Chapter 9
“What?” All kinds of thoughts raced through her mind.
“Your training is inadequate. You will report to me at six every morning, and I will train you until you are adequate. I doubt any humans are capable of being more,” he said.
“Oh, joy,” she said with all the sarcasm she could manage. Her heart beat like crazy. With his training, she could keep her promise. She wouldn’t ever lose a patient. Ana could rest in peace. Maybe even forgive her. She’d learned a lot from the books he gave her to study, but if he trained her in better methods and maybe some of his equipment she would be able to save so many lives.
***
Hours later, Madison was about ready to drop, but the damn alien looked like he could work another twenty-four hours without problems. At last the infirmary emptied out.
“We will go now, human.”
“My name is Madison,” she said without heat.
She couldn’t work up the energy to take him on for rudeness. More than the physical tiredness was the revelations she had to face that day. Things she would’ve been better off not knowing. Now she kept thinking of equipment that should work, that should’ve been fixed. Things like the mammogram machines that were available when she was a child that was just not there anymore. And the list was growing.
“From now on, you will accompany me on the visits to the orphanage and the shelters.”
Madison pressed against the wall to avoid the kids going into the dining room when they exited the clinic, and she noticed that all the children were well dressed in brand new clothes. Clothes were expensive, and only the very rich wore a lot of new clothing and followed fashion. Did the aliens provide these children with clothes from their synthesizers? She didn’t want to see them as humane benefactors of children. These monsters killed her brother.
“Why pick on me?” she asked once they were outside. “I think the other doctors should gain experience as well.” And suffer under his tongue.
“I prefer you.”
“Why?”
“You do not need reasons, you will obey.”
“Goodie for me,” she said and, with her shoulders drooping, followed him to the shuttle. They went back in silence and she came to the conclusion that if he was a typical alien, they didn’t suffer from a lot of emotion. “Definitely reptilian,” she muttered.
“You will cease calling us reptiles,” he said.
She kept forgetting his super hearing. “Are you reptilian?”
“No.”
“I’m still calling you a reptile.” If he could call her human in that insulting way, she could call him a reptile. When she’d kissed him it hadn’t felt like kissing a reptile, his lips had been warm and seductive.
“I thought your name for me was Frankenstein.”
Damn, she thought. She shrugged. He wouldn’t know the reference, so she’d just keep quiet on that. And maybe she’d stop calling him Frankenstein.
“I do not sew dead humans together,” he said without any discernable emotion.
Madison could feel a blush starting under her armpits and climbing to her face. He must’ve looked up the name. At least he didn’t realize most people mistakenly used to call the monster Frankenstein.
The rest of the trip, they were silent, and she childishly decided she’d call them reptiles every chance she got. At the hospital, she got out, barely able to contain her roiling stomach. She’d thought he would keep away from her in case she threw up on his shoes again. Instead, he hovered near her.
Rachel stood outside the hospital, trying to look as if she wasn’t waiting around to see if Madison was still in one piece. She’d gotten in the habit of waiting for her after their shifts.
Madison ran down the ramp. “Bye, Viglar.” If she ran fast enough, she might get away before he tried to put her to work. Her stomach that had threatened to expel its contents turned.
“Human.”
Madison gnashed her teeth and turned to him. “My name is Madison,” she said through her teeth. “You call me human in that supercilious voice again, and I’ll feed you a knuckle sandwich.”
Madison cringed at her juvenile words. It had been a long day, with him correcting literally everything she did, and the stress just got to her. She felt stupid for making the childish threat, but she just wanted to get away from him and relax for a while.
“I will not be fed by a human,” he said as if accepting food from her would be the next thing to being poisoned.
Proving she was her mother’s daughter, in spite of the lack of ample weight and the fact that she was a natural red head, she grabbed his jacket and couldn’t get a grip so she grabbed his shoulder to hold him in place and pulled back her fist. “Allow me to demonstrate,” she snarled.
She didn’t think she knew how to snarl, but that was the only way to describe the sound coming out of her mouth. Being unable to hold him with her hand on his shoulder just made her madder.
He caught her fist in his hand and then turned it this way and that, studying it. “I do not see the sandwich.”
Madison’s stomach rebelled and, before she could stop it, she threw up on his shoes. Again. This time he stepped back in time and waited until she finished.
“Why did you call me?”
He loomed over her and bent down until he gritted next to her ear. “You will cease telling Rachel anything. That human is not your friend.” He turned and walked away and she glared at his back.
Rachel stood waiting for her with her eyes stretched so wide she looked like a cartoon character. “Are you crazy, Madison?” Then her eyes narrowed and a speculative look came and went in her eyes. “You know, if anyone else had tried that, he would’ve killed them.”
Madison threw her hands in the air. “Not that again.” She wanted to crawl into a deep dark hole and hide. What had come over her to act like that? After that little scene, he must think she had the emotional capacity of a four year old.
And why did Viglar say Rachel was not her friend? He might be a pain and rude and a know it all, but the aggravating thing was that most times he was right.
