7. Chapter 7

I turned my head when he licked his lips. I didn't want him to see the resentment reflected in my eyes.

No, I had no rights over him. Just because I happened to be the first human woman he had talked to didn't mean I was special to him. Like he wasn't special to me, he wasn't!

I was more interested in the alien landscape around us than him. I proved that by staring at one of the twisted trees.

His asking me to be part of the group of women didn't mean anything either; at least, that's what I tried to tell myself. I didn't care that his lips had been on Lexi's hips or how he had licked his lips after. I didn't!

I did resent, though, how I felt about it, how a pulse of envy had rushed through me. I was aware that I didn't stand a chance of gaining his attention against the queen bees—Sandra, Elsie, Erika, and now apparently Lexi had joined their club as well—and I hated how that thought didn't sit well with me.

Not that I needed his attention anyway. Why would I? I would much rather simply explore this planet.

"Do you have any idea what they want with us?" Kenley whispered next to me.

I wished I could have told her that I had no idea, but the feral, hungry looks from Khadahr's men told a simple story. None of them had approached any of us, yet, but the way their eyes were glued to the women was becoming increasingly clearer and unsettling.

"I think… I think we are for them," I voiced my hunch, nodding my chin in the direction of a group of men. Ten of them stood a few paces away, sharing a skin of a clear liquid among themselves, speaking in hushed tones. Guttural sounds drifted over to us but didn't make any sense to me.

Their eyes—which I now noticed all differed in color like humans'—roamed from one woman to another, devouring them. There was also longing in them, giving me hope that they wouldn't force themselves on us tonight.

Force? I nearly snickered hysterically. Force implied that one party was unwilling, but with the way the women glanced—mostly—at Khadahr, I was willing to bet my last few hundred dollars that the majority wouldn't be unwilling to share a tent or bed or whatever with them tonight.

Besides , I tried to soothe myself, wasn't that why Commander Willis and his guards were here? To protect us ?

Right , my mind snarled, like they would stand a chance .

Not without guns anyway , I conceded. Unfortunately, guns would have simply disintegrated on Vandruk. Even if they were secretly armed with plastic guns—I had looked up options online—in order for bullets to do any kind of damage, they would still have to be metal. And metal… disintegrated.

The human guards wore axes and swords crafted from sharpened bones and rocks, much like the aliens, who were undoubtedly better trained in their usage. Not to mention the size differences. Yes, ICs had selected the strongest, tallest, most muscled guards they could hire, but they still looked like younger brothers compared to the Vandruks.

"They're not gonna… do something to us tonight, are they?" Kenley asked, and my head whipped around to face her. Her tone held a lascivious undercurrent, which I read in her expression as well. Her eyes were too bright, her pupils too dilated to be called fright. She looked from one alien to another and licked her lips.

Good God, what have I gotten myself into ? Was this why all these women had volunteered? Because they wanted to be… ravished by these barbarians?

Oh, I didn't want to, but they made me ! The voice piping up in my head sounded just like Sandra. Revolted, I shook myself. What kind of airheads had ICs selected?

Then it hit me. They had selected these women because of that. They had been psychologically tested, all but me because my coming was a given after Khadahr requested it. I had been under the impression that the testing was done to find the fittest women for this… expedition. But now I realized that I was wrong about that. They had been selected because they weren't opposed to… having sex with the barbarians.

What did that make ICs? A pimp? Greedy?

Yes, greedy. They had been wanting to exploit Vandruk ever since they had built the wormhole.

Thankfully, Khadahr gave the signal to end our break because I didn't like the direction my thoughts were taking me, and I really didn't want to explore my emotions about Khadahr and the queen bees any further.

"Why won't they tell us what they want us for?" Kenley complained as we began marching again.

"Why didn't ICs ask?" I countered. Why didn't you before you committed yourself? my mind accused, but then a rush of shame coursed through my veins because I was here too; wasn't I? I came because, for years, I would have sold my soul to set foot on Vandruk, and now it looked like I was going to sell my body. What scared me most about that was my willingness to do so. Which made me no better than the queen bees or any of the other women, so I needed to stop thinking of myself as being better than them.

Easier said than done, though, because my mind was already composing glib responses and self-directed accusations. I feared they might eventually slip past my lips if given an opportunity, and dammit, this was supposed to be a new start, a start where I finally made some friends.

