Exodus: Extinction Event

by Kaitlyn O’Connor

  Swallowing against the churning in his belly, he merely leaned down and kissed her forehead. “We stay close, Meeka, if need,” he whispered in her language, even though he was not certain she could hear him at that point.

  Kael had already lifted her hand to kiss the back before he saw the sharp contrast between her hand—which had been cleaned—and his, which had not. Feeling defiant, he kissed her hand anyway, lay it carefully down beside her, and then glared at the others as he turned away, daring them to comment.

  There seemed an unusual number of people loitering in the corridor they traversed from the med center to the quarters Torin had mentioned considering it was dusk when they had arrived. It seemed to Dar that they should have retired to their personal quarters already.

  The expression on Torin’s face seemed to tell the tale, though.

  They were gathered to gawk.

  The news of their arrival had spread like wildfire and everyone had gathered to stare at the wild men that Torin had brought in.

  Dar was relieved when they went into the suite and closed the door behind them.

  He was not particularly comfortable with the surroundings, but he was glad to be free of the intense, and he felt critical, scrutiny.

  Torin pointed the facilities out. “I trust neither of you have forgotten how this works. We are rationed in hot water—you can use as much of the cold as you want. My suggestion would be to wet down, turn the water off, soap up, and then use the bulk of your ration for rinsing. There are bath sheets in that cabinet for drying. I will find a change of clothing for you.”

  Dar and Kael stood in the middle of the bathroom for many moments, staring at the shower—a relic of the civilization they had lost. Finally, as one, they stripped their furs and rags off and stepped into the cubicle.

  Fortunately, they’d grown accustomed to icy bath water. They adjusted the temperature to just above tepid and were able to thoroughly soak and soap themselves up a couple of times to scrub ground in dirt.

  Dar was of the opinion that he was a stone lighter and two shades paler when he emerged.

  Kael was grinning when he got out and towel dried himself. His smile faded as he glanced at Dar. “I feel as if I washed my beast away,” he said uncomfortably.

  “I do not think it will be that easy to wash away the wild men, but I will not apologize to anyone for surviving—or doing what was necessary to survive.”

  Kael snorted and then said wryly, “Well we have made a very fine first impression.”

  “Fuck them,” Dar muttered. “You and Meeka are the only ones in this life that matter to me.”

  Torin came in. “I understand given that you have not been welcomed as you should have been, but I hope that will not always be the case. They are spoiled, but they are basically good people. We will grow together, I hope, when we begin the new colony.”

  * * * *

  For what seemed like an eternity, Monika couldn’t get past the wall of pain that blocked her every time she felt herself floating toward awareness.

  Well, the pain and the cold.

  The cold seemed to make the pain sharper, spread it throughout her body instead of focusing it on her leg—which clearly hurt worse than anything else.

  But she ached all over.

  It felt as if she’d entered hell without transitioning first.

  Finally the painful bouncing stopped and she felt the straps being removed. Torin’s face swam into view when she managed to lift her eyelids enough to see. It hurt so badly when he picked her up that she couldn’t keep from gasping, couldn’t hold on to consciousness. And she didn’t really want to try. She wanted to escape the pain and the cold.

  And then she found herself in a brightly lit room, felt the tug as she was stripped and then the warmth of a blanket replaced the cold.

  And it was warm. It was a heated blanket.

  She was puzzled, but she was too tired to think about it.

  A strange face appeared above her. He reminded her of Dr. Hobbs, but then she realized he couldn’t possibly be and she felt like crying.

  His expression changed from shock and disbelief, softened. He patted her reassuringly and she found herself relaxing.

  She kept drifting off and then someone would hurt her again, pinch, probe, pull at her, freeze her with wafts of air every time they pulled the blanket back.

  She dropped into a dark hole without warning and when she roused sometime later she realized her leg was still throbbing, but the pain was less than stomach churning as it had been—much less.

  They’d done something to her leg, but it still hurt so it was still there.

  Torin appeared above her.

  His expression was so … loving, she thought she must be dreaming, or maybe just hallucinating. He lifted her hand, brushed her knuckles across his lips and then he said something in his tongue that she couldn’t understand.

  Well, there was one word. She didn’t know what it meant, but Dar had said it to her before, several times. She thought it was a made up nickname, but he would only chuckle when she asked what it meant and look her in a way that made her heart flutter.

  Dar appeared next and kissed her forehead.

  And then Kael took the hand that Torin had and kissed the back of it.

  Was she dying, she wondered?

  Were they saying goodbye?

  But Dar had said they would stay close by in case she needed them. That had to mean she was ok, didn’t it?

  She discovered when they began to move the gurney she was lying on that there was a drip feed attached to her.

  So this was … a medical center, she wondered, completely baffled.

  But not for very long because the doctor put something in the tube and she went out like a light.

