Alien Beast
A Dark Alien Sci-Fi Romance
Penelope Woods
Contents
About the Author
Introduction
1. Ava
2. Ava
3. Kalxor
4. Ava
5. Ava
6. Kalxor
7. Ava
8. Kalxor
9. Ava
10. Kalxor
11. Kalxor
12. Ava
13. Ava
14. Kalxor
15. Ava
16. Ava
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Penelope’s Dungeon
About the Author
About the Author
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Penelope Woods is a top 100 Amazon author who writes dark sci-fi, horror, fantasy and uniquely gothic romance novels. When she learned about smut, it was like a light bulb clicked on in her head. She started writing in 2016 and has never looked back.
Introduction
“He speaks in stones and trees, the bones of things.”
-Cormac McCarthy, Blood Meridian
1
Ava
Year: 2097. Location: Earth.
Are you content with your life? Will you ever feel brave enough to run away and live out your own story?
I come to these support meetings often. Sometimes twice. Maybe three times a week if I’m feeling extra masochistic.
The stale room, bright lights, and fearful tears from the others forces me out of my comfort zone. They pause, glaring back at me like I’m their anchor…
Like I can ease their pain.
I can only give them encouragement. I can be there to love them. But at the end of the day, I still don’t have anyone to love me.
So I keep returning, hoping things will change.
All the meetings do is force me to reflect, to look back on the uneventful life I’ve lived. To remember the people I’ve lived it with. A canyon of emotions, laid bare.
I relate to everyone’s pain. I absorb their tears like a fucking sponge.
But these meetings are not a place of clarity. Not really.
They are simply there to block out the noise. That’s it. A plain and simple therapy session without the obligation of any genuine change. These people accept me for who I am. It doesn’t matter how much I speak, how much I let them know about me.
Abundant words are not created equal. Everything is a line of code. There are a million ways to think of your life as a void.
Leftover are a bunch of clichés, apologies from others, and phrases such as, “life is complicated. Thank you for sharing.”
My father hurt me emotionally. That’s the truth.
He made it so that my heart was empty. Made it seem like I wasn’t meant for this world. He told me I couldn’t be loved every damn day of his life…
And then he did me a favor. He died. He left me, so I could travel forty miles a week to hear others speak to my pain.
I don’t hold grudges.
His funeral was tough. There was no clarity there either. Respectful, courteous words guarded his tomb. Words that kept his secrets safe. In his coffin, he looked meek and mild, just as God intended him to be.
But I knew better.
That doesn’t mean I didn’t love him. It just means that life is complicated.
There are no words to describe how I feel. Alone, maybe. Desperate to find a companion, definitely. I look for better words, searching for answers that might help me ease the pain, yet I find nothing.
I feel numb.
As much as I want to blame him, all men have let me down. Boyfriends were not any kinder.
Who wants to love someone who goes to support meetings all the time? Someone who codes for a living? I’ll tell you who. Not too many.
My boyfriends looked at me like another toy. Fresh out of the box. I degraded over some heavy use, and every single one of them left me to rust.
Not that it matters. I’m better off alone.
Maybe I don’t deserve love, but, one way or another, I keep going. I keep charging on.
Sometimes, I see the faces of old friends, a few precious childhood moments I struggle with keeping, but I can’t find the will to relive the good times for too long.
If I keep my mouth shut, is it possible to change the past?
When I think of my father now, I see a ghost. He won’t sleep, not anymore. Though he was not the definition of a generous man, I still miss him.
He’ll never speak to me again. He died.
I took his place.
I can’t be here...
“Ava, would you like to speak to the group?” the presenter asks.
Her eyes hold enough empathy to help a crowd of struggling people. If this was the Titanic, she’d sink with the orchestra.
I wonder if I’m the iceberg…
I blink like a deer in the headlights.
“No judgment,” she reiterates.
The door swings open. A flood of sunlight comes pouring in. It’s one of my cousin’s workers, a tech supervisor or something. I can tell by the outfit he’s wearing.
Printed on his shirt is his company’s logo, Arnoi Industries, and as I raise my eyes to get a better look, I see that his face is covered in deep tissue scars. How he found me here, I have no idea.
I’m not sure how to feel about his appearance.
He’s thin, dressed in black, bald as a cue-ball, with a set of familiar eyes. Familiar, but I’m unsure how I know him.
As he meanders through the entrance, he examines the faces in the room. When he sees mine, he nods and waits in the corner, folding his hands over his large belt buckle.
I heard Elon was in town, working on some new and mysterious project. He’s famous now. The Nightly News is always talking about him. Kind of odd he wouldn’t give me a call.
He knows I’m a good coder, but getting someone to follow me is a bit over the line. I have half a mind to ask him to leave, but Elon is my cousin. I haven’t seen him in years.
