Gamma Rift

by Kalli Lanford

  Garran rapped his knuckles against the secret door, and it opened a moment later. Lestra kept her arms crossed when we entered, and then dropped them with a clack when the wall resealed.

  “She seems angry,” I said.

  “We were gone longer than I told her we’d be.”

  And hopefully she didn’t suspect why. With the back of my hand, I wiped the perspiration from my forehead and shook my ruffled hair back into place. Garran’s shirt was askew at the shoulders, and the flap of the shaft of one boot lifted.

  Garran held my hand while we walked through the wall, and at one point pulled me closer to sneak a kiss when Lestra was ahead of us. Once we reached my cell, he entered with me, while Lestra stayed inside the passage, manning the secret door.

  “That was amazing,” said Garran softly, taking me into his arms. “I’m glad it was you—my first time to be with someone I care about, and not the girl I meet on my wedding day.”

  I smiled and lifted my head for him to kiss me. His touch took me back to the bed of jessom moss, and my body tightened with delight.

  “It meant a lot to me, too.” It was surreal. I’d just lost my virginity to an alien and on a planet three galaxies from Earth. And there were no regrets. I cared about him. I wanted him to be the one.

  “I’ll come for you tomorrow night. I’ll have everything ready for you to stay there by then.”

  “Thank you,” I said, giving him a kiss. “And will you be able to stay with me for a while once you take me there?”

  “I will. I don’t have communications class until the afternoon.” And hopefully there’d be time to make love again.

  His hand skated to my waist, and he pulled me against him for another hot kiss before letting me go and exiting into the wall.

  Though in a state of enamored bliss, my gut wrenched, and I held my breath in an attempt to settle my stomach. A pain developed in the hollow of my belly. It was a pain I felt before when I’d had the flu, the pain that usually left my body retching over the toilet and my throat raw from bile. The pain subsided as I swallowed and drew in a long breath, but a moment later, a raw churning worked its way up my throat. I made it to the toilet, and it extended just in time for me to vomit without making a mess.

  My hands trembling, I wiped my chin with the back of my hand and waited for the sink to project, so I could wash my face. Three splashes of cold water calmed the rising heat in my cheeks, but the back of my throat burned, and my stomach continued to bubble with pain.

  What was wrong with me? Was it a reaction to the food cubes I’d eaten or was it some kind of allergic reaction to Garran, a species so different from me it was nature’s way to keep us separated?

  Slaine’s shadow appeared on the other side of the wall as I held my stomach and leaned against the back wall until I heaved a second time, and I couldn’t stop myself from gagging, my whole body shuddering as I remained bent at the waist above the toilet.

  It was embarrassing with all the puking and choking sounds I made, but at least the water wall was up to block some of the noise and blur the image of me hanging over the metal basin. A rubber band would have been nice, so I could at least keep my hair away from the stream of spew.

  It was Slaine who helped me to the far wall where I lowered myself and sat down, pulling the blanket tight around my torso. He reclaimed his post outside my cell and didn’t take his eyes from me until the liquid curtain lowered back into place.

  There was nothing left to puke up, but my stomach twisted and turned. I was cold, despite my blanket, and lonely. My teeth chattered uncontrollably until I pictured Garran in his deep green shirt, his face as smooth as a chunk of white wax. But it was a rugged face, a masculine face, and the body that matched it had done an amazing thing to me earlier that day.

  Tomorrow, I was going to leave this cell for good. But would he return to find my dead body huddled in the corner where Slaine left me? That’s what I felt like. I felt dead, and I might as well have been. My family and friends probably thought I was at this point, so what did it matter anyway?