“So, what did he whisper in your ear?”
“The usual nonsense about how useless I am.” Though to be fair, he threw a lot of insults at humans, but he never insulted her. It was the fault of the university that trained her or faulty equipment, but now that she thought about it he worked her hard, but wasn’t as scathing to her as he was to the other doctors.
For some reason, she didn’t want to tell Rachel what he said and she didn’t know why. Rachel was her best friend and she normally shared everything with her, but some strange sense stopped her from telling her the truth and that made her feel dreadful. Damn alien.
“You almost threw up on his shoes.”
“It wouldn’t be the first time,” Madison said as Rachel left and Madison went back to work.
“Tomorrow morning at six your studies begin, human,” Viglar said as Madison finally left for the day. “Do not be late.”
She didn’t answer, just walked to her flat. She was lucky to have a place near the hospital. It was a combination of Rachel’s family’s influence and working at the hospital that made it possible for her to have a flat in a good part of the city.
She found Rachel sitting on the steps waiting for her. “You shouldn’t do that, it’s dangerous to sit outside after dark.”
They lived in a fairly good area and, even though they were only interns, doctors were scarce and they were paid decent money. When Jacobson didn’t sabotage her salary. Though this area was cordoned off, there didn’t seem to be any safe neighborhoods. Gangs were everywhere.
“Yeah and it’s dangerous to walk after dark.”
Madison shrugged. “I suppose.” She’d been desperate to get away from Frankenstein. Though it’s been a while since she saw any of the thugs hanging around. She turned and scanned the street. “Have you seen any of the gangbangers lately?” she asked Rachel.
Rachel got up and looked up and down the street. “Now that you mention it, I haven’t had any trouble for a while. Not even someone hassling me for money.”
They went inside and she poured them both a generous amount of wine and took out the previous day’s pizza to heat.
“So give, what happened?” Rachel took a huge bite of the pizza, but her eyes were avid.
Madison closed her eyes and shuddered. “It was awful, he criticized everything I did and I threw up on him.”
“What?”
Madison took a large bite of Pizza. “Twice.”
“What did he do?”
“Nothing, just cleaned his boots and now I have to work with him every day.” She took a big gulp of wine before continuing. “He said my methods were barbaric and the two years we spent in medical school were too short to learn anything, so now he’s going to teach me.”
This is an opportunity to study his methods. Learn from him. With his advanced technology, he would never be confronted by a patient he couldn’t save.
“If you can stick it out, you might be able to get your hands on their technology or DNA.”
Madison took another huge gulp of the wine. “I suppose.” She knew she should be eager to get his DNA and technology, but she kept thinking about the way he interacted with the children. Their well-dressed clothes. The way he gave them sweets with that god-awful smile.
Rachel smiled at her, a teasing smile. “And he’s sexy, at least you get to look at that body up close every day.”
“What? No, he’s not sexy. Why would you say that?” Madison had a nice buzz going and Rachel was spoiling that.
She took another swallow. Okay, so he had a good body. And his face with its high cheekbones and firm jaw wasn’t half bad. That didn’t make him sexy. He was a good kisser. But even with the wine causing a nice buzz in her head she didn’t tell Rachel about that.
Rachel tapped a finger against her wineglass and thought about it. “Okay, he’s green and those black eyes are creepy, but you have to admit he is well built. You don’t see many men like that.” There was a strange watchful look in Rachel’s eyes that, even with the buzz Madison felt, struck her as odd.
“I can’t see past the rudeness. He said we’re collapsing.”
“What? The hospital?”
“No, our civilization. He said because we don’t fly anymore, we are collapsing, and it’s not true. We’re at the peak of our existence.”
“Hmmm.”
“And he said they used to put down weak women, but now their emperor or something married a weak woman so things are changing.” She needed to stop talking. She blamed Viglar for this feeling that she couldn’t trust her best friend.
“Hmmm.”
For the rest of the night, they talked about work and the guy Rachel broke up with the previous week, and then Madison said she had to go to bed because she had to be at the hospital at six the next morning. Rachel left to go to her flat on the floor upstairs.
Madison fell into bed, and she was so tired she didn’t lay awake obsessing about everything the alien said. She especially didn’t want to consider how exhilarating it was to spend the whole day with the dratted alien. He might be aggravating and know it all, but she’d never felt this alive before.
She fell into a deep sleep and only woke when the earthquake made her bed shake. She was uncomfortably warm and moaning she kicked the bedding off her. Or tried to. It suddenly weighed a ton. Blinking she sat up and stared at her bed. “What the hell?” It took a moment for her befuddled mind to realize she was looking at what looked like an animal pelt, died red. The same red as her hair. “I’m going to kill Rachel and whoever else is in on this joke,” she muttered.
Mumbling about crazy friends, she moaned and rolled, sleepily getting up to go and stand in the doorway. Earthquakes were a reality of life.
Someone large and green stood in her way.