He was always friendly with my father. He’s probably just sending his condolences.
The woman leans forward, fingers twisted together like ancient, mangled roots, divided only by a thin, wet tissue. Every so often, they open and enclose over an area untouched.
I sit and stare, entrenched in my own thoughts.
“Ava?” she repeats. “If you’d like to speak, you may.”
The bald man doesn’t sit. He waits by the coffee cart, dully eyeing the desserts. He purses his lips and wags his head, fingers tickling the air over the donut of his choice.
Nothing like a quick burst of sugar to make the tears go away, right?
There’s no way I’m going to tell my story today.
I stand and grab my purse, hands trembling around the leather strap.
“I’m sorry,” I say, voice too shaky for comfort. “Really, I am. But I can’t do this today.”
“Don’t apologize. It’s okay,” she says. “We understand. Don’t we?”
Everyone in the room nods, mumbling shallow words of support. They do that thing with their lips, pulling them inside their mouths, empathetic to the story they don’t even know is mine.
The way she says those words breaks my heart. These people are the only ones who can understand my family. My father and the motherless childhood I faced. She left me with him.
I was the stone that sunk him down into the bottomless abyss that was his life. Me, not his wife. He never blamed himself because I was the only one around, and I didn’t know any better than t
o take his words as truth.
When he drank, he let me hear it. “Honesty is the best policy,” he said. But I think honesty was often a weapon to him. I could never dodge the bullet.
He never left me, so I never thought I could complain. He did the honorable thing by raising a child he never really wanted.
I can’t speak about this with Elon’s man hovering around the room.
As I walk past the cart, I keep my eyes directed at the shag carpet of the old Bible study room. When I hit the metal beam to open the door, I feel a rush of warmth wrap me in its bliss.
I’m free. I’m out of there. I can be whoever I want to be.
I feel for everyone in that room, but I’m not like them. I can move forward from this. I’m strong.
It just takes time.
I hit the lock-button on my car keys. My heels click against the pavement, but it’s accompanied by another’s footsteps.
“Ms. Lancaster,” the man in black says. Good ol’ cue-ball.
Hands tight around my purse, I keep walking, hoping one of my heels won’t twist out from under me. “Could you have picked a worse time?”
“I just want to talk,” he says.
“Then talk. You have about thirty-seconds.”
He struggles to keep up, and I reach my car before he can stop me from getting inside.
“It won’t take long.”
“Look, I’m not running away. I’m late for a meeting,” I lie.
These meetings are the only ones I go to. Other than them, I rarely leave the apartment. I live inside a small place, squashed in the middle of a tall high-rise.
When I do leave, it’s only for necessities.
If I need money, I sign into an app on my hologram tablet, and I sign up for a few software jobs. It’s not a great living, but it’s not too difficult to beef up another person’s code.
“Elon knows you don’t have a job anymore. He heard they laid you off a few years back. He has talked about your well-being quite frequently, believe it or not,” he says. “You’re on government subsidies, right?”
I try to pull the door shut, but he slips his hand around the frame and applies pressure. “If someone sees you, they’ll call the cops. Is that what you want?” I ask.
It’s not a powerful threat. Elon probably owns the cops nowadays.
“You’re family to him. Don’t worry. He’s just looking out for you,” he says.
I let go, exhausted. Today was supposed to be a pleasant day. The air is clean, the sun is shining, and the wind is deliciously refreshing. This turd is the only thing standing in my way.
“You can tell Elon I don’t need his charity,” I say.
He reveals a business card with an address printed on the front side. Two fingers extend it outward.
“No charity. Just an offer.”
An address is printed on the front:
Arnoi Industries
3923 E. Abbey Ln.
I take it, staring at the letters like it’s a key to a new life. A better life.
“We all want love,” he says.
I direct my gaze upward again. “Excuse me?”
“Love, Ms. Lancaster,” he says. “We’re all looking for someone to complete us.”
I clear my throat, heart beating. I try not to get emotional, but after listening to those women talk, it’s hard to get out of that mode.
“Um. I’m sorry, but I think I need to go now.”
“He’ll be out here for a while. Big project. I’m sure you heard about it,” he says. “Head down sometime. He’ll clear his schedule.”
And then he walks away. Like everyone in my life. But this time, there is an opportunity attached to the absence.
Love? I don’t know what he meant by that, but it hit home. Hard.
Elon and I are cousins, so we used to be pretty close. I can’t imagine what kind of job this is, but he knows I like a challenge.
Maybe, just maybe, this is what I need. Maybe it will heal me.
The opportunity of a lifetime rests in the palm of my hand. It’s not the world. It isn’t a total fix.
But it’s something, and I have to take it.
