Page 43 of Alien Peacock
I look over at Arelion. It’s not completely dark. His face looks innocent and relaxed. He’s unspeakably manly and serious and mostly grumpy, but then he has this less serious part of him where he makes jokes and tries to cheer me up. He really didn’t have to do any of those things.
This is probably the only time I’ll see him sleep.
I lean over and place a soft kiss on his cheek, stroking one hand on the golden comb on his head. It’s soft and warm, and it looks like the world’s most outrageous mohawk.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
- - -
“This is Gigori,” Arelion says when we step out of the Bululg saucer and into a rough tunnel that looks like it was gnawed through the rock by some giant rodent. “Some friends of mine live here. It’s a safe place to stay while we think of what to do next.”
I get a warm feeling when he says ‘we’, as if we’re a team now. “And you’re sure they’ll like me?”
We walk along the tunnel, which is lit by small points of yellow lights. It’s bitterly cold, and the air feels thin.
“Oh, I didn’t say that,” Arelion’s voice echoes from the tunnel walls. “But they won’t object to you being here.”
I really should have asked more about these people. This tunnel makes shivers run down my spine, as if we’re walking into catacombs. A strange idea strikes me. “Are they… dead?”
He laughs. “I hope not! But you’ll see.”
I relax. Of course my overthinking got me jumping straight for the creepiest possibility, that this was some kind of mausoleum. “All right.”
“Anyway, the miners that hollowed out this asteroid stayed here for a long time, and they turned the spaces they’d dug out intoliving quarters. The next owner turned them into something else.”
“Into what?”
“Again, it’s easier to let you see for yourself. Ah, here we are. The main living section.”
There’s a door in front of us, looking ancient and rusty. Arelion knocks hard on it, opens it, and goes in. I follow, into a bright room with metal walls. Our boots clang on the metal floor.
There’s suddenly someone behind me, and I spin around. “Shit!”
There’s just a rainbow, like a specter of colors that moves.
“Sponz,” Arelion says as he calmly turns. “I knew you’d be the first to greet us. Maeve, this is Sponz, my friend and ally. He doesn’t speak much.”
The rainbow is suddenly in front of us without seeming to move. Then it’s gone.
“He’s very fast,” I rasp, my heart thumping. “How did he get past us?”
“His species won’t tell us how they do it. I suspect they don’t know how it works. But it can be useful to have a friend who moves that fast. There should be more people here.”
The room is all bare metal. Above us there’s another floor made from metal mesh, and I spot well-ordered stacks of crates and heaps of strange items up there. Some kind of storage, probably.
In the middle of the room there’s a normal table with big chairs and tall benches around it.
Arelion sits down and motions to me to do the same. “This is the common room. It’s where we eat and make our plans.”
“Are they all like Sponz?” I ask, jumping up to sit on the lowest chair in the room.
“No, he’s the only one of his kind. I don’t know how many are here right now.”
I lean back and dangle my feet. “How long do you think we’ll stay?”
“I haven’t thought about it. It’s the kind of place where you could easily get stuck and not leave for a long time. A few days, perhaps. I have places to go. And so do you.”
“Do you think we should try to solve our missions together—” I begin.