Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 61982 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 310(@200wpm)___ 248(@250wpm)___ 207(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 61982 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 310(@200wpm)___ 248(@250wpm)___ 207(@300wpm)
“Very well,” I say. “But if anything hap—”
“Yes, yes, you’ll kill me,” Drak sighs. “I’m used to the threats by now. They don’t do very much for me, I’m afraid. Let me get on with this, unless delivering the same tired threat you’ve already agreed not to follow through on is doing something for you sexually.”
I grit my teeth and everything else and I tell myself that if I knock him out right now he won’t be able to remedy what he’s done here. What an absolute asshole he is. An unrepentant, psychotic, brilliant monster of a creature.
Evie’s life is in his hands. And I have to hope they’re still competent enough to restore her to her former self.
CHAPTER 9
Evie
Tee hee. He’s so little. And so angry. The way he waves all four of his arms at once looks adorable from all the way up here. I remember when I used to be smaller than him, and the things he used to do to me then.
I have an intellectual yearning to feel them again. I can’t want them in this body. This body was not made to want. It cannot experience desire, so it cannot yearn. But it can imagine and it can think.
They are arguing down there, about me, I think. Their voices are distant and small and their concerns seem petty to me by merit of how little they are. I could lift one of my leviathan fingers and squish them both in one go.
I don’t, of course. I feel a deep affection for Arkon. He has a very earnest way about him, very brave and very kind in his own way. He tried to look after me, even when I was very hard to look after.
As for the other one, Drak. He gave me this body. He let me see the universe in ways I never would have otherwise seen it. He showed me what near ultimate power feels like. And then he reeled me back in like a fish on an invisible line, and now he is climbing up my face with a little black bag of tools. I wonder what they are for…
* * *
I open my eyes.
I am in the alien sick bay. I am not a creature thousands of miles long with feet big enough to smash small cities. I am a human woman in a human woman’s body. I can feel a slight ache in my lower back. I can sense my ankles. My neck feels as though I did something wrong, though I have no memory of such wrongdoing.
A wave of emotion crashes through me and for a moment it scares the fuck out of me because I’ve managed to forget what feelings feel like. Were they always this intense? Did they always involve so many things squishing about inside me?
Water is running down my face. My nose feels stuffy. My head aches. I am weak and I am limited, and I could not be happier for it.
“Be careful with her!” a strong, feminine voice intones. “Don’t grab at her. She’s fragile.”
I turn toward the voice and see that I am not alone in this room. The doctor is here, and for that I am very glad because I feel absolutely overwhelmed with physical sensations.
I try to make sense of what is happening. I must have been drugged. There could have been something wild in that drink Drak gave me. I must have been vividly hallucinating, or in a coma, or something. I’m going to be in so much trouble for taking in alien food. I was warned not to and I trusted Drak anyway. He was probably trying to get me fired. He’s never really been a big fan of mine. He’s always thought I was simple and stupid and human—and not in a good way.
The important thing is, none of it was real. I didn’t run rampant through the universe and set off a small war on the planet I love the most. I didn’t fail to deliver on the one promise I made to my boss before I left. I didn’t take the internet down for millions of people…
“Evie? I’m here.” Arkon’s deep voice emanates from beside me. He moves into my field of vision, his big, four-armed body rippling with something like relief. “You’re okay,” he says.
I look at him and I feel my eyes mist with tears. It feels like it has been a long time since I last saw him. I wonder how long I was sick for. I wonder how scared he was.
“I’m sorry,” I whimper. “Am I in trouble?”
“No, baby, you’re not in trouble,” he says, dipping into a very human form of speech. His calling me baby is the most intimate thing I think he has ever done with me. It makes me feel warm all the way to the very core of my being.