Page 13 of Stowaway to the Stars: A Duet
“Oh, good. Hey, man. Fuck you!” Darcy said, startling everyone. “That was not cool, the way you went all scary monster on my ass, you sick fuck.”
“DARCY!” Stephenie cried. She couldn’t tell if she was humiliated by Darcy or fearful for her. Who knows how this guy could react to something like that?
Darcy shrugged off Stephenie’s concern. “That was such a dick move.”
“Are you TRYING to get him to kill us?” Stephenie asked, glaring at Darcy.
The gray alien named A-rec made a sound that could only be described as a scuff. “It is against our ways to hurt another’s Mate.” His voice was gruffer than Ee-rah’s. Showing his age, perhaps?
Stephenie glanced at Darcy. “Still,” she said, pleading with her eyes for her stubborn friend to listen.
“MATE?” Darcy glared at Stephenie. “The blue one called you that earlier. What the hell does he mean by that?”
Stephenie felt her cheeks warm. “It’s…kind of a long story.” And something she seriously did not want to get into right now. She was still reeling about the whole thing herself. The last thing she wanted was for her best friend and roommate to be passing judgment.
“Yeah, and I bet it’s a good one,” Darcy grumbled. “I don’t trust them.” Her eyes flickered over to A-rec. “Especially that one.”
A-rec straightened up, bringing himself to his full height. “I give my word, I will not hurt you.”
“Oh, is that why you were chasing me down the corridor earlier?” Darcy shot back.
“You misunderstand me, human,” A-rec replied, hesitantly taking a step further into the room. “I wasn’t chasing you to harm you. I simply-”
“Yeah, whatever,” Darcy said, cutting him off. She turned to face Stephenie. “How the hell are we going to get home?”
Stephenie bit her lip. “That… I don’t know. I’ve run into some problems trying to figure that out. I have no idea how we got here in the first place- neither does Ee-rah. He just found me- and it’s not like they can just drive the ship to Earth and drop us off.” Stephenie turned to Ee-rah. “You can’t do that…right?”
Ee-rah smirked down at her. “No, my Mate. I cannot do that.”
“There is something we can do,” A-rec said carefully. “But it would be risky.”
“Don’t,” Ee-rah growled at the newcomer. He narrowed his icy eyes at A-rec.
“Why?” A-rec asked, raising an eyebrow at Ee-rah in turn.
“She is my Mate.”
A-rec tilted his head to the side and flashed a smile at Ee-rah, revealing his small fangs. “You haven’t told her.” Why did he seem almost gleeful at the fact?
Stephenie glanced between the two. “Told me… What?” When no one responded, she narrowed her eyes at Ee-rah. “What have you not told me, Ee-rah?”
It was A-rec who responded. “There is a way we can get you back to your planet, but as I said before, it’s risky.”
“Well, let’s do it then!” Darcy stood from her spot on the bunk. “What are we waiting for?”
A-rec sent Darcy an annoyed look. “Did you not hear me, little human? I said there is a risk.”
“So what kind of risk? Anything is better than being trapped on an alien spaceship in space.” She shook her head. “God, I just sounded like a bad B movie.”
“I don’t know what a bad B movie is. However, there’s a Transporter on the bridge of the ship,” A-rec explained. “But the bridge is constantly manned, and any time someone uses the Transporter, the date and location are stored in the computer.”
“Wait…” Stephenie said, her mouth opening and closing in disbelief. She narrowed her eyes at Ee-rah. “You…knew there was a way to take me back home, but you didn’t tell me?” Stephenie couldn’t explain the ache she felt in her heart, the pain of betrayal that filled her. It wasn’t as if she CARED about Ee-rah. It wasn’t as if she trusted him. He was just some weird, blue alien that happened to find her before anyone else. Yeah, they had a few good fucks, but that didn’t mean anything… At least not to her. She had only been doing what she thought she needed to do to survive and find her way back home. There was no way she was feeling some sort of way about it.
At least, that’s what she told herself.
“Seph-e-knee,” Ee-rah said, reaching out his hand to touch her face. He looked desperate now, pleading with her with his eyes.
Stephenie jerked out of his reach. “Don’t fucking touch me!” She cried. “You lied to me. You said you didn’t know how I could get back home. You… You just wanted me to stay here with you, didn’t you? You were going to keep me here, locked up in this room, like some sort of pet.”
