Eban's Command: Scifi Alien Abduction Romance (Science Fiction Alien Romance) (Survival Wars Book 2) (8 page)

None of the samples were workable. Well, that was a lie. For
once in her life, the testing process ran as smoothly as could be. It was just
that every single bit of earth she had was dead. Too acidic, too gritty, simply
lacking in nutrients or any form of sustenance whatsoever. At least the ship
farming plots were kept relatively healthy by a steady supply of fertilizer
–she pitied whoever had that job- and the occasional burial, if the family
wished it to be so. But this tiny, homely little planet was every bit as
uninhabitable as it looked. Even when she scraped together a mixture and
supplied it with the necessary vitamins, and even applied a dose of the first
generation of her Icari growth serum, nothing would grow.

Eban looked stricken when she told him. He stopped by her
lab after a week of fruitless testing, looking hollow-eyed and impatient.
“What’s the news?” he asked.

Saffron looked down at the ground. “Oh, Eban,” she whispered
brokenly, “I’m so sorry. Nothing can grow there. We’ll have to try again
somewhere else.”

The panicked look on his face grew. “Are you serious?” he
whispered back, looking so overwhelmed with a barrage of emotions that he
couldn’t even speak up. Everything was all pressing for release at once, and he
had nowhere to put it.

“Everything was all wrong. Even the lower-level stuff is
just too flat. I even gave it some of my growth serum, but all it did was make
the seed go rotten. It sprouted inside but couldn’t grow, and burnt itself
out.”

“Damn,” he swore, turning and slamming the side of his fist
against the blank wall. “Dammit! Damn the flight!” Again and again, he pounded
on the wall. His knuckles swelled red with strain.

Every part of her cried out to go to him, but Saffron just
bit her lip and watched. If he didn’t get this out of his system, it would only
fester.

Only when he was still, breathing raggedly and obviously distraught,
did she speak up. “It’s not the end of everything,” she said quietly, and
walked towards him. He stiffened, the fine muscle definition of his back
tensing up hard enough to crack a walnut.

He moaned, “You don’t understand,” and pressed his forehead
to the wall.

She blinked a little, taken aback. Dread settled in the pit
of her gut. “So, explain it to me, Eban. Who am I going to tell?”

He didn’t say anything for a moment, clearly arguing with
himself. She saw the emotions sweep over his face, anger and desolation
followed by embarrassment; clearly, he was remembering how she’d rejected him
but that wasn’t entirely her fault. It was just circumstances, that was all.

I can’t let him make me feel guilty,
she swore.
I
just can’t. This is how it has to be.

Finally, he just sighed and looked down to hide his face.
The light caught on his tears though, exposing them for her to see. “I have
lied to everyone. There was a reason I was so desperate to find you. Or someone
like you. And I was so hopeful…”

Now she knew. “Something’s running out, isn’t it?”

He nodded against the wall. “Even with your serum, we won’t
be able to grow enough to survive. We had less than a year of food before we
met you and now we have even less.”

She felt just awful, suddenly regretting her experiments
that had been wasting valuable food. But, it was all for the better, wasn’t it?
She would be able to replace more than she took, after all.

“It’s okay though, isn’t it?” Saffron soothed, stepping
closer and laying her hand on his back. “My serum can keep you afloat for
awhile longer after that, can’t it? Won’t it be long enough to find something?
Hey, where even are we in relation to everything else?”

Eban sighed but lifted his head up from the wall to rub at
his face. “Your serum will certainly help, as will your advanced farming
techniques. We have you to thank for many of our recent advancements. And I do
not know how long it will take to find another suitable planet. I do not know
the name of the galaxy where we are, but it is at the edge of the system
nearest to the one which housed your solar system.”

Throwing her mind back to general science class in
elementary school, she figured that probably meant they were at the edge of the
Andromeda Galaxy. After that, she had no idea what else was around.

