Page 68 of Technically Abducted
"You're not crazy," I tell him. "It was real. They're real."
"My entire life," he says quietly. "My sobriety, my career, everything I've built—it's all because of an alien abduction."
"It's because of you," I correct. "Whatever happened in that room, you're the one who stayed clean. You're the one who turned your life around."
"But if he hadn't taken me..." Alex trails off, shaking his head. "What if I'd died in that alley? What if he accidentally saved my life?"
The possibility hangs in the air between us, heavy with implications neither of us wants to examine too closely.
"Alex," I say finally. "The alien who took you—did he seem like he'd made a mistake?"
"Absolutely terrified he'd screwed up." Alex meets my eyes. "Why?"
"Because if he broke protocol by taking a minor..." I pause, thinking about everything Tev'ra told me about procedures and assessments. "What if there are different rules for situations like that? What if the system is more flexible than they made it seem?"
I shake my head.
"And yours was recent?"
"Three weeks ago." I glance at the container of gems on my desk. "He brought me back with those as compensation."
Alex follows my gaze, his eyes widening when he sees the crystals. "Holy shit. Those are beautiful. What are they worth?"
"I don't know. I haven't looked into it." I can't explain why the gems feel too painful to deal with, why they represent everything I've lost rather than what I've gained.
"Finn." Alex's voice is gentle. "You're in love with him, aren't you? Your blue alien."
I've been avoiding thinking about it in those terms, focusing on the loss of connection rather than examining what that connection actually was.
"It doesn't matter," I say finally. "He sent me back. Standard protocol. I'll never see him again."
"Maybe," Alex says slowly. "Or maybe there's more to this than either of us understands."
"What do you mean?"
"I'm serious, Finn. You said this was an assessment program, right? That implies there are different possible outcomes. Maybe your blue guy thought he was following standard procedure, but maybe there are exceptions."
"Even if that's true, what am I supposed to do about it? I can't exactly file a complaint with alien customer service."
"No," Alex says, and there's something in his tone that makes me pay attention. "But you could make some noise. Draw attention. Force them to respond."
"What kind of noise?"
Alex grins, and for the first time since he arrived, he looks like the tech genius I know him to be. "The kind that gets noticed. The kind that can't be ignored." He pauses. "You want answers, Finn? About what happened to me, about what happened to you, about why they think they can just kidnap people and send them back with shiny rocks?"
I look at the gems again, then back at Alex. For the first time in three weeks, I feel something other than hollow sadness. Something that might be anger, or determination, or hope.
"What are you suggesting?"
"I'm suggesting we do what we do best. We break their system. We cause enough digital chaos that they have to acknowledge us." Alex's grin widens. "How do you feel about writing some code that's guaranteed to get alien attention?"
The idea is insane. Dangerous. Potentially catastrophic for any hope of seeing Tev'ra again.
But it's also the first thing that's made sense to me since I stepped off that transport platform three weeks ago.
"What did you have in mind?"
Chapter Twenty-Two
