“I didn’t mean to throw up on you. That was an accident,” I continued. My hand lifted to gesture at the mess on his tail, but it was a struggle to do that much at all. The thought struck me that he might not be a friendly alien. Just because I’d found one didn’t mean he wanted to be my friend, and after I’d puked on him? Even less likely, was it? I gulped, because all he was doing was staring at me, and I couldn’t figure out if it was because he was mad or because he was as surprised by my appearance as I was by his. In any case, he hadn’t even looked at the mess I’d made on his tail.
He leaned in a little closer, his upper body perched on that massive tail. He was sort of at the foot of my stasis pod, but when he leaned in, it was a little too easy for comfort to approach. I realized that massive tail allowed him to hover above me, his upper body—the human-looking part of him—perpendicular to my pod. Then he reached out with his hand. I flinched back, falling into the padded stasis pod with a thump, but I could not avoid that touch.
His palm was gentle as it cupped my face, warm too, but also textured in a way a human hand never would be. Very fine scales covered his flesh, and I felt them like soft, dry bumps. It was kind of pleasant, actually. Maybe he was very barbaric; his society might not have gained any significant technological advancements yet. He wore leather and fur, after all, and what was on his belt was all in crude pouches. Perhaps I’d ended up on a world that hadn’t advanced past the Stone Age yet.
The touch lingered, warm, still gentle; a caress. I didn’t realize how significant that moment was until I saw his eyes grow huge in his alien, but shockingly handsome, face. He was right above me, his strange body allowing him to be on top of my prone form without actually touching me anywhere. A soft light was beginning to glow inside the narrow interior of theFuture. That light felt a bit like warmth too, or perhaps that was just the heat radiating down from him onto me. Whatever it was, the slight tremor in my body began to ease.
“You can, uh, move. I’m not going to puke on you a second time, I promise.” I couldn’t actually promise that; my stomach was still a mess. I’d rather puke all over myself than puke onhimagain, though, as disgusting as that would be. I was just a little scared that if he stayed above me like this, I’d end up throwing up in his face.
His head cocked to the side, listening, and long strands of black hair fell out from his pale fur hood. They surrounded my face, a curtain that enclosed us in a tiny, intimate cocoon. “If you must be sick, you may be sick on me if that pleases you, sweet mate,” he said. His voice was gruff, with hints of a hiss in it, but his tone was so full of awe that I could only stare up at him in shock. What? Wait, how was it possible that he spoke my language?
His hand remained against the side of my face, but he shifted, and I heard a soft whispering noise that could possibly indicate his tail was sliding along the floor. Now he wasn’t hovering right above me, but at the side of the pod. Still close, still touching me, but not invading my space so much that I felt pinned.
I wasn’t worried he was hostile anymore; now I was just worried he was a freak. I could throw up on him if that pleased me? Whothe fuck said that? Not anyone normal, that was certain, but… I kind of really liked the way he was looking at me. Like I was the most beautiful creature he’d ever laid eyes on. The awe in his green gaze made me feel a million bucks, not like death warmed over.
“Oh, uh, no, that doesn’t please me. I’d much prefer not throwing up at all, you know?” Holly Hannah, why was the first-ever conversation I was having with a real, honest-to-God alien about freaking puke, of all things? This was so embarrassing and weird. It was really weird, and I wanted to change the topic so bad, except my roiling stomach really made it a struggle to think of much else.
“I see, sweet mate,” he said agreeably. His voice had this really sexy rumble to it; it was very distracting. Why did he call me mate, sweet mate, at that? I’d never had a guy call me that, not even when we were dating. You’d think he was Australian, but that made very little sense…
“Allow me to heal you,” he asked next. I nodded before I could think better of it, my hand going up to my face to cover my mouth. Ireallywas very close to puking again, and I had to fight to keep the rising bile down. This was terrible, absolutely terrible. My fingers brushed against the hand he still had cupped against my face, and his scales felt so warm and solid, so real. I focused on that, but it was hard.
He lowered his free hand to a pouch hanging from his belt, but then he grimaced when he discovered he couldn’t get what he needed from it. He had to use his second hand, and it slid from my face with obvious reluctance, fingers stroking my temple, my cheek, the bridge of my nose. I tingled—absolutely tingled—allover. The feeling of being sick faded to the back of my mind for a moment.
He freed a glittering silver-and-gold object from his pouch and slid it over his right hand with practiced ease. What was it? Heal me? It only just began to register how odd a request it was. How could he heal me? With that thing? Maybe it was some kind of primitive ritual he thought would help me.
Something touched my face again, and I screamed in fright, all my Air Force training flying right out the window. I was weak, tired, exhausted, and feeling very sick; I’d never felt so low. It still was no excuse. All it was was the tip of his tail, narrow but agile, sliding against my temple and touching my throat. Not gripping, just a gentle pressure. It was still creepy.
“Forgive me, beautiful mate,” my strange alien companion said in a rush. My eyes locked on his face, and I saw that his were wide and shocked, rapidly filling with remorse. “I did not mean to frighten you,” he said, and he hunkered down lower beside the pod, as if he were trying to make himself small. “Please, forgive me.” I nodded again because what else was I going to say? I was pretty sure I was going to have to depend on him to get my ship up and running again. A little tail petting was going to have to be acceptable.
“Will you still allow me to heal you?” he asked again, and I weakly shrugged. A bit of hand-waving wasn’t going to do much, but he could give it his best shot. The fright with that tail had made my adrenaline surge enough that the nausea was now firmly fading to the back of my mind. That didn’t mean my stomach wasn’t still extremely uneasy, but I no longer felt like throwing up was imminent.
