Chapter 3
Eva
I need another blanket, dammit.
I wriggled and drew up my knees to my stomach to try to hold in my heat, but it was no use. I just got colder and colder.
Worse, I was still feeling sick. I sneezed, the inside of my nostrils itching and hurting and my ears stuffy. I’m fucking miserable. Why the hell did I agree to this shit?
I wished I was back home. Ivy would know how to make me feel better. She’d probably heat broth in a cup I could wrap my hands around and give me an extra blanket to hold in the added warmth. We would talk as I started feeling better, and I would quickly know that things were all right.
I could feel the tears begin to fill my eyes and then trickle down my cheeks. I blinked them away angrily. Joining the program had been my idea. I can do this.
I pulled the one puny blanket tighter across my shoulders. It rubbed on the still tender mark, making me wince. The faint irritation reminded me why I couldn’t go back home.
I had been chosen.
I was it…the last surviving test subject to go through the program without quitting.
The others had already washed out and gone home, according to my medical monitor, Dr. Ostrov. I envied them, even as determined as I was to hang in there where they hadn’t.
I had given my word that I would go through with this, and I never went back on my word. Even more importantly, I was doing this for Ivy and her kids—Trevor, Mark, Josephine, and little Jaylynn. They had taken me in and treated me like family when I hadn’t been able to stay at the Children’s Ward any longer.
It was my turn to take care of them. That was the promise I had made myself.
Participating in an off-world genetic surrogacy program had made me into a guinea pig now getting over a damn alien flu, but it paid very well.
Ivy had been against this idea, but I had talked her into it. The fifty thousand credit sign-on bonus had helped sway her, especially after it had freed her from the mortgage on her housing pod.
Now, the kids were going to a real school instead of dialing in on a third-rate computer, and Ivy could go back to her job full time. Her letters these days were full of hope, and she was happy to admit how wrong she had been.
I couldn’t disappoint her now. I didn’t care what I had to go through.
We had seen the advertisement in the posts on the vid screens in the square. Ivy had mocked the Peace Opportunity Program when we’d read the fine print about the “dying alien race” and “advanced technology.” But something about it had tugged at my heartstrings.
Afterward, I couldn’t let the idea go. I kept imagining how awful that would be. So few children that the whole race was dying out? Only one female born in every two thousand births? Having advanced technology that still couldn’t fix the situation?
How helpless they must feel.
I knew I might not be able to help, but the five thousand credits the program had offered just to let them try to see if my DNA was compatible with the alien DNA had seemed like a godsend. There was no way I will be accepted, I had thought. All they would do was test me, say I was incompatible, give me my credits, and send me home. Or so I had thought.
Ivy had worried so much when I had gotten my offer letter from the program, announcing that my genes were theoretically compatible with those of the mysterious aliens. I had been pretty scared, but after thinking about it, I had decided to go for it.
Ivy and I wrote to each other as much as we could on the monitored communications system. I always did my best to reassure her that I was doing fine. But the truth was, the experiments were grueling and sometimes very painful.
The retrovirus therapy they had used to bridge the genetic gap between humans and aliens had all sorts of weird effects on me. Fevers, light sensitivity, hallucinations, and finally, this damn flu or whatever it was. It sure felt like the worst flu I had ever had.
My muscles and joints were stiff and ached. Shifting to my other side to face the wall was torturous. Of course, the shapeless hospital gown-thing they’d given me to wear got twisted under my curvy hips. I pushed myself up and caught sight of the skin on my arms. Now I really wanted to cry. My beautiful skin. Usually the color of the specialty hot caramels we’d save up credits for during the holiday season, it was now ashy and pale, with a sallow look. At least that painful all-over rash was gone, aside from the welts running down the side of my neck and my shoulder blade.
My head pounded with pain. I was stronger than yesterday, at least, and I thought I might be able to get up and deal with it without calling the nurse. I hated feeling helpless.
While up on one hip, I glanced around my assigned cubicle for a cup for water. Nothing. Once again, whoever handled room supplies had forgotten something. I’d have to get a handful of water from the sink in the lavatory.
Groaning in pain, I rolled to the edge of the cot and placed my feet on the cold tile. It was a very good thing that I was wearing socks. My feet still ached as the chill radiated through them. I stood to my full height of five foot one and immediately slumped just a bit. I was much too tired and achy to walk with my usual attention to posture and attempt to flatten my tummy. A shuffling walk was all I could manage. But at least I was walking again.