Kenley fell silent after my remark, and I was too broody to start another conversation. I pretended to be enraptured by the strangeness of our surroundings, and it didn't take very long until I actually was. We began pointing things out to one another, astonished by the alien beauty surrounding us.

We must have walked for hours under the sun shining down on us as if coming through a fog. It never seemed to become bigger or brighter; it simply stayed this shiny orb in the sky. Which made me wonder if that meant it was a lot farther away from Vandruk than our sun was from Earth, explaining the cooler temperatures—or maybe we had just made contact while it was winter here.

What if this is summer ? I mused. The idea disconcerted me. I didn't want to contemplate how cold it might get here. Cold had never been a friend of mine. Originally from Southern California, Denver's colder climate had been the only drawback in my move.

The terrain never changed; it still looked the same as it did when we exited the wormhole. It never ceased to intrigue me even after walking for hours in the alien environment, but I was getting more accustomed to it. So much so, that the sight of a small, furry creature scuttling through a group of miniature trees startled me into crying out and jumping back.

The creature was so fast I barely got a glimpse of it other than that it resembled a large rat with a long spiked tail. Kenley squealed next to me, but I managed to keep track of it until it vanished inside a small hole. It was the first animal life form I had seen besides the insects we had encountered.

Not that we saw the insects, they were too fast, but now and then a quick buzzing sound announced them flying close by, accompanied by loud shrieking from the women they got closest to. Now and then, Lexi still rubbed the side of her hip where she had been bitten, scrunching her face up in pain.

Thankfully, nobody else seemed to have noticed my little squeal dance, nobody but Khadahr, who narrowed his eyes questioningly at me. If I hadn't known any better, I would have said he appeared coiled to jump, making my heart hitch for just a moment until I realized that, yes, he looked ready to jump in front of trouble; he had sworn to protect us, didn't he? All of us. Including me.

Don't read anything into this; don't read anything into this , my mind screamed at my heart, but I was afraid it was already too late. Of course, my stupid heart read something into this.

Keeping his promise, Khadahr announced a little while later that we would make camp here. I hadn't noticed how much closer we had come to the mountains that had seemed so far away when we left the portal. I lifted my hand to the sky, and just like Khadahr had said, it was exactly a fingerbreadth before the sun was about to vanish behind the mountains.

Exhausted, the women fell to the ground where they stood. I wasn't about to show my weakness like that, but I was here to make friends, right? Being different from others had never made me a friend before, I reminded myself, so I plopped down next to Kenley, who actually stretched out on the ground.

"Wow, I don't think I've ever been this tired in my life," she complained.

"And hungry." Michaela joined us. She and I had shared a room during our last night on Earth. Since she had preferred to hang out with the queen bees during the day, I hadn't really talked to her besides learning her name.

"They're gonna feed us, right?" Kenley turned to me, and Michaela followed her example.

How would I know ? lay on the tip of my tongue, but I bit it down. New life, new life , I reminded myself.

New-me shrugged. "I would assume so."

But I hated that idea. I didn't need to be fed like a pet.

"What are they doing?" Michaela nodded at a group of aliens, grabbing spears and bows, readying to take off.

"Hunting?" Kenley guessed.

"We haven't seen any animals," I pointed out, besides the rat-like thing, and I wasn't hungry enough to eat that.

Commander Willis and his men hunkered down in a circle, opening their backpacks. They produced plastic water bottles, protein bars, and pouches with meals ready to eat.

Half of Khadahr's barbarians, including him, had left. The others were either patrolling, busy erecting tents, or lighting four different fires in the center.

"I don't suppose we can have some of that?" I watched Sandra saunter over to one of Commander Willis's guards.

"Depends on what you're offering in return, sugarplum," the guard replied, looking up at her.

"This is why I'm leaving Earth," Sandra declared, swooshing her hair back and stomping away from the guard, who shrugged and accepted a high-five from another man .

"This is why we don't hang with alien bait," another guard shouted, and laughter accompanied Sandra back to where the other queen bees stood, ready to enfold her and listen to her rant about Earthmen.

"Shut it," Commander Willis ordered, and the men obeyed.

"How are we supposed to gather anything when we're already exhausted," I heard Scott whine farther down.

