1
Kiki
I’m swimming through syrup. Like the kind we harvest from the trees within the Droherion Dome. Jaxel and I used to go with our mothers to collect it during the cold season when we were little. Jaxel looked up to me back then, even though at just three rotations, he was already taller than I was. He still does, I just don’t give him that chance.
I inhale deeply. Mmmmhmmmm. Everything is warm. The syrup is the same temperature as the rest of my body making it impossible to decide where my skin ends and the syrup begins. It’s so comfortable. What did I ever do to deserve to be so comfortable? I’ve never been comfortable like this before, or if I was I can’t remember it.
Plagued by twin suns and almost no atmosphere, if it wasn’t too cold in our human colony, then it was too hot. The windows of my mom’s tiny adobe and tin hut didn’t close so there was never any insulation against whatever extreme temperature the outside opted for that day, and there was a draft that let in a ceaseless stream of sand. Mama always liked the gap in the windows. She said it let the stars keep an eye on us.
I’d believed her then. And then I grew up and I was hunted by aliens, viciously claimed by the worst of them, left for dead, and Mama tried to remind me that the stars were still there, still watching…but I know the truth. The stars don’t care about us.
The Hunt. Running. My legs pumping. Jaxel hadn’t started training me then so running was all I had. I thought I could outrun him — the red demon with the wicked face that they called Bo’Raku — but I could hear him behind me cackling with laughter.
He chased. I ran. I stood no chance and I refused to let what happened to me next happen to Miari, my best friend, a hybrid human-Dra’Kesh, and the product of one of the past barbaric Hunts. This day every three Earth cycles red-faced aliens called Dra’Kesh swoop down onto our human colony and demand their right to breed our women. And then they do it. Unforgivingly.
Last Hunt, Miari was targeted by a big brute — he was blue though, wasn’t he? I’d never seen a blue one before… He wasn’t a Dra’Kesh but a Voraxian and apparently king of all the alien fuckers. He’s coming back for her this Hunt, or wait…did he already come?
A sharp shard of a memory cuts through my passive bliss. It’s the day of the Hunt and Miari and I are crawling through the sewers, trekking outside of the Dome covered in shit. We find a cave to hide in while Svera, our best friend, takes Miari’s place in the Hunt. She’ll distract him long enough for us to find a hiding place and when she reveals herself to the king, he’ll leave — or he’ll search for us, but he won’t find us. He’ll leave either way because we’ve found the perfect cave. Sunken into jagged black cliffs, it’s dank and wet and when we barricade ourselves inside, I know we’re going to succeed. All that’s left to do is wait…
Tssaaaaak. My whole body jolts at the sound and the memory the sound brings to life in livid, gruesome color. We didn’t account for the monsters.
The syrup thickens around me, becoming claustrophobic. Kind of like the cave, filled with shadow monsters who have blades for fingers, seven arms and two mouths. Miari doesn’t know the first thing about fighting, but I do. I take my sharpened spear and battle the thing. Pain lights up my abdomen as I’m stabbed by one of its claws. The serrated blade rips across my stomach, halving my belly button. I’m going to die. But I’m going to save Miari first. I stab it in the eyes and when I stab again, I kill it, or so I think. But when we flee the cave, I see that there are at least three more monsters closing in. I take the amp Miari built and I press the button, sending monsters scattering in a brutal explosion — one that takes me with it.
I feel sharp rocks come up against my back and tension flee my muscles. I’m going to die here. Yes. Finally… I sink into the smell of hot, metallic blood. And then nothing.
And now warmth. Wet syrup sliding over my body. The smell of a deep, fragrant spice, like the blossoms of a cactus in a faraway desert. One I’ve never been to before. One without any rain. One without any storms. It’s pure comfort where nothing can get to me. Not the monster in the cave, not the monster in The Hunt. There are no aliens here. Just a cactus and its bloom, and a pressure in my chest right below the beat of my heart that tells me one thing: Death will have to wait.
2
Kiki
I wake to the sound of my own teeth chattering. I’m cold. I remember the fuzzy goop clutching my bare body, my hair floating off of my neck, suspended by thick purple syrup, but when I open my eyes, the memory is gone like it never was. Like a bad dream. No. Like a good dream. I just haven’t had one in so long it’s hard to recognize.
Whispers. I hear them softly at first before they gain in volume.
“She’s awake. The chosen…”
“The alien you mean. The weak one…”
“She would not have been chosen if she were so.”
“She is to be our Xhea!”
“Shh! She can hear you.”
“Who cares if she can hear me, she can’t understand. She’s useless. Speaking only her stupid, alien speak…”
“I…” I lick my lips, voice cracking from so many rotations of disuse. I haven’t spoken in rotations. Is it worth it to speak now just to level insults? Yes. “I can hear you, you stupid bitch.” I swallow hard, coughing into the floor, which is soft beneath my cheek. “I can understand you too.” My throat hurts, like the chords have been cut. Like I’ve been choked by hands hotter than the sun.
One female voice titters nearby, but just the one. And then a voice says softly, “What did our Xhea say?”
There’s a slight scuffling before a deeper voice projects, “It is not important. We only have a matter of moments before they raise the gate. Before we run the mountain. We must prepare. If we do not present well, we will not be chosen.”
There’s a pause, a few more whispered words. I use the lapse to find my fingers, to wiggle my toes, to shift my legs back and forth. They’re stiff and trapped and for a second, I panic. What did the goo do to me? Am I paralyzed?
Then I blink. White light spears my eyes, but they water and clear and water again. Eventually I’m able to see past it. Black on white. Shuffling feet on stone, white walls beyond them…no, not walls…something white…something foreign…something cold.
What’s clear is that I’m in a cave full of aliens and that it’s light out and the light is natural even if it’s made so harsh by so much white. It falls in light flurries, reminding me of springtime on the colony when the cotton fields bloom and little pieces of white are sprinkled through the world. It was always my favorite season. Miari and I used to try to catch them.
I shudder and block the memory out as I do memories of all things good. There is no good anymore. Just as there’s no electricity in here, no wires, no heating. There’s just a black stone ground and white surrounding it and aliens filling the space around me.
My hackles rise. I’m ready to fight. But none of the females are looking at me — well, they are looking, but only sparing quick, hesitant glances. Like they’re more afraid of me than I am of them. As they should be. I’ll kill any of them who tries to touch me. Maybe I’ll kill them just for fun. I hesitate for a second as my head fully clears, wondering if I could really take on so many.