Chapter Ten
I stayed on the planet, whiling away the days, wondering where Detro was. I spent the day in my small closet in the laundry. It seemed that overnight my pregnancy had blossomed. I could feel a definite swell now. In the small closet I unzipped my jumpsuit and looked down my body.
My breasts were larger than they ever had been. My already large hips looked even bigger. But even more noticeable was my belly. Always soft and round, now there was a clear protrusion. I ran my hands over my own warm skin. I wondered if the baby could feel me. Did he or she know who I was yet? Would this little baby ever get to know Detro?
At least the nausea had passed for the most part, and the tiredness. But that had all been manageable. What would come next would be even worse. I would only get bigger from here on out. My feet and ankles would swell, my back would ache. It would be hard to hide, but easier down here on the ground than it would have been on the ship.
I wrapped myself up and stood in front of a glass cabinet where I could vaguely see my reflection. I zipped my jumpsuit back up and turned to the side, but still it was impossible to see that I was pregnant. Hopefully, I could hide it a little longer. Detro would come back for me. He had promised, and I had promised to wait for him. I needed to keep my end of the promise. I and this little thing inside me would wait for Detro. He would come.
I moved slowly back to my tent. It was one of the few pleasant nights at the camp. The larger sun had gone down and a chill wind was pushing through the camp. I could almost detect the scent of something in the air. A spice or a sweetness I had never smelled before. I wondered what else was on this inhospitable little rock. We only lived here in this little section. In another life, this planet could have been teaming with civilization. But the Gosebs were only interested in what they could get from it, not what they could build on it.
I found my way back to my tent, closing the flaps once I was inside. I didn’t bother lighting any lamps. There was nothing to light. Instead, I lay back on my bed and stared up at the shadows of my tent. They seemed to shift and change in front of my eyes. One was a tall tree with many branches, then the wind blew and the shapes rearranged and appeared again as a wolf with its teeth bared.
I drifted off to sleep. If I had any dreams, I didn’t remember them. I was woken by a hand pressed against my face. I opened my eyes with a start, but in the darkness I could only see the shadow of a man standing above me. I struggled as the man’s face came down, but then I heard his voice.
“It’s alright, it’s me.” My eyes adjusted to the darkness. He had a simple cloth wrapped around his face and I watched as he pulled it down, revealing his face.
I grabbed at him and pulled at his clothes. His arms were around me, holding me up. Tears streamed down my face. At last. At last, he was here. He had come back. I tried to stop the tears. I had a thousand things I wanted to say to him. I wanted to kiss him.
He put his hands on my chin and smiled down at me.
“You’re back,” I said, my voice hitching with a sob.
“I told you I would be,” he said, brushing my hair out of my face.
“What happened?” I asked him.
He shook his head. “I’ll tell you when we’re on the ship. Right now we have to go.”
I nodded and stood up with him. Out of habit, I reached for my rucksack, but then I realized I didn’t need it anymore. I would never come back here. Tomorrow I would be missing, although whether I was dead or alive was still to be decided.
“Are you alright?” he asked me. “Are you hurt? Did anyone hurt you?”
I shook my head and he breathed a sigh of relief.
“We’re going to have to run. Can you run?”
I nodded and then he took my hand and pulled me out of the tent. We walked out into the darkened camp without a backward glance. Our shoes crunched on the rough stone ground of X29. We stayed out of the main pathways of the camp. Instead, we hugged the shadows of the tents themselves. Moving as silently as possible we made our zig-zag way through the camp towards the western wall.
We stopped at the western edge of tents. Detro stopped suddenly and I kept close to him as we looked up and down the road. It was technically still night, but X29 had no real night, only the portion of the day when the more distant sun shone. We were open and exposed. If even one person saw us we would be doomed.
Detro crouched down and pulled me with him. Not far to our left were the Goseb guards. They were leaning against the western wall and didn’t look like they would be leaving for a while.
“My sensor!” I hissed, as the realization hit me. “It will signal an alarm if I cross the wall,” I said, putting my hand on the back of my neck.
“Don’t worry. My ship is right on the other side of the wall. I still have some friends on the orbiting ship. They’ve been covering for me on the scanners, but we don’t have much more time.”
He looked over at the guards and then to the right.
“We need a distraction,” I said, and he nodded.
“Wait here,” he said.
“No, I don’t want to be separated from you.”
“It’ll be fine,” he said.
I nodded and watched as he slinked back behind the tent. I sat on my haunches, looking up and down the lane for any more guards. There were pins and needles all over my body. It felt like I had been waiting forever, but it couldn’t have been longer than a few minutes.
A commotion to the left. The sound of something ripping. The guards stopped their talking and looked towards the sound. The commanding officer nodded his head and the others fell in line to investigate.
It had worked! Detro’s distraction had worked. Now I just needed to wait for him to come back and then we could climb over the wall and be gone. I looked for Detro but didn’t see him coming. I took the chance and stood up, but still there was nothing.
Then I saw something straight ahead. It was two guards and, to my horror, I saw that they held Detro between them. He was wrestling and fighting, but they had his arms pinned behind his back and then they furiously threw him against the wall.
Panic flooded my veins. I was frozen. I couldn’t move. Couldn’t scream. I couldn’t do anything but watch. And then my entire body began to shake. From head to toe, uncontrollable shivers ran down my body and I thought for a moment I might be sick.
The baby. I looked around. I had to do something. This was our one chance. There were two guards with Detro, but where was the third? I crouched down and ran between the tents until I saw him. A Goseb guard in his faceless mask, lying face down on the ground. I needed his gun. Where was his gun?
Carefully, I moved to his body. The Goseb guards weren’t far away. If they turned around, they would see me. I could hear them still scuffling with Detro. He wasn’t done fighting yet.
I knelt down by the body and felt up and down his armor for his gun. But it wasn’t here. Then I saw the way he was awkwardly laying. His right arm was crossed underneath his body. Taking a deep breath, I put both hands underneath the guard and then with a heave I hefted him over and saw his gun still clasped in his hand.
I pried it free of his already stiffening fingers and shakily stood up.
I didn’t shout a warning. I just fired the weapon right at the back of the guard who had Detro. The other guard turned around in shock, reaching for his weapon. But he was too slow. I pushed the trigger button and in an instant, he was dead. A shock of electricity strong enough to put down a beast twice his size had just been shot into his body.
Detro looked at me, his mouth hanging open. “The keys,” he said. His hands were cuffed behind his back. I could see the keys laying where they fell in the dirt. I grabbed them and raced towards Detro. I unlocked the cuffs and without a word he grabbed my hand and we headed towards the wall.
The wall was short, only four feet. The prisoners had the sensors in their necks, but that wasn’t the only deterrent. There was nothing out here. A human might run, but he would be dead within a few days.
Detro gave me his hand and helped me over the wall. Once on the other side I could see the faint shimmer of his ship.
“Open the bay door,” he commanded and, as if by magic, a door lifted and I could see the interior of the ship.
He made sure I was inside first and then he ran in and closed the door behind him. It was just a small shuttle, barely more than two chairs and a console. But the chairs were supply level and the air in here was fresh and cool. I collapsed into a chair as Detro took off. I could see the camp below us. The small white tents grew smaller as we left X29 behind.