Alien Caller (6 page)

Soon there were
no more weapons, other than their own bodies, and he could relax a
little. Physically, he knew he was outgunned by her claws and her
speed. If he let go he would either have to incapacitate or kill
her or she would tear him into shreds; very small ones. Yet he
didn’t want to do either. Instead he just hung on. Lying on top of
her he had her wrists in his hands and was using his knees to
cruelly pin her legs. Her injuries and his body weight easily made
him more than a match for her and no matter how much struggling she
did she couldn’t roll him. More importantly the more she struggled
the weaker she became, her adrenaline boosted energy fading away as
she realized she wasn’t going to die.

In time things
quieted down, as she realized she was going nowhere, and gave up
struggling, at least for the moment. It was time to breathe again,
and to recover what strength she could. Then too she had to know
that he had had the upper hand, at least for the moment, and he
hadn’t used it. He hoped she might have accepted that he wasn’t
going to kill her. Instead of struggling she just lay there and
stared at him as he stared at her, and no doubt they both wondered
what to do.

“I don’t want
to hurt you.” It was all he could think to say, and again he knew
it was useless since she spoke little or no English, but at least
it was the truth. As they lay there he repeated it to her, a lot.
He tried to be calm, to sound sincere and mild as his training said
he should. Perhaps she understood some of his words, or perhaps she
understood the tone of his voice, but whichever it was she seemed
to relax a little more, to stop struggling, and those dangerous
looking fangs retreated further behind her lips.

In time two
sets of racing heart beats and two sets of heaving lungs slowed and
they became almost comfortable as they lay there, or at least David
did. On a hard wooden floor with well over two hundred pounds of
his body weight bearing directly down on her, she couldn’t be
happy. But at least she wasn’t in deathly fear of her life any
longer. She surely knew he could have crushed her neck, strangled
her, or simply snapped her like a twig, and he hadn’t. That had to
count for something.

That still left
him with a problem. What did he do next?

He knew even
then that ultimately he was going to have to get up and let her go,
but he was worried she’d take a swipe at him the moment he freed
her arms and those claws still looked decidedly nasty. But he
couldn’t just keep her pinned on his cold wooden floor forever, he
couldn’t seem to cuff her, and he didn’t want to kill her. Worse he
knew that she knew what was going through his mind. How could she
not?

The most shocking thing of all
was that in time as he lay there on top of her he began to feel
other sensations awakening in his flesh. Concepts that were
bizarrely out of place. But undeniably, the intimacy of their
position and the fact that he had her totally at his mercy in such
an intimate position had brought out the male in him. Then there
was her natural musk and the feel of her warm flesh yielding under
his. It had been too long. He squelched down on the
inappropriate
thoughts, and tried to concentrate on the problem at hand.
He wasn’t however, entirely successful. He just hoped she didn’t
guess his distraction.

A clicking
sound brought his eyes back to her teeth, and he watched her open
and close her mouth several times, the jaws snapping shut with a
bone crunching snap. For a second he thought she had injured her
jaw. Then he understood. She was telling him that even pinned like
this she could make a bleeding mess out of him with her bite. His
neck felt distinctly vulnerable. But was she threatening him, or
telling him that even though she could have, she hadn’t? So far?
Either way it wasn’t really a choice.

“Okay. You
win.” He nodded to her, hoping she understood he was simply
agreeing. If she even understood a nod.

Very, very
carefully he took away his right arm from her wrist, dreading the
thought of her hand swinging towards him like a bullet. But she did
no such thing. Instead she let her arm lie there pretty much as it
was, just opening and closing her fist as she returned the
circulation to it. Encouraged he released her other arm and was
rewarded again. No strikes at his face, no bites, no violence. It
was like a slow motion car chase in a movie where the audience
waits for the inevitable crash, but for once it just didn’t come.
Finally he rolled off her, allowing her to move and breathe, while
he headed directly for his gun.

Reaching it and
turning he found she was just in the process of sitting up,
something she stopped the instant she realized he had his gun back.
Her eyes opened wide presumably wondering whether he was going to
shoot her, and he quickly slung it behind his back and held his
arms out towards her, fingers wide in what he hoped was a clear
sign of his peaceful intent. The gun’s weight was a comfort to him,
but clearly the sight of it made her nervous and inflamed the
situation.

His alien
patient too gathered her belt and tied it back around her waist,
putting the various bits of equipment back in their slots. He
watched her put each piece away as carefully as she had watched him
handle the gun, looking desperately for the first sign that she was
going to use one on him, but she did no such thing, rewarding his
trust. He could probably have stopped her but not peacefully.

By mutual
unspoken agreement they each moved to opposite ends of the room,
keeping as much distance between them as possible. Still neither
had said a word.

David noticed
that she walked relatively easily and realized he had been right
about her gait. She normally walked like a human being but the
wound had caused her to hobble strangely. It must have been damned
painful. He wondered how she could have recovered so quickly, but
he didn’t know how to ask.

Instead he just
mimed her walking and tried to ask her by signs how her leg felt.
Either he was particularly good at mime or she was exceptionally
perceptive, but either way she showed him that it didn’t hurt her
so much as it had. She might not be jumping for joy but she could
walk relatively freely. His first aid might have been what had
gotten him into this mess but he was still pleased to see the
success of his handiwork. And it reminded her that she owed him her
surgery.

In turn he
understood by her own hand motions that she wanted to know about
the operation and he pointed to the piece of metal he’d removed. It
was still sitting on the side table by the couch where he’d laid
her down. Then using his own leg as a model, he tried to describe
the operation in general, making sure she understood the chemicals
he’d used, and perhaps more importantly, the ones he hadn’t. If she
had antibiotics of her own, this he figured would be the time for
her to use them.

