Starsign, Chapter 5

In the soft light of her kitchen, Melody thought she had been wrong before--the alien’s skin was not sickly, merely a soft shade of blue that the harsh light of her phone had washed nearly green. With their upper body free of both suit and helmet, she could also now see that there was a pattern of stripes in a slightly darker shade that rippled down the length of their body. Their skin also…shimmered slightly. As though it was damp. Or slimy. Was it?

Focus!

Her eyes snapped up to their face--which really didn’t help the whole focus situation. With the helmet on, though she could see that their face was distinctly inhuman, there was still the barrier of the visor that somehow kept the reality of that from fully setting in.

Now, looking at them with no high-tech shield between them, the reality of what was happening shot like lightning down her spine. Their general shape was humanoid, or at least bipedal, but without the helmet she could see that their head was elongated in a way she hadn’t noticed before. A finned ridge of some sort ran from roughly just above their brow--at least that was the best equivalent she could come up with--along the length of their skull and down the back of their neck. Their eyes were at least twice the size of a humans, and set further up from their mouth. There seemed to be no nose to speak of--no, no there were two thin slits set roughly in the middle of their squarish face that flickered open and closed as their chest moved with breath.

Wow.

That was an alien. In her kitchen.

Wow.

“God! Um…” Shaking herself, Melody darted forward again to try to get a better look at their side, now that she could see the wound completely. The alien flinched back from the sudden movement and she froze, looking up at them with wide eyes. “Is it okay if I…?”

“Yes. Please.”

She glanced at her phone automatically, then shook her head again and knelt beside the alien’s chair, more slowly this time.

“Jesus…” she breathed as she looked over the wound. It was messy and deep, oily black blood making it difficult for her to discern exactly where it started and ended, but it seemed to slash from nearly under their arm diagonally down almost to their stomach. Or, well, the front of their torso. “How did…?”

The crash had been bad, clearly, but…she hadn’t seen any sign of bloodied debris in the cockpit, or even in the surrounding wreckage.

“Sabotage,” the alien answered her briskly. She glanced up to see them staring pointedly at the far wall. “It was…why I crashed.”

Her eyes went, somehow, even wider. “You mean…someone did this to you? You were attacked?!”

“Yes.”

Oh. Great.

That was totally fine new information.

“I am absolutely losing my mind,” Melody whispered to herself as she took one of the damp towels from her haphazard first aide pile and began cautiously cleaning away the blood to reveal ragged, unsettlingly white flesh. The alien winced, and she stopped, but they shook their head quickly.

“I am…fine. Please continue. I have…lost a lot of blood.”

“R-right.” She swallowed thickly, then kept going. “Fuck, I don’t--I don’t think I have enough bandaging for this, I’ll have to--I mean you need stiches, but until we can--”

“Use this.”

The alien flipped a catch on the outside of their glass-and-chrome box, tapped a pattern she couldn’t decipher on what she had to assume was some sort of touch-technology on the lid, and it popped open. One-handed, they retrieved what looked like a small spray of some sort and held it out to her.

“Is this a disinfectant?” she asked as she took it, very, very carefully pointing the nozzle away from them both.

“That is part of it,” her phone’s translation answered. “It will also help seal the…the…abrasion.”

Abrasion seemed like a very charitable word to describe the wound she was looking at, but she didn’t give it too much thought. The alien said this little spray can would help, so she had to hope they were right.

“Okay. Er…I guess you know better than I do if this is gonna sting, so…” Cautiously aiming the nozzle at the wound, she pressed down. A light mist coated the laceration, and the alien hissed, a sound for which her phone offered no translation. “Sorry sorry sorry,” she whispered, jerking her hand back and looking up at them again.

They shook their head. “That is…what is meant to happen. It will still need to be wrapped. But it is healing now.”

“It--” She looked back to the wound, and her jaw dropped. “What in…”

It wasn’t healed. But the raw, bleeding flesh looked…healthier. The sluggish drip of blood had slowed, and was stopping before her eyes as the wound slowly, slowly seemed to knit its lower layers back together.