  She slept for the better part of what she thought was the next day or maybe it was two days, but she felt a little better every time she woke up. Then a woman woke her and asked her something. Monica didn’t have a clue of what the woman wanted until she urged her to get up and helped her into a wheelchair.

  She was embarrassed but absolutely delighted when she discovered she had been taken to a room where she could bathe.

  She was not to get the bandages on her leg wet!

  The woman made that clear even though there was a language barrier by wrapping the bandaged area, holding out the washcloth and shaking her head.

  Monica felt sure she would still have been in the dark if not for the fact that she had basic knowledge of medical procedures.

  There was hot water! Monica was so thrilled she was beside herself. The only fly in the ointment was that she couldn’t strip bare and soak.

  She comforted herself with the thought that she might get the chance while she was there—wherever she was.

  Heaven!

  It seemed really close when she hadn’t seen anything even nearly as comfortable since she’d left the mother ship so long ago—months that felt like years in some ways.

  Time was strange anyway. In terms of misery, she felt as if she’d lived years.

  She felt as if she had known Dar and Kael and even Torin to a degree for years, had forged a life around theirs.

  Everything that had happened before—everything she’d known before—seemed to be fading into a distant past.

  She felt almost a wonder of first discovery when she examined the conveniences she had taken for granted before she’d left Earth, before she’d left the mother ship.

  She’d just had time to get thoroughly sick of being in the med center when Dar and Kael came to collect her. To her surprise, instead of leaving as she’d expected, they took her down a wide corridor and into a suite of rooms that included a living/dining area, a working kitchen, a bathroom and three large bedrooms.

  “We stay here,” Dar said when she’d looked around everything uneasily.

  She whipped a startled look at him. “Here?”

  “Yes.”

  She frowned, studying the area more carefully and more doubtfully bec
ause she could see there were a good many personal items scattered about. “Right here?”

  Kael grinned at her. “Ours.”

  Monica blinked at him. “For how long?”

  Kael and Dar exchanged a questioning look and spoke to one another in their language. “Till get to new planet,” Dar said after that discussion. “Make nice … uh … ting to stay …lib in when we get dare. Bigger, I tink.”

  Monica stared at them in disbelief. “You’re saying ….” She stopped and studied the place more carefully, cast her mind back to recall what she could of their arrival, what little she’d seen. “This is …. You’re saying this is a ship?”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Monica thought she was going ‘not so slowly’ insane.

  It had never really mattered that she and Dar and Kael had difficulties communicating. They managed to get across the most important information, explain what they needed to.

  All of that had changed, though, when she’d woken to discover herself on a colony ship—she thought. Because every attempt to discuss it with them and what the plans might be ended in frustration for her. They didn’t really manage to get anything across beyond the fact that it was a ship and it was supposed to take them to another world.

  The worst of it was that it was so hard to believe and she hadn’t been able to get out of their quarters to verify it with her own eyes.

  Her leg was mending. She had crutches to help her get around, but undoubtedly she was still weak from her ordeal because it wore her out just trying to maneuver from her bed to the bathroom.

  Not that she minded that effort when it was so rewarding.

  The facilities!

  They were very basic and not even close to lavish, but it felt like the most decadent luxury she’d ever experienced.

  They would’ve had to pry her lose to throw her out once she discovered she had access to a working toilet and shower—with hot water!

  She didn’t realize until she finally managed to venture out of their quarters that that flippant thought was far closer to the truth than even a cool welcome.

  In all likelihood it would have been a lot longer before she discovered it except that she was so anxious to explore and the guys had finally decided she was well enough they didn’t have to hang around their quarters with their noses up her ass.

  They left—to work, they said.

  She gave them plenty of time to vacate the area and then she went into the bathroom, bathed, combed her hair and put on one of the military style jumpsuits that had been provided for her.

  She had to wear her own boots, as worn as they were, because none of the footwear they’d tried fit her feet.

  Actually, the jumpsuit didn’t fit particularly well, but it was actually a good thing that it was loose because that made it easier to pull on over her bandages.

  She made a mental note of the symbol on the door when she left and looked up and down the corridor for any sort of landmark that would help her find her way if she got lost.

  There wasn’t one, but she thought the symbol on the door was unique.

  On second thought, she went back inside and found a colored under garment and then tied it to the handle when she went out again.

  Landmark!

  After a brief debate, she decided to head the opposite direction from the med center.

  Not that she was really familiar with that, but she had seen that area. She wanted to see something she hadn’t seen.

  Her heart seemed to flip over the first alien she saw. Unlike Dar and Kael, who were both red-orange and tiger striped, or Torin who was golden, this one was black—skin, eyes, and hair—panther-like—even his facial features looked far more cat-like than the others she’d seen.

  She shouldn’t have been so surprised. There were many races on Earth, wide variations of skin, eye, and hair color.

  His facial features made him appear far more alien than the others, though, so she supposed that was what startled her.

  He stared at her. She could feel it even though she had looked away after smiling at him and encountering a blank stare.

