Chapter 32

“Oh God!” Pat worried. “Should we do what it says? Should we all go back?”

“No.” I answered firmly. Xiomara nodded with a grim frown.

“Why not?” Vanessa worried. “We can’t face a bunch of aliens who kidnapped all of us! That’s insane! We should do what we’re told.”

“I’m not sending Zoë back. I’m not giving up my family. On my girls.” I shook my head. “What else Xiomara?”

“I’ll see.” She asked and hit the down key. The screen on the left kept up its warning. The second screen showed data, scrolling uncomfortably fast. Impossible to read in totality, but easy enough to get the gist of.

“112 females pregnant. 3 females terminated. 24 males terminated. 17 failed mental severs.” I read aloud, though I probably would’ve read more by reading silently.

“I think that’s you, Zoë, and Wanda.” Xiomara posited at the concept of mental sever. I supposed that made sense. There were 14 others at school that were living this? Or including Pat’s school as well. Or ... Why all the languages if everyone was from our neighborhood. I frowned. Xiomara scrolled down again.

“Recommendation for distributions: No sector should have fewer than 450 females per mil settlers. No sector should have fewer than 375 males per mil settlers.”

More data flew by. I could see Pat had abandoned trying to read, favoring my narration instead. Xiomara was concentrating hard to absorb more and more. I rubbed her back.

“Go at your pace.” I told her.

“Really?” She asked. “Dammit!” She swore, losing her place and concentration. She scrolled back up to the statistics and returned to the recommendations. I caught something this time I hadn’t before. There were numbers, in shadow behind each line. I reached around Xiomara’s hip and keyed in for the ‘settlers recommendations’.

The left screen changed this time. A Google Earth type map appeared. Was this Second Sigma Draconis? Planet Dragon, I think we had agreed to call it. There was a lot of ocean. Four continents were bracketed around an island dotted sea just south of the equator. The vegetation centered on this sea and looked lush and green like it would back on Earth. If you travelled to the ice capped poles, the plants died off and vasts swathes of rocky deserts ruled.

I touched the screen, attempting to scroll and look. It worked, in that it stopped the planet spinning faster than I could make out, but failed, in that the gestures to zoom in and zoom out were different from my iPhone. I could only turn the planet at my own pace. Pat reached for the scrolling words and realized she could control that speed as well.

“Good,” Xiomara nodded, “Let’s find what we need then.”

“You’re the pilot, Pat and I will steer. Vanessa how are Renée and Andrea?” I gave out my orders. Xiomara rubbed my back this time.

“They waved back, but we’re too far to be heard.” Vanessa said.

“Good, what do we need?” Xiomara worried.

“I want to know where we are going, whether those terminations are being mitigated, how to get more control over our lives.”

“And do you want to drop a couple of boxes of poontang right next to our new home?” Pat conspired.

“No,” I shook my head. “I’ve got the best girls I could want. If we even can fuck things up against their recommendations, we don’t know what’ll happen.”

“What does mitigating a termination mean?” Vanessa frowned.

“I think termination means a death.” Xiomara whispered. She didn’t like the subject at all. I nudged her toes with my toes. She steadied. She pointed to Pat to hold up some manifest discussing food and resource distribution. I was trying different gestures on the planet. Hoping to better control the screen.

“And by mitigation, I mean fixing that.” I added.

“You can’t raise the dead.” Vanessa crossed her arms and shook her head. “That’s crazy.”

“I don’t know their medical science,” I started but I stopped and took a deep breath. I looked Vanessa in the eyes. “I was thinking more along the lines of 3-D printing a new clone of whoever.”

“Clones?” She scoffed. “Is that why my eyesight’s been fixed?”

“Probably,” I nodded. “I was--Holy crap! Yes!”

I had figured it out. Spiralling one finger inward zoomed in. Spiralling one finger outward zoomed out.

“Those look like Earth plants.” Xiomara said as I had zoomed in on the forested archipelago that ran below the equator. We could only zoom in enough for a good look of the trees. They were deciduous and palms. Conifers ranged over the continents and further away from the sea.

“They probably terraformed it for us.” Pat announced. I nodded. She blushed she was very happy with herself.

“Did you two find anything?”

“How to open the locked locker.” Xiomara grinned.

“And how to get into our box the easy way.” Pat grinned. “No catching a ride on the cranes. We should be able to take a loop around the backside of the boxes and get in.”

“That’s such a relief.” I squeezed Xiomara around the waist and touched the side of her head with my forehead. “Keep looking for what to do about Reggie. Vanessa, take control of the Google Earth over here.”

“Google Second Sigma Draconis,” Pat puffed up to sound smart.

“Google Dragon,” I slipped around Xiomara and hugged Pat from behind. She pointed beyond the water treatment towers to the far unilluminated wall.

“There should be paths over there.”

“Thanks.” I kissed her flaky hair. I squeezed Xiomara’s shoulder. I turned to leave.

