He Comes in Peace

“Mom, can you wheel me over to the shade? I can barely see,” Skye called, gesturing weakly with her unbroken arm. She sat in a wheel chair tied with various ribbons, words of encouragement and “Get Well Soon!” written on the shiny fabric. Her friends had tied them to the handles of the wheelchair to brighten up Skye’s time away from school.

“Of course, honey,” Mrs. Cedona answered. She adjusted her sun hat and pushed Skye closer towards the edge of their small garden, where the hedges threw long shadows across the lawn.

“Can we go to the lake house sometime this week?” Skye asked, feeling an itch along her free arm, but unable to scratch it with her opposite broken wrist.

“Skye, you’ve asked me that several times already. And my answer is still the same. You still need to keep up with school, even if you’re not physically at school.” Mrs. Cedona twirled her bendy straw around in the tall glass of iced tea she was drinking. She had decided to stay at home with Skye while she was getting better.

“Why do you want to go back there so badly, anyway?” she continued suspiciously.

Skye shrugged, though she felt a tug at her chest. It had been months since she had fallen from Kartayon’s mothership. Months since she had seen him. Months since she had been released from the hospital. She was lucky enough to have walked away with her life, though both legs were broken, elbow nearly shattered, and wrist broken badly.

She winced at the memory of falling. Kartayon had not been able to save her. His brother had caught him before he could launch himself out of the spaceship. All Skye could hear when thinking of the memory was how his mouth had opened wide as he screamed; she had not heard him, for some strange reason.

Probably because of all the wind rushing past my ears, she thought. And the sickening crunch of hitting the ground. I should thank the ECI man, she continued morbidly. The man had cushioned her fall, said Doctor Cooper, the nice man that had taken charge over her welfare at the hospital.

I don’t even want to think about what happened.

Somehow, the ECI had found a way to cover their tracks. The man that had dragged Skye down with him had died. Died with some kind of honourable prize, however. She remembered the newspaper article vividly, though she tried not to because it made her sick to the stomach.

Scientist Saves Girl from Terrible Death

It had been something about how Skye had not been in her right mind when she wandered up to the roof of the building, and how the scientist had tried grabbing her before she could fall, but ended up tumbling down with her. Something about how he had “sacrificed his own life for the good of a young girl”. For weeks after that, everything had thought Skye was a nutcase with depression problems. It had taken several hours spread across the span of two weeks for Skye to convince her mother that she wasn’t suffering from trauma and was not suicidal.

“Skye, honey?”

Skye jolted out of her reverie and looked around at her mother. “Yes, Mom?”

“I said we might be able to go this weekend.”

“Go where?”

“The lake house. Haven’t you been pining to go?” Mrs. Cedona looked at her anxiously. “Are you having headaches again? Dizziness? Feeling—”

“No, Mom, I’m perfectly fine. I’ll start packing soon.” If her legs were not broken, Skye would have jumped up and bolted upstairs to get ready for the weekend trip.

-

Skye sat impatiently on the curb outside their lake house. Her mother was unloading the car, though there was not much to unload for a two-day trip. Skye’s duffel bag landed in her lap and she drummed her fingers along the armrests on both sides of her wheelchair.

“Come on, Mom, I want to see the forest again!” she said, sighing when her mother insisted upon laying everything down in the hallway before going anywhere.

“Since when have you been so nature-loving?” her mother retorted.

“Since forever. Duh, Mom,” Skye replied with a grin. The smile quickly faded when she realized that her mother was unpacking, too.

“I’ll just go by myself, then,” she grumped, tucking her bag in the pouch behind her wheelchair and trying to wheel hers elf forward with one hand.

“Skye, just wait for me to finish unpacking!” Mrs. Cedona called from the open doorway.

“No can do. I want to get going!” Slowly, and with much wobbling, she made her way down the beaten path to the back of her house, and in extension, the forest.

The smell of pine needles hit her as soon as she rolled a few feet into the forest. She inhaled deeply, missing the smell and the time she had spent here.

Even though this was where bad things had started happening, she recalled.

But she would gladly go back in time…

If I could see Kartayon again.

