Page 48 of Alien Desire
The blood rushes to my head and I am suddenly dizzy, grappling to steady myself with a hand on the wall of the machine.
Breathe, I tell myself, breathe.
I knew it but now it is all the more real. A heartbeat? A heartbeat in my stomach?
Steadying myself, I step out of the machine and I find Tor standing in the corner of the room, arms folded across his chest, watching me.
“I’m pregnant,” I blurt out.
“You told me this wasn’t possible.”
“It shouldn’t be!”
“I knew I shouldn’t trust human technology. Look at this place and its rudimentary machinery. Of course your medicines are useless,” he scoffs, sweeping his hand over the room.
“So it is my fault?” I snap. “I seem to recall two of us involved in creating this situation.”
He ignores my comment.
“I need to get a message to Astia immediately.” He spins on his heels and marches away, leaving me standing naked and aghast in the middle of the medical bay.
For a moment I’m so shocked I don’t move, and then I hurry after him. “What do you mean send a message?”
“I have nearly succeeded in upgrading the computer. It requires only a few flicks of switches and then the computer will be capable of sending a message to my planet.”
“It’s nearly ready? How long has it been nearly ready?” I’d noticed he’d spent less time tinkering with the machine in the last few days, but I thought that was because I’d proved a more enjoyable distraction. Now I realise he’s been hiding things from me.
“Four days,” he grunts, as he flops himself down on the chair and punches at buttons.
I grab at his hand and he brushes it away. “Four days?! Why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t you finish the job and send for the ship like you said?”
“Because I wasn’t ready for us to leave this planet yet, and for everything to change.” He doesn’t look at me, his attention is drawn to the screen and to the buttons he busily presses in front of him. I barely have time to process this, more keen to stop him from doing whatever he is doing before we’ve talked this through.
“So why are you contacting them now?”
“I need to get you back to Astia as quickly as possible.”
Leaning all my weight on the back of his chair, I swing him away from the console to face me. “Why?” His words sound so cold and hollow, void of emotion. I don’t know what I was expecting. He’d talked so often about mating and procreation in the past, I thought he’d be delighted, ecstatic. He just sounds annoyed. “There’s no way I’m getting rid of it.” I snarl.
Horror sparks across his face and he grabs me by the upper arms. “What?”
“Nothing,” I mumble.
“I was happy to entertain the idea of us delaying our return to Astia, of exploring the universe together or perhaps allowing you a visit to Earth. But not anymore, Omega. We’re going home. Now!” he swings his chair back to the monitor.
“But you promised!” My voice is a high pitch screech. “You promised you’d fetch us a ship and we’d head out there exploring together.”
“Circumstances have altered and as a consequence so has my mind.”
“And do I get a say in this? Do we get to talk this through? I’m not yours to order about. We’re not even mated.”
“I can change that,” he says with a growl so low and with such menace a sinister chill skates down my spine.
“What in Hell do you mean by that?”
“I can bite you anytime I want, little Honeypot.”
I take a step backwards and curl my other hand into a fist. “I’d like to see you fucking try,” I yell. I may be small but I’m a fighter and I make my own decisions. This is my body, my baby and I get a say in both our futures. “You can call them all you like. I’m not going.”
