Total pages in book: 44
Estimated words: 40274 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 201(@200wpm)___ 161(@250wpm)___ 134(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 40274 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 201(@200wpm)___ 161(@250wpm)___ 134(@300wpm)
“Can you move this thing, already?” I go from apologetic to strident. “It’s not safe here.”
Arlo smiles but obliges me by putting the shuttle into gear and sending us up into the stratosphere. Up is so much easier than down.
“You need to be more careful,” I lecture Arlo on the way. “People get shot, and worse, doing what you were doing.”
“Buying coffee?”
“No. Being different.”
Arlo nods, as if I have said something useful to him.
“People are fucking terrified of you and what you mean for us. We don’t like change. We don’t want change. Half of us would rather wallow in our own filth and let the world die than do something different.”
“Of course,” Arlo says. “Change might be inevitable, but for many, change is death.”
“I hope not.”
“Hm,” he says in a way I do not find to be encouraging. This is my first day at work, and I am engaged to an alien. Change is all around me, coursing through me, infiltrating every part of my life.
We return to the Halo. Cir is not in his office. Arlo says he’ll take his coffee to him, and that I can have a break back in my apartment for the rest of the day. I’m willing to go because I’m tired and my head is spinning and I’m wondering what the hell I got myself into. My history with choosing and being chosen by men isn’t good.
5 DIRTY JOB
I nap. I nap a long time. When I wake up again, I have the pretty strong sense that a night has passed. It just feels like morning. My body clock might be super messed up by living in the Halo without the sun to moderate my sleep. I get up, eat some food, and dress myself before heading off to work. I really need to ask Cir for a clock, or at least how Halo time works.
Cir is in his office, gleaming handsomely behind a big desk. He’s trying really hard to do the relatable human thing, but it only serves to make him look even more alien.
“Am I late?”
“No,” he says as I enter the room. “Right on time. I came to see you last night, but you were fast asleep in a bed for once, so I left you to it. Arlo says your trip to the planet did not go entirely smoothly.”
“There was a woman who basically wanted to kill him, and he acted like it was no big deal, but I’m telling you now. You can’t ignore people who want to kill you. Eventually, they try. And I don’t know what kind of super powers you aliens have, but humans have had a whole lot of time to do nothing but defend the planet. You’re invaders to them. You’re an unwanted presence. And you should really stop getting coffee down there, because I’m pretty sure you’re getting more than distilled water in it.”
I’m slightly out of breath by the time I finish that extended paragraph of rant that has been percolating in my mind since we went down to Earth.
“I didn’t want coffee,” Cir says. “I wanted to see how you would handle yourself.”
“What? Badly? No surprise there.”
“I mean I wanted to see where your allegiance lies. You could easily have sided with the hostile humans. It would have been easier for you to do so. Instead, you defended Arlo, a Cupid you have barely known for a day. I am impressed with you.”
“Because I’m a traitor to my species?”
“Because you are loyal to those who are kind to you over what is most convenient to you.”
“I don’t like assholes,” I say simply. “They were being assholes. He wasn’t invading them. He was trying to get his demanding boss a coffee.”
“I suppose I am the demanding boss in that scenario,” Cir muses.
“Exactly.”
“You shouldn’t test me,” I tell him, just in case he has any more of those sorts of tests planned. “I’ll fail, and probably sooner than you think.”
“I don’t believe that is true,” he smiles. “You are not nearly as bad as you think you are, in many respects.”
“No,” I say. “I’m probably worse.”
Cir
She’s adorable. And she’s very sexy. And she’s extremely brave. The attraction I felt for her from the beginning is flaring into something even more intense. Something like love. I have not known her long, but I have been inside her. Our flesh has joined. I have felt the contents of her mind and soul. I know with absolute certainty that this little human is my mate. The one I have been waiting for all my life. I cannot wait to marry her.
But she is not ready for me or for our marriage to be sealed. I can feel the work she needs to do percolating inside her mind. I can sense how torn she is about the path she has chosen, and the potential conflict between her species and mine.