I thought nearly being dragged off at knifepoint by a deranged alien gangster would be the scariest thing I ever experienced. When I boarded the Novai mother ship, I realized I was dead wrong.

Faces were everywhere. Stark white, eyeless faces framed by sheets of jet black hair. I was lost in a sea of ridged foreheads and cheeks, lips as red as a vampire’s after the hunt, and undefined noses reminiscent of snake snouts. And the screeching…

So much screeching.

Hearing one Novai speaking was painful enough on the ears. An entire docking bay of Novai conversing was enough to render me deaf for life. The shrieks pierced straight through my eardrums and rocketed into my brain, making my whole head feel like I’d slammed it against the wall over and over for hours. The ache was so extreme in fact, I probably could have banged my head and experienced no greater pain than the one I was already experiencing.

We’d been standing in the docking bay for at least ten minutes and, so far, we were basically being ignored. I kept waiting for Venan to speak to someone since he was Captain, but the seconds dragged on, and we just stood stupidly next to our ship while Novai hustled around us. Zuran was whispering translations in my ear, telling me they were analyzing the spacecraft and preparing to inspect us. I was pressed as close to him as I could be. Being in the presence of so many Novai was alarming enough; being inspected sounded utterly terrifying.

In truth, the Novai ship was a masterpiece of technology. The docking bay alone was so advanced I couldn’t even begin to imagine how anything worked. When we’d approached the sleek, disc-like transport—which Zuran told me was classified as a “heavy cruiser,” whatever that meant—and rounded to the loading port, I’d pictured a garage door of sorts opening to allow us entrance. What happened instead was a feat of Star Trek abilities. We soared into the port, a small unmarked hole in the side of the ship, at a cautious and leisurely pace before suddenly being sucked straight up like we’d accidentally wandered beneath an enormous vacuum. Instantly, I felt crushed, compressed, like I was racing through a gravitational pull at hyper speed. Then, with a jolt, we popped up through a hole in the ceiling and found ourselves in the docking bay.

I didn’t even want to think about how we were supposed to get out of this ship.

The Novai circling our craft were brandishing slender silver wands that looked like the handheld metal detectors airport employees used at security. Below their feet, ropes of yellow light illuminated the floor panels every time they took a step. I watched with an uneasy mixture of fascination and apprehension.

“Do you know what those are?” I murmured to Zuran, gesturing subtly to the wands.

He shook his head and softly replied, “I have never seen such a thing, but I imagine they are using them to take data about our ship.”

“And we’re just going to let them?” I hissed.

“What choice have we?” he whispered. “We are guests onboard their cruiser, and there are far more of them than there are of us. Our only option right now is to stand by until they are satisfied.”

“Is that why Venan isn’t telling them to take us to their captain?”

Zuran narrowed his eyes sharply as if to tell me I better not dare do such a thing, which I couldn’t even if I wanted to since the Novai couldn’t speak English. “Venan is establishing trust. He wants them to see his crew does not simply board and barge in, nor do we pose a threat.” He wasn’t looking at me while he spoke, preferring to keep his eyes on the Novai nearest us. I could feel in the way his hand gripped my side that he was as tense as I was in their presence.

A very tall, ghostly alien walked up to us then. In his hand was a wand exactly like those being used by the Novai examining our ship. I immediately looked at Venan, hoping he’d speak on behalf of all of us.

The Novai screeched. I wondered if some blood vessels in my ears had burst because, at this proximity, its voice stabbed as painfully at my senses as a blade stabs skin. I was the only one who seemed pained by the language, though, as the rest of the crew was A’li-uud and they were able to understand what he said.

Venan spoke back to the Novai, taking a single step forward to address him. He, too, was screeching, but it didn’t sound quite the same from his mouth. I figured it was probably like how the A’li-uud spoke English: fluent, but distinctly non-native. I tugged on Zuran’s fingers to urge him to translate.

“We are to be inspected,” he muttered.

I eyed the wand. If he planned to scan it over my body like at the airport, I didn’t have a problem, but the device was rounded on both ends and relatively slender, and I couldn’t help remembering all those stories from people who lived in the boondocks claiming they’d been captured by aliens and probed. That thing looked very capable of probing somewhere I definitely didn’t want probed.

Venan stood very still, and the Novai approached him. He held the wand aloft horizontally about a foot from Venan’s body and began skimming it downward. I relaxed. This, I could handle.

One by one, we were each inspected with the mysterious contraption. When the Novai was finished, he stood back and screeched once more at Venan, who replied in kind with an inclination of his head. The Novai didn’t return the gesture, probably because it wasn’t part of their culture.

“We are going to see the captain,” Zuran said quietly to me.

My pulse quickened, and we began walking in a clustered group behind the Novai. He guided us toward an open, portal-style exit leading into a very narrow corridor. At first glance, it was nothing more than a circular doorway without a door, but, as I stepped through, I yelped. It was like I’d stepped through a sheet of ice. The hairs stood up on my arms, and a massive shiver rocketed through my body, but, when I turned around to see what I’d just walked through, there was nothing there. I could see straight into the docking bay, and the temperature was comfortable again.

“What was that?” I gasped.

Zuran looked grim. “I do not know,” he admitted. He was clearly as unnerved by the invisible ice as I was.

We were led through a maze of corridors of varying widths, some broad enough to host grand galas and others so narrow we were forced into single-file, and our shoulders brushed both walls. The Novai had not looked over his shoulder at us once, nor had he spoken since our inspection had finished. I watched his curtain of inky hair swaying as he walked, grateful I couldn’t see his blank, terrifying face. I hoped the captain was less frightening.

He wasn’t.