by Vivian Venus
Maybe a little bit? Damnit. He’d be out of her life soon anyway. She quickly finished with the lay-in and started refining some of the details of the painting.
Inside the camper, Daggen threw off the sheets and found that Ryn had wrapped bandages around his abdomen and chest where he had been bruised and cut. Then he got out of the bed, picked up the bag of clothes and got dressed. He found a mirror and examined himself, chuckling at his appearance. “Dressing like a human,” he said. “Daggen, you’re breaking all the rules now.”
He wondered when the enforcer would arrive. Sometime soon, probably. He felt a little guilty for breaching protocol, but at the same time he felt this incredible welling of energy inside him. Up until now, Ryn had just been a figure on his scopes, someone he would see every day but could never speak to or meet. And her work – her “paintings” as she called them. He walked over to some of the canvases that were sitting propped up against the wall and crouched down to look. They took his breath away. As he looked at them up close, he marveled at how the image broke down into a series of unrecognizable strokes of color and form. He had never seen anything like it.
A certain painting sitting in a black frame called out to him. Unlike the others, which were all of the desert landscape, this one was a whirl of color and shape, not of anything defined. Daggen could tell there was something special about it, but he needed to dig deeper. He focused on the work, reaching out with his mind, using the special ability his people carried to understand the energy and process used to create something, whether it be artificial, biological. When Daggen surveyed the Earth’s surface, he could feel how the tectonic plates moved and how the red hot magma was shifting beneath the crust and all the minute intricacies of how the earth was formed. As he extended out to the painting and examined it with his abilities, Daggen felt a blast of overwhelming energy. He gasped and stumbled back and fell, like a hand had reached out from the surface of the canvas and hit him. His heart was thudding in his chest, and he felt tears building in his eyes. What was that? He wiped his eyes and tried to slow his breath. The feeling that was contained in this object, the emotion.
The door to the camper opened. “What are you doing?” Ryn stepped inside, her expression suspicious.
“This…painting,” he said. “It’s special isn’t it? It’s different than the others. The energy behind it. Loss, betrayal. Sadness… But also something else. You’re waiting for something.”
Ryn found herself somewhat shocked at his analysis. Could he really have seen that all in this? She turned the painting around so that it was facing the wall. “I painted it at a very difficult time in my life. I’m surprised that you noticed.”
“How could I not,” he said.
“Do you know a lot about art, Daggen?” She stepped back outside, and he followed her.
“Not a thing. There is no such thing where I come from.”
“No such thing? Just where are you from?”
He hesitated, not wanting to reveal too much. “It’s quite far from here.”
Ryn brushed a strand of her dark hair back behind her ear and crossed her arms as she looked at him, trying to figure him out. She hated how secretive this guy was, but she had to admit that she was intrigued by him. “There’s not some secret government base around here, is there? You’re not some escaped spy from another country?” She smiled.
Daggen chuckled and shook his head. She wasn’t too far from the truth, in some ways. “That painting…” he started.
“Is none of your business,” Ryn said pleasantly as she motioned to follow her to her truck. “Come on, I’ll take you back into town.”
Daggen held up his hand. “No, it’s alright. I’ll go on my own.”
“Into town. You know it's more than ten miles out, right?”
“Not to town.”
“We’re out in the middle of nowhere.”
Daggen smiled guiltily. He felt bad to have intruded on her in his delusional state after the crash, but eventually the enforcer would be here and she wouldn’t remember a thing. He would be punished, but it was fine. Meeting her face to face had given his life an energy that it had been lacking for so long. He now only wished he could stay longer and talk with her more, see her painting up close, but he had already done too much. “I’ll be fine. Thank you for saving my life, Ryn.” He turned and began to walk off into the desert towards the site of his crash landed ship.
Ryn stared after him, completely mind boggled. What the hell was wrong with this guy? He had to be mentally ill or on drugs. She thought about forcing him to get in the truck with her so she could take him to town, but she decided against it. It was his life. She had already done what she could for him.
Ugh.
She ran back into her camper and grabbed a wide brimmed hat, headlamp and her water bladder and rushed back outside. “Hey, idiot!” she yelled as she ran to catch up with him. He turned around, and Ryn thrust the items into his hands. “At least take these, so I won’t worry about you.” She turned heel and grabbed the sunset study off the easel and then deftly collapsed the wooden frame, then lifted it up and set it back against the side of the trailer before going inside. Daggen smiled to himself watching her, and then turned to walk back out to the desert. The sky was a deep purple as the sun gave a last look at the earth before it dipped below the horizon. He marveled at the sight. He had never seen a real earth sunset before.
CHAPTER THREE
Daggen looked at the items that Ryn had given him and smiled. He would treasure them. The pendant on his necklace glowed brightly, creating an orb of light around him that allowed him see perfectly in the dark and his body, now fully rested and adjusted to Earth’s climate, wouldn’t need water or sustenance for days. His ship wasn’t too far, anyway. Just a several miles out, hidden with a cloaking device.
