Mutual Trust

by Lea Linnett

  Urek left the room, but he did not take all of the tension with it. The human was still pressed flat against the wall, watching him distrustfully. “You got rid of him?” she asked.

  “I tell you: I keep you safe.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “But you’re not in charge, are you? That asshole is the one keeping me here?”

  Technically, Urek was little more than a middle manager. He only ran the mine while their Head Administrator, Carren, was away, but with how often that had come to be the case lately, the distinction seemed too meaningless for Marek to bother explaining.

  Besides, he had a more pressing question.

  “What is… asshole?” he asked with a frown, and the human rolled her eyes.

  “Never mind,” she said. She looked up at the forcefield with a calculating look, and then sighed. “I’m not telling you anything. I don’t care what he does to me.”

  That response didn’t cheer him, but not because he cared one way or another for Urek’s plan. His brother was not someone who enjoyed having things denied of him, and he would not react well to the human’s obstinacy.

  He would have to approach this differently.

  “We do not speak about your people, then,” he said, gesturing toward a chair that had been left on her side of the forcefield. “Sit?”

  She stared at him for a long moment, before silently abandoning the wall and dragging the chair to a spot in the center of her cell. She then perched upon its edge, watching him carefully.

  Keeping his movements slow and predictable, Marek leaned against a desk, his gaze roving over her. He knew he was staring, but he couldn’t help himself.

  He’d seen humans before, of course. They weren’t common in his home city on CL-6, but he had seen many since arriving on CL-32, and there were some here at the mine. Then there were the years he’d spent at the university, absorbing every morsel of information on human biology, culture, and history that he could get his hands on—all in an attempt to understand…

  But this human captured his attention unlike any other. It wasn’t just the furs and leathers she wore as clothes or her sharp, vigilant gaze. There was something intriguing about the human’s features. Although the forcefield obscured it now, he remembered how her skin had appeared ruddy and pink, weatherbeaten by the elements, but not unattractively so. Her rich brown hair was windswept by her attempted escape, but Marek had noticed how strands of it caught the light, almost like his people’s scales did. Her nose was long, her eyes wide-set, and the latter remained steady like a predator’s as she returned his studious gaze.

  “What are you?” she asked suddenly.

  “I am levekk.”

  Her dark eyebrows drew into a frown, her eyes hardening. “You don’t look like the others.”

  Ah. He expected the vaguely disgusted look she turned on him, but when he thought about how to explain it in her language, he felt a prickle of discomfort. “It is… complicated,” he finally said, and her eyes narrowed.

  “Why do you know my language?”

  “I study it. I study your people. Or, the people from before…”

  Her lips thinned, her voice shaking as she said, “Do your people know about us?”

  Marek frowned. Did she mean humanity in general? Of course they knew. But her people specifically?

  “…It is complicated,” he said again, and when her nostrils flared, he added, “We know humans for a long time. But before we finded you, my people do not know about your people.”

  “Found.” Her mouth twitched. “Before you found me, your people didn’t know.”

  “Thank you.”

  “So you’re levekk? Or… something else? They are levekk,” she said, gesturing towards the door. “I guess that means the stories are true. Your people—your species—invaded our planet and drove us away. You’d have thought the spaceships and the Giants outside would have convinced me, but somehow it seems more real now.”

  Spaceships? Giants?

  He didn’t have time to ask. The human was looking around the room, her hand fisting at her side. But then she straightened. “What’s going to happen to me?”

  “I do not know,” he said truthfully.

  “But I can’t leave?”

  “No.”

  “No?” she repeated, her voice hardening. “So, you’ve kidnapped me, locked me in, attacked me, and now you’re keeping me prisoner? Why not just kill me? What could you possibly gain by keeping me here?”

  He made a noise in the back of his throat, cursing his clunky grasp on her language. In reality, he was lucky he was able to communicate with her at all, but now more than ever he wished for eloquence. “There are questions we wish to ask—”

  “Well, I’m not answering anything,” she snapped, crossing her arms again.

  “Human—”

  Her eyes flashed, and he knew then that he had chosen the wrong thing to say. They stared at each other, the air humming with tension. He had lost his chance, at least for today.

  “I will help you,” he said, but the human scoffed.

  “You can help me by getting me out of here,” she said, her eyes blazing with a fire that he’d never seen before on a human face.

  “I cannot, but I will keep you safe,” he promised. It was all he could promise.

  Her gaze followed him unwaveringly as he backed out of the room, but she didn’t move. There was a stoniness to her that fascinated Marek, as if she believed she could weather anything they threw at her. Was it a bluff, or was Urek right about them?

  “So?” Urek hissed as soon as the door slid shut behind him.

  “She is uncooperative,” Marek said, somewhat relieved to slip back into Trade. Procuring the foreign words and grammatical patterns was hard work—harder even than digging through soil deep beneath the planet’s surface. “We have not made a good impression on her.”

  “A good impression?” His brother’s eyes narrowed. “She is sub-species. An outsider. We shouldn’t have to make an impression.”

  “Well, I wish you luck in extracting any information from her without one,” he said. “My recommendation is that you let her go. She isn’t a threat.”

