Then Potat had curled up in a small furry ball, asleep in an instant.
Once again, Antaska pulled her mind back to the present to answer Tabxi. “Well, I don’t really know what to say,” she said lamely.
“Ah! That means you might consider bonding.” Tabxi’s soft voice held the satisfied tone of one who had scored a victory.
Vorche’s space-tanned balding head nodded as if pleased, and Zapop’s younger brown-haired head nodded too, his attention back on the humans. Zapop uncrossed his legs and leaned toward Antaska.
All three humans looked at Antaska, as if waiting for her to say more.
“Well…well…,” she began, “actually, thank you, but we were encouraged in space prep school not to get involved romantically because I’ll be in outer space for the next hundred years, you know, and that kind of involvement would only result in a painful separation,” she finished in a rush, proud of herself for being so diplomatic.
“But maybe the Verdantes would let you take him along with you,” Tabxi pressed. “I’m sure M. Hoyvil wouldn’t mind.” Vorche smiled and nodded in agreement.
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” said Antaska.
“Well, of course he won’t mind. You know he’ll be out every night this week at the Verdante adolescent social events looking for his future life mate. That’s all he’ll be thinking about,” said Tabxi. And Vorche, Zapop, and Tabxi all chuckled.
“That’s not what I meant,” said Antaska. “I meant I just don’t know about that.”
“Well then, what do you know about?” asked Zapop with a slight growl in his voice.
Suddenly, Antaska felt even more coldness in the room. Extreme coldness. Emotional coldness.
The other humans sat silent, waiting for her answer, sipping and nibbling. They didn’t seem to notice the coldness. Tabxi straightened her already straight dark blue fabricated-wool skirt. Her wrinkled hands, darkened almost black, evidenced a long-time spacer’s exposure to starlight. Smooth-skinned Zapop scratched behind a large ear, absently twitching a foot at the same time, and then turned back toward Mistress Bawbaw.
Antaska looked across the room. Master Meeepp and another enormous Verdante man had entered the room and were storing large unidentifiable objects in compartments in the walls. They kept at least six feet apart, but they had raised the mental barriers that blocked them from reading each other’s thoughts.
Instinctively, Antaska rubbed the tawny skin on her bare upper arms, but it made no difference. The movement tracked Zapop’s eyes sideways from Mistress Bawbaw to Antaska’s toned arms. Then up to shapely shoulders and bright pink hair, lustrous in the fire’s glow, that brushed the shoulders. Small dusky mouth, pointy nose and chin. Just for a second or two.
Antaska, unaware of Zapop’s brief stare, looked at Master Meeepp, in brown work clothes instead of the bright red ship suit that adult Verdantes always wore on space ships. Lethal muscles bulged under plain brown cloth. From this distance, she could see the sharp features in his deep green face, large upward-slanted blue-green eyes now hard and narrowed. For once, he looked less like an eleven-foot-high mountain and more like a humanoid--a dangerous humanoid.
The Verdantes far surpassed humans in technological and physiological advancement. But to Antaska, seeing them so silent, huge, powerful and brooding, tense with unspoken emotions, gave them the feel of humanoids at a barbaric phase of development. Raw, earthy and animalistic. Culture shock threatened to raise its dizzying head. Antaska took a deep breath and pushed it away.
Across from Master Meeepp on her humongous divan, un-Earthly beautiful Mistress Bawbaw stretched perfectly shaped large pale green arms above her head. Alabaster statue-like sensuality in tints of green. Lips like slices of ripe avocado.
Antaska thought about her. Mistress Bawbaw looks so happy and content, but is she really happy stuck on this planet, always waiting for Master Meeepp to return? she wondered. Never to explore new worlds? Never to discover unknown and bizarre species?
Antaska sighed, once again attracting the attention of Zapop.
Then Master Meeepp looked at Mistress Bawbaw, light green skin covered only where propriety demanded in filmy deep green fabric. An intense, unreadable look. Static electricity sizzled through the coldness.
The other humans were still waiting for Antaska to answer. Tabxi nudged Vorche, who was leaning back in his chair with eyes closing. Zapop covered an enormous yawn with a large, somewhat hairy hand.
“Dear?” Tabxi prompted.
Antaska returned her attention to Tabxi. The tense chill remained. She tapped nervously at the hems of her petticoats with the pointy toes of black lace-up ankle boots.
I don’t really know to say without offending these people, she thought.