“This is not charted territories for us,” he explained
hesitantly. “We have not been here, nor are there any signs from other
civilizations to give us any extra information. We have been scanning
endlessly, which unfortunately takes up quite a bit of our fuel even when we
just drift. Only that rocky little thing back there had a breathable
atmosphere. At this rate, I would even take a gravity so high that we could
never fly again.”

“No!” she said, alarmed.

Eban spun around to face her, looking serious and
determined. “Yes! We can survive anything but we cannot come back from the
dead!” The fight went out of him abruptly. “I suppose I should break the news
to everyone.”

“Are you going to tell them about the supplies, too?” she
asked. He said nothing, and she knew
that
was wrong. “You should tell
them, Eban.”

Her urging only seemed to backfire. Eban just shook his head
at her. “I cannot. I cannot let their fate hang over their heads. I wish them
peace until the very end.” A gleam returned to his eyes, startling her because
she’d thought that he was too tired to be angry, but then she saw that it was
more tears. “If you tell them…Well, I cannot stop you from telling them. But I
swear to you that I will never forgive you if you do.”

With that, he turned and walked out, leaving her alone in
the midst of failures.

Not long after that, Saffron suddenly found herself with a
lot more free time than she was used to. The Icari were in mourning but there
was nothing that could be done for it except to continue on with their lives as
they knew it.

Even so, it seemed that for the next while, the children
were the only ones who flew at all. Everyone else was simply too heavy with
sorrow to even think about it.

Saffron was sad and heavy too, overwhelmed by the weight of
what she knew. She was constantly questioning her decisions to keep Eban’s
secret, but she was doing her best to occupy her time even without anything to
do. She produced large quantities of growth serum, more than the current plots
of land could ever use in a lifetime. As a result, permission was given to open
two more plots and she eagerly joined in to help with the planting. Perhaps if
she could control everything from the beginning, she could really turn production
around.

Tullia seemed to have formed a sort of girl-crush on
Saffron, and often elected to spend time as her assistant and handling small
jobs. Unfortunately, that meant there was even less for her to do. And that was
when she got the idea. She was still mostly a stranger, wasn’t she?

It was time to change that.

So, for the first time in her life, Saffron took on a job
serving the people. She learned how to bake muffins and rough bread, and helped
service those who came by to purchase a snack. Not only that, but she spent
some time observing the children at school, and washed dishes at the meal hall.
The workers there were friendly, and she quickly grew closer to them. After a
bit of nagging, even Garem and a couple of others in the command room started
to take to her.

For the first time in her life, she learned how to act
differently in front of different people. She was raised never to change
herself for anything, but now it was a requirement and she actually enjoyed
being able to express very different parts of herself.

Tullia was girly and fluff-minded, but with a startling wit.
She and the rest of her family appreciated sarcasm and dark humor.

The children delighted in silly jokes and human antics.

Garem and his friends enjoyed scientific talk blended with
regular conversation. Surprisingly, so did the kitchen workers. That was when
she learned that they had all started out in much more technical positions but
gradually gravitated towards a need to interact with more people.

It was exhausting and rewarding all at once, but the Icari
slowly stopped just watching her or bowing to her. Word seemed to travel, for
some of them started to wave at her or greet her happily when she walked past.
Sadness still shadowed them, rendered them with clipped wings on their
emotions, but she was happy at being able to provide even a little bit to boost
their moods. And her mood, honestly.

After a bit, this felt rather more like home and the notion
of herself as a human began to fade. She was Icari, now.

One day after a long session in the kitchen, she dragged her
feet on the way back to her room. The lights were dimming but the ship was not
entirely quiet yet.

“Saffron!”

She turned to find Tullia striding towards her. Alarm shot
through her just like it had the last time this happened, and she was
immediately worried. “What is it?” she asked, hurrying to meet the young woman.

“Eban wants to see you.”

Her heart seized up, before she noticed that Tullia didn’t
look particularly concerned. “Is something wrong?” Saffron asked, cautious
anyway. “So late at night?”

Tullia shook her head and then nodded, making her amused at
how earnest this girl was. And so excitable. She did everything with the same
enthusiasm that it was often impossible to tell whether she was happy or upset.
“Nothing’s wrong. Eban has just decided that since tonight is one of our normal
relaxation days, he’s making it mandatory.”