  But there was one thing for sure— I was not going to die without someone who cared for me on this planet. Someone who’d given me the most amazing experience of my life.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Garran

  Today’s lectures had left me completely drained. The last things I cared about were atmospheric studies, four-dimensional physics, primitive-life anatomy—we were currently studying the dimpled frog of Desna Ten—and dual-stage propulsion systems, especially after I received a message from my father, requesting I meet with him and his research team that afternoon, a meeting that could bring me closer to having access to a ship in the near future. And especially since I still needed to prepare the Ring of Reverence for America’s arrival.

  Lestra entered my room and stood at the foot of my bed where I was sitting. Her lips, which were normally curved at their corners in a natural smile, dropped, but it looked forced and rehearsed.

  “I talked to my brother today. The human is sick.” Lestra couldn’t have cared less.

  “What?” I stood and grabbed her by the shoulders. My stomach twisted, and for a moment, I couldn’t catch my breath as Lestra bobbled under my frantic grip. “Yesterday she said she felt like something was wrong, but when I left her cell, she seemed fine.”

  “You and my brother— I just don’t get how you two can have feelings for that thing. Slaine is disobeying orders and breaking his pledge to the king. At first he did it because you ordered him to, but now!” She shook her head. “It just doesn’t make sense to me. How can you and my brother care for it so much?” she asked nonchalantly, like she equated my beautiful human to an amphibian knull.

  Enestians, though arrogant, which wasn’t unfounded considering we were the most advanced beings in the Millennius, were known throughout the galaxy as being intelligent but sometimes overly emotional beings, or what we Enestians liked to say, passionate beings. Enestians of lesser bloodlines have been known to go insane if their feelings festered and were not shared with others. Slaine Timuary didn’t just break his oath of secrecy and allegiance to my father, like me, he was the victim of having a big heart.

  “I need to find out what made her sick.” I couldn’t have caused her illness. I mean, I’d visited her before, touched her, kissed her, but then again we had never made love until yesterday.

  “I should have never told you about the walls,” said Lestra. “I should have let you get caught and banished.”

  “The walls. Was it the walls? She was fine until—until we were outside.”

  My fingers couldn’t work fast enough. My hypotheses came so quickly that I pushed away my keyboard and worked the database by voice command. Lestra rolled her eyes, but she remained in my quarters with her arms folded and huffing every time I talked to myself, trying to think through each theory.

  “Well, it’s not the air circulatory system outside the lab. It’s no different from the filtration and air acclimatizing systems on Earth,” I announced and continued my research. “The food replacement cubes—it’s not those or the water—I’ve checked and double checked their molecular structure and the mineral and vitamins they contain, none of which are harmful to humans.”

  Two hours passed. Thirty minutes more, and I’d need to quit and leave for my meeting with the lab team.

  “Okay,” said Lestra. “I don’t think I can listen to your pathetic rant for a minute longer. You’re going in circles. You’re so consumed by this alien that you’re not thinking logically. Every theory has been a dead end.” She headed toward the door. “Here’s my advice. Take a deep breath and ask yourself what the major differences are between Enestia and Earth. That’s where I’d start.”

  She was right, and just as the door to my quarters slid opened, America’s own words cut across my mind. “It’s beautiful,” she had said when she scanned our horizon.

  “Two suns,” I shouted. It’s our atmosphere. Our cosmic radiation levels must e
xceed that of Earth’s. “Until I took her outside, she was protected by the thick walls of her cell.”

  An overdose of radiation. Yes, that was it. Why didn’t I think of that before? Enestia’s suns dwarfed the sun in which the planet Earth revolved, and the radiation ours produced was unlike any type in Earth’s galaxy. My shoulder plates relaxed with an uncomfortable clunk, and I smacked the top of my thigh with my fist.

  “Then there’s no question. She can’t stay here—not a minute longer. She won’t survive in the Ring of Reverence. I have to get her back to Earth.”

  Lestra snapped her lips. “You don’t have a ship, and you won’t have one in time. There’s nothing you can do for it. Don’t see it anymore. Forget about it. All you can do is let it die in your father’s lab.”

  “That’s what you want, isn’t it? You want it to die.” I banged my fist on my desk.

