It was the best day of Phyrne's life, even before
landing on Earth five days ago. She, her mother Liss, her
aunt Ki and her cousin Deena strutted through the gleaming
casino with the one thing that brought them across
thirty–one solar systems to New Jersey.
Money. Bundles of money. Their purses stuffed with
money. Lovely, lovely money.
She wanted to laugh, dance and do cartwheels. But not
yet. Later. Twenty–five–year–old women
didn't do cartwheels on Earth. Even after they'd known
great sorrow and now knew great joy.
A plume of acrid cigarette smoke coiled in front of her
and she made a face. The casino was just like she'd seen on
the monitors on Kergeron, but the constant noise was
louder, the motion more intense, the air sizzling with
excitement. Music blaring, machines clinking, voices
talking, colored lights blinking.
Avid eyes stared at the machines, but a few followed her
and her family. She faced forward, careful not to catch
anyone's gaze, but in her peripherals, she saw auras,
flashes of colors tinted with the deep pinkish red of
carnality.
She clamped down on her pheromones. The worst timing for
her make–me–a–mom chemicals to fire up.
She didn't want men following her. She didn't want men in
her new life. She didn't want men.
Fighting the urge to release stray scents that would
make men howl, she kept her gaze on the back of the nice
hostess leading them out of the busy casino.
Out into the new life they would live as average
Earthlings. The life her aunt Phyrne had envisioned for
them ten years ago.
She quivered with an eagerness she hadn't felt since she
was a young girl, before she'd experienced the shock and
pain of a fist on her face. Hard to believe she would
escape Kergeron while she was mated to Argon and he was
ramming her like she was the hill and he was the bulldozer.
But Argon was dead now and here they were. Free. Better
yet, free and rich.
The casino hostess opened a door and ushered them into a
corridor. The smile she gave them was strained, brown
spikes dulling her peach aura.
"Since you insisted on cash, we thought it would be
safer for you to leave from the back."
Her eyes darted away from theirs, and the brown spikes
bled into the peach.
Phyrne shivered, her excitement turning to trepidation,
though the darkening aura could mean anything. The hostess
could be thinking about a sick child or a lover who beat
her. Or she could suffer from one of many health issues
they'd seen on the monitors back on Kergeron.
A lifetime of watching Earth TV had primed them for
their new life, but they didn't know everything. Deena
could use her telepathic skills to find out what the
hostess was thinking, but her jaw was rigid, her thin face
tense with the effort of blocking out the cacophony of
thoughts.
Phyrne ached for Deena. The plethora of auras in the
casino had distracted Phyrne, colors flashing and popping
wherever she looked, others shrinking and cringing. Easy to
see who was winning and who was losing. But how much worse
to have hundreds of thoughts swarming into her brain like
an army of buzzing blusts?
The hostess took the lead again, hurrying past a
stairway, elevator and bathroom. No glitz here, the walls
white and stark, the mud–colored carpet so smooth the
soles of Phyrne's shoes slipped. Feeling like a clumsy
udzo, she slapped her palm against the wall to keep from
falling.
The others moved on, and she scurried to catch up. The
hostess opened the back door, bidding them good day,
speaking so fast her tongue tripped and she had to say it
again. Phyrne didn't need to read her thoughts to know she
was thinking: Go. Get out. Hurry.
Maybe the hostess needed to pee. Kergeronians had
elimination emergencies, too. That came with the human body
they shared with Earth people, the genetic similarity
confirmed by tests conducted in the previous century on a
few Earth specimens. Unwilling Earth specimens.
Phyrne's relatives chirped goodbye to the hostess and
hurried out into the air that smelled like salty ocean
mixed with car fumes. A black dumpster on one side and a
sign on the other said Deliveries Only. Across the street
was a huge concrete structure Phyrne identified as a
parking building for cars. One lone van was parked by the
curb, beige and nondescript.
The door behind Phyrne clanked shut. The Earth sun slunk
under a black cloud – on Kergeron they called it a death
cloud. The sky dimmed, the air chilling Phyrne's arms, bare
from her elbows to her cold fingertips.
From the beige van, a bright blue aura pierced the
gloom, jewel colored and so bright her breath caught. As
she twisted to view it better, Liss stopped and Phyrne ran
into her.
"Oomph." She bounced back, her mouth open to ask what
was going on, when she saw two men stealing out from behind
the dumpster. Blood red auras seethed around both men.
The small hairs on Phyrne's arms and the back of her
neck rose. The last time she'd seen an aura that color,
she'd ended up in the clinic, her body bruised from her
cheek to her thighs, one eye covered with a patch and an
arm in a sling.
Liss stepped back, grabbing Phyrne's forearm. "Let's
run. I feel the tall one's anger. He wants to hurt us."
The men pulled out guns.
"Too late to run." Deena's voice quavered. "We'll have
to do something else. I'll take care of it." She swallowed
but stood tall and tossed her head.
No! Phyrne's mental scream sliced through Deena's walls.
Deena looked at her, grimacing, lifting one hand to the
side of her head.
"I'll stop them." Phyrne pushed past Deena. She was
older and stronger than Deena, plus she possessed a
powerful weapon. The ultimate weapon.
She was ovulating.