Infuriatingly, Tasha shook her head.
“Everything has been arranged for next month,” she said, not unkindly. “I’m glad you’re so enthusiastic about the program, though!” She smiled at Magnolia, who smiled back, and Darcy, who didn’t. “Have you two decided if you’d like to proceed to the next stage?”
Magnolia hesitated for a moment, then appeared to steel herself and nodded firmly. “Yes. I’m in,” she said.
Darcy sighed. “Me, too.”
“Wonderful!” Tasha said, looking relieved in a startled sort of way, like she hadn’t expected this to be quite so easy. I eyed Magnolia, then Darcy, wondering what drove them to agree to participate in this program.
Were they running from something just like I was?
“Well, if we’re all decided,” Tasha went on, beaming and nodding, “we can move on to the next stage!”
5CHERRY
The “next stage” lasted three days and consisted of medical exams, vaccinations, and updates to our inner-ear translators. Mercifully (and rather humiliatingly) Tasha noticed after the second day that I was still wearing the same grubby factory uniform and arranged for me to receive a couple of plain but comfortable outfits of leggings, tops, underthings, and pyjamas.
“You’ll be provided with more clothing to bring to the planet,” she told all three of us. “The environment there can be quite hostile. It gets cold at night even during summer. You’ll need jackets, hats, sunglasses, and sturdy boots.”
At least I had the boots part covered.
After all the medical stuff got cleared, we received our Zabrian landing papers. Shockingly, the documents weren’t digital, but on a shiny, silver sort of paper.
“Don’t lose these,” Tasha told us sternly, pointing a slender finger at the intricate symbol stamped at the bottom. “That’s the Zabrian Imperial Seal. The indentation is inlaid with a case-sensitive energy signature that cannot be forged.”
“What’s this other thing?” I asked, noticing a far less impressive-looking white card behind the silver Zabrian document.
“Oh, I printed those off,” Tasha said as all three of us examined our cards. “Those are the names of your future husbands.”
I inhaled shakily, running my eyes over the letters. I couldn’t read Zabrian, which was the first line of text at the top. But it had been re-written in letters I could understand directly below.
“Silar,” I said, an odd sort of numbness spreading outward through my chest.
“Not sill. It’s like sigh,” Tasha corrected. “SIGH-lahr. Magnolia, you’ve got Oaken. Darcy, yours is Fallon.”
Magnolia looked pleased, nodding and gazing down at her card. Darcy shoved hers in behind her silver paper without looking at it again.
After receiving our papers and being released for the day, I refused Magnolia’s invitation to join her and Darcy for dinner the way I’d done every night so far. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to hang out with them – I did. I was beyond curious to know why they were shipping themselves off to marry an alien they’d never met.
But I just couldn’t stand letting my guard down. I didn’t want to be chatting and laughing with them out in the open at some cafeteria while Magnus’ men might be trawling the station for me. The Zabrian Empire had given me a small stipend while here, and I spent almost all of it on food I got delivered directly to my sleeping quarters.
Before returning there, I completed my nightly security ritual. The ritual that had replaced the lock, deadbolt, and chair system back home.
I went down to the shuttle bay to watch the docking announcements.
So far, I hadn’t seen any other shuttles from Terratribe I listed as arriving.
Until now.
My blood went icy, then suddenly sped up in my veins. A small Terratribe I vessel flashed as an incoming arrival across the screen. I tried not to panic, telling myself it could be any old innocent ship coming to dock.
But would any vessel besides that of a crime lord’s goons be named Black Hole Bitch?
Yeah. I didn’t think so.
Fighting panic, I stumbled away from the docking arrivals and departures screen as if it had burned me, even though it was well overhead, bleating out its messages near the towering metal beams of the ceiling. I moved as if in a dream – or nightmare – through throngs of new arrivals to the station, letting the noise of the human and alien crowds swallow me in a comforting swarm that I hoped could keep me hidden. My heart beat so loud I almost worried it could be heard above everything else.
Furtively, I scurried towards one of the lift orbs, scooting inside and directing it to the floor that held my sleeping quarters. As it zoomed upwards through the cylindrical core of the station, restaurants and shops and trading posts flashing past, I tried to quell my fear and make a plan. I was suddenly reminded of being in another lift, clutching at a bloodied pan, trying to make plans then, too.
Nothing has fucking changed. New place, same problems.
But this lift was faster than the one back home which meant there was less time to think, plus there was no colourful advertisement inside to give me sudden inspiration on what the hell I should do. After getting off the lift, I let myself into my quarters, locking the door behind me.
But I didn’t feel any better. No, now I just felt trapped. And if Magnus’ men had any contacts among the staff of the station (which they probably did) then it wouldn’t be long before they knew exactly which room was mine.
OK, Cherry. You can’t stay here.
What, then? Go to Tasha and tell her everything?
No. That could put her in danger. And with all my baggage, she might decide I was too much risk to the Zabrian outpost planet and cut me out of the program. I could go to Elora Station security, but that still ran the risk of Tasha finding out about my situation and branding me too dangerous and stupid a human to be allowed to marry a Zabrian.
Like a brainless factory machine, my body moved without my mind telling it to.
I started to pack.
I’d used my stipend from the Zabrian Empire to purchase a bag to fit my new clothes and some toiletries inside. I tossed everything I owned in all willy nilly, not worrying about wrinkles or folding. The only thing I placed with any real care was my Zabrian landing papers, trying not to crease or tear the document in my haste.
Last came the pan, recently scrubbed clean of any lingering traces of blood. I shoved it in, gritting my teeth as I closed the bag’s zipper. The pan really wasn’t meant to fit in here. But I wasn’t about to leave it behind and I certainly wasn’t going to traipse around the station swinging it with a big smile on my face. With my luck I’d run right into the guy whose nose I’d crushed with it. Might as well put a holographic sign with an arrow above my head flashing, Here she is – the girl who smashed your fucking face in!
Hoisting my bag, made heavy by the pan and strained at its seams, I settled the strap over my shoulder. At the last second, I yanked the zipper open a tiny bit, reaching into the small opening with my forefinger and thumb to fish out a scarf I’d been using to wrap around my hair during sleep. I’d bought it on the station, and it had been a spontaneous decision at the time. With my meager stipend it was a bit of luxury I couldn’t actually afford, the long ribbon of it made from fine Hadorian silk, but I hadn’t been able to refuse it when I’d seen the colour. Cherry red, Mama would have called it. I’d never actually seen a real cherry on Terratribe I. I’d meant to seek out cherries, or at least something cherry-flavoured on Elora Station, but I’d been a little busy with the whole marry-an-alien-to-avoid-getting-murdered thing.