  Urek scoffed. “It’s not her that I’m worried about. She wasn’t just spying, Marek. She was spying for someone. There could be an entire army out there, preparing to strike.”

  “An army of what? Small humans with ancient weapons? According to the Guides, humanity is no threat. But then again,” Marek added, “the Guides also insisted that no humans had escaped their reach, and that seems questionable now.”

  His brother’s mouth twisted into an ugly expression. “You’ll continue to interrogate her. Find out where her people are located and report it to me.”

  “I will not encourage this strange paranoia that you’ve developed. You should let it go.”

  “And if you do not help me, I will make sure you remain down in those mines for so long that you forget what the sun looks like,” Urek snarled. “Do you forget already how precarious your position was before I brought you here? Without my help, you would still be wandering the backstreets of CL-6 with all the other sub-species filth.”

  Marek fell silent, and Urek’s face softened.

  “But you are my brother, and I will admit that you are more… well-versed in human matters than I am. I am willing to offer you a deal if you cooperate.”

  “And what deal is that?”

  “Unlimited access to your office upstairs,” Urek said, and Marek’s breath caught in his chest. “A permanent position amongst the karanaan. No more mining. You wouldn’t even have to sleep in the shared quarters with your solayan friends.”

  It was everything he’d wanted since he was stripped of his position all those years ago, but suspicion nipped at him. “Why?”

  “Because even if her people aren’t a threat, but they could be an opportunity,” Urek said cryptically, that awful grin back on his face. “Besides, isn’t this a win-win for you, little brother? I get the informatio
n I want, and you get a human test subject to study to your heart’s content. That was a pet project of yours, wasn’t it? Before?”

  Marek looked away. “I don’t want her harmed. She was willing to speak to me. I think she might even be as curious about us as we are her.” He met his brother’s gaze. “We can do this without violence.”

  “…If that is what you believe, I will defer to your knowledge. But do not take too long. This is not an excuse for you to do research.”

  “I understand,” Marek said. But as Urek turned away, he stopped him. “She should be given a proper room to sleep in. The equipment in there frightens her.”

  Urek’s eyes narrowed. For a moment, Marek was sure he would protest, but then his features smoothed. “Whatever you think is best, Karanaan.”

  4

  Note to self: Never live in a spaceship.

  Although, she should probably stop calling it a spaceship, she thought to herself the next morning as she stared down the strange meal that had been brought to her. Unless the window was somehow lying to her, that was definitely snow flying around outside, whipped up by the storm that still raged up above. The sky was dark, the trees bending in half under the wind’s anger, but she knew that landscape better than her own face. She was definitely on the ground.

  And still, she’d rather be out there than in here.

  They’d brought her to this room an hour or so after the one who spoke her language had left, and although it was obviously a bedroom, she couldn’t imagine anyone choosing to sleep here. It was nightmarish, with its dark, featureless walls and bright lights that had hummed in her ear even after night fell. The furniture was all angles and sharp corners, flowing seamlessly from the walls, and when she’d lain down on the bed, she’d found it hard and uncomfortable, with glossy sheets that threatened to tear at the slightest provocation.

  There was a room adjoining hers where she assumed she was supposed to wash and relieve herself, but even that was an exercise in frustration. She’d gotten the door open easily enough, pressing her hand to the panel set into the wall beside it as she’d seen the aliens do elsewhere, but the toilet—or what she thought was a toilet—was disconcertingly warm when she perched herself upon it. Then, it had taken her an age of slapping various parts of the toilet itself and the wall around it to find a hidden panel that caused everything to get sucked away with a terrifying screech. To her relief, the sink had been more straight-forward, although she’d jumped back in shock when the water came out hot.

  The worst was the shower—or at least, what looked like a shower. Her people had used them before the levekk invaded, and there was still one hooked up behind Luis’ residence which he rarely used, saying it was a waste of water. Curious, Bree had pressed her hand to the small panel inside, but she’d jumped back with a yelp when not water, but a hot and unnatural and itchy spray had erupted from the faucet. She could still feel the strange residue clinging to her the next day, but at least the itching had stopped.

  No more touching of strange alien devices, she thought, glaring down at her food.

  Her stomach growled, trying to convince her that it was worth the risk. The food—a large brick of something brown and unappealing sitting on a bare tray—didn’t appear dangerous, exactly, just inedible. It had been dropped off by an alien that looked more insect than man, with huge eyes and translucent wings that snicked nervously as it stared at her. It didn’t speak her language, just pointed at the brick and then at its own mouth before fleeing the room. She’d been too shocked by its appearance to stop it.

  Gnawing at her lip, she reached out tentatively, breaking off a small corner of the brick and popping it into her mouth. It was… nothing. It tasted like nothing. She chewed it for a moment, cringing at the powdery, crumbling texture, and swallowed.

  Nothing happened, except for her stomach growling even louder.

  “Okay, okay,” she said, breaking off another piece, but it fell from her grasp when the door suddenly snapped open behind her.

  Bree whirled around, the food forgotten, and clenched her fists.