He thought about the punishment he would receive for breaking one of the strictest protocols an Earth assigned observer had. Only the very highest ranked scientists, the very elite, could contact humans. He would likely be grounded back home, stuck in the yards assembling new ships. It was worth it. Getting to meet her was worth it.
Daggen had trained since he was young with the sole goal of adventuring off planet to the far away world of Earth, the home to an emerging alien civilization. He had studied the human race since he was just a child, and it had always been his dream to meet a human. He had put forth his best effort throughout his education to become a human researcher so that he could be planted among them, live out life as a human being, start a human family, do the things he had dreamed about since he was a boy. But in the end, he couldn’t pass the rigorous tests for the assignment, and not because of a lack of knowledge. Too much of a dreamer, not serious enough, the officials had told him. He was talented and made the Earth observation program, but only as a geological surveillance researcher. He would never be allowed to fulfill his dream.
It seemed that way until the day that Ryn appeared, her form appearing on his scopes like a glimmer of light in the darkness of his tedious life.
He thought of Ryn’s attitude and chuckled to himself. He wondered if all human women were that way. He liked how she handled herself, how strong she was. He could sense as much just from when he observed her, so it felt refreshing to him that his senses had been accurate.
There weren’t many women on his planet. Daggen had been a constructed birth as they called it, a baby born from artificially created genetic material, just like most others. Being around Ryn, even for just that short amount of time, filled him with this marvelous energy like her very presence was building him up and bringing him to life. The smell of her that lingered around him when he had woken up in her bed had made his head spin like he was intoxicated, and he found himself wishing he could smell her wonderful scent again. He laughed as he realized how he felt. He had been so affected in this way but to her, his arrival was just an unusual event that would probably be forgotten in a few days time. He was nothing special, just some man lost in t
he desert. A story to tell her companions over drinks.
After a few hours of walking, Daggen crossed over a rocky plateau and made his way down a sandy dune towards the crash site. The ground was blasted and disturbed in a long trail where his ship had hit the ground and slid to a stop, and he walked along until he reached the end where a large boulder sat. He took his pendant off, wrapped it around his hand, and then touched it to the side of the rock which sent a shimmer like a ripple in a pond across the stone surface. Then it morphed, revealing its true form: a large grey oblong disk wedged partially into the sand. He slipped the pendant back around his neck and then touched his finger to the side of the ship, drawing it around in a precise and practiced movement like he was writing with his fingertip. There was a hiss and hum, and an entrance opened on the side of the ship. Daggen walked inside.
The control deck was a circular domed room that took up most of the ship, save for the living quarters. Daggen sat down in the pilot’s chair that sat in the center of the room, and a holographic control panel materialized in front of him. His fingers danced over it as he initialized the startup procedures. There was a low hum as the systems kicked to life. “Begin diagnostic procedures,” he announced.
The computer confirmed. “Beginning. Hull damage minimal. I have taken the liberty of self repairing the hull to satisfactory levels. Thruster damage, moderate. I will require your support.”
“Sure, no problem,” Daggen said. “How long?”
“An Earth day or two, depending on you. Were you able to find what you were looking for, Master Trys?”
He smiled slightly. “More or less. Has there been any contact from home?”
“No contact from home.”
“Hm. Interesting. I would’ve thought I’d have received an official notice of my breach of protocol.”
“Typically one will be contacted by an enforcer first.”
“Ah. Okay, well we better get started. Wouldn’t want anyone wandering onto the crash site.”
“Affirmative, sir. I will begin prepping for repairs.”
Daggen slid out of the pilot’s chair and walked to his living quarters, which consisted of a small bunk area and a desk. He carefully placed the water bladder and head lamp onto the desk. He looked at the hat, turning it over in his hand and feeling the feel of the fabric on his fingers. He hesitated for a moment, and then lifted it to his nose. He closed his eyes as he was surrounded by her scent. He sighed, and put the hat down. The fantasy was nice while it lasted.
The next morning, Ryn sat outside her camper and smoked a cigarette. She had just finished breakfast, simple eggs and frozen sausages cooked over the tiny gas camping stove she had. She usually didn't smoke, but she found herself doing it occasionally in times of stress or when she wanted to forget about something. She had picked up that habit after the big breakup – he had hated smoking, and she ended up doing it just to spite him. Stupid, she knew, but it made her feel better. Now she found that she couldn’t get her mind off of Daggen. He was weird, probably crazy, but there was something about him that intrigued her, and not just that he was really attractive. Something about the way he had looked at that painting of hers, the one she made after she found out she had been cheated on. Not only had he noticed the one painting that everyone seemed to ignore, his reaction to it showed plainly on his face. She saw that he had understood it. Which was more than she could even say for herself.
