How to Marry an Alien (3 page)

"Of course not, silly. I could never go
without a hug goodbye from my baby brother." I held out my arms,
and he eagerly jumped into them, squeezing me tight.

"I love you, sissy."

"I love you too, Elijah."

The sound of a horn behind me startled us
both, almost knocking me to the ground.

I let go of Elijah, stood, and turned toward
the sound. I expected to see Ace grumbling from the driver seat of
my new car, but instead I saw Brody Birley hanging out of the
passenger door or Brad Gage's bright red truck.

"Hey Alex!" He waved.

Brody and I hadn't talked much in the past
few months, ever since Simone lifted her sleep creep off him. His
little crush on me finally went away, and I didn't have to worry
about him trying to get in my pants.

"Oh, hey, Brody." I walked over to the truck.
Brad might have lived down the street from me, but I never expected
either of them to show up at my house, especially so early in the
morning.

I glanced back to see Ace glaring, but he
still gave me some space. After the fiasco with Brody's crush and
the big battle with Simone, Ace had a tendency to get even more
jealous.

"Leaving so soon?" Brody stammered. I turned
back to him and a waft of stale beer and something even more toxic
wafted from the window. Brody and Brad both looked like they never
actually went to bed with their bloodshot eyes and disheveled
clothes.

"Yeah, got to get on the road." I forced a
small smile.

Brody reached through the window, gripping my
hand in his. "I'll miss having you around here, Alex."

"Uh, yeah, I'll miss you too Brody." I tried
to pull my hand away, but he had a vice grip. It brought me back to
the Cephalopod that attacked me last summer at Circe. Brody had
been controlled by an alien before, so I worried that one could
have been controlling him again.

"No, Alex, I mean I'll miss you when you are
gone." His eyes widened, empty as ever.

"I'll be back for breaks..."

"No, Alex, don't make excuses. I know."

I cocked an eyebrow. What did he really know?
"Excuse me?"

"Simone. I know she wasn't like us. As soon
as she came to town I felt different. Then when she left, everyone
acted like nothing happened. But me and Brad, we never forgot."

I looked across the seat to Brad. He slowly
nodded his head and stared out the front window.

"Come on, Alex. We need to get going," Ace
yelled behind me.

"Sorry, Brody, but I have to go." I broke my
hand free of his. "Good luck with, um, everything."

I turned and walked as fast as I could back
to my car.

Circe operatives said they came up with a
good story about Simone robbing Cuppa Java and going crazy, but
maybe not everyone believed it. Maybe it was best that I got out of
Winnebago. The less people wrapped up in my alien world, the
better.

There is absolutely nothing exciting to look
at when you drive hundreds of miles on the highway. Somewhere after
Oklahoma I felt my eyes start to drift. There hadn't been any sort
of a gas station or rest stop for miles, and I was running low on
energy.

Ace was lightly snoring in the seat next to
me. He drove most of the morning and into the afternoon. The sleep
I had while he was driving was to sleep off the hangover. Now at 3
a.m., I needed actual sleep. I should have stopped. Why didn't I
just stop at the rest stop an hour ago and take a nap? There really
wasn't any hurry to get to Flagstaff, but I was determined to make
good time.

I sang along with every stupid song on the
radio, blasting the air conditioning just to force my eyes to stay
open. I constantly found my eyelids drooping and jolting myself
awake, so that the car would slightly swerve.

No, I wasn't going to fall asleep and ruin my
new car. I had been driving around in the Pox for too long to take
something so nice for granted. I had to stay awake.

The road ahead was completely dark, save for
the few lights that would hang on the overpasses every few miles.
There wasn't another car in sight and no reason why another one
would be out as late as we were anyway.

A flash of brown streaked across the road so
fast I could have blinked and missed it. A deer? Off the highway
with nothing around? I banked my wheel hard to the right, trying to
avoid hitting it. It was definitely too small to be a deer. I
looked to my left and saw the grass ruffle on the other side of the
highway. I'd never seen something move so fast, and it was so dark
I could only make out a faint outline of something sprinting
through the field.