"Stop whining, Scott," Dawn hissed, and I watched her pull a few plastic bags from her backpack and move toward an array of rocks. She hunched down and carefully parted a few grass stems with a wooden stick. She scraped a small amount of dirt onto a glass slide, sealed it, and put it into one of the smaller plastic bags before cutting a piece of grass and placing it into the same bag.

As if pulled by a magnet, I got up and moved to her side. "What are you looking for?"

She looked up in surprise and shielded her eyes against the last rays of the sun to make out who was talking to her. "Oh, it's you. You're the one who let the barbarian in, right? Gwen something."

"Gwyn Perez." I nodded, encouraged that she didn't seem hostile toward me, despite her words being open to interpretation. It was hard to tell if I found her favor or disapproval with letting the barbarian in .

"Our first assignment is to find out why all metal disintegrates the moment it arrives on Vandruk," she informed me, still shielding her eyes.

I hunkered down next to her. "And the dirt will tell you that?" I asked, honestly curious .

"In part, it might." She lowered the hand from her face. "Why the interest? You're a janitor, right?"

I liked that she wasn't mincing words.

"'I've always wanted to explore Vandruk," I admitted. "I took some college classes."

"Oh yeah? What kind?" Dawn snipped a few more pieces of different plants and put them into individual bags, which she meticulously labeled.

I rattled off the smorgasbord of classes I had taken so far, and she grimaced at me. "That's a lot. What were you planning to be your major?"

I shrugged. "No clue. They all seemed interesting."

Dawn's laughter warmed me up to her.

"Nothing like keeping your options open." She winked.

I grinned back at her.

"You want to help me?" She offered me her scissors, not plastic but ceramic, with sharpened blades. "I need some samples from that… whatever it is, twirly thing." She pointed at one of the trees that looked like an over-coiled spring.

"On it." I grinned back and moved to the spring tree.

Time passed by quickly, darkness kept edging in, and when it became hard to see, Dawn called it a night. We packed our collected samples away carefully before she thanked me for my help and returned to her colleagues. None of them, including her boss, Bob West, had moved an inch from where they had planted themselves originally .

"What was all that about?" Kenley asked when I returned to her side. She wasn't alone with Michaela any longer; three other women, Sophia, Lurdes, and Meredith, sat with them.

"I kind of want to learn about the plants and life here," I explained, looking from one woman to another. "Aren't you curious?"

"The only thing I'm curious about is food," Sophia stated, followed by agreeing groans.

As if my stomach had waited for just that, it began to grumble. Food had not been on my list of things to pack. All the self-reprimanding in the world, or an alien planet, wasn't going to change that. I threw a futile glance toward where the guards were camping down amidst five tents and a fire. They were eating and laughing, but I doubted they would share their rations with us.

A small stab of anger rolled through me. It almost seemed as if ICs had already written us off. During all the briefings there had not been a word about sustenance. Did they simply herd us into the arms of the barbarians, expecting them to take care of us?

I supposed they had because the guards sure as hell weren't about to do so.

My eyes searched futilely for Khadahr, but he and the men he had left with were nowhere to be seen. Too bad. I was about to give him a piece of my mind for leaving us here, starving, after making us walk all day.

My nose caught a whiff of something cooking, followed by another growl of my stomach .

"There." Sophia pointed at three barbarians standing over a fire. A thin, flat rock was raised above it, and something sizzled on it, making my mouth water.

The queen bees also took notice. Their heads stuck together, loudly hissing at each other. They sat down and rummaged through their backpacks.

"Oh my God, are they going to put makeup on?" Michaela groaned.

"I didn't bring any." Sophia shook her head in dismay. Rigorously, she rose and walked over to the queen bees, who gave her a contemptuous once-over.

"Think they'll share?" Kenley asked with a small snicker, giving away she already knew the answer.

A few seconds later, Sophia retreated with her head hung low. She didn't come back to us, but instead moved to another group of women sitting on an array of rocks.

Pretending not to watch the spectacle was useless; all eyes were on the queen bees. As soon as they finished putting on their makeup, they walked—no sashayed—over to the fire with the three barbarians flipping something on the rock.

Sandra held out her hand in greeting, tilted her head, and fluttered eyelashes too long to be real. The barbarians stared at her and her companions. Sandra moved her hand to her mouth, then rubbed it over her tummy before she pointed at whatever the barbarians were cooking, holding it out again.