Pheromone, page 18
part #1 of For the Love of Aliens Series
“How do I find the nets? Or a manual switch?” I sound hysterical now. I’m sure I look hysterical, standing there aroused and wild in the middle of a barbaric alien battle. Hot blood spatters across the floor at my feet, staining my toes. I look down at it and then slowly turn to stare out at the pair of Aspises as they circle one another.
Big D is the one who’s bleeding. He’s got a gash across his right wing that must’ve been inflicted with such force that his blood was sent flying to spatter all over me.
“You’ll need to climb up the side of the ship. There should be one just above the door on my left. That is, if I recall the layout correctly. I no longer have access to the ship’s floor plans, only my own fallible memory.”
Fantastic.
All I have to do is scale the side of a giant spaceship, locate a manual switch, and shoot a homing net at a dragon. Lovely. Exactly how I planned on spending my summer.
“The suit I provided you will allow you to climb the ship with ease; it was designed for that purpose. You’ll need the boots and the gloves.”
Now she tells me.
“Nice, really, thanks for the history lesson, Zero.” And thanks for making something so hard sound so reasonable and easy. Yeah, I’ll just climb the crashed spaceship and shoot a net gun at a hostile alien female.
But the mind and body will do incredible things when faced with certain death.
I pretend like that’s my primary concern, my own mortality. It’s not.
Yeah, if I don’t do this, and Big D loses, I’m dead. That’s it. I’ll be eaten, and even though I said I didn’t care if he ate me, I didn’t mean it. I don’t want to die. More importantly, I don’t want Jane to feel alone. If she’s holding onto some thin strand of hope the way I am, we can be each other’s support in a crazy, impossible situation. She’s fighting for me; I have to fight for her.
Mostly … I don’t want to disappoint Dragon Dude.
I yank on the boots and the matching white gloves, and I sprint to the doorway, searching around for one of the huge vines that have a stranglehold on the ship. I do my best to get a grip on one. Doesn’t work. It’s humid and somewhat slimy to the touch. I turn back to the screen in time to see Zero typing out fresh instructions.
“There should be handholds beside the door. The gloves and boots will adhere to them, preventing you from falling as you climb.”
I try my best to ignore the fight that’s occurring just below me, but it’s impossible not to look. The female has Big D on his back currently, one of her wing-hands at his throat. He’s flailing in a puddle of blood, desperate to get her off. She’s not doing much more than keeping him contained, but I notice that the pair of them are pushing at one another’s tails, as if they’re trying to impale the other—or avoid being impaled.
He overpowers her as I watch, throwing her so hard against another tree trunk that it actually snaps, crashing into the woods behind her. Big D and the female circle one another, teeth bared, spikes raised, horns flashing. They charge forward and clash, locked at the head, fighting to flip the other onto their back.
Shit.
I turn away and then reach around the doorway, shoving vines and leaves and glowing snails out of my way. The handholds are there, but it makes sense why I didn’t see them right away. They’re absolutely buried beneath the foliage, stuffed with debris and dead leaves. Once I’ve got a few cleared out, I grab onto one, fit my foot into the other, and swing myself out of the doorway.
For a second there, I’m sure that I’ve got this in the bag. I’m going to deploy the net and be a hero. It does not turn out that way.
Whatever the boots and gloves and handholds are supposed to do, they don’t work. When I try to wedge my right foot into another of the notches, it slips right out and I overbalance. My left hand grasps uselessly for another hold but misses, and then I’m falling backward with a gasp. I don’t even have time to scream.
The female catches me with a wing-hand, having spun away from Dragon Dude to go for me instead. She lifts me right to her face and sniffs me. Her bright eyes are so close to mine that I see striations of red and blue in her irises. Specks of silver. That ring around her pupil.
“Mate … this?” she asks, and then she laughs, and her mouth is opening like some sort of fucked-up Lovecraftian nightmare. I knew these creatures had big mouths, but not that big. She opens wide enough to swallow me whole, wrapping my waist with her tongue and pulling me into the heat of her mouth. I’m screaming now, mindless sounds of terror that I’m ashamed of but can’t seem to help.