“Mandatory, huh?” Saffron mused, turning around and heading
back the way she’d come. “That sounds like him.”

Tullia laughed a little. “Isn’t it? Well, he didn’t quite
say the word but it was implied. It’s not often that he suggests we all relax,
so it’s best to take advantage of it when he does.” They walked on in quiet for
a bit and were almost rejoined with the crowd filtering into the atrium when
the bakery manager spoke again. “I know he’s just trying to lift our spirits
but I almost wish that he would let us be sad for a little bit longer. I don’t
think any of us are quite over our disappointment. I’m certainly not.”

Saffron nodded, but then reached out and stopped the other
woman. Looking right into her eyes to hold her into place, she said, “I know
it’s hard. I hate it, too. I really feel like I belong with you all now, and it
hit me hard, too. I just want to help. And I know that we’ll get somewhere
eventually.”
Hopefully sooner rather than later.
“But, everything
happens as it’s meant to be. We just weren’t meant to live there. The next
place we come across will be better. And the one after that? The best.”

Tullia stared at her for a moment, and then nodded. “That’s
an interesting way to think about it. I will keep that in mind and spread it
around when I hear anyone expressing their doubt. Thank you.”

Watching the other woman head out into the atrium ahead of
her, Saffron felt amused again.
It’d be funny if I somehow managed to turn
everyone into hippies.

Resigning herself to having to spend just a bit more time
hanging around with other people before she was able to sleep, she stepped out
and started to look around for a good place to sit and enjoy the quaint music.

Eban’s voice rang out over the din of the crowd. “Icari! My
people!”

Everyone turned in his direction. He stood in the midst of
them. Saffron stood up on her bench to be able to see him over the surprised
fluttering of wings all around her, not minding when feathers and firm
mechanisms bumped against her.

He wore his wings, pristine and beautiful, raised up high
over his head to catch the light in a fading, somber halo. The noise died down
rapidly, respectfully.

“My people,” he began, “I know that the times have been
difficult for us but we must remember that we have lost
nothing!
In
fact, we have more now than we have in quite a few years. Our lives will move
on, and we must be thankful for our new bounty. I propose a short celebration
tonight, and then a day of holiday tomorrow.

“I have already spoken with our wonderful chefs.”

Saffron noticed her kitchen friends elbowing each other and
giggling secretively. How they had kept something like this from her when they
were such gossipers, she had no idea!

“We have enough prepared in our future to have a feast
tomorrow. Everyone will eat their fill, and we will rejoice in our continued
existence!”

He wasn’t much for eloquent speech endings, so he just shot
into the air towards the end. Crying out and cheering, the Icari around him
rose into the sky as well in a swelling wave. The air filled with jubilance,
and Saffron watched the sky-dancers with a smile creaking on her face.

A scuffle of wings behind her caught her attention. She
turned, and felt her breath catch. Eban stood right behind her, looking
tentative and youthful, yet incredibly old at the same time. “Saffron, can I
talk to you? Please?”

I can’t let him do this.

“Shouldn’t you be looking for Karree?” she said icily,
turning away. Then, he caught her shoulder.

“If you think I’m in love with Karree, you are quite wrong,”
he said, low and dangerous in her ear. Her breath caught.

“What are you saying?”

“I’m saying that I figured out the reasons you rejected me,”
he murmured, “and I wanted to tell you that I understand. And explain to you
that you are wrong. I do not belong to anyone, nor am I expected to be –or not
to be. Our customs are very free as far as relationships. Each must decide
their own. That is our way. And I decided quite a bit ago that I wanted you.”

She looked down at her feet. “Eban, but…”

“Please?” he said, not begging, but close to it. “Please
just give me a chance? Just treat me as a man. Not a commander, and not an
alien. Unless you aren’t interested?”

Not everything will turn out the way I think. As it
should be.

Really, she didn’t have a choice if this was the way her
life was meant to be. “Okay,” she said softly. “But, how?”

