"Okay, before you move forward, I should tell you…” Sca started to tell her. She’d pulled away from his grasp and was trying to avoid being grabbed again. He reached one last time but she snapped at him.

“Listen, I’m tired of you telling me what to do. It’s time for you to listen to me.”

“I’m trying to help,” he reached out to stop her once more and she jerked her arm away. Walking forward he watched as the ground gave way and she grasped in the air for anything to stop her fall.

“Help,” she yelled.

He couldn't help but think, that's what I was trying to do for you. She was a stubborn woman and it was starting to get on his nerves, but she was pretty as hell.

“Okay, listen to me. Do not move. Not one inch. I’ll get you out, but you can’t move.”

He tried not to panic her. She didn't move. He knew she had no way of knowing what was in the hole with her. He looked at the size of it and tried to remember which trap this was. The hole was at least three feet taller than she was. He could see she was standing in water. He knew what it was and took off looking for a rope or something she could grasp onto. He found a wire of some sort and realized it would have to do.

He looked down into the hole and saw something move, but it was too dark to see. It was really close to her, so he needed to hurry.

"Something touched me," she screeched up at him. "I can see its eyes. They're bright red, it's a demon."

“Grab on,” Sca yelled from above her and threw the wire into the pit. She grabbed it but he couldn't pull her up.

"It still has me. It’s strong.”

“Let her go, you slimy shit,” Sca yelled and pulled on the wire. He was straining hard to pull her out and it wasn't doing any good. Her little cries of pain made him cringe. He didn't want to hurt her. He kept pulling.

“Shield your eyes.” To his relief, Baston was running towards them, trying to avoid all the other traps as he rushed to their rescue. Sca saw that Abigail had covered her eyes.

Something exploded all around Abigail in the hole and he saw her jump. The creature let out a loud noise and she came up out of the hole as fast as Sca pulled the wire. When she hit his arms, they fell over together and she was crushed against his chest.  She pushed against him to try and get up but he held her there a minute, looking into her eyes. It reminded him of their heated kiss and he felt all his blood rush down.

“What do we have here?” Baston moved forward. His pony tail had been loosened and his black hair was cascading into his face.

This was the first time they’d had to mess with the creature in that particular hole and Sca could tell Baston was excited they’d gotten to.

“Baston, this is Abigail. She’s an Earth girl.”

“What the hell was that thing?”

“A siren snake man, we don’t know what exactly they are so that’s what we call him. Nasty things.” Sca shuddered.

“Come on, Earth girl,” Baston said moving forward to guide her towards the house, “you survived your first booby trap.”

“An Earth girl!” Sca smiled as their wife Cherie came out of the house and walked forward. She was glowing as she always did, even more so now that she was pregnant again. She easily maneuvered around the booby traps and came up to shake Abigail’s hand.

***

Abigail

 

Abigail was still shaken up from almost being eaten by the demon that had her when the woman walked up to her.

“I’m from Earth too, Cherie.” She stuck her hand out and smiled warmly. Her face was doll-like with a glow that seemed to bloom from within. She noticed the rounded belly and assumed being with child gave her the glow. She wore her long blond hair in two braids twisted on top of her head.

Abigail took Cherie’s hand to be polite. A young boy wailed in the distance. There were at least some kids in this community, which so far just seemed to be the three of them.

“Come on in I’ll get you some tea.”

Abigail could see Sca making the “cut it out” symbol across his throat.

“What? She doesn’t want tea?” Cherie asked putting her hands on her hips.

Sca pulled Cherie towards him and planted a kiss on her lips. Abigail couldn’t stop her mouth from hanging open. He was married, and he’d kissed her in the woods.

“Abigail had a run-in with that awful woman. She gave her tea.”

“Oh dear, juice it is. I’ll spike it for you, love.”

Abigail started to say that wasn’t necessary, when Cherie walked over to Baston and leaped into his arms. “I missed you, being pregnant makes me incredibly amorous.”

With a growl, Baston grabbed Cherie’s ass and kissed her passionately before setting her down. She reached her hand out to Abigail, who couldn’t stand it any longer.

“Wait a minute, who is married to whom here?”

They all exchanged smiles with each other. Cherie was the one who answered. “We’re all married.”

“What do you mean? Whose kids are those?” A little girl was running towards them with the wailing boy not too far behind him. The little girl was glowing.

“Stop right there,” Cherie’s voice became authoritative and cross. “You two know better than to come out of the yard.”

“They’re our kids,” Baston said, “all of us. The baby in her belly is ours, too.” He bent down and kissed Cherie’s belly sweetly.

“You’re just okay with all being married?” Abigail had a hard time wrapping her head around the concept. On Earth, it hadn’t been normal for a woman to have two husbands. She knew of some men with multiple wives, but not the other way. And even those men were frowned upon for the way they lived their lives.

“Yes.” Cherie simply said and opened her arms as they approached the house and the little girl ran into them. “Mommy and your daddies would be very upset if you fell in a trap because you forgot.”

“I’m sorry,” the little girl said and Cherie kissed her before putting her down. She walked into the house and held the door open for Abigail.

“Abigail this is Ruby and Halo, our little sun shines.” The kids ran into the open door and laughed joyfully.

Abigail was hesitant. She didn’t have the same sick feeling she’d had walking into the previous house, but she was still apprehensive around strangers. Finally, she made the decision to just stay aware of her surroundings and go inside.

"Have a seat. I hope you don't judge all of us based on the men tribe. We don't think they deserve names and there are only two women, so that's what we've taken to calling them."

"I'll admit, I ran away from Sca. I thought he was the bad guy. It's kind of hard to tell when you're on an alien planet."

