasn’t busy with work. It was no easy feat for Aurora, to be out in public with him, for she received threats, deadly stares and foul words she could not even comprehend. Nevaeh shielded her as much as he could, but she was determined not to let their anger sully the impression she had of them that was already changing. She didn’t take it personally anymore, especially considering the new knowledge that she had found, that it was her and her people who had done them more wrong than had been meted out to her kind. Oftentimes she imagined herself ambling along the walk of shame, receiving blows from rotting foods and vegetables tossed at her, and feeling deserving of each.
This particular day, Nevaeh thought it would be better if they spent the day away from prying eyes and evil minds. He took her to a recreational facility which housed a gym, a lounge area, a pool, various tracks and entertainment for children. Aurora was awed by the artwork displayed in the architecture of the building, and she made full three hundred and sixty turns in each area they passed through.
“Why isn’t anyone here?” she asked when they got to the pool.
“It is my day off, and the children are in school, so there isn’t usually anyone here at this time of the day,” he replied.
“Is that why you brought me here?” she asked.
He rolled the leg of his pants up, sat at the edge of the pool and dangled his legs in the water. Aurora stood there watching him and then she joined him. She wrapped the skirt between her legs, part of the pieces he had gotten for her in lieu of the fact that she had nothing other than the torn gear he had found her in.
“You didn’t answer me,” she said when her feet played in the warm water next to his.
“Yes,” he finally said. “It won’t be easy for the people here to accept a newcomer, especially one from earth,” he sighed.
“So, why did you?” she asked. It seemed the question resided between them, and came up at some point or the other, for Aurora couldn’t wrap her mind around his strange generosity.
“Haven’t we gone through this before?” he chuckled.
“Yeah, I know what you’ve said before, but I don’t believe that the answer is still the same,” she told him. “I’ve watched you, and you have taken a battering from your people as much as I have, and still, rather than casting me out, here you are.”
“It’s the decent thing to do,” he told her.
“But that’s just it,” she retorted. “I’m not sure I would have done the same thing had you been the one to crash on my planet. I’m not sure there would be anyone who wouldn’t want to lock you into an underground lab and use you as the basis for experiments and torture for years on end,” she said and sighed. “I guess we really have a long way to go.”
“But look on the bright side,” he said and nudged her on the shoulder. “If it had been anyone else who had found you here, you would be dead.”
“Are you telling me you wield that much power over the actions of others? There were three of you there. They could have killed me anyway, or any other day on the street.”
“We have honor and respect for the wishes of others here,” he replied.
Aurora smiled and touched his hand as it rested on the hard surface that surrounded the pool. She gazed at the still, clear water that stretched out before her. It looked like every other pool she had seen since she had come to know of their existence, and if someone had kidnapped her and taken her to that world, she would not have perceived it to be anywhere but earth. Except for the extraordinary man sitting next to her.
She had been his prisoner for three weeks, and in that time her status had been elevated to roommate-as far as her terminology of it went. She looked over at him now, and he smiled at her, and his black eyes flashed, piercing her soul, and she trembled under his gaze. Her mind started wandering, and somewhere deep in the shadows of her subconscious, she started developing an attraction for the being who had saved her life.
Perhaps he saw the look in her eyes, or read her mind of the carnal thoughts that had started invading its space, but the next thing she felt was his cold hard lips on hers. She was frightened at first, and her eyes popped when her mind registered what was happening, but like caramel in the hot sun, she melted under his touch and her entire being became a sticky mess. She felt his lips transform from cold to burning hot, and soon her eyes closed as she succumbed to her need. She could feel her body floating away like a helium filled balloon, and when she felt his hand touch her side, she shivered, and he moved away.
When their eyes locked, he smiled and pulled her to him and they sat together, at the side of the pool, feeling contented, yet concerned about their future.
CHAPTER 8
It was no easy feat that Nevaeh took on when he decided he would show his affection for Aurora in public. In the same way she had been jeered before and raked over the coals, he was treated in the same manner when he decided to hold her hand as they
left the pool.
“Disgusting,” an elderly woman spat as they walked by her.
“Look at the strange woman,” some kids laughed, and then proceeded to throw stones at them.
“Stop!” Nevaeh shouted, and they jumped in fright, hung their heads and dashed off in separate directions. Aurora tried to pull her hand away, but he wouldn’t allow her to. “No,” he whispered. “They will never accept us if they think we are weak.”
“Accept us?” Aurora asked. “What exactly is there to accept?”
Nevaeh stopped walking when her words penetrated his colored face. “You are the enemy,” he said slowly, just in case she hadn’t comprehended that so far. “Not exactly the girl you take home to mama,” he said to her.
“That’s not what I meant,” she began. “I meant, are we together?”
“You had to ask? I kissed you. That should in every way confirm what I feel for you and my intentions for us.”
“From a kiss?” she asked him.
“That’s not how it works on earth?” he asked her. His expression was one of shock, and she found it noble that he would think a kiss meant more than just that; a kiss.
“No,” she told him. “A kiss usually means a guy is attracted to you, and that he is probably interested in a date. Most times it happens after the first date.” When she paused from her explanation she caught him looking at her in an odd way. “What?”
“You come from a very strange place,” he told her.
“Well, back in the day, way back in the day, men used to be chivalrous: showing up with gifts, opening doors for women, pulling back chairs and asking permission for her hand in marriage, or even for a kiss. Nowadays that has all but died, and what we have left are a bunch of ‘men’ who just want to get into a woman’s pants. If all they do is kiss, then the girl is lucky.”
“Wow,” Nevaeh said when she was through. “We are more like your men of old; times have changed and we have gotten more advanced, but some things will always be the same. I only wish I had gotten the chance to ask you out on a date. The first time we met I took you home.”
