Page 34 of Stripped By the Alien

“Chief Harrower!” the Signals Chief calls again. “A message!”

“More messages?” I bellow, making everyone in the command room flinch. “That’s all I need now. Yes! Bring it!”

The underling comes crawling on the ground, holding another tablet in the air over him. “From Harrower Buc’Xsit!”

“Ah. Read it.” I touch one antenna to the tablet.

“Yes, Chief Harrower!” The Signals Chief dips his antennae and stays on the ground. “Message reads: Greetings, in the name of our beloved Queen Szum-zic! I have respectfully heard reports of another Queen’s Brood gathering strange wreckage near a newly discovered branch of the minefield in the direction of the Little Branch seven cycles ago. That is all. It is my sincere hope that this may assist you, Chief Harrower, in serving our highly beloved Queen! May she live forever! Harrower Buc’Xsit.” He crawls quickly away.

“That’s this minefield,” Sris helpfully tells me. “But it can’t be Nora’s ship. That wasn’t seven cycles ago. Only about one cycle.”

Another survivor. Another chance to find the world. Or another Brood already holding the key.

“No,” I growl, wanting to smash the whole room, but staying in control. “This is another of her kind.”

And getting the location of Nora’s world is now truly urgent.

10

- Nora -

I stare out the big window. “Are we moving? Is he trying to find Earth?”

Lucius sets down on the alien bed. “I got an impression of this ship while you were being carried inside. It's big, about the size of those old-fashioned aircraft carriers for ocean use on Earth. But it's not metal. I get the impression that it's a lifeform. So plainly capable of space flight, even long distance. I suspect we are very far from both Krix'vorr's world and from Earth.”

I tap on the window. It feels soft, like bioplastic. “M-hm. Was he just waiting for us here? Did he know we were coming?”

“My impression is that he was simply observing the minefield and wondering how to get through it. Then he saw us and decided to rescue you. At great danger to his own life, I should add. He left the safety of his own ship and made his way into the minefield in open space. He brought you in and determined that you were about to die. I must confess, at that point I had assumed you were dead and I was making alternative plans. But he brought you back through some… unconventional means. It appeared you climaxed several times–”

“Yes, yes,” I snap, feeling heat in my cheeks. And still I press my thighs together at the memory of that healing process. “It worked, anyway. What alternative plans were you making?”

“I was planning to be quiet and act like a piece of trash, while recording as much as I could. Then I would try to make my way back to Earth and report your honorable death.”

I sigh and look around the room. Trophies, skulls, weapons. “So he probably owns this ship, right? And he's a Space Locust, stripping planets of all life and all resources and enslaving their sentients?”

“I think those are safe assumptions,” the drone says. “And that's the fate of Earth if you tell him where it can be found. He is clearly of a very high rank and likely commands massive resources.”

“He must know that Earth's on the other side of the mine field,” I ponder. “But that's all he knows. There are many stars on the other side.” I adjust the silly cardboard cylinder I’m wearing. “All right, Lucius, what's our best-case outcome here?”

“The best case would be for you to tell him nothing about Earth. Or to downplay its wealth and biomass, if there’s no other option. The very best option may… well, speaking as a Space Force asset, I would have to suggest you make yourself impossible to interrogate.” Lucius’s voice has gone mild, which is never a good sign.

“You think I should take myself out of the picture?” I ask, turning to look at him. “So I can’t tell him anything?”

Lucius dips his front edge. “It would make everything easier if he hadn’t resurrected you after the minefield. You must see that, Captain. But it’s a Space Force principle that a living officer is more valuable than a dead one, regardless of situation. No one is required to deliberately make the ultimate sacrifice. But this situation was almost certainly not what they had in mind.”

“Well, I’m not doing that,” I tell him firmly. “I will serve Space Force as long as I can. And I can’t believe that’s the best possible outcome you can come up with. I didn’t ask for the worst-case outcome.”

Lucius thinks about it. “You may be right, Captain. That was not a good reply to your query. How about this as a best-case thing: You persuade Krix’vorr to give you a spaceship so you can go back to Earth to warn everyone, or at least get out of Space Locust custody.”

“That’s better,” I tell him, feeling better. Drones can sometimes be disastrously wrong, even Space Force ones. “No more defeatist talk, Lucius. Recalibrate to assume our victory here, not defeat.”

“Yes, Captain,” the drone says with determination. “I suppose there’s reason to believe that we may be able to gain priceless intel about this alien race and then bring it back to Earth.”

“And that will be our mission,” I tell him. “Done recalibrating?”

Lucius suddenly takes off from the bed and flies in close, hovering at ear height. “That flower, Captain.”

I touch the blue flower that Krix’vorr placed behind my ear. “What about it?”