She touched her hand to the side of her head, a migraine starting up again. She gritted her teeth and stopped pushing herself forward. She sat still in the forest, letting the sounds of animals and birds and rustling leaves wash over her.

“What are you doing here?” a voice said.

Skye’s eyes flew open for a fraction of a second, and a face-splitting grin had just started to appear on her face when she realized that the voice was much too deep to belong to a certain alien friend she had been hoping to meet.

She sighed and met the gaze of a large man, who was holding a rifle in his hands.

“Just wanted some peace and quiet,” she replied with a little frown of irritation.

The man nodded. “Watch yourself. I saw some weird thing in the forest a few minutes ago, climbing around in the trees. Wouldn’t want to cross that thing.”

Her heart jumped. “What did the thing look like?” she asked weakly.

The man shrugged and squinted at Skye. “Big. Really fast. I don’t know any animal that’s big and climbs around that fast in the trees. Do you know an animal like that?”

Skye was about to ask the man if he thought she was some mad scientist, but decided against it, irony making the edges of her mouth curl. “No. Sounds weird.”

The man nodded. “Stay safe, kid.”

Skye nodded and half-heartedly raised her unbroken hand.

He’s here. I know he’s here.

She started to wheel herself more furiously. How long she spent in the forest she was unsure, but by the time her arm had started aching, she was so deep in the forest that she could no longer see the lake house.

She stopped moving, letting her arm hang limply over the side of her wheelchair. Sweat made her hair stick to her forehead and back of her neck, and she wiped at it irritably.

There was a rustle above her head, and she looked up sharply, only to receive a face-full of pine needles. She spit it out angrily, and glared at the squirrel skittering across the branch above her head. It chattered noisily as it scurried along nimbly.

Her eyes drifted through the foliage above her. The forest really was beautiful at this time of year. And there was just the right amount of sunlight filtering through the trees to keep Skye warm, but not too warm.

“Y’know, it’s not creepy at all that you’ve been following me through the forest from up in a tree,” she called loudly. She waited for several heartbeats in silence before there was a chuckle from a tree to her left.

“Not creepy at all.”

Heart pounding furiously now, Skye turned to see a familiar shape perched between two branches that formed a thick ‘V’. She followed him as he gripped the bark with his hands and bare feet, and scampered down the trunk of the tree.

He looked the same as he had ever been. Red-brown hair and glowing eyes. Maybe a little taller. And—

“Tay, why is your mouth blue?” Skye asked, once he had gotten close enough.

His hand jumped to his lips and he rubbed them, looking down at his fingers when they came away. He grinned.

“Your teeth are blue, too,” Skye remarked, turning the wheelchair with difficulty to face him.

He stood there shyly for a moment before closing the distance between them slowly, his feet moving noiselessly atop the carpet of green needles.

“It is a transformation among my species,” he admitted shyly, going to kneel in front of Skye so they were eye-to-eye.

Skye felt as if her heart would leap out of her throat or pound until it was too exhausted to move anymore. She reached forward and stroked his cheek, reveling in the tingle she still got when she touched him. Her fingers moved to his lips, and she covered them in a small kiss before pulling back sharply.

Kartayon looked at her with raised eyebrows, a question in his eyes. “What is it?”

“You liar, you taste like blackberries,” she shouted, giving him a playful shove.

He grinned and opened his palm. “You were moving considerably slowly, so I decided to pick some berries when you were not looking.”

Skye frowned. “Didn’t think to come down here and meet me?”

“I was wondering how far you were willing to travel to look for the ‘weird thing climbing around in the trees’. I was curious.”

“Mmmph,” Skye replied, kissing him a second time. “Are you here to stay?” she asked, getting right down to business.

“Perhaps.”

“What do you mean, perhaps?”

“I will if you tell me something.” A smile was beginning to form on his face.

“What?”

“Three words,” he replied, holding up three fingers.

“Oh yeah? What three words?” Skye said, biting her lip to keep from smiling too much.

“I believe you are familiar with those three words,” Tay mused, giving a nonchalant shrug and leaning in closer.

“Let me guess. Three words that—” She touched her forehead to his, felt the connection between their minds open.

—humans on Earth—

—use much too lightly.

I love you.