2
Ava
The first thing you see defines the rest of your life. Welcome to Arnoi Industries. Please enjoy your stay.
From the outside, the new headquarters of Arnoi Industries seems rather boring. It’s just another innocent factory in the middle of the industrial heartland of Ohio. Rough and tan grass plains stand like brittle needles, swaying against the wind. Trash litters the streets. It makes little sense Elon chose this spot for his new project, but at least it’s not too far from my apartment.
I did what the man in black told me to do. I didn’t call or make an appointment. That’s not Elon’s style. Arriving without his knowing gives me some time to get a read on what is really going on here.
The warehouse seems harmless enough. Probably a new type of database storage facility. I doubt he even needs my coding expertise. Most likely, he’s just doing me a favor. Back in the day, he’d call that “doing me a solid.” These days, he’s a little more refined.
Whatever the case may be, I’m here, walking through the grand entrance. Ready for whatever comes my way.
A secretary greets me in the lobby. She stands behind a long counter, smile fixed. A crisp outfit forms around her modest frame. Her dark hair is pulled back into a bun. “Oh, great. You’ve arrived. Ava, right? Mr. Arnoi has been expecting you today,” she says.
I brush my fingers against the expensive marble kiosk. As soon as I touch it, the rock gleams. A thin layer of liquid drapes around my fingerprint. Within seconds, the counter cleans itself.
“Today?” I ask, a bit stunned.
She appears more confused than I. “Well, yes,” she says. “But he has, of course, been expecting you all week.”
“Oh, right,” I mutter, lip twitching into a thin smile. “He doesn’t like to arrange appointments.”
The woman, small and petite like all secretaries these days, moves nimbly around the counter. She gestures for me to follow. “Elon doesn’t favor chance encounters,” she says. “This is his way of letting go of control.”
Elon’s life was built on control. In fact, this entire company is now controlling the world. We own his products, play his games, and we use his holographic technology for just about everything. In a sense, he is a king.
If he’s letting go of control now, it would be highly uncharacteristic.
“Right this way,” she says, leading me through an automatic door at the south end of the facility. “There is a lot to show you.”
Ugh. I could kill for a drink right now.
I turn and gaze at the golden ceiling. It moves alongside my steps, bubbling like champagne. The walls emanate the scent of oranges.
A portal in the wall opens, and a drink tray slides toward me.
“Care for a mimosa?” she asks.
I gasp and jump back. “How did you know I was thinking about… how did you…?”
I stop speaking, mouth agape.
She smiles, eager to appear to please. “How’s it taste?”
I slowly sip the contents. It tastes incredible.
“Good,” I mutter.
This is clearly Elon’s work. I knew he was looking into alternative forms of Artificial Intelligence, but I never saw how far he got with it.
Just because I’m a coder doesn’t mean I value our technological progression. Most of the time, these products prove to halt any real development.
They won’t save the world.
I take the glass and watch the tray disappear. The wall reassembles. The ceiling is white and standard, back to normal.
“So, he finally figured it out,” I mutter. “Good for him. Not sure if the world will accept software that reads their thoughts, but I suppose data-mining is nothing new.”
“You’re correct. This isn’t a new discovery,” the woman says, circling us around a corner. “We will release it to
the public in less than eight months, just as the Christmas season makes its way onto the home-shopping hologram decks. In fact, all our new products have been beta-tested and focus-grouped to fit suburban condominium needs. They will be technological hits.”
Products to make our lives easier, but all they end up doing is complicating the entire process. I didn’t need a mimosa. I wanted one. Just because I felt that urge doesn’t mean I should get one.
Who knows – maybe it’s better I don’t have everything I dream of under the sun.
“If Elon isn’t hiring me to help out on the new product line, what does he want from me?”
She leads me into another room. Lay bare in front of me are many chambers, divided only by a single sheet of glass.
Inside are curiosities. Sets, like the kind from theatrical plays of the past. Humans and beasts act out their roles accordingly.
“What is this place?” I ask.
“You know, if you decide to stay, you will be one of Elon’s first hires,” she says. “He prefers you answer any questions you may have by exploring the creations first.”
“Creations,” I repeat. “Hm. All right. Whatever. Let’s see ‘em.”
Her arm wraps around her waist, and she folds into a bow. “Welcome to Arnoi Industries,” she says. “We are sure you will enjoy your stay.”
I gaze at the women curiously and chuckle to myself. “My stay, huh? Well, I’m sure I will,” I mutter.
But as soon as I turn toward the strange oddities, I feel her presence leave, absent. Devoid of something I can’t quite put my finger on. The woman smiles and makes her way through the automatic doors, leaving me alone to explore.
Alien Beast: A Sci-Fi Alien Romance Page 1
