Iateaworm.Correction, I wasforced toeat a worm. A worm. Oh my god. At least it was dead already because Adam bit its head off, but it was still a worm!
Logically, I know eating worms should be the least of my issues. People eat worms back on Earth. They’re supposed to be high in nutritional value or something like that. I should be grateful Adam is trying to feed me instead of eating me, and that the worm doesn’t seem to be poisonous. It wasn’t even that disgusting. Actually, it was extremely disgusting, but it could have been worse. It’s the idea of a wriggly worm in my mouththat makes me nauseous. Couldn’t it have been a bug? I could deal with a bug much more easily than with a worm. I still wouldn’t be ecstatic about it. Ugh. I’m the worst survivalist ever, aren’t I?
What’s worse, Adam looked so proud when he presented me with that disgusting thing, and when I yelled at him instead of being grateful, he just deflated. Now I feel like an asshole. Again. Seriously, all this alien does is help me, and I just keep putting him down. I like to think I’m a good person, but I’ve been nothing but terrible to Adam. He’s literally going against his basic instincts to keep me alive, and I’m being an ungrateful bastard. That ends now.
When he brings over another worm, this one much longer and thicker—how big do these things get?—I accept it with a smile and thank him for it. He seems a little confused by my reaction but settles down next to me, watching me expectantly. Right. Now I have to eat it. God help me.
I smash the worm’s head between two stones because I can’t bring myself to put it in my mouth while it’s alive. When it stops moving, I gingerly pick the limp body up and bring it to my mouth. Channeling my inner Steven, I hold my breath and bite into the worm. Steven must have eaten worms during his Navy SEAL training, I think as I chew, doing my best to keep my mind off what’s in my mouth. I bet Steven ate worse things than worms and didn’t bat an eye over it. I do bat an eye, but force myself to swallow. The worm goes down smoothly and, to my surprise, my stomach doesn’t try to push it back up. In fact, it just reminds me I’m still hungry and that I should eat more.
“Oh, fuck it,” I sigh as I take another bite. “I’m in an alien jungle, eating worms. How much worse could my day get?”
It’s a rhetorical question because I can easily think of at least a hundred ways my day could get worse, starting with something tearing me apart. Reminding myself that I’m lucky, I stuff therest of the worm into my mouth before giving Adam a shaky thumbs-up. “Delicious,” I say while chewing, only gagging a little when the tip of the worm’s tail slips out of my mouth. Thinking of spaghetti, I slurp it back in. Can’t afford to waste food, right?
Adam is bouncing on the spot like an overeager puppy, and when he sees I’ve finished the worm, he immediately darts off to find another one. Groaning, I crawl over to a rock to rest my back against it, hoping there aren’t any mutated scorpions waiting for me there. Hopefully, Adam would let me know if there were any.
Thinking about all our earlier interactions, I have to readjust my opinion of my alien keeper. He’s definitely intelligent, and not everything he does is just instinct. Yes, an animal would instinctively know not to touch those red leaves. It might even teach its young the same, but Adam went further than that. He knew what would happen to me if I touched those leaves, and was able to communicate it in a way I understood, despite being literally from a different planet. That’s abstract thinking, and I’m fairly certain it’s one of the criteria for determining whether a species is sentient.
Not only was Adam able to communicate with me, but he also brought me different leaves and later helped me put on my jumpsuit, even though the idea of clothing must be foreign to him. Or is it? Perhaps there’s a village of clothed murder-chameleons somewhere around here and Adam is just the weird nudist who refuses to cover himself?
No, I doubt it. He seemed baffled by my clothing the first time we met, but has since adapted to the idea. Just like he has adapted to the idea that he now has a disabled human on his hands to keep alive because without him, said human would have died at least a dozen times by now. Is that why he took me? Or am I projecting compassion onto what might just be a variation of the “ooh, a shiny rock! I must have that!” instinct?
So many questions. Since it looks like I’ll have the rest of my life to find answers, I let my worries go and just relax. At first, I watch Adam hunting for worms. He keeps bringing them to me and only after I’ve convinced him I’m full does he start eating himself. It’s so damn sweet it melts my heart. My sweet murder-chameleon.
Watching Adam’s sinuous body sends my mind to completely inappropriate places. Even if he isn’t an animal and is a somewhat intelligent alien, it’s still wrong to lust after him. Isn’t it? I bet it is. But those four hands! What would it be like to have sex with someone with four hands? My disability makes the selection of sexual positions and activities dreadfully slim, but Adam can easily hold me up and still be able to—
Nope. Bad Jaime.