Whatever they’d done to me was still hurting like hell. At times like this, I felt like I’d been so wrong to go through with this. I comforted myself that at least my family would do better from now on, no matter what happened to me.
The advert had called for healthy females between the ages of eighteen and thirty. It had asked for “clean, healthy, of sound mind, literate” and a whole host of other things including “being able to bear children without having been pregnant on previous occasions.” It had struck us as no weirder than some ovum donor programs I had considered before. It was just that the beneficiaries in this case weren’t human.
I’d bathed and taken great care with my appearance the day we had gone for my test. My thick, curly fluffs of black hair had been tamed with oil and conditioner, and I’d pulled it back off my face to draw attention to my almond-shaped eyes. Ivy had found me a dress of deep blue that accented my generous curves. It had given me a touch more confidence to arrive dressed up, and I would wonder later if the choice had affected their decision.
Ivy had walked me to the Medical Ward, where the line to sign up had stretched all the way around the block. The queue had moved quickly, though, as only one in ten women had been let through the gates.
The gate personnel had turned away the elderly ladies, the coughing or crutch-wielding, the ones with babes at breast or at hand, and the pregnant ones. They had refused entry to prepubescent girls, no matter what their mothers had said to try to get them in, and the tears of the desperate girls had not swayed them.
The guards at the gate were unyielding in their decision. They would take one glance at the woman walking toward them and, in an instant, decide whether she met the criteria or not. When my time had come, I had hugged Ivy quickly and strode for the entry, sure in my knowledge that I met all the prerequisites.
Sure enough, checkpoint one had let me through with a smile. Checkpoint two had required a brief pause at a table, where I had been made to place my hand on a scanner and speak my name in order to confirm my identity. They then had handed me a small screen device. I had to read the information on the screen and answer some questions about what I had read—proof that I was literate. Many women had been turned back then. Even on Earth itself, literacy had dropped like a stone since the public schools had closed.
The third checkpoint had been a mental health screening by a psychiatrist. The doctor’s signature had been required for the credits to be transferred. I had sighed in relief after he’d signed the screen, sending the credits winging into Ivy’s bank account, one less thing to worry about.
A month later, the offer letter welcoming me to the program had come, shocking us both.
According to the letter, only five of us had qualified for the program. I had wondered at that. Five? How could five women help a race of people that needed thousands?
All the more reason for me to tough it out once the pain had begun, and it had. Medical screenings, blood tests, and physical exams. They had checked my heart, my breathing, my skin, my eyes, my hearing, my breasts, my womb, and my vagina. Nothing had been left un-probed. It had been painful and humiliating, but I had never complained.
And when they had finished, instead of getting back my lovely dress, I had been given my current outfit, which was changed for an identical one every morning. It consisted of a long, shapeless pale blue gown that stretched just a bit across my breasts and hips, and an actually nice, cozy pair of socks. The lack of a bra had given me backaches for a while, but then I had gotten sick and had spent most of my time lying down.
Now, I was finally recovering—and I was also, officially, the last woman standing. I leaned against the lavatory sink to catch my breath. Crap, this is humiliating. It felt like most of my muscle tone was gone.
On a daily basis, I had walked most everywhere I needed to go for my life in New Atlanta, only occasionally catching the tram. I had considered myself in pretty good shape. Good enough that a ten-foot hobble should not have exhausted me.
If whatever they had injected me with had made me this sick, no wonder they didn’t want those who had already felt ill; this stuff would’ve killed them. Maybe that was why they had kept the five of us isolated from each other, to prevent cross-contamination with any of those screwed-up alien diseases.
It’s too bad, though. The loneliness was the worst part of all of this. If it weren’t for the letters from home, I think I would have gone a little crazy. I turned on the water and slurped down a few cupped handfuls quickly, taking the edge off my headache.
Maybe a hot shower would help ease some of my aches and chills. Certainly couldn’t hurt. I reached into the tiny shower closet and turned on the water. Steam immediately began billowing around me. I breathed it in, enjoying the idea of the water pounding on my skin. I shut the water off and got ready for my shower.
Back when I had lived in the Children’s Ward as a kid, showers had been rationed. We had gotten one every other day as wards of the state, on a timer that had stopped the water after five minutes.
