Chapter 14

Helga

I'm led out to a little stage that's barely big enough for my bare feet to stand on. I have a feeling I'm not like the usual wares this silver-colored alien sells. He leads me around like a precious object, and there's a small crowd of bewildered aliens looking at me. I don't know what I'm supposed to do. I just stand and look at the aliens looking at me. If I didn't know this was real, I'd think it was a strange dream. Like something out of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.

After a few minutes, the little silver man says something, and it's apparent the bidding has begun. At first, the aliens seem hesitant, but then, in the back of the crowd, I see larger and scarier-looking aliens who begin bidding more aggressively. They have red skin and tentacles, and I begin to worry about my life span then.

I think about what the young woman on the spaceship told me and try to fall into a trance to make myself as boring as possible. To make my mind appear as vacant, lobotomized, in the hopes that the scariest aliens will lose interest.

My trance is broken when I hear a woman's voice in the crowd. I think I hear a Germanic language from Earth. I look through all the aliens, but I only see grey, red, green, silver, no hint of any kind of human. The only humans here were the ones who left me on this station.

Again I hear a voice, and I'm sure it's from Earth. I scan the crowd desperately. Still there are no humans. Only grey faces. But grey faces with human bodies. My eyes rest on these three. They're too far for me to make out their features clearly, but they're definitely grey and human shaped.

Then something happens and the bidding stops. I watch as a grey woman and two grey men walk up to collect me. They're not unlike some of the men who sold me. I close my eyes, not wanting this to be true. Have I really been sold? Are these the Alliance people the young woman mentioned? I hold back my tears. I'm not weak. I won't let them see me cry. But I keep my eyes closed as the transaction of my sale is completed.

"Helga!"

I open my eyes. Tears run down my face. I wipe them and look around. It's Fox's voice, I'm sure of it. I look everywhere for his red hair. "Fox?! Fox?! Where are you?" I can't see him.

The grey man in front of me puts his hands on either side of my face and forces me to look deep into his green eyes. "Helga."

I recognize those eyes, but I pull away. "Get your hands off me. You're an impostor."

The grey man lets go of me immediately and then says something to his friends in an alien language.

"I'm not stupid," I say and cross my arms and close my eyes again.

A woman's voice speaks softly to me in accented German, "Helga, all is not as it seems, we're here to rescue you. Please, come willingly with us now. It's not safe here."

I open my eyes and look at the grey woman. "You speak German?"

"Yes, I'm human in disguise. Please come with us now."

"Oh!" Then I point to the man who said he was Fox. "Is that a disguise too? Is that you, Fox?"

The grey man who has Fox's eyes touches his chest and has the sincerest look on his face when he says my name, "Helga." He sounds exactly like Fox. He extends his grey hand to me, and this time I take it.

The woman says, "I'll explain everything once we're safe. Come on."

I look at his companion. "Is that Axl in disguise as well?"

Axl does a little bow.

The grey woman who hasn't introduced herself takes her cloak off and gives it to me. It's nice and warm. I thank her and she replies, "Bitte."

"Where's your accent from?"

"Sweden. It'll all make sense soon," she says. "We can't waste any more time," the woman adds, but it appears she is translating what Axl has said as he motions with his head toward another large group of terrifying large red aliens.

"Who are they?"

"We'll explain later. Please just follow my commands," the woman says. "Now let's walk. And fast."

Some of the other more intimidating aliens begin to follow us. Fox squeezes my hand and the woman, now translating for Fox, says, "We're going to run like hell on my mark."

I'm not wearing shoes, and the thought of running on this slimy floor is questionable, but I remind myself this is probably a life or death situation given the seriousness of the people I'm with and that they're armed as well.

"Now!" the woman yells, and we all begin to run. Fox is pulling me with him so fast I'm like a doll being dragged along. I'm sure my feet are bloody and dirty from this floor, with alien goo and who knows what else all over them, oozing between my toes. But I hear aliens in hot pursuit so I force myself to run on. I don't want to die here.

I lose my balance and fall, my whole body is now covered in the filthy slime from the floor. Fox stops and quickly lifts me to my feet, but at the sight of the aliens following us, my legs give out. I'm trembling and too scared to run anymore. The grey-skinned Fox lifts me into his arms and says something in the language I don't understand. Clearly realizing this, he puts my hands around his neck, then with only one arm holding me, he gets out his gun and starts talking to the aliens closing in all around us.

I see Axl has his gun out as well. I don't need a translator to know we are in trouble.

The woman whispers to me, "Just stay calm."