  It was the levekk female from the day before. Her speckled lips were downturned, her crest briefly fanning out as she stepped into the room, looking around with disdain. Bree lowered herself, preparing to evade capture again if she had to, and growled, “What do you want?”

  The female sneered, jerking her head toward the door. “Salak yassira.”

  Bree hesitated. “You want me to follow you?”

  The levekk made a sound of displeasure, and she shot forward before Bree could react, wrapping sharp claws around her upper arm, tight enough to bruise even through her coat.

  “Hey!” she yelled as she was pulled off her feet, but the grip was uncompromising. The female tugged her out the door like she weighed nothing, barely pausing to dislodge her when she tried to cling to the doorframe. Bree snarled at the alien, spewing every obscenity she could think of as she was dragged down the hallway, her leather boots slipping and sliding on the polished floor.

  No one helped her. They passed by many aliens, most of which she’d caught glimpses of the day before. A gaggle of the insectoids buzzed to life as they turned a corner. A round, pig-snouted alien peeked over its meaty shoulder at them as they passed. At one point, Bree even noticed one of the inky black nightmares pause in its duties to stare at her, its glossy red eyes following her. But look was all they did, even as she kicked and screamed and clawed at the levekk’s scaly wrist.

  They walked for long enough through the maze of tight corridors that Bree started to wonder if the female was just doing this to torture her. But then they came to an abrupt halt outside another featureless, black door, and Bree was dumped on her knees on the floor inside. She immediately lunged for the retreating levekk and bounced off the forcefield that sprang up between them, but was on her feet again in seconds. “You can’t leave me in here!”

  The levekk ignored her, slipping through the door and out of sight.

  “Fuck!”

  Her chest heaving, Bree looked around. It was the room from yesterday, she thought, but it looked different. Much of the furniture had been removed except for two tables and chairs that faced one another from either side of the thin forcefield. The countless instruments and devices had similarly vanished, leaving her with nothing she could use to escape. Still, she searched the walls and floor again for weaknesses, just in case anything had changed.

  On her fifth circuit of the room, she froze, noticing something new. It was hard to make out through the rippling forcefield, but hanging from the ceiling in the corner closest to the door was a device, black and glossy, with a blue light winking on its side. Its rounded face almost looked like an eye, and Bree got the strangest feeling it was watching her.

  She didn’t have time to investigate further. The door to the observation room hissed open, drawing her attention, and Bree’s heart skipped a little at who stepped through it.

  It was the one who could speak her language, however clumsily. He hovered by the door, his gaze darting to the strange device she’d just been looking at before coming to rest on her.

  “Hello,” he said in English.

  Bree frowned warily. “…Hello.”

  The alien relaxed a fraction, as if he’d been scared she suddenly wouldn’t understand him. “How are you?” he asked in a stilted fashion.

  Her lip curled. “Fan-freakin’-tastic. I love being dragged out of my room and locked behind a magic wall like a misbehaving child.”

  “I am sorry,” he said, gesturing to the forcefield. “I do not know they decide to use this. It is not dangerous. Or magic,” he added.

  Bree’s teeth ground together. “What do you want?”

  The alien paused, watching her contemplatively. “I am telled to speak to you. It is my job now.” He sat in the chair on his side of the forcefield and gestured toward the other. “Sit with me?”

  She eyed the heavy-looking tables and chairs. They were large, built to accommodate bigger b
odies than hers, but there were no chains, no restraints. There was no reason to think that they were anything but what they appeared. The easiest thing to do would be to play along, but why should she have to make things easy?

  “Why should I?” she asked, crossing her arms.

  “So we may speak.”

  “And why should I speak with the aliens who locked me up in this hellhole?” Bree spat. “You said you’d keep me safe. You said you’d keep the asshole and his friend from hurting me.”

  “Peris harmed you?” he cut in, his calm expression replaced with displeasure.

  The sudden change froze Bree’s anger. “Not exactly. Just threw her weight around a little,” she said in a softer voice. The levekk frowned, no doubt confused by her turn of phrase, but Bree wasn’t finished. “That doesn’t change anything. I still won’t tell you where my people are.”

  “And I will not force you,” he said. “We will speak about other things.”

  He waited expectantly, making it clear that he wouldn’t take no for an answer. Well, if he wanted to waste his time, she wouldn’t argue. She approached the chair, but as her hand found the warm metal, Bree went rigid.

  Something had moved, high on the wall on the alien’s side of the forcefield. When she followed it, she found the strange, black device up in the corner winking at her, its muzzle pointed in her direction.

  “What is that?”

  He followed her gaze, a slight frown marring his textured brow. “It is a…” He paused, as if trying to remember the word. “A camera. It records sound and image for others to watch.”

  “Oh.” Now she understood why he’d glanced at it earlier. Anyone could be watching them, she thought with a shudder.

  “It is uncomfortable for you?”

  “Uh, yeah,” Bree said. “Especially if it’s the asshole who’s watching us.”

  She jumped as the levekk abruptly rose from his chair. He went to stand beneath the camera, reaching up to fiddle with some small dials and buttons on the side. There was a whirring sound and a click, and then the blue light near the muzzle turned orange. He glanced over at her. “It is disabled.”