He Comes in Peace

[Please read through the entire author's note and tell me, if you post a comment (which I sincerely wish you would), that you did.]

When her lips touched his, it felt like her ears had stopped working, like she had just been submerged underwater. The thunderous yelling of the ECI members died out completely, and all she could hear, smell, feel, see and well, as bashful as she was about admitting it, taste, was Kartayon.

Curiouser and curiouser, Skye found herself thinking.

Skye. I can hear you perfectly well.

She felt her face flame red and she heard a little Pop! when she pulled away from the kiss, but Kartayon had lifted his cuffed arms as best as he could and closed his hands around her neck, tugging her closer.

When she was under again, she heard a faint whispering that must be Kartayon's thoughts.

...electrifying...hm...rather...

This is weird.

Kartayon started slightly and peeked at Skye. Is it?

Very.

Skye pulled away again. A tinkling sound made it clear to her that Kartayon was rather disgruntled at her departure. She gave him a quick peck once more on his lips before she tenderly wiped the blood from the corner of his mouth. It did not take long for another small trickle to reappear. She gazed down slowly at the silver blood on her fingers before wiping it on the hem of her jeans.

"I...I rather liked that," he murmured, his eyes an almost terrifying shade of neon green.

"It's called a kiss, Kartayon," Skye whispered back, thankful that the ECI members were still shouting and cheering. She was sure it would not last, however. She took both of his hands.

"I know that." A disgruntled look came across his face. "We will not have much time for discussion. But I will try and speak to that man, and convince him to allow me some time to talk to you," he said grimly.

"How do you think it'll go?"

"I am in no place to make a prediction," he replied stiffly, though Skye was certain he was just as skeptical about the request as she was.

She gave his hands a squeeze. "I'm here. That's not much of a consolation," she admitted embarrassingly, "but I want you to know that. I won't leave without you."

Kartayon gazed at her for a moment. Skye was afraid he would insist that she leave him here if the ECI offered her an escape. But he did not. His eyes softened and he squeezed her hands, smiling gently and sadly. Then, all of a sudden, his face took on a fierce, blazing expression. Skye's heartbeat skipped when she saw the rapid change in his face.

"Tay, what's wrong?"

"Skye, I want you to know something as well," he said in a quick whisper, speaking so low and fast that Skye needed to lean forward to hear him. "Originating from a different planet...I do not know what it is like here. But I believe I have observed the human race long enough to know what this particular term means—"

"Get on with it!" Skye interrupted nervously, her eyes darting around and confirming what her ears heard: the din was dying down, lunch was resuming, and her two 'guards' were making their way back to the two of them.

Stubbornly, Tay continued his explanation. "There is no such thing on my home planet, and I do think that humans use this term much too lightly, but Skye, I mean it when I say that I—"

Bzzzzt!

"No!" Skye screamed, digging an elbow into the man holding the taser. He stumbled backwards slightly from the impact, giving Skye enough time to lurch forward and cover Kartayon with her body.

She would have never done that for anyone else. All her life, she had been sheltered, timid, never motivated enough to jump in front of someone. It seemed that any harm that came to Kartayon—for he was always so steady and nothing ever fazed him—spurred some animalistic attribute within her.

"Get the girl away from that thing."

All Skye knew was that she kept screaming 'No', over and over again, her throat letting out horrible cracked, nails-on-chalkboard noises. She grew a sailor's mouth, flinging at them any insult that came to mind. She clawed and kicked at the pair of arms constricting her torso and her arms. She heard the man swear loudly and drop her. Barely having enough time to scramble to her feet, she took one step before another pair of arms, whether the same or not, wrapped around her, tugging her roughly backwards.

"Keep resisting and these little electric shocks will be nothing compared to what I will do to him."

"No!" Skye grappled with the man holding her and screamed again when Kartayon received another horrible zap. It caused spasms to ripple from his neck to his feet, his torso convulsing terribly. The blood on the edge of his mouth lengthened into a trickle, and a single drop beaded on the edge of his chin and fell. "No." Her flailing limbs slowed down until they gradually stopped moving altogether.

"Good girl." Then, as if the man enjoyed hearing Skye shout and screech, he pressed turned the knob on the taser and touched it to Kartayon's skin again.

Her glass-shattering screams died as the man successfully yanked her out of the cafeteria and slammed the doors shut.

-x-

Crash.

"I don't want to eat that. I don't want to eat anything so you can just take that away and feed it to lab rats. Probably kill them since that's what you guys do here," Skye spat venemously, throwing the bowl of cold, pasty pasta at the guard's retreating back.

It hit him squarely and he whorled around. "You'd better watch your attitude, you little bitch."

"You're the ones performing sick tricks on innocent people, and I'm the bitch?" she shouted, rubbing her left wrist with her free hand. They had cuffed her to her bed after she tried gouging out the eyes of her last guard.

She did not know how long she had been kept here. Now, there were no more visits to the cafeteria. She was not allowed out of her room. The ECI brought in a miniature porta potty she could access right next to her bed. Skye had cussed at them for fifteen minutes straight about their disgusting sense of hygiene.

She wobbled to her feet, dragging her cuffed hand along the bed railing that was oh-so conveniently shaped so that she could stand and not have to lean all the way over.

She had a deep suspicion that there was video surveillance in this room, and resisted the urge to go to the washroom until she absolutely needed to; she could not close the door because of her cuffed hand.

"Jackasses, all of you!" she shouted to the room, her eyes darting around. She had discovered that there were no overhead lights in her cell, just the lamp on the bedside table.

When the door opened suddenly, it nearly confirmed that there were cameras situated around the room.

"What do you want?" Skye had gone from bad to worse in her attitude. Unless Kartayon was the one that entered the room, she would not say a single polite sentence.

"I'm here to let you know that your friend has requested a meeting with you."

Skye paused before she started shouting again. "And?" she proceeded cautiously.

"I have granted his request."

Skye squinted her eyes at the man. It was the 'ringmaster'. "On what terms?" she asked in a low voice. "What did Kartayon say?"

"Funny name, don't you think?" the man said, idly looking about the room.

"What did he say to you that made you say yes to him?" Skye demanded.

"He said not to let you know, that's what he said." The man grinned when he saw Skye make a move to kick her bed.

"When can I see him?" she asked, biting her tongue.

"In a few minutes. You will be given forty-five minutes with each other."

Skye furrowed her brow. "That's not a lot of—"

The man interrupted in a silkily smooth voice. "Just be thankful I gave you any time at all."