I can’t think about that right now. If I do, I’ll totally break down. I have to think about my plan.
They drag me into the hold of the ship despite my deliberately slow steps. Instead of flinging me down into another hold like they did before, I’m taken to a sterile white room and dumped onto a narrow white board of a bed. Oh God. This looks like an operating room.
The guard that has taken me as his personal hostage looms over me, fingering his weapon. A few moments later, the door opens and another one of the Little Green Men comes in. He speaks, and his voice has a different timbre than the others.
This is the infected one that was mentioned? It tilts its head toward me, curious.
“Yes,” the guard says in his growling language.
I try to chirp back to it, to let it know I understand its words.
Its head tilts again. Is it trying to speak?
“It’s stupid,” the guard says, and smacks my arm with the butt of his gun. “Want me to kill it?”
“I’m not infected,” I say in the guttural language of the szzt. “I have a symbiont. A creature living inside me. But it can’t be removed without killing its host.”
A parasite? How very curious. I wonder that I can remove it anyhow. I should like to study this and see how long it can survive in an artificial environment, if at all.
They want to kill me just to see what happens? These guys are dicks, as Liz would say. “You can’t do that,” I say quickly. When they simply stare at me, I cast about for a logical explanation as to why they can’t. “I’m worth more alive than dead.”
The Little Green Man tilts his head and then reaches out to touch my ear. Even though I want to slap his hand away, I have to force myself not to react. This is the one we implanted the translator in, yes? Her aural cavity shows markings of one, but I confess all these things look alike to me.
“I had a translator,” I tell him.
Where did it go?
“I had the ship remove it.”
The ship on the surface? The creature’s head tilts again. If it weren’t for the fact that my life was in danger, all the head-tilting would be kind of hilarious. It is not functioning.
“It’s not completely functioning. It doesn’t fly, but I have a secret code,” I bluff. “I know the access codes to the computers. I can give you the ship if you return me to the surface and never come after me and the other women ever again.”
The thing chirps repeatedly, and somehow, I know he’s laughing. Why would I want an old ship that does not fly?
“You can tow it,” I tell him, staring into the enormous black eyes of the alien with what I hope is a confident expression. “I’m sure you have a way. And people always pay good money for…” I struggle to find the alien word for ‘antique’ and settle for “…very old and special things. That ship has lots of valuable equipment, plus all the valuables its passengers left behind when it was stranded several hundred years ago.”
The aliens exchange a look.
We can simply take it with us, along with you, the one alien says. You know both of what you speak.
“But if you take me from here, I will die. My dead body is of very limited use to you. Your employers won’t pay as much for a dead girl as they would for a live one. I know this.”
I don’t know this. I’m guessing.
The black eyes of the Little Green Man blink slowly. We will discuss this.
I look over at the computers blinking on the wall. “Cool. You want me to just wait here?”
Put her in one of the holding cells.
The guardsman grabs me with a brutal hand, his rough skin tearing at my arm. I fight against him, but it’s only playacting. It’s what I think they expect me to do. In reality, a holding cell will work just as well as anything else for my plans. So I struggle and fight against the guard as he drags me down one of the narrow, metallic halls of the alien ship, and flings me into a dark hold. This time, there’s no cage, just what looks like a storage room. Good. I skid to the floor and huddle against the wall, doing my best to look frightened. Granted, it’s not that hard because I’m scared out of my mind, but I’m also thinking hard.
The guardsman looks down at me and curls his thick lip. He says something that I have no translation for, but is probably an insult, and slaps a panel on the outside wall. The door closes, and I’m alone in the dark.
Panic flutters in my chest. I have to remind myself that this is good news. This is what I want. I need to be alone.
Oh God, I need this to work.
I run my tongue along my gums, searching for the small packet I pushed there. Still there. I pull it out and rub it against my tunic to dry it, then press it between my lips to hold onto it while I look for the air filters to this room.
I’d noticed on the elders’ ship that it’d had air vents much like my old apartment back on Earth did. That had got me thinking about a game plan and what I could do against the Little Green Men. They have more technology than I do. They have guns and they have the numbers, so I have to be sneaky…and fearless.
I find a vent near the edge of the floor and dig my fingernails into it until I locate what feels like a fastening of some kind, and then rip it off. I tear a few fingernails, but that is a small price to pay. With shaking hands, I peel the thin layer of plastic off of the packet and remove half of the contents.
One part is a computer part, much like a USB drive, that will allow the elders’ ship to access this ship, provided I can find a compatible slot to plug it into.
The other part is a small square of filter that I’ve pulled from the elders’ ship. After hundreds of years of being in the atmosphere, it’s filled with concentrated nalium. I know that there is an element in the atmosphere of Not-Hoth that makes it impossible for humans to survive for long. There are trace elements of it in the atmosphere, and within a week, we succumbed to sickness, our bodies growing weak and our minds disoriented. Our khui adapts us and allows us to live planet-side. Of course, planet-side, there’s only trace amounts of nalium in the air. But after hundreds of years, the ship’s filters are full of the element. And if I add it to the air supply in my room, I’m hoping it’ll poison my guard.
The computer assured me that the tiny amount that I drop into the air filtering system is enough to do it, but the computer’s also three hundred (and some change) years old. It could be wrong. This ship could be more self-sufficient than I hope.
A million things can go wrong. All I can do is cross my fingers.
I replace the filter cover and sniff the air. I don’t smell anything. The air doesn’t taste weird. I have no idea if it’s working or not, if the poison is seeping into the air of my small chamber or throughout the ship.
I tuck my body against the wall and wait.
? ? ?
Hours later, I’m in a frenzy of worry. There’s no difference in the air that I can tell, and all I have left is the small bit of computer I’m supposed to somehow interface to one that’s three hundred years younger.
This is the stupidest plan ever.
Despair threatens to overwhelm me. I ignore it, because there is no Plan C. This has to work. This has to.
A mental image of Aehako’s fallen body flashes before my eyes, and I clench my fists, determined not to cry. He’s not dead. He’s not.
I’d know if he was, wouldn’t I? But we’re not connected by khui. We’re only connected by heart and mind and choice. We don’t have that deeper bond. We never will because of my body—
Someone fumbles at the door.
I jerk to my feet, my stiff muscles complaining. My body’s instantly on alert, my heart hammering in my chest. Did they decide to take my offer after all? The broken ship for our freedom?
Then again, what is to stop them from taking the ship and us? Or taking the ship and then coming back and snaring us at a later date? If they’re into slavery, it’s not as if they’re upstanding people anyhow. They can’t be trusted.
The door slides open, and the guard walks in.