Before I could turn my head back to the road
in front of me I felt my whole body jerk back into my seat and the
crushing sound of metal on metal.
Screeeeech
.

Ace stirred awake, his eyes wide and looking
straight ahead. "Alex, what the—?"

Before he could finish his sentence, the car
bounced off the guardrail and before the scream could leave my lips
the car rolled to the left. It didn't take long before it
completely rocked over. That left me clutching at my seatbelt while
I hung upside down from my seat.

Finally, my voice came back to me, and I
looked at Ace. He didn't wear his seatbelt and his seat had been
leaned back so he could get a better slumber. His body was pinned
between the seat and the crushed roof. A large oozing cut bled from
his head and into his closed eyes.

"Ace?"

I pulled myself free of the seatbelt and fell
to where the roof now became the floor, careful to avoid the glass
that had crushed in from the windshield. But there was no avoiding
it; it had shattered and cut into every bit of bare skin I had on
my arms.

He moaned, slightly lifting his head.

"Oh my God, Ace? Are you alright? We need to
get you to a hospital!" My body was stiff. It felt as if all my
muscles had ceased up, and I could barely crawl from my spot toward
him.

"No hospital," he groaned. "Just call your
dad and get some Circe officials here."

"But, Ace, you're really hurt." I couldn't
even see the lower half of his body. It was completely covered by
the bottom of the car. His torso hung forward over the hood of the
car and his seat pressed against his back.

"Alex, just call your dad!" His voice grew
louder. The lungs had to be crushed against the ceiling and I
wasn't sure how he could even talk. Hopefully someone would get
there to save him before he stopped talking.

Within minutes of the phone call to my dad,
three silver Circe vans pulled up and guards quickly began to
remove us from the vehicle. I was able to be pulled from the
driver's side window, but Ace wasn't so lucky. They couldn't pull
him through since his lower half was pinned by the turned over car,
so they had to bring out the Jaws of Life to cut the car away from
his body.

All I could do was sit in the back of one of
the large vans and watch as they pried Ace's limp body out of the
car and placed him on a stretcher. I wanted to be near him, to hold
his hand and pray that everything was going to be all right, but
nobody would let me near him. So I waited and waited until I
couldn't wait anymore, and fell asleep curled up on the cold metal
floor.

When I finally awoke, I was greeted by the
morning light streaming in from the back windows. My whole body was
rigid and it took me a few minutes to pry myself up to a sitting
position. I adjusted my glasses and looked around. Nothing had
changed about the van. Same dark interior and metal walls, but a
soft blue blanket had appeared over my stiff body. I examined the
cuts on my arm. They weren't terribly bad, but felt like millions
of tiny bug bites. I was just lucky to be alive and hoped Ace was
too.

"Looks like someone is finally waking
up."

I stirred at the sound of the familiar
southern drawl and my friend, Justin, climbed out from the
passenger seat and kneeled down in the back next to me. I hadn't
seen him since my internship last summer. He was the one that
equipped me with weaponry to fight the Caltian warriors who were
after me. I could have definitely used his help when Simone
attacked me, but I was still glad to have a friendly face near me
after the unexpected turn of events.

"Where am I? Where is Ace? Is he
alright?"

I rubbed the back of my neck. My body felt
like it was completely made of lead. I didn't know if it was from
the accident, sleeping on the floor of a van, or both.

A bright smile crossed Justin's pale face. He
hadn't changed a bit: same freckled skin, short, cropped red hair,
and the same dopey grin.

"Always with the questions. I thought you
might ask how I was doing since it's been awhile, but I guess I'll
always come second to your alien." He shot a wink in my
direction.

"Well, you being here answers my question if
you would be working at Circe after graduation. That or you have
secretly been an alien this whole time and just not told me." Two
could play at the teasing game.

"It's good to have you back, Juliet." He
laughed, shaking his head.

"Does this mean you will answer my questions
now? What the heck is going on?"

"Besides you rolling one of the Circe
vehicles?"

"You mean the car Ace gave me?" I arched an
eyebrow.

"Well, technically you can say it was Ace's
that Circe gave him, and then he gave it to you." He rocked back
and forth on his knees.