Ashamed of myself, I quickly redirect my attention to our surroundings. Black rocks. Pink rocks. The pink ones are some form of sandstone, I think. I’m no geology expert, but since most of the sand around has a similar pink hue to the rocks, and more sand crumbles away when I run my hand over the one I’m leaning against, I’d say yeah. Definitely sandstone. Or do I get to name it, since I’m the first human to see it? I could name it something silly. I bet Jaimonium would look really cool in geology textbooks.
Chuckling, I lift my gaze, a surprised gasp escaping me. “Wow…” The sky, which until now has been a weird shade of lavender, is glowing with bright green lights. Smooth waves run across the entire sky from one horizon to the other, rippling like a flowing river. “Northern lights.” Are they still northern lights when I have no clue where north is on this moon? Chasing the odd thought away, I return my attention to the captivating celestial display. It’s truly breathtaking. I don’t think auroras on Earth get this big or strong, but since I’ve never seen one in person, I can’t really say for sure.
I snort. Looks like all it takes to see the northern lights is to get kidnapped by aliens and crash on an alien moon. Easy peasy.
Adam’s alarmed bark pulls me out of my reverie. When I see him bounding toward me on all eight, I’m immediately on guard, looking for danger. I don’t see any mutated scorpions or anything else, but something has my alien really spooked, so I don’t protest when he grabs me and runs off. There doesn’t seem to be anything hunting us as we barrel through the jungle, but Adam doesn’t slow down. Whenever I try to shift in his arms to at least be able to look at the northern lights, he hisses, pushing me back until I’m hidden under his body. Reminding myself that I decided to trust him from now on, I stop squirming and just try to look for threats, of which there seem to be none.
The jungle is quiet. Actually, it’ssilent. That gets my attention because that’s how silent everything went when Adam first showed up. Is there another of his kind around here? The foliage doesn’t seem to provide too many hiding spots but—
Wait a second. I take a good look at the bushes we rush by. They’re the same ones we’ve been seeing all day, except now they somehow look different. It only takes seeing the not-poison ivy for me to figure out what changed. The once large, splayed out leaves are now curled up in tight rolls. All the leaves on the bushes and trees have changed shapes, most curling up, some snapping closed, some hiding under the branches.
Adam doesn’t give me time to examine the changes. Without stopping, he bounds straight under one of the massive trees. The protruding roots create a system of small caves here, and it’s in one of these caves that Adam finally sets me down. It’s dark, my eyes taking a long time to get accustomed to the low light after the brightness outside.
Soft moss lines the floor of the cave, packed dirt and roots making the walls and the roof. It looks surprisingly cozy, though I can only hope we haven’t invaded someone’s lair. Adam seemsrelaxed now that we’re inside, though, so I take it we’re safe from whatever spooked him.
“This is nice,” I say with a smile as I make myself comfortable in the corner of the cave. It’s so small that I’ll barely be able to stretch out when I lie down, and it smells of wet dog, making me think that maybe something does live here, after all, but it’s cozy and with Adam here, I’m not afraid of the original inhabitants coming back.
“Hmm. Food. Shelter. I really won the survival lottery with you, didn’t I?” A yawn cuts through my words. Adam whines when I open my mouth wide, perhaps thinking I’m about to bite him. Or that he didn’t feed me enough worms. That thought has me explaining hurriedly, “I’m just tired. Need to sleep for a while. It’s safe here, right? I don’t know how long days on this moon last, but it feels like I’ve been up for a week.” It was probably just ten or twelve hours, but with the spaceship crash, nearly drowning and being terrified nearly constantly, I’m exhausted.
Stretching out on the cave floor, I settle on the soft moss. It’s a far cry from an actual bed, but it beats sleeping on rocks. At this point, I’m so tired that I’d sleep anywhere. The last thing I see before sleep pulls me under is the unblinking stare of Adam’s four eyes.
Chapter 10
Adam
MyJaimetrustsmeenough to fall asleep, despite how terrible I am at protecting him. I was so focused on hunting wiggletails for him and then feeding myself that I missed all the signs of the coming sharp light. It took Jaime to bring it to my attention, and that was after he had been staring at the sky like he didn’t know he was supposed to hide when the sharp light comes. Every creature in the forest knows that. Even the trees know it. But not my Jaime.
I rub my hands together, anxious. How am I supposed to keep him safe when he knows nothing? I’ve never taught another creature.
A large, strange cave. Oddly shaped creatures watching me, listening to my words.
