Page 3 of Alien's Challenge
A fog lingered in her head, making her sluggish and slow to respond. She was forgetting something important, but it kept slipping from her mind, like trying to hold water in her hands.
People—alien people? —kept talking. Alice tried to ask where she was and all the other typical questions about what the hell was going on, but her words slurred. They injected her with something. She tried to struggle but moved like she was stuck in mud.
He was there. Tall, red scales, watching her with reptilian eyes. His name was Randevere, as far as she could tell. Someone jabbed her behind the ear, and she could understand them. When she tried to speak, they patted her on the head and called her a “cute, little, squishy thing.”
They treated her like a child. Worse, a pet. Randevere’s cute, squishy human pet.
Before she could protest that she was a person, not a cat, they shoved her into a crate. The days that followed were hazy. Sleep in the crate. Come out of the crate and sit on a pillow. Be quiet.
Alice suspected that her food or water had been drugged. Exhaustion never seemed to leave her.
Today was different. Today, they were on a train. For the last few hours—how many she couldn’t say, but it felt like five or six—the train zipped along through an urban maze into a rolling prairie, and now the tracks wound their way through a mountain pass.
Alice watched the landscape, the fog in her head slowly lifting. She marveled at how the alien landscape all felt so similar, despite two suns in the sky. The larger sun looked like the regular old sun. The second was tucked up alongside it, diminutive in appearance, and cast a bluish light.
This was definitely an alien planet.
Surrounded by aliens.
Who put a collar on her.
Sitting on a cushion and being treated as a pet wasn’t the worst outcome. No one tried to eat or fuck her. Randevere largely ignored her, which was fine and dandy. She had food and water, even if it was drugged. Clothing that covered a bit more would have been nice, though.
The current snow-covered mountain view outside suggested that Alice would freeze when they got to wherever they were going. Fluffy white flakes sped past the window. Hopefully, someone would realize she needed shoes, pants, and a coat.
Alice rubbed a hand up her arm to warm her bare skin.
“What is it doing?”
A tug at the leash attached to her collar forced her to turn at Randevere’s question.
“I’m cold. I need clothing.” After chipping her, they gave her a piece of gauzy cloth and a blanket. She wrapped the gauze around herself like a sarong, even though the cloth didn’t hide anything, and huddled under the blanket.
Randevere watched her, the vertical pupils in his eyes narrowing, and the frills at the side of his neck fluttered. “She’s trying to speak. How charming.”
“I’m not trying, Iamspeaking, you giant red jackass. Give me shoes.” She pointed to her foot. “Shoes! I need shoes.”
“You do have tiny feet, yes you do.” He patted her on the head.
“No, I’m cold! I need shoes and a coat. Look at my goosebumps!” She shoved her arm in his face. The thin hairs stood on end.
Her antics no longer amused Randevere. He pushed her away, forcing her back down onto her cushion. “You will be quiet, or you will be put in your cage. Do you understand?”
“I understand you’re a dick.”
He tilted his head, watching her.
“I understand,” she muttered. She curled up on the cushion, tucking her feet under herself, and resumed watching the world glide by.
She didn’t know where they were going, but she guessed it wouldn’t be her idea of fun.
The train entered a tunnel. With the outside view nothing but blackness, Alice had nothing to distract herself from her misery and resentment.
Randevere had staff, or maybe henchmen. Three aliens, the same reptilian variety as him, came in and out of the carriage. When he wasn’t issuing orders, Randevere busied himself with a handheld device that reminded her of a phone, not that she could get a good look at the screen. Not that she could read anything on the screen.
Ugh, abduction problems.
Maybe he was Googling “how to take care of your new human.” At least she knew that he knew her species name. She heard someone say human and Earth, so all he had to do was look up her basic human needs. The internet made this problem, so now it could fix it for her.