  Her rigid posture softened. “Maybe, but it’s more than that. All I’m thinking about right now is you and my brother. Both of you have taken great risks for that alien—you especially—you’re jeopardizing your future as king. It’s best you stop thinking about it, and then once it’s dead and forgotten, things can go back to normal.”

  “Forgotten. I will never forget her. My life will never be back to normal after this. How will I ever be able to look my father in the eyes after knowing what he did to her?” I asked. The plates around my eyes and mouth locked until I took a deep breath.

  I sat across from her, my chin to my chest and my head in my hands while a surge of sadness came over me. I blinked a few times, and a tear fell against my palm. What? It had been so long that I forgot what it felt like. I bit my lip and held my tears as I grieved for Lestra’s anger and pain, the dead Trispian, my unwanted future as a vile king, and most of all, America’s impending death.

  Then I felt a light pressure on my shoulder, a hand—Lestra’s hand. She sat next to me and leaned her head against my shoulder. “I’m sorry, Garran. I really am. I know you genuinely care about that alien. It’s just hard for me to understand how and why.”

  “Yeah, I know,” I said, and stood abruptly, ready to confront my father.

  My father and me— How could two people be so different?

  Quips, the most regarded fruit on Enestia, begin as fluffy white blossoms, identical in size, shape, and smell. After each blossom shrivels and the last petal falls, a small quip bubbles up in its place to grow red and ripe under the Enestian suns, and the once-thick trunk splits at its center, producing two vines in which to harbor its young fruit.

  But quip growers lose half their harvest by the end of the season, for one vine produces a fruit so sweet you can taste its goodness radiating within your shell, but the other vine, though its quips are identical to the other, produces fruit so bitter on the tongue it is impossible to eat. That was my father and me—quips on a tree. Our bodies were grown from the same bloodline, but our scruples were twisted up two different vines.

  My father’s ten-member research team stood when I entered his private conference room in the research section of the lab. Huskus, the lead scientist, motioned with his finger for me to sit at the opposite end of the table across from my father, who by the way, was not obligated to stand at my presence and chose not to.

  King Meallian. I could barely stand to look at him as he sat at the head of the long glass table. “Release the human,” I wanted to say. “Send her back to Earth. How dare you pick on a poor shell-less creature.”

  But instead of using those icy words, my anger came out in the form of a fixed frown in my father’s direction, a frown that caused him to grab my arm and whisper in my ear that I looked “sulky and tired” and not to “embarrass him” as I passed to take a seat.

  He was a tall, strong man that most Enestian females considered extremely handsome. His shell was worn where the plates met and hinged around his eyes, a sign of his age, but his jaw was firm and square, giving him a certain inherent dignity that enhanced the royal title. No one dared to disobey my father.

  “The prince has a sudden interest in our research,” he said, once I was seated. “So I’ve decided to include him in our next research endeavor and relevant dissection.”

  Huskus Weevnil drew in a short breath. “My king, are you referring to the next specimen abduction or the one we currently—”

  My father held up his hand. “That’s enough.” Huskus sank in his chair.

  “Or the one that what?” I asked, leaning back with enough false confidence and arrogance to hide that I knew which specimen Huskus was referring to.

  My father scratched his chin. “How far are you willing to go with this, my prince?”

  “As far as I can and be just like you. The king of all kings in the Millennius.”

  The words burned my tongue, but my father was amused, taking delight in the fact that I honored him in front of his royal team, a dozen scientists and chemists he’d handpicked. I tried to hold a smile as I nodded at the men and woman who helped my father study its enemies inside and out, in order to remain the most powerful planet.

  “Huskus was referring to the specimen dissection taking place tomorrow.”

  “What dissection?” I tried to ask calmly as my heart thumped hard, practically knocking against the inside of my shell.

  “Another irrelevant creature.” He paused and his shell lips pursed. “The dissection is scheduled for tomorrow afternoon.”