Her training in protocol for interacting with alien cultures had not prepared her for this situation. She crossed her arms and tried to hide her discomfort.
“I’m sorry, but must I decline your kind offer,” she said to Zapop at last.
“Tut, tut,” said both Tabxi and Vorche not quite in unison.
And Zapop said, “Did you really think I wanted to go to outer space with you? You’re much too skinny, and you’re much too short.”
“Now, now,” said Tabxi.
“I’m not short! I’m six feet tall!” Antaska answered, beginning to raise her voice.
“Whatever!” said Zapop, also getting louder.
“Shush!” said Vorche and Tabxi, and both made downward waving motions with their hands.
Zapop sucked in an offended breath. “Don’t you shush me!”
“You should know better, Zapop,” said Vorche. “She’s new, but you know we’re not supposed to disturb the Master and Mistress.”
“Now, now, it’s quite all right,” Tabxi said, patting Zapop’s arm. “They haven’t noticed, so there’s no harm done. But we need to drop this subject that’s getting everyone so worked up. We tried, but this young female has told us her preference, and we have to accept that.”
Zapop turned and snarled at Tabxi, and she removed her hand from his arm.
“Once again, you have tried, but you have not helped me at all,” he said. “I’m not sure why you keep trying to interfere in my life.”
“I’m sorry, my dear,” said Tabxi. “You know we’re concerned about you, and all we want is for you to bond normally with a person of your own species.”
“Now you’re saying I’m not normal!” Zapop criticized Tabxi in a whispery irritated voice. “You’re the one who’s abnormal. A freak of nature who left your Verdante Mistress for Vorche!”
Antaska’s almond eyes widened in surprise.
“Ah, that was an exciting time,” said Vorche, breaking into the conversation with his memories of the past. “The scandal--the tears--the eventual outcome of young love conquering all!”
Vorche and Tabxi turned to look at each other and shared a secret smile.
“You’re the ones who are abnormal,” grumbled Zapop, “and this woman is abnormal too. Bonding with a cat!”
“Don’t mind him, dearie,” Tabxi spoke aside to Antaska. “He gets a little grumpy when the Master is home. Unfortunately, as I was saying, the affection some humans feel for their Verdantes sometimes becomes more like obsession.”
Zapop muttered under his breath as Tabxi kept talking.
“But it only causes heartache for these humans. The Verdantes are only attracted romantically to other Verdantes. The affection they feel for humans is exactly what a different and very superior species would feel for a much lesser species they might adopt for companionship. Like what you feel for your cat, for example.”
Antaska didn’t reply. If Potat somehow found out that Antaska claimed to be a superior species, there would be trouble.
Zapop resumed his low-voiced rant. “Anyway, you two feel sorry for me because you think I’m bothered by Master Meeepp being here, but I’m not. Here’s only here for a few weeks out of every year. It’s Mistress Bawbaw’s other pets that bo
ther me. You know, her ‘special creations’ she keeps down below in her personal chamber. She spends more and more time with those freaks and less and less time with me.”
“Well, they’re what worries us too, actually,” said Vorche. “In fact, we think it would be much better for you to get off this planet. And with those, ah…beings, in the mix, your relationship with Mistress Bawbaw is freakish by anyone’s standards.”
Zapop’s face flushed red. “Oh really!” he said. “What makes you the relationship expert, Vorche? Flying around in space with Master Meeepp for the past two hundred and fifty years is all you’ve done. What do you know about life and love? What do any of you know? You’re the freaks, all of you. So I guess this new one who claims to be bonded with a cat will fit right in. I’m the only one here who’s normal,” Zapop’s voice rose. “I’m the only normal human in a household full of freaks.”
Antaska and Tabxi both gasped, and Vorche muttered something incomprehensible.
Then Vorche spoke again. “What I’m trying to say is we don’t think it’s healthy for you here. Don’t you think we old people might have learned something in 300 years? I’m an old man, and my gut feeling, intuition if you will, tells me there is danger here.”
“Oh please! Danger on the Verdante planet! Right. And so nice of you to care!” said Zapop, no longer trying to keep his voice down. He leaned forward on the edge of his chair and swayed toward each of them while he spoke to the group.
“For your information,” said Zapop, in an intense voice that rose louder and louder, “I will never run off to space and abandon Mistress Bawbaw in order to escape from any danger, real or imagined. Especially if there may be danger, I will stay by her side. She needs me! No one cares about her more than I do. Not Master Meeepp. He takes her to Earth sometimes, but most of the time, he’s going back and forth to the space station where she can’t go, and she’s left alone here. He doesn’t have to do that. Most Verdante men his age stay on the home planet.