I’m just a normal person trapped in a place I do not belong.
I am a human woman, not an FBI agent or a marine or a vampire slayer or a wizard.
A person.
A soon to be dead person.
I don’t close my eyes even though I know that I should. I see everything: the pinkness of the female’s tongue, the saliva dripping from the roof of her mouth, the darkness of her throat as she pushes me toward oblivion. Her teeth press into my back and pain explodes through me, knocking the fear right out of me. There’s no room to be afraid; there’s only room to hurt. Blood—my blood—splashes onto her tongue as she releases me and I tumble headfirst toward death.
My body slams into her throat, and then she swallows, and the contraction of her muscles drags me down into blackness. It’s utterly horrifying. I—like most people—have had thoughts like, what’s the worst way to die? Fire was one of my great fears. Hot lava, irrationally enough. Disintegrating in some hot spring in Yellowstone like a bumbling tourist. Those were all ideas that had occurred to me.
Swallowed by an alien monster? That was not on my list.
Another contraction of the female’s throat sends me deeper into her body, and I tumble into a vat of acid. Her stomach. It’s not an open space like I might’ve imagined if I’d ever imagined something this horrendous, but rather like being trapped in hot, slimy plastic wrap. It’s smothering me, and I can’t decide if I’m going to suffocate first or melt away into nothing.
The suit—and boots and gloves—seem to be doing an admirable job of protecting my body, but my face … I wish I could scream, but that’s not an option. No sound will come out. I’m stuck there inside a fucking alien and wishing I hadn’t been so glib about the lawyer’s last moments. Douchebag he might’ve been, but very few people deserve this level of torture.
Jane, I’m sorry, I think, and if I could’ve cried then, I would’ve. Mom. Dad. Nate. My sisters, Jenna, Kari, and Maribel. I love you guys. I love you guys so much.
I’m sorry, Dragon Dude. You were fucking awesome.
My dying wish is to see them all, one last time.
A strange contraction ripples around me, smothering me further, and then I’m being expelled with such violent force that I’m convinced I just died. This velocity and speed, it’s all the sensation of my soul slipping from my body. It’s a feeling similar to that sort you get when you’re drifting asleep, and then it feels like you’re falling off a cliff, and you wake with a startle. I assume that’s what dying feels like.
Then I hit the tree.
A groan of pure agony slips past my burning lips, and I fall to the ground—on my head. The pain in my neck and shoulders is nothing compared to the acid burns on my face, so I barely acknowledge it. I lie there on alien soil, more or less blind, bleeding everywhere, skin on fire. I can hear the sounds of the fight as it continues, but I can’t see anything.
I truly don’t think I’ll ever be able to see anything ever again.
When I try to move, my body ignores the command. There’s a disturbing numbness from my lower half, and I can only guess that when the female bit down, she severed or broke something in my spine. I’m alive, but not for long.
I lay my head down on the grass and find that my body is taking in these strange, erratic gulps of air. They’re wet and gurgly, and I just wish that it was over already. If I’m going to die, why does it have to be such a long and painful death?
There’s a horrible sound not long after that, a death rattle that brings a fresh sob to my lips. That’ll be me soon enough. I hate that. I hate it. I don’t want to die here, an infinitesimal nothing, a speck in the universe. If I were at home, surrounded by people who love me, I wouldn’t feel this way, this sad and pathetic and small and useless. I just want my family and friends back.
“Tiny female.” The ground shivers as a massive body trundles over to where I’m lying on the ground. I’m rolled onto my back, but there’s no pain. As of now, I’m barely aware of what’s going on.
“Why didn’t you wake me up?!” I’m shouting at my mom as I struggle to find my car keys. I know that I left them around here somewhere. “I have a gig in thirty minutes!”
“You’ve built a tight ship, Eve. You have reliable employees who know what they’re doing. Take the day off and have lunch with your sisters.”