He brought the hand holding the gold and silver object over my chest, hovering just above my suit, then slowly lowered it to my stomach. A light flared, catching me by surprise, and a gentle hum resonated between us. My stomach eased, and the cramps in my body—the stiffness I hadn’t known was there—also began to fade. Whatever that device was, it was no simple hand-waving. That was actual technology, something far more advanced than we had on Earth. Hope surged. Maybe he really could help me fix my ship, find out where I was, and send me back on my way. Maybe his kind really could be of help to Earth somehow—an alliance, the beginning of a new era.
“Better, sweet mate?” he asked after a moment. The light on the device flicked off, but he did not remove his hand from where it hovered over my belly. When I nodded, he smiled, and that expression made my insides twist in funny ways. Holy Hannah, that was sexy. That mouth too lush, his eyes sparkling, and the strange nubbed ridges that formed his brow scrunching up in a very adorable way.
“How did you do that?” I asked, rising on my elbows to peer more closely at the device. He obliged by lifting it closer to my face and angling his hand so I could see the portion he’d aimed at my body. It appeared to be a disk, a black gem embedded in a gold frame, nothing more. Sinuous lines decorated it, but they did not appear to have a purpose. It was a mystery.
“With this,” he said, and then he launched into an explanation, words falling over one another as he tried to explain a very complex technical concept I couldn’t possibly understand. Something about light waves and healing matrices and precise ways of stimulating the body. Well, that answered the big question: was his society advanced? Clearly, I shouldn’t judgea book by its cover. He mightlooka little primitive, but he definitely wasn’t.
“Okay, okay,” I said, halfway through his explanation, or at least, I hoped it was the halfway point. “Thank you, but that’s a bit above my pay grade. I’m a pilot, not a doctor, I’m afraid. Let’s start with the basics: I’m Captain Felicia Haines. Who are you?” I held my breath and waited, hoping I hadn’t been rude by interrupting him. He seemed so earnest in helping me that I didn’t think I could offend him at this point. After all, the man did tell me I could puke on him again if that pleased me. I was never going to forget that.
He froze, his eyes beginning to sparkle as his mouth snapped shut. “My apologies. I am new to this, and I very much want to do it right.” He smiled, and I liked that. It was a little self-deprecating, and a man who could find humor in his own mistakes, that was sexy. “I am Shaman Levant,” he said. Levant—I liked that. It was foreign but familiar at the same time. Shaman, that also made sense, even if itwasan interestingly primitive word.
“That’s okay, I’m new at this too,” I said to him. After all, I was the one who had screwed up our first meeting with an alarming amount of bodily fluids. I hoped I was never reminded of that again. First contact was hard, but I was starting to believe we’d weathered our first hurdles all right. “I’m from a planet called Earth.”
“I know,” he responded immediately. “You are human, a human from Earth.” I didn’t know how to respond to that; hell, I didn’t know how to feel about it. He knew what I was, and where I came from? How was that possible? That put me at a distinctdisadvantage; I knew absolutely nothing about him. At least his healing device had worked wonders, and I felt much more like myself as I rose to a full sitting position inside the pod.
I’d take stock of my surroundings and the situation, and then I’d tailor my questions accordingly. Perhaps it was a mistake to trust so quickly, but I didn’t think Levant wanted to harm me. If anything, the way his gaze had dropped to linger on my chest suggested he wanted to please, not harm. The attraction I saw simmering like banked fire in his eyes wasn’t unwelcome. I felt the same intriguing pull to explore our differences in ways that were probably entirely against military regulations.
TheFuturewas not exactly a small ship, but most of her bulk was taken up by the experimental FTL drive. The interior of the ship was very limited, and Levant was taking up most of its space. There really was a lot of long, black, scaly tail everywhere. The tip still lay against my neck, touching skin, and the warm light that spilled over the gray metal came from the glowing slashes along those coils.
He used a scrap of fabric from a pouch to finally wipe away the evidence of my upset stomach from earlier. Then he seemed to be all business as he began fiddling with the side of my pod, detaching strange-looking wires and a small, triangular-shaped device. As he pulled it free, the lights on my pod dimmed, then winked out entirely, and a feeling of deep unease unfurled inside my belly. If the lights on the stasis pod went out, did that mean the battery was dead? How was that possible? It was designed to last for several centuries.
“What now?” I asked carefully, trying to keep my voice neutral. The ship was priceless; I couldn’t abandon it, but at thesame time I needed to find out as much as I could about Levant’s world, too. One thing was certain: we couldn’t stay here indefinitely, and I would probably need supplies to get theFutureready for the return trip. Power definitely seemed to be the first order of business to get her back in working order.
“Now, I take you to my camp, sweet mate. We need to bundle up warm against the cold. It is very bad outside, and night has fallen.” That sounded incredibly ominous, and camp made it sound like he was only here temporarily. A scout, a forerunner, sent to investigate my ship’s landing? Or had it crashed? Nothing about the interior seemed to indicate damage, but I couldn’t be sure.
In any case, Levant was very prepared, with a large pack of supplies he’d wedged into my pilot seat. From it, he began pulling a thick fur tunic and more purple-furred items. They were clothes he wanted to bundle me up in, and though the ship’s interior wasn’t anywhere close to freezing, I did as he wanted. The tunic had to be his, as it smelled distinctly masculine, spicy and sweet at the same time. It was a really good smell, and I might have stuck my nose into the white-and-black ruff at the neck to inhale an extra whiff.