…Right. Okay then.

“Bandages,” Melody mumbled intelligently, turning to her own first aid kit out of habit before the alien held out a small bundle of tightly wrapped greenish material to her. She took it, but flinched a bit at the oily feel it had. “So I just…”

With some coaching from her patient, she cut and layered the fabric--it was apparently a kind of fabric--in strips over the wound, then pressed lightly at the edges so it would adhere to the alien’s skin. Skin that was, in fact, a bit slick to the touch. Not slimy exactly, but still a little slippery.

“Okay. Okay, that’s…done. What else?”

“That should be sufficient.” The alien tilted their head to eye her handiwork and nodded once. “If I am given…a little time to rest. It will heal well.”

“Good. That’s…okay. Good.” Melody sat back on her heels and continued to stare at their side for a long, long moment.

Then she snapped to her feet and strode purposefully into the kitchen.

“Do you want some tea? I want tea. Can you drink tea? Do you know what tea is? Tea is good. I’m--I’m gonna make some tea…”

***

“This is not tea,” Melody murmured vaguely into her cup fifteen minutes later. “This is just hot water.”

“Mrrow?” Leo glanced up from his toybox, tucked into a corner near the door, then batted a felt mouse in her direction. He seemed much more charitable with her now that he was out of his harness.

“Exactly, buddy.”

“You can understand it?”

Melody snorted a bit as she searched her cupboard for an actual tea bag. “Ah, no. Not really. But it’s just the two of us out here, so sometimes he’s the best conversation partner I’ve got.”

“I…see.”

She glanced over to see them eyeing Leo for a few moments longer before returning their attention to…whatever it was that they were doing. Fiddling with the gadget on their wrist, it looked like, though occasionally, they would glance at her phone and make some sort of adjustment. Maybe feeling her eyes on them, they tipped their head up and sideways--far too quickly for the motion to read as human--and asked abruptly, “May I handle your device?”

“May you--you mean my phone?” She pointed at it, and they nodded. “Uh, sure. I guess. It’s still not getting any service, so it’s not like it’s doing us any good right now.”

The alien made a low series of clicks that her phone didn’t translate as it picked the tiny computer up and turned it over curiously. “It won’t,” they told her through the phone speakers. “The distress signal from my craft will…take several more…hours-minutes to dissipate.” The alien hissed abruptly and gave her phone a look that almost translated as a frown. They pressed one finger to their wrist-gadget, repeated a series of crooning chirps twice, and her phone’s translation corrected, “At least three more hours.”

“Huh.” Melody blindly sipped at her tea.

Oh. Peppermint.

That was nice.

Peppermint…

What the fuck is going on?!

Ah. Seemed it was time for all that freak-out she’d been suppressing to come bubbling to the surface.

Okay. Okay, just breathe. Breathe through this, this is fine, just breathe… She stared hard at the wall opposite her, hip leaning heavily into the counter as her in-for-three-hold-for-five-out-for-seven breath pattern rippled the surface of her tea.

So. Aliens were real. There was one in her house. They were injured--though healing now, thank god--and had apparently wound up that way from an altercation with something attacking them. Which implied…well, nothing good. Her phone still didn’t work, except as a very odd translation device, and it wouldn’t be serviceable for another three hours.

I could run, she thought vaguely. They’re still moving kinda stiff. Their side probably hurts, but with all their wild-ass tech, who knows how long it’ll take to heal. I could just take off. It’s about thirty minutes into town, provided the car starts. But…

But she didn’t feel like she needed to run. Despite the insanity of the situation…the alien didn’t feel like a threat. Maybe it had been some sort of instinct that spurred her into helping them, but now that she had a moment to think…she was actually glad that she had.

“Human.”

