I watch him stroke Rebecca between her legs like he’s petting a pet pussy. I smile thinking about that sentence, but my smile turns to a frown when she violently pushes his grey hand away and he retaliates by harshly smacking her naked breasts like aman who has slapped many women’s naked breasts and knows how to make it hurt.
She begins crying even louder. I pity Rebecca, she never said so, but I have no doubt that Rebecca has never had a boyfriend and was saving herself for marriage. Now she’ll never get that wedding day or the human husband. Instead she’s living out another woman’s fantasy of being an alien man’s pet.
I want to tell Rebecca that it’s not that bad, but I don’t want the grey man to know that my muzzle has been partially released, so I say nothing. This man who bought us may look innocent enough, but he did just purchase us, and we’re naked except for our leashes.Who knows what kind of punishments he inflicts on pets or slaves or whatever we are if we don’t obey him?
Rebecca is inconsolable, so our grey captor abandons her, and moves to stroke me like a pussy. If I could purr for him I would. This wasn’t my fantasy, but neither was getting married and living a traditional life. To be honest, I never had a fantasy. I think I’ve been stuck in survival mode since my father died.
And so far, this doesn’t seem too bad. The more I see of our new master, the more I like the look of him. More than the octopus-like aliens, and he, at least, spoke to me in English, even though he said he was never going to do it again. But he already broke that promise once which speaks volumes to his character, grey skin zombie or not. He has compassion.
I watch him stroke my pubic hair and I want to know more about him. Why he looks human but with grey skin and why he has a leash on us.Are we his pets for real?
I don’t know. But right now I want to please him so he doesn’t return me to the octopus-like aliens. I think about how I might mimic a purring sound as I look into my master’s green eyes.
Something passes between us. A spark.
If he were human I’d say it was lust. Or maybe it’s just because a man is rubbing my genitals. He’s better looking than any of the other aliens and with my survival mode kicking in, I might even be convincing myself that this alien is handsome and that I want him to touch me.
The moment shatters when an alarm pierces the air, and suddenly, I’m being yanked into the grey man’s arms.
The airlock is opening.
Loud klaxons blare, but I still can hear Rebecca yelling at me. “God has spoken to me through prayer! Free yourself from that grey Devil and join me! We will be forgiven!”
Before I can process her words, the strongest wind I’ve ever felt rips through the room, pulling everything into the vacuum of space. The air is freezing, burning my skin with its intensity. I hold onto the grey man—or maybe he’s holding onto me. I’m not sure anymore.
All I know is that when it’s over, Rebecca is gone. She chose to risk her eternal soul rather than be caressed inappropriately by this alien.That is true courage.
The alarms fall silent, leaving only the slight vibration of the ship and the sound of my own breathing.
The grey man looks at me, his expression one of shock, and then he asks me something unintelligible, I assume he asked, “Why?”
I stare at him, incredulously.Seriously?I want to scream at him, ‘Gee, I don’t know. Maybe she didn’t want to be your naked pet in space.’ But I keep my mouth shut. Instead, I motion for him to take off my muzzle.
He ignores me.
My gaze drifts to the small window in the airlock door. Rebecca is out there, frozen in place, her face serene, like some kind of macabre Sleeping Beauty.
Rest in peace,I think, swallowing hard. Despite not being religious, I mentally pray that she’s in a better place. I should have noticed she was suicidal, and said something more comforting. But then again, I was honest with her, because I don’t know what’s going to happen.
The grey man follows my line of sight, then quickly shackles my wrist to his, tethering me so I can’t make a similar choice. He pulls me away from the airlock and leads me back to the area we were in before.
The bustling crowd of aliens is gone. Now, only a few remain—three grey men and some of those awful octopus aliens, their tentacles moving sluggishly as if nothing unusual just happened.
As we walk, the shackle around my wrist rubs uncomfortably against my master’s. His skin feels human, almost familiar—just grey. I glance out another window, searching for Rebecca, but she’s gone. It’s like she never existed.
Did that really just happen?
I close my eyes and force myself to breathe. It was real. I know it was. I wish it weren’t.
Rebecca chose to end her life rather than live with a complete loss of dignity. And all while I imagined I was having a “special moment” with our new owner.
What does that make me?
CHAPTER 8
Aefre
When we board theLuminous Arc, my second is there to meet us.