Some time later
he had a brainwave and grabbed a pad and a pen out of his desk
draw. If she didn’t speak English then the chances were she
couldn’t read it, but they could still draw. Cautiously he
approached her, pad and pen in his hands, gun still slung loosely
behind his back. He showed her the items and then guided her,
extremely carefully to the kitchen bench where they could both sit
and draw. Much to his surprise and relief she accepted his
guidance.

Slowly a degree
of trust was building. They didn’t really know anything about each
other, but at least they understood that neither really wanted to
kill the other.

From there it
was an almost straight forward procedure as he attempted to get
some answers to his questions. His many questions. He began by
drawing the stars and a space ship, and pointing to her, asking her
he hoped, whether she had come from another world. For an answer
she smiled, and crossed out the rocket he’d drawn, and replaced it
with something that looked more like a van with wings, but he
guessed it was the same principle. Rockets he realized couldn’t
travel between stars. It took them months and years just to make it
to the closest planets of their own solar system.

Then he drew a
picture of the ship crashing, and her beside the ship with a piece
of metal sticking out of her leg. In response she changed the
drawing in a little, but significant way. She showed the crashed
ship as a smaller ship came out of a big flying van. There was a
mother ship in orbit somewhere above them. And after a few more
sketches, he realized there were people on board the ship who knew
she’d crashed, and more of her people on the ground awaiting her.
More of her people. They had fur, tails and another big flying
van.

Her people had
a base somewhere on Earth. The news shocked him nearly as deeply as
had her own appearance. Despite all the satellites in orbit
covering the land, the radars searching the skies and the security
operations looking for signs of infiltration, a group of aliens had
established a base somewhere on Earth. Worse still he realized, it
must be somewhere quite close given that she had come from a mother
ship heading directly for it and had crashed nearby. Of course,
close for her people could mean something else entirely. It could
be a thousand miles or more with alien technology.

She must have
sensed his shock, because the very next thing she drew was two men,
one with fur and a tail, one without either, shaking hands.
Whatever else it meant, it meant either she or her people were
friendly. But was she talking about herself or her people? And
which humans? Locals? Americans? Other countries? Government? And
why were they shaking hands? It was a particularly human gesture
and suggested she knew more about humanity than she could say. He
had no doubt she was telling the truth.

For the next
few hours they exchanged sketches, drawing until the pad was almost
gone. To anyone watching it would doubtless have seemed very
strange, as he spoke to her in English, and she responded in
whatever language she spoke, while they both drew pictures. But it
worked.

Over those few
hours he learned an awful lot about her. He soon had a rough guide
as to the direction from where her ship had crashed, and a vague
idea as to where she was heading. He also guessed that it was
close. Not that far from the lake in fact and perhaps a few valleys
over. It was a shock to realize that there was an alien camp so
near. But she had drawn the outline of the nearby lakes perfectly,
a good sign that she knew the area at least from maps, and the
place she identified, he knew well.

Wrath Valley.
At least that was what the locals called it because of the way the
wind seemed to whistle through the hills almost angrily. It was a
large valley, used only by hunters because of its thick bush and
stony outcroppings. The land was useless for anything else. There
were no roads in or out of it, a few trails and cabins used by moon
shiners in the days of prohibition, but nothing more. And in more
recent years the valley had been used less and less even by hunters
because of the belief it was haunted, though no one would ever come
out and say that. Even mountain men wouldn’t admit to something as
screw ball as that.

Except that it
wasn’t. Now he guessed, he knew the reason for the haunting. Not
ghosts but aliens - not that he would mention that to anyone
either. Fortunately he might not have to. There were plenty of
other valleys filled with game closer to town and easier to get to,
and he liked the peace and quiet.

The real shock
was that his patient wasn’t far from her people. Two more days walk
if she was fully fit. Less if he drove her most of the way, which
he could. It was a rough trail but the four wheel drive could
follow it.

Then as the sun
finally poked its head all the way above the mountains he learned
one thing more. He was hungry, and so in all probability was she.
He left her on the stool still puzzling over their latest sketches,
while he went round the other side into the kitchen to get some
breakfast. But the question became, what do you feed an alien? And
would it be safe?

His first
thought was corn flakes, his normal breakfast, but then he looked
at her fangs and thought again. The lady wanted meat.

He put the corn
flakes back in the cupboard and pulled out some bacon and eggs. But
he still had no idea whether she could eat it safely. He didn’t
even know if she knew. There was really only one solution. He
carried the bacon and eggs over to her and asked her to smell them.
She wrinkled up her tiny nose at them in what he assumed was
distaste, and he wondered what next. Hunting in the fridge he found
some cold sausages, a pint of milk and cheese, yoghurt and fruit
bran, and one by one he let her smell them. Oddly it was the
yoghurt and bran that appealed.

Then he had to
try and explain about safety, and spent an interesting few minutes
pantomiming eating and falling down sick. Either he wasn’t very
good at it, or she enjoyed watching his clowning around, because
she simply didn’t seem to get the idea. Then, when he was finally
at the limit of his frustration, she got up, poured the fruit bran
into two bowls, covered it with the yoghurt and began to munch.
Evidently she wasn’t too worried. And equally he realized, she
didn’t feel like eating alone.

Feeling a
little shell shocked by the whole thing he reached for the other
bowl and a spoon, and sat down on the stool beside her. Soon he was
tucking in to a good breakfast with her. And it was good. Not only
was the breakfast quite tasty, it was somehow reassuring to be
eating with her. Sharing food he recalled, was a universal custom
used in getting to know people. Or at least it was on Earth. Now it
appeared that it was a practice enjoyed further afield as well.