I remember thinking how insane that sounded, how a day off was like giving into laziness and forgoing everything that I’d worked so hard to build. But then I’d looked at my mother’s face, and I’d really thought about it. During my dying breath, would I remember that I worked an extra day or would I remember that I went to lunch with my sisters? Only one of those things would have staying power in my flickering memory.
Luckily for me, I remember my sisters. Luckily for me, I went to lunch.
I’m smiling as I die, giving into the softness and relaxing as I stretch my arms above my head.
That’s when the pain hits.
It wakes me from my stupor and I start to scream.
I’m on my back outside the ship with Big D above me, his tongue bathing my acidic, bloodied form. He washes me with hot saliva as I continue to scream, head thrown back as my body bows with the pain. I’m looking upside down at the dead female now, her throat torn out, blood soaking the forest floor around her.
I’m also in agony.
Big D must’ve licked my eyes first—um, gross—so I have no trouble seeing. What I do have trouble with is the blinding pain in my spine as he licks me back together. Quite literally, when I drop my head down to stare at my midsection, I see that I was nearly bitten in half.
I pass out again, either from the pain or the view of my severed body, I’m not sure. When I wake up the second time, I’m lying in the nest.
“What …” I’m so beyond dizzy that when I struggle to sit up, I fall back and end up tumbling stupidly into the furs. Agony strikes me in the stomach, and I look down to see that there’s a ragged, angry wound around my middle. But I’m whole. I’m alive. I’m in a lot of fucking pain, but I’m alive. “Big D …” I don’t know his name—he won’t give it to me—but I sure wish I did.
Because I owe him. Again. At this point, if he wants to mate with me, I should just say yes sir. I bungled his rescue attempt and ended up making the fight even harder on him. And after I just rejected him? Hell, I’m stupid sometimes.
It’s not easy to get up, like all my limbs are fuzzy and asleep. When I finally do stand, I’m like a newborn foal trying to get my unwilling legs to obey. I stumble into the living room with a hand on the wall for support.
That's where I find Big D.
He’s lying on his side, panting heavily. I can no longer see the gash in his wing or the claw marks on his throat. He must’ve healed all of those with his magic spit. And yet … he doesn’t look so good. He’s small. The smallest I have ever seen him. Dim, too. His bioluminescent shine is dull and dispirited.
He looks like he’s dying.
“Big D, are you okay?” I ask, pushing up off the wall and coming over to stand beside him. I can’t keep my feet, so I end up falling hard to my knees and gritting my teeth against the pain. I reach out a hand and place it on his scales. His purple parts have faded so much that they pulse with a whisper of light before going dark. That, and he’s incredibly sweaty in a way I haven’t seen before.
Was it not like twenty minutes ago that he looked like a dark and unyielding god, standing with his arms spread and his wings raised against the lightning-cracked sky? What the hell?
“Venom,” he replies without ever opening his eyes. He doesn’t have the translator, so he must simply be guessing as to what I just asked. “Death.”
Death? He can’t die. This can’t happen.
We were just about to … you know.
I take the headset off and put it on his head.
“What can I do to help you?” I ask, immediately removing it and placing it on my own rapidly swelling migraine. I mean head. On my migraine-swollen head. I wait as he cracks one eye open to stare at me.
He doesn’t answer. It could be because he’s stubborn and only answers when he damn well feels like it … or it could be because he’s actually dying here. His eyes close, and I find myself fixated on the rise and fall of his chest.
Primal terror oozes into my blood, turning it sluggish, making me waver on my knees. For a few seconds there, I’m sure that I’m about to pass out. Me and the dragon, dying together in a sweaty heap. It’s far less terrifying to confront the idea of death with him here beside me. I don’t feel quite as alone as I did when I was in the gullet of the female.
My body gives an involuntary shudder as I swallow down a sour taste in my mouth. When the adrenaline is gone and I’m lying in the dark waiting for sleep, I’ll relive that moment and it’ll torture the hell out of me. For now, I have to at least try to do something. Although, isn’t that how you ended up in this position in the first place? If I’d just let Big D fight the female on his own, maybe it would’ve gone down a little better?