Joy lit up his face, and he grinned happily. “Wonderful! I
think we need some time alone. Why don’t we…”

The ship shook, slamming Icari everywhere to the ground or
against the walls. Several fell out of the sky, while others tumbled awkwardly
before just barely managing to catch themselves. Feet tossed out from beneath
her, Saffron fell to the ground, her reaching hands dragging Eban down with
her.

“What happened?” someone screamed.

Another blast rocked the ship, an explosion that lit up the
command room with hellish orange and white fire.

“Eban!” Saffron cried out. “What’s going on?”

His eyes were horrified. She stared at him. What was wrong
with him? He was just sitting there on the floor with the flames reflected in
his eyes, billowing black smoke melding with his dark irises. “Eban!” She
grabbed his shoulder and shook it roughly, his head bobbling back and forth on
a frighteningly loose neck. “What’s the matter with you?”

“It’s them,” he whispered.

“Who?” She shook him again. “Get up! Your people need you!”

Everyone was screaming, panicked, flapping violently. Fights
were breaking out, fists flying. And yet another explosion lit up the front of
the ship. Eban turned his head, staring right into her eyes. His gaze was
glassy and empty, shattered. “This fire,” he whispered. “The smoke is poison.
These are the invaders who destroyed Daeden when I was a kid.”

Fear seized her throat but she shoved it away, focusing on
his eyes as he lost himself in a dark memory. But, she couldn’t let that
happen. Shaking him again, she snarled into his face, “If it’s poison, you need
to do something! Ramp up the air filtration! You’re not a kid this time. You’re
a commander. You can fight back against them.”

For a long moment, nothing seemed to register. His jaw was
slack with terror. Looking toward the front of the command room, Saffron
suddenly saw huge, dark shapes moving amidst the flame.

Then, Eban blinked. His whole demeanor changed, and he
lurched to his feet. “Icari!” he screamed. “To the rafters! All the way up,
towards the center! Help each other! Safety first, retaliation later!”

Nearly everyone was already doing that, but the grounded
stragglers finally went aloft. Parents grabbed their children, and a group of
elders held hands as they struggled to rise; Tullia swooped over and began to
help.

Strong arms wrapped around Saffron’s middle, tugging her
upwards. Eban held her close to his body, his wings thundering as he dragged
her up to the nearest perch. Settling down upon it, he took in a huge gulp of
air and struggled for the next. On and on, they worked their way higher.
Everyone else was already safe, fluttering and calling out nervously as they
watched their commander save the flightless human.

Far below, Saffron caught a glimpse of the attackers. They
looked like golems, naked and forged from earth and crystal with hammer-like
fists. In their very front was one twice as large as the rest, quite obviously
their leader.

“Grab this,” Eban grunted, and shoved her at a perch before
letting go of her. Fear filled her, her stomach fluttering maddeningly as she
struggled for a grip, the surface too round and wide. Still, she clung to it
for all she was worth and shouted over her shoulder.

“I believe in you, Eban!”

“I won’t let anything happen,” he swore, and then receded
from her.

Twisting as best as she could to watch, she saw him dive to
a group of mechanics. A few rapid words exchanged, and the small group broke
away from the rest and quickly disappeared through the nearest entrance.

I can only assume they’re going to the air filters. Good!
Her heart raced. Her palms were slick with sweat, making it even harder to
hold on.
But, what about the guys down there? How did they find us? Were
they following all this time?

Really, she knew there would never be an answer. Most
likely, they just happened to be in the area. More worryingly, they might have
seen the receptacle go down to that little planet and followed the signs.

Eban was fluttering around, speaking with various men. He
was too far away for her to hear, and she had to turn around and press herself
harder against the perch to keep from falling, but she had faith in him.
Whatever happened, he would pull them through.

Even if they all died now, she would die knowing he did
everything he could.

Suddenly, her foot slipped. Then, her other foot. “Eban!”
she started to cry out, but her hands were too slick to hold on long enough for
him to notice. She couldn’t get back up. Then, she dropped.