“Well, go make a new life-stone blade in her name,” I tell him. “May you wield it to protect her, our females, and all our future daughters.”
Shaking his head, Hyx seems to find his way out of his stupor. “Yes, High Spear,” he says before hurrying away to honor his daughter. No doubt if I see him tomorrow, he’ll wear a daughter-band around his tail and will have clipped his best flight feather in her name too.
Our Elders say that fathering young heightens a warrior’s instincts to protect. It’s something I imagine experiencing often, though I haven’t made frequent seed-offering of my own since becoming High Spear. The lengths I’d go to already to protect my tribe and Temple are exhausting.
Chapter 2
SERENA
Honestly, if I thought I was ever going to get abducted in the middle of the night, wearing nothing but a ratty old t-shirt and sleep shorts, my first guess would have been one of my creepier clients as a cam girl. Not aliens. I didn't even believe in aliens.
Well, I sure as shit do now!
One of the horrible hulking gray creatures prods me with a long stick that has some sort of electrical current zinging through the end of it. Stinging heat shoots up the side of my ribs making me arch, trying to get away from the source. In all honesty, the thing reminds me of a cattle prod and the allusion to cattle doesn't end there. We're in a huge domed arena of some sort, there are wood chips on the floor and I can't help but feel like the other girls and I are being herded. Some of the gray aliens are trying to wake up the girls still crumpled on the floor - whether from sleep or fear, I don't know.
That's how I woke up too. One minute I’d been drifting off to the land of slumber, safe in the knowledge that I’d earned enough for this month’s rent by doing someveryunladylike things on camera for a client. And the next, I'm being prodded awake by a hideous creature with pallid gray skin, a hunched back, a pig-like snout, and what appear to be tusks.
"What is happening?!" a short, blond girl stumbles forward and grabs hold of my arm as she tries to avoid one of the creature's cattle prods. "Where are we?!"
Clutching her arm in response, all I can do is shake my head. "I don't know. But it's not good." She worries her lip, her grip on me tightening as wide hazel eyes take in as much as she can. There are so many women here and we're sectioned off in groups with thick metal bars while the alien creatures lumber around, trying to wake up those still on the floor. Above us, the huge, domed ceiling is made from crudely welded metal. Lower down on the walls, there are circular windows like port holes on a ship and beyond them is nothing but black, dotted with stars and swirling, clustered colors. Is that what a nebula is? I don't know. Anything space related is beyond me - none of it ever feltreal.Well, it’s real now and all I do know is it's hot as hell in here and the whimperings, cries, and shouts of hurt and scared women echo in my ears.
One of the gray things nearby calls out to his buddy as he stands over a girl collapsed into the fetal position. He makes a gurgling sort of bark and prods her with his electric stick before repeating the God-awful noise. Two more creatures lumber over, sticks in hand and they all have a go at shocking her as she lay there on the floor, yelping in pain.
"Hey!Stop doing that!" Another woman yells, storming over, her sleek dark ponytail swinging as she advances. She looks like an angry thundercloud - even while dressed in her button-up hot-pink pajamas. The blond beside me shivers as we watchpink-PJsslap the thick, knobbly skin of one of the gray creatures. "Leave her alone, you ugly-ass-mother-fucker!”
The gray creature whirls. This isn't going to end well. My self-preservation wars with my instinct to jump in. The creature - alien - whatever he is, yells something angrily at Pink-PJs and takes a step forward. I take a step forward too but Blondie clutches me tighter. "Don't," she whispers, but it’s too late, I slip from her grip and march right up to the fray until I'm between the alien and Pink-PJs.
"Whoa! Whoa!" I say, holding my hands up in what I hope translates universally as'I come in peace'. Big-Gray-and-Ugly only glares down at me, the end of his electric shock-stick sizzling in warning. "We can help!" I offer. Big-Gray stares at me with disdain. "We can help," I try again, taking a deep breath and brushing past the alien, hoping beyond hope that those shock sticks won't be turned on me now. "Come on," I murmur to the puddle of a girl on the sawdust floor. "They're just going to keep hurting you until you get up. Come on." Reaching down, I hook my arms around her and heft her upwards.
"I don't want to be here," she whimpers.
Pink-PJs joins me, shouldering the girl's weight at her other side. "I don't think we have a choice."
***
Eventually, our section of around thirty women is gathered into one area. Two women had refused to get up off the floor and had been carried off elsewhere. I hope to God they'll be alright, but if I were a gambling woman, I'd say the odds of that are low. "Why do you think we're here?" the woman we’d helped off of the floor asks. Looking around, I can't help thinking that this set-up is similar to the livestock markets my uncle had taken me to when he'd had the hair-brained idea to start farming goats. I decided to hold my tongue on that conclusion though.
"I don't know," I answered instead. "But my name's Serena and if we work together somehow, maybe we can get out of this and back to Earth."
I offered my hand out to shake to the nearest women who were listening.
"Alana," said Pink-PJs with a sharp nod of her head.
"Gwen," answered Blondie.
The mousy-haired woman who had needed to be helped from the floor shook off mine and Alana's help, holding her own weight now, although still a bit wobbly. "Tessa," she said, taking my hand to shake.
A tall, leggy redhead wearing a baby-blue, silky two-piece sleep set turns and grabs my hand. "Chastity Charm," she added. "Whatever you guys are planning, I want in."
All the nearby women look at me expectantly. Shit. Do I need to come up with a plan now? Licking my lips I open my mouth to speak unknown words.
"Hold on a minute," Alana thankfully interrupts. "What do you mean, 'back to Earth'?"
"What do you think that is out there?" I say, gesturing to the port-hole-like windows above us. "And those gray dudes with the cattle prods. I don't know about you but I've never seen those explained on any nature documentary back home."
Alana folds her arms. Someone nearby begins to cry.
"But-..." Gwen flounders, "aliens don't exist!"