“What are you going to do now?” Xiomara asked me.

“Go get my girls.”

“Hey!” I had walked back to the fence alone. Renée screamed in excitement to see me. Andrea hugged the cheerleader and reached her hand through the bars to clasp my fingers. “Where’s Heidi?”

“She fucked off,” Andrea worried. “Said Vanessa was our dead weight now and she was going to get inside a box that would take her.”

“It hasn’t been that long has it? I’m not that hungry.” I wish I had a better hold of the time. “I don’t want to fall asleep in the middle of everything and be a burden on you girls.”

“No, but it could’ve been a couple of hours.” Renée worried. “Thanks for turning back and waving all of those times. Where’s everyone else?”

“Waiting for the three of us,” I grinned, “C’mon, I’m sure you want to get home safe.”

“Home Earth or home us?” Andrea worried.

“Home us,” I said and she let out a relieved sigh. I was surprised. Renée was surprised, but she smiled. Her black flaked lips were mischievous. I grinned.

“I think she really likes us.”

“You’re like my sister,” Andrea said with a frustrated worry to Renée. “I haven’t really had good friends before. I never knew I wanted a big big family.”

“Do you want a best friend?” I asked. “Pat’d love someone to conspire with.”

“What about me?” Renée shot a look at me.

“What about Connie? Jinx!” Andrea caught me. I frowned, unable to talk. I gestured with one hand, telling them to climb over.

“Connie’s looking out for me but she’s taken a big sister role. I think I need someone on my level. Besides, she’s been gunning to put herself among Xiomara or Zoë’s place in your mind.” Renée explained. I didn’t answer. I gestured upwards once more.

“Are you sure? I don’t think it’ll be as easy to get back from your side.” Renée frowned. I flashed her a thumbs up.

“Really, you’re going to play the game?” She asked. I nodded. “OK, well, you’re lucky you’re pretty. Pretty should be seen and not heard.”

I stuck my fingers in my ears and leered at her tits. Andrea tugged Renée’s sleeve. “Help me up and then I’ll help you up and then D--he can help you down and you two can help me down.”

“That seems right, be ready to catch her, sugarlumps.” Renée poked at me.

Renée made a step by interlacing her fingers. She squatted on one knee while Andrea gripped her shoulders and then the top of her head. Andrea quaked as she hunched. It was difficult for her to reach the top of the fence that way. I wanted to tell her it was OK. I stopped myself. I reached through and rubbed Renée’s leg. I caught their eyes and gave the OK sign. Andrea nodded and mounted the top of the fence.

It was more awkward but less of a chore to get Renée up. I made a step with my hands, reaching through the bars. Andrea was unbalanced and bad at helping Renée up. The cheerleading paid off. She mounted. The cheerleader hugged the Asian girl. She jumped down before I could catch her.

The fall was about 10 feet but there was less gravity it seemed. She landed with a soft bounce of her knees. She slapped my chest and we looked up to Andrea’s worried face. I grabbed Renée’s shoulders and bent my knees a little for her to grab mine. Andrea was able to touch our arms with her toes from her seat on the fence.

“Don’t drop me!” She pleaded.

“We got you.” Renée said and I nodded vigorously.

Heavy rapid hyping up breaths burst out of Andrea’s lungs. She put her weight onto her feet on our arms and we had her. She whiteknuckled the bars behind her. She inched her butt down. She slipped between our arms and skidded her butt over my elbow until she had her feet on the floor and an arm hooked over each of us.

“Thank you.” She wheezed. She smiled and kissed me on the lips.

“Hey, I held you up too.” Renée joked. Andrea looked at her with suspicion. I nodded vigorously when she looked at me. Her skin darkened in the green light. She pecked Renée on the lips and ducked under our arms and took off towards the light cloaked Xiomara, Pat, and Vanessa.

“I can’t believe she kissed me.” Renée worried and frowned. “You liked that didn’t you.”

I smiled and nodded. She took my hand. We walked over to the other girls.

“He’s jinxed. Don’t say his name.” Andrea didn’t sound like she was joking when we arrived.

“OK,” Xiomara grinned.

“Are you sure this is alright?” Vanessa asked.

“What if he wants something from us?” Pat looked me dead in the eye. “How will we know?”

I was feeling incredibly happy with what we had learned. I confidently swaggered to my redheaded martial artist. I took her tit in my hand and smiled.

“OK, what if he wants something he doesn’t always want?” Pat stuck her tongue out at me. She squirmed out of my grip and wiped down her tit. “Not while we’re covered in this crap.” Pat shook herself out. I gave her as good of a puppy dog pout as I could. “No, I’m not getting this shit up my cunt. You can’t make me.”

“That’s absurd,” Xiomara sighed, “He could easily make you with a smile. He just won’t do it because you told him you weren’t going to be raped that first morning.”

“Has he put himself on anyone yet?” Vanessa asked. I raised an eyebrow at her verb choice but said nothing, even in spite of the jinx.