"Awesome, I got his hand-me-downs."

Justin nodded his head toward my hand. "By
that giant rock on your hand, I'd say he doesn't give you too much
in the way of hand me downs."

I held up my left hand. The ring was still as
beautiful as ever, glistening in the sunlight. At least that hadn't
been demolished in the crash. I guess Caltian rocks really were as
sturdy as Earth's diamonds, maybe even better.

"And I'm sure you are worried about the alien
that gave that to you."

I put my hand down and looked back at Justin.
"Worried doesn't begin to describe it. I tried to get him to go to
the hospital. We could have died! Jesus, he wasn't even wearing a
seatbelt. Stupid animal in the road."

"I wish I had something more to tell you, but
all I know is that some Caltians beamed him back to Circe and I was
just sent along so you could have someone familiar with you since
your dad couldn't be here."

My dad! The last I talked to him I was a
raving lunatic. Waking him up, screaming, and blubbering that the
car was tipped over. He snapped awake with that one, but I hadn't
talked to him since to tell him that I was coherent.

"Hey, Justin, you think I could borrow your
phone? I have no idea where mine is." Or where any of my other
stuff was. I packed my whole life in that Circe SUV and all of it
was probably destroyed because I couldn't avoid a guardrail. Stupid
deer.

"Yeah, that's cool." Justin pulled a sleek,
smart phone from the front pocket of his shirt. The last time I'd
seen him in any sort of civilian clothes was when we first arrived
at Circe. And there he was looking like a normal boy in a
button-down shirt and khakis, not like the weapons specialist that
I knew he was.

"Thanks," I said, taking the phone from him
and dialing my dad's number.

He answered on the second ring. "Private
Rice, is that you?"

Dad's voice was husky, as if he hadn't slept
in days.

"No, Dad, it's me, Alex."

He let out a deep breath into the phone. "Oh,
Alex! Thank God you're alright! I was worried sick!"

All right? That wasn't the right word. Alive,
maybe, but far from all right. "Yeah, Dad, I'm fine. But have you
seen Ace? Is he ok? What about the SUV?"

"The car and your belongings are in transit
on the convoy with you to Circe. Ace is currently in the medical
ward. I don't have any other news to report other than that." His
voice was all professional and no nonsense. That wasn't what I
wanted at the moment. I wanted the loving father voice that I only
had hints of in the past. That was the voice I wanted and
needed.

"Okay." I swallowed hard. "Thanks, Dad. I
will call you when we get to Circe."

"Alright Alex. Goodbye, glad you are
safe."

I hung up the phone and handed it back to
Justin.

"Uh, Alex, I hate to tell you this, but we
aren't going to Circe right away," Justin said, stuffing his phone
back into his pocket.

"What? Why not? If my car is going there and
Ace is there, why can't I be there?" I blinked, hard.

"Your dad wanted to make sure that you didn't
miss your move-in day for the dorms. We managed to get a few of
your bags from the car and figured after you are settled in, then
we can arrange for someone to bring you to Circe." He said it so
nonchalantly I almost thought he was joking.

"You're kidding me. I just totaled my car, my
alien fiancé was dragged off with me not knowing what condition he
is in, and you expect me to just move into my dorm like nothing
happened?" My voice rose with each word.

"Well, one of the medics gave you a shot of
some Martian aspirin when you were out and checked you for any
broken bones before you left. Your dad and the medics figured since
you were alright that it was better for you to continue with your
trip instead of waiting around Circe for Ace to wake up."

"He is still unconscious?" I couldn't hide
the panic in my voice. It had to rise at least three decibels.

"Whoa, hold on there." Justin held out his
hands toward me, palms out. "Yes, he is still unconscious, but he
is in one of the goo tubes, so he should be just fine.

The goo tubes. How could I forget about
those? My first day at Circe I was frightened by the giant tubes
filled with a green gelatin-like substance with floating aliens in
them. Then I took my own dip in the goo after one of my many alien
attacks. It may be able to heal a person quickly but that doesn't
mean it eliminates a green tinge that haunts the skin for days
afterward.