While I had been living with Ivy and the kids in her living pod, the water shortages had started, and I had truly learned what rationing meant. In her small living quarters, we had gotten a full shower of seven minutes once a week, and we had made do with cleansing-pad sponge baths every other day, no matter what.
As a current “guest” of the Medical Ward, I could take a shower several times a day if I wanted to and had the ability. But after everything I had been through, I considered that idea so wasteful that I would never allow myself the indulgence. So, I had gone back to five-minute showers, shutting off the water to lather up.
Now that the damn fever had broken last night, the doctors were eager to get me back on my feet, but it would be a while before I was anything close to camera-ready. I wanted to try to be at my best when the Peace Opportunity Ambassadors came to call. Cleaning off the sweat of my illness seemed like a pretty good first step.
I heard noises out in the main room while I bathed, but I ignored them. I knew that while I was in the shower, my gown and socks would be whisked away and replaced with fresh ones, as would the sheets on my bed and that short, inadequate blanket, which they never added to no matter how often I asked.
I knew the doctors were always watching me. I had understood that from the beginning, and I had figured I’d better get used to it. I knew I’d signed up to be a lab rat.
Not many knew anything about this alien race. They were the first who had made direct contact with us. But I knew that the treaty was important. It had already netted Earth several technological breakthroughs, including the use of hyperspace tubes. But our new friends had been very tight-lipped about a lot of aspects of their world and culture.
The doctors had told me that some of the aliens had joined the observation group that monitored me 24/7 through the surveillance system. I didn’t even get privacy in the bath. I can feel their eyes on me even now.
Shit. I hate this part. Stripping with a damn audience. Somehow, it always seemed so much more intimate than either washing or dressing again, or maybe it was that I had to get used to it every time. I looked longingly at the streaming, steaming water, and kicked off my socks.
Suddenly, I felt new eyes upon me—a strong, distinct sensation that made me feel more self-conscious. I straightened up and glanced out the bathroom door into the cubicle, but it did not seem that anyone had entered beyond a bland-faced attendant stripping the bed. She wasn’t even looking my way.
“Hello?” My voice creaked and cracked like a teenager’s. I could still feel those eyes on me, so I looked up to where I knew there was a camera in a corner of the lavatory ceiling.
I stared at the camera, whose blind gaze had taken on a strange sort of life. I didn’t know how I knew, but someone was watching me through it. Someone…special…
My stomach did a quick flip, and my breath became shallow as a totally unexpected flood of desire washed over me.
If the program was successful, I was told I would be paired with the alien who was my genetic match. And depending on how well I got along with the alien, they might request a traditional mating with me. Otherwise, they would ask to harvest some of my ova, which they could use for in vitro fertilization.
I didn’t know how I knew, but I was absolutely certain as to who was watching me. It was the alien I’d been matched with. And the whole idea of his staring at me as I undressed made my toes curl from lust.
I wanted him. I wanted him to see me, to touch me, to possess me. Whoever he was, somehow, he had already captured my interest, sight unseen.
Without taking my eyes away from the camera, I faced the lens squarely and moved my hands to the fastenings at the shoulder of my gown. Slowly, I untied the lacing. I pushed the cloth to one side to expose my shoulder and let the sleeve slide down one arm. I repeated the process on the other side while holding the gown in place across my large breasts. All at once, I released the gown and let it slide down my body and fall into a pile onto the floor.
Tilting my head back and thrusting my chin up slightly, I ran my hands down my naked body. I trailed them from my shoulders down to my breasts, where my dusky-hued nipples were hard and sensitive. I cupped my heavy breasts briefly and then continued smoothing my hands down my ribs and over my belly to where my thighs met, the delta of my sex, and the soft tangle of curls. I stood there for a moment, letting my mystery partner look, then with a deliberate movement, I reached behind me and turned the water back on. I slowly stepped backward into the shower and under the cascading water.
I kept one hand covering my mound and trailed the other back up my body to my breast. I let the water pour over my body for a moment while I rolled one responsive, aching nipple between my fingers and slipped one finger of the other hand between the folds of my sex.
My lips parted, and a moan escaped me. I was much wetter than I had expected to be. Still staring at the camera, I brought the finger, now covered with evidence of my arousal, up to my lips and placed it in my mouth.
At the very same moment, I slammed the curtain to the shower closed. My alien had had enough of a show, and he could damn well come and talk to me before he saw anything else.