I don't reply. I can't. I'm so scared. The aliens surrounding us are large and have multiple black eyes. They also look like they have fangs. Are these the kind of aliens that eat humans?

Fox's deep voice vibrates against my body, and I can feel his heart beating quickly. I wonder how long he can continue to hold me. I want to tell him to put me down to shoot, but I don't want to break his concentration. This is a showdown if I've ever seen one.

After a few long minutes of tense talking and weapons aimed at each other, Axl shoots one of the aliens, then the others begin shooting at us. Fox turns his back on the alien in front of us to shield me and shoots over his shoulder. He must be wearing armor because I know he's been hit more than a few times and should be dead.

"Put me down so you can shoot."

He says something back to me gruffly, but only holds me tighter against him.

Axl comes around to our side and shoots the remaining aliens. He's been shot too. I see blood on his clothing, but he seems pleased with himself. Axl's yelling something incomprehensible to the whole station now and the other aliens back off. I imagine he said, ‘Who else wants some of this?'

Fox shifts me in his arms and then says something. The woman translates, "Fox says he'd die before he puts you down."

It takes me a second to realize what that was in response to, and of course it was when I asked him to put me down. Suddenly it hits me. Fox came for me. I repeat that again in my head. Fox came for me and I feel so protected and loved. It's good that he never wants to put me down because I never want him to stop holding me.

We rush onto the ship, and Fox is giving what I suppose is probably a command to close the door and leave. We watch as the doors shut, and I think everyone breathes a sigh of relief when the door locks. I look at Fox and he says something again in his alien language. I'm confused as to why he doesn't speak German anymore, but I figure now is not the time to ask.

"Fox says in the interview room, the ship's translator will work. But first we all need to go to the medical center."

Fox still carries me as we all walk toward the medical center. Another grey man joins us. He's speaking Swedish with the woman. I don't understand Swedish, but it's close enough to German that I recognize it. I assume he's Swedish too, but I don't know why he's got grey skin if he wasn't going on the station in disguise.

When we enter the medical center, there're two young doctors there. One looks like a grey-skinned teenager. Why do they also have grey skin? I make eye contact with the teenager doctor. He puts a hand on my arm and then he says something I can't understand.

The woman is at my side then, and she's no longer grey. She's human, with long brown hair and blue eyes. "Helga, my name is Anna…"

Before she can finish, I ask her, "Is everyone going to change back to normal now?"

The young doctor says something that's tinged with annoyance.

"Helga, I'm just going to rip the band aid off and tell you. Everyone is as they are. Fox, Axl, the doctors, my husband, they're aliens. They all have grey skin naturally."

I look at them all one by one. My eyes going from Fox to Axl to the doctors, and to the Swedish man. "But he speaks Swedish," I say, as if that would automatically make him human. "Who speaks Swedish but Swedes?"

"Someone married to a Swede," Anna answers. "I know this is all shocking…"

I interrupt Anna and address Fox with a revelation, "This is what you were trying to tell me before I was abducted, wasn't it?"

Fox nods and says something. I look at Anna for a translation. "He's very sorry for what happened."

The memory of my abduction, those last moments, plays through my mind. Then I ask, panicked, "What about Ella? Is she okay? Please tell me you saved her too?"

"Yes," Anna replies. "She's been sent home safely."

I breathe a sigh of relief. "Good."

The doctor then says something; he's less annoyed now. Anna translates, "The doctor wants to give you a physical exam. It won't hurt, but since you don't have a common language and he finds it tiresome for me to translate, he wants to use telepathy to communicate directly with you."

I laugh at the thought. I now feel like this all might be a dream or some weird form of escapism because I'm still at that horrible place and I'm making this all up to survive. "But I'm not telepathic."

"It's okay, the doctor will do all the work. He just needs your consent."

"Sounds invasive."

"It can be. But I can vouch for this man, he'll do his work and nothing more. Also, there's another telepath here to make sure nothing out of the ordinary happens. Do you consent?"

Anna and I hold eye contact, then I look at the young doctor. His grey eyes don't look threatening. Then I look at Fox. "Is this okay?"

Fox answers and Anna translates, "He would trust this doctor with his life. And he isn't going to leave your side. None of us are."

I consider all of this before replying, "Okay, I consent. What do I have to do?"

"Just lie on the medical bed and allow the doctor to enter your mind. Then he will run some scans and treat your injuries."

Before I lie down, a thought occurs to me. "He's not going to change my memories, is he?"

"What do you mean?"

"Like erase all of this? I've seen science fiction movies where that happens."

Anna looks over at Fox, and I look at Fox too. He shakes his head.

