Page 16 of Alien Attachment
—“Failure. Too much autonomy. Refuses to compromise primary systems when ordered.”—
I gasp, withdrawing my tendrils as the memories fade like nightmares in daylight. The stabilizer panel now glows a steady blue, the efficiency reading climbing to eighty-seven percent.
“How did you do that?” Kaylee asks, her voice hushed with reluctant awe. I feel her fear and fascination mingling through our bond, along with something warmer—admiration, perhaps even attraction to my abilities.
“I was... designed to interface with systems. To connect. To harmonize.” I flex my tendrils, watching the luminescent patterns ripple along their length, and notice how her gaze follows the movement with rapt attention. “It’s part of what I am.”
“And what exactly is that?” Her gaze is intent, searching, and when she looks at me like that—really sees me—it’s almost overwhelming.
“A tool,” I say softly, the words bitter even as I speak them. “That’s what they wanted. A perfectly obedient instrument that could interface with their technology, enhance their ships, their weapons.” I meet her eyes, letting her see the truth through our bond. “But I began to... question. To choose which commands to follow.”
Understanding dawns on her face, and with it, a flash of anger that surprises me with its intensity. “That’s why they were shipping you off. You were defective.”
“Failed experiment,” I correct, though the words don’t sting as much when she’s looking at me with something approaching protectiveness. “I would not compromise safety systems when ordered. I would not harm... certain subjects I had bonded with.”
The memory comes clearer now:
A small, terrified technician, her hands shaking as she attaches monitoring devices to my tendrils. Her fear tastes sour through our minor connection. The commander enters, orders me to send a power surge through her to test my obedience.
I refuse.
Pain. Darkness. “Decommission the asset.”
Kaylee’s voice pulls me back, grounding me in the present. “So you can just... what, talk to machines?”
“Not talk. Feel. Connect.” I gesture toward the stabilizer, acutely aware of how her eyes track the movement of my tendrils. “Your ship has patterns, rhythms. I can sense them, adjust them. Make them flow more efficiently.”
She studies me, calculation replacing some of her wariness, and I feel her thoughts through the bond—weighing my usefulness against the danger I represent. But underneath the practical considerations, there’s something else: curiosity about what other things I might be able to... harmonize.
The thought sends heat through both of us, and she quickly looks away.
“The jump drive,” she says finally, her voice slightly breathless. “Can you help calibrate it?”
“Yes.”
We move to the main engine room, where the jump drive dominates the space—a massive cylindrical chamber filled with swirling, prismatic energy. The control panel shows multiple misalignments, the result of our emergency jump. As we work, I’m intensely aware of every movement she makes, every time she reaches past me for a tool, every accidental brush of contact.
Without waiting for permission this time, I extend my tentacle toward the interface. The connection is immediate and overwhelming—raw power coursing through me, the very fabric of space-time bending around the quantum singularity at the drive’s heart.
“Careful!” Kaylee warns, but I’m already deep in the system, feeling the disharmonies, the dangerous fluctuations that could tear the ship apart on the next jump. Through our bond, I sense her watching me with a mixture of concern and fascination, and the knowledge that she cares about my safety sends warmth through me even as I work.
“The containment field is unstable,” I murmur, my voice distorted as my consciousness splits between my body and the ship’s systems. “The quantum matrices are misaligned by point-three microns.”
My tendrils move in complex patterns, making adjustments too subtle for human hands. I feel the drive responding, the chaotic energy patterns smoothing, aligning, harmonizing. The ship seems to sigh around us, tension releasing from its frame like a satisfied exhale.
“Drive calibration at ninety-two percent and rising,” Lila announces with what sounds like approval. “Anomalous interface detected. Analyzing.”
“It’s okay, Lila,” Kaylee says, surprising me. “He’s... helping.”
The simple acceptance in her voice fills me with warmth. She’s defending me to her ship’s AI, treating me as crew rather than cargo.
I withdraw slowly from the system, the separation leaving me momentarily disoriented. When my awareness fully returns to my body, I find Kaylee staring at me, her expression unreadable but her emotions a complex mix of awe, curiosity, and something that feels dangerously like desire.
“That was...” She searches for words, and I feel her struggle to maintain emotional distance. “Impressive.”
A warm pulse of satisfaction flows through me at her acknowledgment, and the bond brightens between us. For a moment, I feel her resistance soften, her carefully maintained walls wavering.
Then the comm system crackles to life, shattering our fragile moment of connection like a plasma blast through hull plating.