I remind myself that she’d already made him bleed before I ever got involved. Doesn’t help any. I feel so guilty right now. The gurgle of regret is worse than the aftereffects of the ragged wound around my midsection or the chemical burns on my face.
I look to my only friend and companion, a semi-sentient bitch of a chatbot named Zero.
We are so fucked.
“Is there anything I can do to save him? He says he’s dying, that he’s been poisoned. Is there someone in the market I could ask for help?” I’m desperate here. This stupid alien has been nothing but nice to me. On top of that, he’s … he’s courting me. It feels like he’s my boyfriend or something.
I’m fighting for both of our lives.
“Are you sure he said he was poisoned?” Zero queries, and I blink in confusion. When I don’t respond right away, she clarifies. “If you bite it, and it’s harmful, it’s poison. If it bites you, and it’s harmful, it’s venom. Is he envenomated or poisoned? Seeing as we’re discussing a mating battle between two Aspis—highly venomous species who rarely fail to strike—I’m assuming the former.”
I want to scream.
Teeth gritted, I grind out a reply.
“Envenomated then. He’s envenomated.”
“Did the female bite him?” she asks, but I’m not sure. Looking back at Big D, there aren’t any visible wounds that I can find. “Did any of the spines along her back or tail penetrate his skin?”
“I think she got him with her tail,” I reply, doing my best not to look at the wound around my midsection. The pink space suit is trashed, and I’m held together with little more than dragon spit and an iron will. I reach out a tentative hand, hovering my palm over Big D’s scales. When I touch him, he gives a violent shudder and a growl that ripples in his lips and shows his teeth.
Don’t think about it, Eve. Don’t go there.
So I don’t. I won’t. I can’t think about the horror of being swallowed.
“I might be able to help you. Might being a very strong word.” That’s what Zero has to say when I look back at her—well, not her face. The black screen with the pink MS-DOS circa 1985 text on it. That, and the big blinking block of a cursor that follows after. “My people were working to produce antivenom before our research team was—”
The text cuts off abruptly and Zero starts a new line.
“The Aspis produce a type of venom that’s not been documented in the whole of the Noctuida." I have absolutely no idea what she’s talking about at this point, but I also don’t know how to say ‘hurry the fuck up and tell me what to do!’ without causing her to shut down completely. If she doesn’t help me, it’s over. There’s not a damn thing I can do.
Big D shifts, a groan of pain escaping him just before he turns and coughs purple blood all over the spaceship’s dirty floors. He collapses again and curls up on himself, tail tucked close, wings folded.
“The Sucker Tail,” he breathes without ever opening his eyes. “Trust only him.”
I’m so lost. What is he talking about now? Is he trying to get me to leave him?
Zero’s screen fills with unhelpful nonsense.
“I’ve calculated the chances of saving this creature’s life, and the odds are not good. He has a seventeen percent chance to live with your assistance, and a sixteen percent chance without.”
Am I truly that useless? A one percent difference? It occurs to me that Zero might understand and relish the use of sarcasm.
“I want to help him. You said you have antivenom?” It’s too much to hope for, isn’t it? A convenient store of antivenom locked away somewhere that can save Big D’s life. I let myself latch onto the idea of a magic space suit and a net gun, and look how that turned out. Still … “Where can I find it? How do I administer it?”
“If it is still viable and intact—there is a seven percent chance of both events occurring simultaneously—then it will be located in the front end of our once great ship. Based on the trajectory of the crash, the force of gravity, and the winds that plagued the region that day, I can estimate where you might find it. But it is only an estimation.” There’s a long pause here for drama’s sake. “Although, perhaps I will not tell you how to get there. I don’t need him alive. He serves me no purpose.”
Rage swells inside of me, so complete and absolute that I don’t trust who I am or what I might do.
“If you withhold this information from me, I’ll set this entire ship on fire with you inside of it. How would you like that?”
