Chapter 12: Sub Sandwich

“I want ... tuna,” Zhari said, pointing at the menu beside the window with one of her curved claws.

They had decided to eat out today and stretch their legs on the station’s torus. She was wearing her usual Navy blue uniform. Even if the maid outfit wasn’t currently going through a much needed wash cycle, McGregor would not have made her wear it outside.

There were all kinds of cafes and restaurants in the tourist quarter, and it was a popular destination for the ever ravenous aliens. This sandwich shop especially was a hit with the Pinwheel’s Borealan denizens, serving subs and sandwiches of monumental sizes. While Borealans were certainly a niche demographic, the store no doubt made up the difference in the sheer quantity of food that they sold to each customer. It was built into the station’s wall, as were all of the stores and buildings on the torus, this one quite small and designed to resemble something that one might find on a beach-front promenade.

McGregor swiped his credit card, and the man staffing the counter handed his eager partner her foot-long tuna sandwich, Zhari wasting no time taking a huge bite out of it. Her people were very fond of fish, not just because they so resembles the cat species of Earth, but because their societies were built around the life-giving lakes of Elysia where the micro-climate created by the surrounding jungles shielded them from the desert heat.

She ate happily as they made their way through the throngs of people, the station so crowded that it was hard to go five feet without running into another person. There was privacy in a crowd however, there were so many people and there was so much noise that eavesdropping on a conversation was practically impossible. Everyone had somewhere to be, something to do, and so nobody paid attention to the masses that surrounded them.

The pair stopped at a bench situated beside some planters, sitting together as the leafy saplings provided them with some measure of cover from the ever present lamps that were embedded in the painted ceiling. It was a human-sized bench, and so Zhari had to sit somewhat awkwardly, but she was too consumed with eating her tuna sub to complain.

It was refreshing in a way, she had such simple tastes and she was so easy to please. His last girlfriend ... God, how long had it been since he had shared a bed with a fellow human? Her tastes had been extravagant, she had demanded candlelit dinners in the most exclusive restaurants, elaborate and expensive gifts that had cost him a small fortune. He never had to bribe Zhari to get her into bed, never had to coerce her into spending time with him, and it wasn’t merely because of her submissive position. He observed the same behavior in the more dominant Borealans too. Their kind just had a laissez-faire attitude towards relationships that was a breath of fresh air to the comparatively stuffy humans.

“I gave it some thought,” Zhari said, finishing up her sandwich as she sat beside him.

“Oh?” McGregor asked, surmising that she must be talking about their conversation concerning her future in the military the day prior.

“I think you were right. Maybe the military life isn’t for me. My entire life I’ve been doing what others expected of me, what I thought that I was supposed to do, not what I really wanted to do. I wanted to be Alpha, but I was letting outside factors dictate my behavior. That isn’t what an Alpha does, not really. I might have been the master of my pack, but their expectations were my master and I didn’t even know it.”

McGregor was taken a little off-guard, that was some impressive introspection coming from the usually tight-lipped alien.

“Yes!” He exclaimed. “Sometimes taking charge can mean saying no, it can mean swimming against the current and doing your own thing, even if other people don’t like it.”

“I will do as you suggested,” she continued, “I will become my own master and make my living through my own means.”

“And ... you’re ok with not being part of a pack? I know that’s a pretty big deal for Borealans.”

“I ‘am’ part of a pack,” she replied, reaching over and ruffling his hair with her massive hand. “One does not commonly get the opportunity to choose their own Alpha, and I couldn’t imagine a better one. Once I’ve finished my tour, I’ll send in my resignation and get my honorable discharge. With the money I have, I can afford a small store on the station, and the Borealan apartments are never occupied.”

“Yeah, they built way too many of them after first contact. Your people aren’t really the tourism types.”

“We’ll be able to spend more time together too,” she added. “No more waiting weeks and months, hoping that our shore leave will coincide. If I’m self-employed, I can take time off whenever you have leave, and we can hang out.”

McGregor hadn’t thought of that, and his heart swelled at the prospect. He had never really worried about her all that much when she was on deployment. She was a capable soldier and there weren’t very many things in the galaxy that could kill a Borealan shock trooper, but it would be a load off his mind to know that she wouldn’t be put in harm’s way anymore. Finally she could pursue her passion, a talent that she had kept hidden for fear of being ridiculed by her peers, and as a bonus they would be able to see each other far more frequently.

“I worried that I might be pressuring you,” he said, “I thought that you might take it as an order rather than as a suggestion.”

“No, you just helped to clarify something that had been bothering me for a long time. Living on Borealis, I never really had an opportunity to see that there were different ways of living, different ways of going about things. The more time I spent with humans, the more I started to ask myself why I was adhering so strictly to the old ways. You put it into words, and I guess I kind of ... couldn’t keep it suppressed any longer.”

“Well I’m glad,” he replied, patting her thigh affectionately. “I’m proud of you, I know that honor and duty are a huge part of your culture. It must have been a hard decision to make.”

“I’ve done my duty thrice over,” she said as she licked a blob of residual mayonnaise from her furry finger with her rough tongue. “Oh, I have something for you.”

“Something for me?” McGregor asked, watching curiously as she delved into one of her pockets.

“Yeah, I made it this morning, while you were asleep.”

“You do get up early...”

She passed him a small, oval-shaped object that was attached to a length of string. He took it from her furry hand, holding it up to examine it. It looked like a wooden kitchen spoon with the handle shaved away. No, she had left a small stub of handle, and she had made a hole in it through which the string was threaded. Upon the concave surface of the spoon she had carved an intricate relief, turning the cooking implement into a finely detailed work of art that resembled a locket without the lid. It was a little large by human standards, but he hadn’t been awake in order for her to take a measurement, and rousing him would have ruined the surprise.

There was what looked like a rune or a series of scratch marks in the center, raised from the wood below where she had removed layers of the material, and the strange symbol was framed by what looked like intricately carved foliage that reminded him of a tropical jungle. It was very ornate, she had managed to pack so much detail and texture into the tiny amount of space that the spoon afforded her.

She leaned closer and pointed to the carving with her claw.

“See, this is the Borealan symbol for ‘marked’, so that others of my kind know that you’re spoken for. I can’t mark you in the usual way, I might injure you, and so I thought a pendant might do the job. If you meet any Borealans while you’re working and they come on too strong, just flash this at them and they should back off.”

“And what about the leaves?”

“That’s the jungle, where we met. Do you like it?” She asked, a little hesitantly.