Page 103 of Stripped By the Alien

Nora exhales beside me. “That was incredible.”

I lean back in the command cradle. “The Beast now fights the same way you do when training. Using the enemy’s power and weight against him.”

She gives me a little smile. “I said you might learn something from me, too.”

“I didn’t know how right you’d be. Oh, your machine is here.” I look past her.

The drone is hovering near the exit. "Captain?" he asks.

Nora points toward the drifting wreck. "Krix’vorr, can we make a connection to that ship? Nobody needs to go over there except Lucius."

“Lucius and Sris,” I state. “Two are better than one. Hear that, Sris? Go over there and see what you can find out.”

“You too, Lucius,” Nora says. Lucius accelerates out, and Sris climbs up to the ceiling and runs out in a whirlwind of shimmering, pointy legs.

A relieved silence settles over the command chamber. Outside, one Gzet ship drifts dead in space while the wreckage of the other spreads slowly across the stars.

I feel certain of one thing: We're close.

30

- Nora -

Again I’m astonished by Krix’vorr’s skill at directing the Beast’s fighting. And this fight was harder than the first one we were in. He was clearly struggling for a while when the Gzet started using grappling hooks, but then he adapted and used my suggestion immediately.

I put a hand on his shoulder as the Beast moves over to the wreck of the Gzet ship and softly bumps into it. “This could be important.”

“As you say, we must be close,” he replies and bends down to sniff my hair. “But how close? There’s a hundred stars they may have come from. If we were to search all of them, it would take many cycles. And many attacks from the Gzet.”

Still, I’m getting excited. We may be within days of finding Sophia, if everything works out. I’ll ask for a cabin for her, and some food, and some drink, and maybe I can get more of the wrap material…

Lucius and Sris return after about thirty minutes.

“Well?” Krix’vorr asks, hands on hips.

“The Gzet on those ships expected to be taken prisoner,” Sris says from up on the ceiling. “We told them we would leave them where they are if they would answer some questions. So they did.”

“They didn’t have much to say,” Lucius continues, hovering in mid-air. “They were low-level crew only. But they had computers, and those computers knew more. We can now pinpoint the Gzet home sun quite accurately. I’m also using the route of the ships that attacked us to confirm it all. That attack was a major mistake on their part.”

“Sometimes an enemy will make mistakes,” Krix’vorr says with satisfaction. “It’s not something to rely on, but it’s fun when it happens. Anything else?”

“The Gzet are slave traders,” Sris says from the ceiling. “And so the most important thing for them is to get customers to their slave auction. It appears that all their ships carry schedules and locations for those auctions as well as the lots being sold. The remaining crewmembers were eager for us to see those schedules, and they recommended we leave this part of space, because bids can be made from any part of the galaxy.”

Butterflies start taking off in my stomach. “And?”

“And one description caught my eye,” Lucius says. “I will quote from the auction announcement:

One alien female, round and soft, two legs and two arms, fur only on the head and a couple of other spots. Otherwise remarkably smooth. Species unknown. Temperament unruly, active and strong. Appears healthy and young, with small damage from recent spaceship crash.

To be sold on the 9th Epp on 44th of 23rd of 7776th. Price estimate: Extremely high

There’s an image attached. Shall I project it?”

“Yes!” I exclaim, barely able to contain my excitement. “Do it!”

It’s not a trivial decision - alien contact procedures are strict on what kind of technological capabilities Space Force shows to aliens. But I’ve broken most of those directives already, including falling in love with Krix’vorr, so if the locusts now find out that our drones can project pictures, that’s not going to be a major problem.

Lucius projects an image on the uneven wall of the command chamber. It’s mostly red and green, but the outline could be a human female.