***Alexis***
Alexis Fisher tucked her blonde hair behind her ear and sat on the piece of the ship that jutted out from the round, glass window that she had been training her eyes on almost every evening since she had boarded the spaceship that would take her to live on an alien planet. She loved to watch planets and stars pass by them on their journey. She had once wanted to work with NASA, exploring what was out there right alongside the greatest space program on the entire planet Earth, but no one had taken a wispy blonde of 27-years-old seriously. Getting on this ship and agreeing to essentially be a mail-order bride to some veiny Arkani had been the only way for her to get close to her dream.
She heard footsteps coming towards her and the brush of air that meant someone had sat down next to her. She didn’t bother to look because she knew just who it was. "I see you're out of bed too, Destiney," Alexis commented, pressing her lips into a thin line. Alexis remembered how Destiney used to annoy her when they first boarded the ship. The fifteen women aboard were all pretty sad, either forced on the ship because of hardships or seeking a new life because their life on Earth didn’t go as planned. Alexis knew now what was lurking behind those amber eyes and bright smile that Destiney walked around with, but her zany attitude had not been welcomed in the first couple of weeks. Now, Destiney was her only friend on the ship, and the one keeping her going.
"Well, c'mon, Alexis, you can’t tell me you're not at least a little excited. We've been on this ship for two months now, and we're finally going to be setting our feet on land again in just a few days." Destiney’s bubbly voice broke through the semi-trance Alexis had put herself into, watching the universe fly by. Alexis turned away from the window and gave a sad smile. She had some mixed feelings about the whole thing, but it was too late to back out now.
"I'm excited to get to be a part of an intelligent community again. I'm excited to find out what the Arkani know about science," she admitted, trying to find the silver lining. The Arkani would surely take to her scientific mind since the reason they needed women was because their women had begun dying of a disease they did not understand. It didn’t affect humans or the men, and Alexis was ready to be the person who helped discover why, even if it meant being the wife to one of the men who had lost theirs.
"Well, I'm excited for a new life," Destiney whispered, leaning her tanned body over with delight. "I don’t care what race this man is, as long as he cares for me. One of those alien men is going to choose me and be with only me. I've never felt appreciation like that." Alexis nodded. She knew Destiney's story all too well. Looking at the beautiful woman before her with sultry curves and wavy brown hair, Alexis couldn’t understand what wasn't to love. But Destiney's family had felt quite different, stuck in their traditions.
"It's going to be great for you," Alexis told her, placing her hand on Destiney’s leg comfortingly.
"You're always such a good friend, with the right things to say. I would go crazy in a depressing place like this without a gal like you in it. I wish you could be happy for yourself for once, though, Alexis," Destiney commented, calling Alexis out. Alexis just shook her head and looked back out the window, putting that wall back up around her that she always had. It was the closest thing to armor she had, and she just felt like she needed it.
"I just don’t have a whole lot of faith in others anymore, Destiney. I wish I could be more open like you, but I'm just not. It's why I like the stars so much. They are something you can study and predict." Alexis remained focused on the many stars and asteroids passing them by until she could see the glint of another planet in the distance. It was her favorite part of the journey they were on: getting to glimpse all the other planets that humans hadn't even known about until the last century. How all these amazing and intelligent races had remained hidden for so long, she just couldn’t fathom.
"Look!" she told Destiney excitedly, pointing towards the planet. Alexis racked her brain to see if she could think of what planet they could be passing. In her studies, she had made several planetary maps.
"Wow, what planet is that?" Destiney asked, looking out the window where her friend was pointing. Alexis thought about waking the others up to show them but then thought better of it. Many were so sullen they wouldn’t even care about it. The Arkani were going to have their hands full with these depressed babes.
The planet had large masses of green seas on its surface and an atmosphere not completely unlike Earth, with clouds. There were four moons surrounding it. Then she remembered. "Oh, it must be Milisaria," Alexis told Destiney, her finger thoughtfully tapping against her chin. "The aliens on the planet are warriors. I think they call themselves knights now, though. They're pretty friendly with humans compared to some other races, but they are really brutal, always taking over other planets."
Alexis had met one once. They often came to Earth because many countries had peace treaties and trading deals with them. They were daunting creatures, superhuman in that they were extremely tall and all very muscular, some even having evolved a second set of arms. They had some attractive features about them, but they often weren’t very intelligent, which automatically made Alexis dislike them.
"Oh, yeah, I've heard of them. They're pretty sexy for aliens," Destiney commented with a chuckle and a blush. Alexis nudged her playfully, and the two women laughed. It felt good to laugh. Alexis didn’t know how long it had been since she had.
Their laughter was quickly cut off by a sudden jerk of the ship, as if there was an Earthquake happening in space. Both women were jostled to the floor before they felt a sudden pull as the ship sped in a different direction than it had been going before.
The other thirteen women began to get out of their beds and come out to see what was going on, running through the ship and seeing if they could tell what had happened. Despite the jarring, everything still seemed to be functioning, but as Alexis and the others opened all the shades, they saw what had happened: an alien ship had latched onto theirs and was pulling their ship inside.
Some of the women cried, and others screamed in terror, none of them knowing what to expect. But Alexis knew whom the ship belonged to. The Milisarian Knights would never let them reach the Arkani now. It looked like they were going to be meeting a different type of alien man entirely.