Cherie nodded as she sat a cup of tea in front of her, "I know what you mean."

"How did you three come to be here? I mean it doesn't seem like there are many people or aliens around."

"We came here by chance, not by choice, but we wouldn't dream of leaving now. See, we had to cross the same path you did once we ended up here. The three of us almost didn’t make it.”

“How did you end up on this planet?”

“I was sold to Sarta by my uncle. There are a whole bunch of humans who make deals with other planets. You know about the trade agreements for people to go and work, well there are also people who sell others against their will. The planet doesn’t check if the people they’re getting were willing to come, they don’t care.  There’s a whole underground unit of people being traded to Sarta to work for their rich citizens.”

“What?” Abigail couldn’t wrap her head around half the world knowing aliens were real and the rest of the world simply being in the dark.

Cherie opened her mouth to say something, but she was interrupted by shouts from outside.

“Baston, you can’t hoard all the women in there, you know that’s not right.”

“That’s Han. Halo, take Ruby to your room and shut the door okay. If you hear people coming your way, get in the closet.”

The little boy’s eyes widened but he listened, taking his sister by the hand and guiding her down the hallway. At the same time, a terrified scream came from outside.

Sca grinned, “Someone found Anabel.”

“Who is Anabel?” Abigail asked.

“She’s a moon cricket that lives in one of the holes. Like the one you fell into. Sca’s taken a liking to the disgusting thing.”

“A cricket?”

“It’s not like an Earth cricket, honey,” Cherie said, “they’re like leeches but grow fast, bigger than a person, and then they eat you. That river you crossed, full of them.”

Abigail was sorry she’d asked. There were so many things that could eat you on this stupid planet. Something large thudded against the front door and both men stood up tall and walked towards it.

Baston opened the door and a loud boom sounded from outside. To her complete shock, a bullet came up to the door and hit some kind of invisible force field bouncing off.

“On one of his trips back home, Baston obtained the means to install some protection for the house,” Cherie explained. “The men have never attacked, but we were always sure they would someday.”

A wave of guilt hit Abigail. “I’ve brought them to your home, to your children.”

“It’s okay, you didn’t ask to be abducted.” Cherie waved a hand like she was dismissing an offer to help with dinner.

“You can’t avoid all the traps out there, Han,” Sca yelled. “They were set up by the military.”

“Okay,” someone who Abigail assumed was Han yelled back. “We’ll just throw some things at you then.”

As soon as he said it a loud explosion came from the side of the house. To Abigail’s horror, a long crack appeared in the living room wall.

“Upped your explosive game, have you, Han? You’ve awoken the beast.” Sca ran to the other side of the room and grabbed what Abigail determined was a kind of Fcrossbow. Its arrow was strange, multi-colored and long with a big round globe on the end of it. Sca rushed to the door and drew it back.

Abigail moved closer to the window so she could see what he was doing. He let the arrow fly toward a group of around fourteen men. They were outnumbered for sure, and Abigail wasn’t sure how many booby traps there were. A large net flew out of the arrow Sca had shot at them and trapped two men, causing them to tumble into one of the holes.

“Got some,” he said triumphantly.

“You missed Han,” Baston said.

As he said that a revving engine filled the air. Abigail wondered if the men had cars. She looked over to where the men were standing and saw they were rising into the air on scooters. Well, at least they looked like scooters to her. The three that owned these flying vehicles were quickly making their way over all the booby traps. Sca drew another arrow from somewhere, a real arrow this time, and shot it at one of the scooters.

The rider fell off and screamed as he fell close to one of the holes. Scared to move, he simply sat completely still.

By this time, Han made it to the front door and pushed Baston into the house with his scooter. With a loud cry of rage, Sca leaped onto the machine and hung on as it lifted into the air above the house. The man on the other scooter grabbed Abigail as she tried to see where Sca was being taken. She saw the scooter hovering over the house and the two men throwing punches as Sca straddled the front of it.

The man that grabbed her laughed as he started to pull her up in the air. Abigail clawed at his arm with her nails and kicked her legs trying to get free. Baston came out of nowhere and knocked the man off of his scooter, throwing her away in the process. She hit the ground with a painful thud and heard the scooter coming down over her head. She could almost touch Sca as he hung on to the side of it.

Han slammed the vehicle violently to the left and Abigail saw Sca’s leg hit the side of the wheel and split open. Blood poured down his leg and it was the distraction Han needed to push him off and make a grab for Abigail. Sca landed with a groan beside her.

“They don’t get to keep all the women,” he said as he pulled her arm. She was ready for him and jerked away with all her might, grabbing Sca to ground herself. His scooter lowered and he pulled himself up into the air.

Baston reined victorious over the scooter he’d been fighting and was currently pursuing the other guy as he ran towards Han. The men who had been left on the other side of the traps yelled loudly and paced back and forth. None of them dared to venture out into the booby traps, and this had caused a fight between them. Abigail watched as one man pushed another out into the trap land and he shot up in the air and swung upside down.

She couldn’t see anything holding him up in the air, but he stayed there. The man Baston was chasing grabbed onto the bottom of the scooter and Han lifted them both into the air. He flew the scooter to where the guy sat, still not wanting to fall into a trap, and motioned him grab onto the scooter as well. Surprisingly the scooter managed to carry them all to the guy hanging in the air, and he was able to free him and put him on the back of the scooter before landing it amidst the other men who were still fighting.

“We’ll be back with more scooters,” Han said as the limped away from the fight, clearly the losers.

Abigail thought that was about the most ridiculous statement he could make.

“Well,” Cherie said laughing, “that was exciting.”

The three of them limped inside the house and Abigail tried to find a place on her body that didn’t hurt.