  That meant America. The shell sections on my abdomen tensed, and for a moment, I thought I’d throw up my last meal. “What kind of creature?” I kept my back pressed against the cube’s support and casually crossed my arms, though I was ready to leap across the table and fracture my father’s facial shell with a right punch.

  “That is none of your concern, young prince, for you will not be present during that dissection. Instead, you will be with Caskin and Alandra, participating in the next abduction.” Another abduction? Another abduction required intergalactic space travel.

  The two team members, one a pilot and the other a containment and quarantine specialist, gave me proud smiles and nods as my father said their names. How pathetic. As if robbing a planet of one of its residents was something respectable. I wondered which of the two, or maybe both, were responsible for capturing America.

  “This abduction will be taking place…?”

  “Tomorrow morning.”

  That’s when I’d leave, taking America with me! “So the ship has already been prepared for intergalactic flight? I mean, I assume the specimen is not from our galaxy.”

  “Your assumption is correct. The abduction will take place on a small planet several galaxies away.”

  Could it be Earth? My heart shot into my throat. Was it really going to be this easy? “And the name of the planet?” I asked, gingerly, containing my excitement.

  The king leaned forward, interlacing his fingers before he set them on the table. “Terinan. Its inhabitants are half-shells. Their heads and abdomens are plated, but their appendages are completely exposed.”

  Damn! I knew it was too good to be true. I’d just have to reset the course.

  “Your duty during the expedition will be to observe and learn, and that is all.”

  “But I can fly a dual propulsion intergalactic cruiser,” I said a little too eagerly, biting my tongue between my lips.

  “Caskin is lead pilot,” he said sharply, “and will remain so for this assignment.”

  As lead, Caskin would preset the flight codes hours before the flight. Now I’d have to delete his codes and re-enter the codes manually, and that would take time—extra time I didn’t have to spare.

  I turned toward Caskin, unable to look at my father. “What time should I meet you at the ship tomorrow?” I asked politely but through tight teeth.

  “At the eighth morning turn,” said my father as Caskin remained mute. The king rarely let anyone else speak in his presence. If my father had the answer, he was the one to give it.

  “And I should prepare to be
gone for how long?”

  “Four days at the most. You can’t remain in Terinan’s atmosphere for more than one day.”

  “And why is that, Father?”

  “An explanation is not required. Just heed my warning. One day in their atmosphere and no longer.” He snapped his fingers, warning me not to nudge for the answer. “I realize you’ll be missing two days at the conservatory, but from what I’ve heard lately from your professors, I’m sure you won’t be too disappointed.” He smirked.

  Not only did my father like to restrict others from speaking, he also liked to embarrass them when he could, even his own son. At this point, he could embarrass me all he wanted. All I cared about was solidifying my plan to take America back to Earth, and as my father discussed the details of the next abduction, his cheek plates grinding as he sneered with pleasure, it hardened my decision that I eventually had to put an end to his experiments.

  My father ended the meeting with a boring brag session about Enestia being the most powerful and advanced planet in the Millennius, but his lengthy speech did do one thing— It gave me time to think up and finalize my additional plan, and surprisingly, moments of concern or indecision never surfaced.

  When America was safely back on Earth, I’d come back to Enestia and stop him for good. How? I didn’t know, and it might, in fact, take years to build up my power as the prince and ambassador to arrange and lead a coup—something I’d have to do if my father didn’t step down from the throne willingly. But if I did, would the Timuarys be on my side or would they lead their wicked king into the walls in order to protect him?

  My blood boiled beneath my shell and then tempered as I continued to concoct a plan to first save America and then eventually depose the king, and the meeting couldn’t end fast enough for me. But when I returned to my quarters, Lestra was less than excited, to say the least, when I told her about my newfound prospect to steal a star ship and whisk America away from Enestia and back to Earth in less than half a day.