The thing she was missing. She didn’t know how he could’ve seen that. She wished she hadn’t been so dismissive of him when he had asked again about it. She wondered how he knew.
Ryn smoked half and flicked the butt into a tin can and squinted at the horizon. The sun was just barely out in the desert sky, but the day was already getting hot. Hell, it hardly even cooled down at night. “Christ,” she muttered, and walked quickly back into her camper, grabbed the keys to her truck off of the table, and then walked outside. She didn’t know if it was that she felt responsible for him, or if it was something else, but she found herself driving her truck away from her camp, her eyes locked on the vague outline of Daggen’s tracks in the sand.
She had gone for a few miles now and not spotted one sign of him. It was nearly impossible to follow his trail with the sand and dirt shifting so often, and eventually she couldn’t see them at all. She stopped the truck and got out and looked around, cursing under her breath. His footprints probably had been covered up by now. Then she spotted them – faint as they had been nearly blown away and covered, but they were there. She leapt into the truck and sped off in their direction.
Daggen worked tirelessly. He had tossed aside the shirt that Ryn had given him, his face and chest beaded with sweat and streaked with grease and dirt. The heat of the desert was unforgiving, but his body was acclimatized now and he wasn’t affected like he was when he had first crashed. Hot, sweaty, but not dying of dehydration and delirium.
“Hydro spanner,” he said. A robot, which had emerged like an amorphous blob from the side of the ship, produced the tool out of its body which immediately hardened as it reached Daggen’s fingers. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome, sir,” the robot said, an extension of the ship’s computer. “My diagnostics indicate you have made excellent time with the repairs. At least ninety percent complete.”
“Good. Once I finish with this we’ll test the aft thruster and see if we can lift the ship out as is. Finish the rest of the repairs out in orbit.”
“Very well.”
Daggen finished with the tool and without looking, tossed it back to the robot where it melded into its body. “Let me get the tricaster now. Forty width, fusion powered.”
“Yes, sir. Sir? I am detecting a visitor approaching rapidly from the east.”
“The enforcer?”
“No, sir. Human. A female.”
Daggen moved out from the ship’s engine and stood up, wiping his hands with a rag. He could hear the sound of an engine in the distance and a cloud of dust rising up.
“Concealment and cloaking advised.”
Daggen didn’t move. He had a feeling he knew who it was. At this point if she saw the ship, it wouldn’t matter. Her memory of the encounter would be erased regardless of what or how much she saw, so the result would be the same. He put his hands on his hips and waited.
“Concealment and advised,” the computer warned again, and the robot moved back and melded its body back into the ship. The hull shimmered and changed to look like a boulder again.
“Dammit,” Daggen said, “I didn’t say to cloak.”
The truck roared over the top of the sand dune and came to a stop, the sun glimmering brightly behind it. He squinted and raised his hand to shade his eyes. The door opened and the driver stepped out. He could see the curves of her figure silhouetted by the sun’s light. She was wearing a simple tank top and tight jeans that hugged her curves, and looked amazingly sexy.
“You’ve been here all night?” Ryn shouted out. She made her way down the sand dune to him, and he found himself grinning stupidly. “Why are you smiling like that? Are you high right now?”
“Miss me?” Daggen said.
She snorted. “You’ve gotta be high.” She looked him up and down, trying not to stare at his well built muscles that were glistening with sweat and streaked with oil and dirt. “You lost your shirt again.”
Daggen rubbed the back of his head. “I suppose that tends to happen to me.”
Ryn suddenly felt awkward, unsure of what she was doing there. She had found him, he was alive, now what? She cleared her throat. “I just, uh, wanted to make sure you weren’t dead in a ditch somewhere. But seriously, you were here all night? What are you doing out here?” She looked around. “No, don’t answer. Okay, this time I’m taking you back to town and you have no choice.”
“I appreciate you coming to check up on me, but I’ll be fine, really.”
“You’re standing next to a boulder in the middle of the damn desert!”
“Don’t worry,
I’ve got the things you gave me. In there” He gestured with his thumb.
Ryn looked, but all she saw was a big red boulder. The guy was crazy. “That’s a rock, Daggen.”
“It’s not a rock, it’s my ship.”
“Daggen…”
He grinned. “You want to see it?”
“It’s a rock.”
“No, it’s my ship. Watch.” He pulled off his necklace and wrapped it around his hand, and then touched it to the rock.
Nothing happened. Ryn stared. Daggen looked confused. He touched his hand to boulder again. “It’s the computer, he must’ve… Override, release cloaking,” Daggen hissed.
Is he talking to that rock? Ryn thought.
“Override,” he said again.
Ryn sighed and grabbed Daggen by the arm. “Come on, let’s go. I’m going to take you to town now and get you some help.”