  At first, she thought they were just staring because she was alien to them—one of a kind—and she stuck out like a sore thumb. It began to dawn on her after a little while, though, that no one returned her nervous attempt at friendly smiles. They simply stared at her, their faces blank masks that hid whatever was running through their minds.

  But the impression persisted that it wasn’t ‘nice’ thoughts.

  They looked like they’d found a roach on the table.

  Monica kept moving but once those thoughts had occurred to her it was harder and harder to keep going, to make eye contact and try to be friendly.

  She felt beat down by the looks—the ones that stared and the ones that seemed to look through her.

  She wasn’t welcome.

  They didn’t want her there.

  No doubt they resented her being fed their food, getting medicines they might need.

  Breathing.

  Because it was their air.

  She thought if she hadn’t had such a hard time getting around that she would have turned and run. She couldn’t run, though. So she lifted her chin and kept going, pretending she was alone.

  She was close to tears when she looked up and saw Torin coming toward her.

  He gathered her into a loose embrace briefly when he reached her and then slipped a supportive arm around her. “You are pushing yourself too hard, beloved. You will hurt yourself again. Come. Rest in my office till you feel better and I then will get you back to our cabin where you can be comfortable.”

  Monica had no idea what he’d said, but his tone sounded solicitous. She had the impression that, whatever it was he said, he hadn’t really intended it for her anyway but rather the eavesdroppers close enough to hear. He urged her toward the door he had emerged from, though, gently, protectively, giving her support, and she went readily, glad to have a haven from the stares.

  The room was tiny and contained nothing more than a large desk, a single chair and a cabinet that looked like it was used to store documents. After glancing around, he cleared the desk top with a sweep of one arm and helped her up on it, carefully lifting her injured leg to the surface so that she could sit with that leg fully extended and supported.

  Stunned, Monica gaped at Torin in dismay.

  He shook his head. Moving closer, he captured her face in both hands, studying her. “I would not have had that happen for the world, beloved.” He frowned. “There are things I cannot protect you from, unfortunately.”

  Monica lifted a hand and cupped one of his where it lay on her cheek. “It’s alright.”

  He looked a little surprised that she’d responded in his language. He searched her gaze, lowered his face and matched his lips to hers.

  She caught her breath in anticipation, feeling her lips prickle with awakening sensation the moment she felt the warmth of his breath. At the touch of his lips against hers, tingling awareness erupted inside her, seemed almost an effect of flying sparks that stung lightly and warmed each place they touched. Sensation exploded to life everywhere at once it seemed as he deepened the kiss, breached the barrier of her lips and swept his faintly rough tongue along hers.

  A heaviness settled over her. She lifted her hands and placed her palms against his chest, felt her body respond to the quickening of his heart and breath with molten heat that flowed through her veins and then settled low in her belly.

  She was already drunk with desire when he broke the kiss and lifted his head to study her face. It took an effort to lift her heavy eyelids and prevent her eyeballs from rolling around in her head.

  He hesitated and she waited with breathless anticipation to see what he would do next, but then he glanced down at her injured leg and stepped back. Dropping his hands from her face, he grimaced, turned away to adjust himself and then knelt on the floor to gather the papers he had so carelessly thrown on the floor.

  Monica’s dis
appointment was epic.

  She knew part of that was because she’d grown accustomed to intimacy, enjoyed it, and missed it when she was deprived. And she had been for a while now, first because she wasn’t on her period and neither Dar nor Kael would touch her unless she was ‘safe’ from pregnancy and then because she’d nearly gotten herself killed.

  But she wasn’t just needy.

  She’d been physically attracted to Torin from the first moment she’d set eyes on him, fantasized about him, yearned for his touch.

  She supposed that made her awful, but she couldn’t help it. She couldn’t make herself not think about it whenever he was near her, couldn’t dismiss the smoldering desire for him that had built from the first moment she’d seen him until it was a torment to her.

  What made it worse, to her mind, was that she also desired Dar and Kael. They had been thoughtful lovers--enthusiastic, exciting, exotically desirable. She cared for them, thought they cared for her.

  It wasn’t right that she feel … more when she was around Torin, but, try though she might, she hadn’t been able to convince herself that it was just lust, animal desire.

  She felt like she’d fallen head over heels in love with him the moment she set eyes on him.

  Crazy.

  Especially when she also felt like she loved Dar and Kael.

  It had been different with them. They had protected and taken care of her and her affection had grown from their nurturing.

  It was real.

  It was strong.

  It was desire for them as well as affection.

  And it was nothing like the way she felt about Torin.

  Not even close.

  She didn’t know why he’d kissed her.

  Pity maybe, because she knew he’d seen that it had hurt her feelings to be treated the way the other colonists had treated her.

  The kiss had still been beyond her imaginings!

  And she began to regret it almost the moment he moved away from her.

  It was her search for a distraction that made her force her gaze from Torin and direct it at the papers he was collecting.

  A jolt went through her when she realized what it was.