“And I doubt if those Eeeepps really care about her. They’re barely humanoid after all. But no matter what happens, I will stay by Mistress Bawbaw’s side. No matter what the danger. I would descend to the deepest depths of this planet for her, no matter what evil lurks there! I would lay down my life for her in an instant!”
“Oh, that is so sweet! So noble!” said Antaska, clapping her hands together and also forgetting to keep her voice down.
Tabxi sniffed and dabbed her eyes with a handkerchief.
“Bravo!” shouted Vorche, pumping an elderly fist in the air.
“Darling, I think the humans are getting agitated,” Antaska heard a loud and powerful male telepathic voice say. She recognized the voice of Master Meeepp. “Should we send them out of the room?”
Antaska looked over at Master Meeepp and Mistress Bawbaw. The other Verdante man was gone. Master Meeepp was sitting across from Mistress Bawbaw in a gigantic chunky chair made from fabricated wood slabs. The two Verdantes were staring into each other’s eyes. Mistress Bawbaw’s body was tilted toward Master Meeepp.
Mistress Bawbaw’s telepathic voice spoke. “No, I don’t have the heart to do that to Zapop. He gets so jealous of the time I spend with my other pets as it is. Let me handle this another way.”
Then Antaska heard Mistress Bawbaw’s voice again, but now it was speaking inside her head!
“You are getting very tired. Relaxed and tired. Your eyelids are getting heavy. Very heavy. They are closing.”
The telepathic voice was gentle, soothing and insistent. Antaska looked at the other humans. They were leaning back in their oversized chairs, heads resting against the upholstered wings, eyes closed. Small snores escaped from the noses of Tabxi and Vorche, and all three appeared to be asleep.
Antaska, so relaxed and comfortable, started to feel tired too. Her body grew limp. She leaned over sideways and rested across her chair’s ample side wing. Her eyes closed, and she saw darkness. Into the darkness, a pale green mist appeared and solidified. Sea green foam floated in the side of her mind nearest to Mistress Bawbaw. Inside the green foamy mist, a woman’s face formed and then pushed forward deeper into Antaska’s mind.
“You are tired. You are sleepy. Sleep now. Sleep,” said the face.
Mistress Bawbaw is using telepathic suggestion to put us to sleep! Antaska thought fuzzily.
She wrestled against the irresistible crush of sleep. But she fought in vain. Sleep was closing in.
“Sleep, sleep, sleep,” the face of Mistress Bawbaw repeated over and over in her mind.
Wait a minute! Something is familiar about this! Where have I seen this before? Antaska wondered.
A suspicion began to form in her mind. Her mind sharpened and focused on the suspicion, and the sea green foam faded and vanished.
Antaska’s mind was wide awake! She jolted up out of the chair, but her body wasn’t fully awake, and she landed on the cushiony floor with a muffled whump. Now her body was awake too.
She didn’t look over at the two large Verdantes, but she heard their mental speech.
“There’s something odd about M. Hoyvil’s new pet,” said Mistress Bawbaw. “She didn’t seem to respond normally to my sleep orders.”
“Oh, I’m sure you’re imagining that, my dear,” said Master Meeepp. “She’s just very clumsy, constantly fainting and falling down. She probably fell asleep too close to the edge of the chair.”
Antaska got up and began to stomp toward the exit. The floor’s deep cushioning muffled her stomping. She stomped harder, but her swaying skirts rustled louder than the stomping.
“You’re right, she seems to have many flaws, and she makes a lot of trouble. Do you really think she’s the best human for M. Hoyvil to take to space?” asked Mistress Bawbaw.
“I have my doubts too about her, but it’s M. Hoyvil’s choice. We can’t make it for him, but of course, we can try to influence him,” said Master Meeepp.
“Yes, we’ll have to work on that,” said Mistress Bawbaw.
Antaska heard the fading telepathic voices as she stomped away down a long, curved hallway.
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A note from Trisha
Dear Reader,
Thank you for reading Alien Pets and chapter 1 of hypnoSnatch. If you enjoyed this book, I would greatly appreciate your writing a review. It can be extremely difficult for new self-published authors to get reviews, but they’re critical to a book’s success.
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May your world one day know peace,
Trisha
Bonded in Space Page 23