I lie down, anxious. I hold my hands together over my waist. I try to keep them from shaking but I can't. I need the doctor to help me. I think about how much my feet really hurt. Whatever was on that station floor is seeping into my body and it feels infectious. I have to trust these people as strange as all of this is.

Like something out of my worst nightmare, I hear the doctor in my head. I realize he's touching my arm. He's not speaking German, yet I understand him completely. He wants to go back through my memories from the moment I was abducted. I allow him to guide me through. It's as if I'm living it again. Only, every now and then, the doctor says something in his language to those in the clinic, but they seem very far away from us now.

We reach the end of my memories, and the doctor pulls back from my consciousness. I feel very relaxed now. I watch the machines as they buzz and flash around my body, taking scans and, I suppose, cleaning the wounds on my feet.

After the machines stop, Anna says, "Now Fox and Axl need to be seen."

I immediately jump up as there's only one medical bed in this small room. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have gone first, my wounds were minor in comparison."

Fox takes me into his embrace and he says something to the top of my head. It feels good to be in his arms again, no matter how dirty and gross he or I am. Underneath it all, I can still smell a hint of the red-haired man I fell in love with.

Anna doesn't translate for him, and I suspect she doesn't need to. It's obvious what he wants to say. That I was more important. And I also imagine he said something manly like, ‘It's only a flesh wound.'

The doctor says something and I watch as Fox painfully removes his black armor and tunic, revealing a muscular grey chest with two angry red wounds still oozing blood. His blood is red like human blood. I look over the rest of his body, and besides the grey skin, he looks so human. I can't help but notice he has some alien tattoos. I find myself staring at them and wondering what they mean. There are a few silver necklaces that fall around his thick neck. I noticed that he always wore some rings, but I didn't think his love of jewelry went beyond that.

Anna tries to lead me away. "Helga, why don't you come with me? I'll get you some fresh clothing."

"I'm not leaving him. I don't care that he's grey."

Fox opens his eyes and looks at me. He says something.

"I don't care what you want," I say, assuming he said for me to go with Anna. "I'm staying here with you."

Anna touches my arm. "He doesn't want you to go either. He doesn't want you out of his sight."

"Oh." I'd be embarrassed under normal circumstances, but these are anything but normal.

"Do you mind if I go and change? I'll bring you some fresh clothing." I notice for the first time that Anna's clothing is covered in blood and filth.

"Are you hurt too?"

"No, no, it's not my blood. I was standing close to Axl when he got shot. I would like to change though, so if you're really fine, I'll be right back."

"Yes," I say, then add, "thank you," when I realize she's been doing me a favor by translating this whole time and now she's going to get me some clean clothing. But I care very little about a change of clothes at the moment. I only care about Fox. He's lying back on the medical bed as the doctor treats his wounds. They are speaking in their foreign language, and it's got a lot of the same sounds as German, but none of the words are the same. I feel uncomfortable because Fox's wounds look bad and I want to comfort him but I don't know how. I just have to stand here, deaf and dumb and wait.

Stunned, I watch as miracles of medical technology are performed by these young doctors and their machinery. In a matter of minutes, Fox's grey skin is as good as new. And although he's moving as if he's stiff, he's no longer injured.

Fox doesn't put on his shirt or armor, leaving it where he dropped it on the floor. He makes eye contact with me, but then says a few words to the doctors and Axl before taking my hand and leading me out of the clinic. I try to tell him Anna is coming back with clothes, but he says something without stopping.

I figure the ship can't be that big, the one I was on coming here was tiny. No doubt Anna will find me. But it doesn't matter. I'm safe with Fox now. He may have grey skin and black hair, but he's still the same on the inside. He smells the same and sounds the same. His eyes look at me in the same way. His hand touches mine with the same pressure and in the same way. He's mine. I would have married him a few days ago. And what are those vows? For better or worse. To be grey. To be abducted by aliens and sold as a slave. This has to be the worse , I think. But then question myself. Is it though? Fox can't help what he looks like any more than I can change the color of my own skin. But it's one thing to imagine yourself with a human who's under the delusion he's an alien, it's quite another to actually be with one. I let that sink in as Fox leads me into a room. No doubt it's the interview room Anna mentioned before, and it'll have a translator so we can talk about this. All of this.

Despite wanting to ask him a million questions all at once, simultaneously I don't want to know anything more than I already do. It's an odd position to be in. I'm teetering back and forth between wanting to know and wanting to live in ignorance. I'm ashamed it even crosses my mind for a second to ask him to bring back the red hair and his fair complexion so I feel more comfortable. I banish that thought from my mind as I sit down in a small sitting area and I give my full attention to my spaceman.