“Gah!” She jerked so violently that she nearly spilled her tea, just barely managing to set the cup down as she turned to find the alien on their feet, hovering awkwardly with one hand splayed and braced against the tabletop seemingly to help support them. Their other hand was extended toward her, what looked like an earpiece of some sort cupped in their palm. They blinked at her, clearly startled by her reaction, and she found herself blushing.

“I did not mean to startle you.”

“No, it’s…fine.” She scrubbed a hand down her face. When she opened her eyes again, they were in the exact same position: one hand outstretched, eyes fixed expectantly on her face. “What, uh, what’s that?”

“For you.” When she just stared at them, the alien cocked their head again and her phone elaborated, “It will help us communicate. Your device allowed me to…adjust my communications system.”

She turned that over in her mind for a few seconds before cautiously reaching out to take the earpiece. “You’re saying…this is a translator?”

They nodded.

Carefully, Melody tucked the device into her ear, hooking a silicon-esque piece around the edge of her ear. “So this is supposed to work better than…whatever you did with my phone?”

The alien nodded, murmuring in a low, churring rhythm as they once again tapped at the device on their wrist and tilted it toward her phone. The tiny speakers began to translate their answer:

“Yes. Your device worked for emergency purposes but but but--”

Her phone cut out, and suddenly the voice was in her ear, low and smooth and flawlessly matched to the rhythm of the alien’s vocalizations.

“This will work better in the long run, I should think.”

Melody gaped at them. She could suddenly hear them, hear inflection and tone and color in their voice that somehow spoke volumes beyond the words themselves. They were tired, hurting, and it came through in the underlying strain in their voice. But there was also real warmth and gratitude to the sound that she wouldn’t have expected simply looking at their otherworldly face.

“Thank you,” the alien said quietly, and now that she could understand them without the awkward delay, she suddenly thought she could see some expression on their face. Eyes half-lidded, head canted gracefully to one side. “It is quite probable that you saved my life.”

“Wow.” Melody just stared for another moment, unable to form any other words. Then she shook her head briskly and stammered out, “N-No problem. I mean--you’re welcome? But like, I couldn’t just leave you out there, I mean…” A nervous giggle bubbled up in her throat and she had to cover her mouth with one hand to contain it. “I’m sorry,” she managed to gasp out, “I’m sorry, it’s just…this is insane.”

The alien cocked their head the other way and made a vaguely familiar series of high chirps. This time, instead of a robotic, repetitive reading from her phone, she could hear their laughter ripple lightly through the air.

“I can’t blame you for being overwhelmed. I was briefed that your planet has begun exploring the idea of space travel, but you have had no contact with any life from beyond your own soil.”

“Yeah, that, uh, that’s certainly true,” Melody huffed, still struggling to contain giggles. Or possibly sobs. It was really up in the air at this point. “Well, I--I guess a proper introduction is in order? Also, like, please sit down. I don’t know how your scifi healing-spray works but I imagine your side must at least still be sore.”

The alien nodded again, sinking carefully back down into the chair. “Quite sore, actually, yes. Thank you.” They placed both hands on the table, looking her up and down for a moment before adding in a slightly softer voice, “I am of the--”

They made a noise that even the device in her ear couldn’t translate. She winced, shaking her head at the pop of feedback, and the alien quickly seemed to realize what had happened.

“Ah, of course. Forgive me--that translator is worlds ahead of the emergency connection I created with your telephonic device, but there will be some concepts in my language that simply have no equivalent in yours. Apparently, my species’ name is one of them.”

“Can you…say it again?” Melody asked cautiously. “It’s just, I was mostly getting like an error sound, and…”

“Of course. One moment, let me…” The alien tapped at their wrist computer--it had to be some sort of computer, right?--again and extended their arm briefly in her direction. “There. That should prevent the translation software from troubleshooting certain words. I’ll try to keep it as updated as I can, to prevent that from happening.”

“Thanks.” Melody tapped the earpiece lightly, as if that would do anything, then asked with a slight chuckle, “Could you, ah, run that by me one more time?”

“Of course. I am a--” Again, her translator couldn’t decipher the sound they made into any English equivalent, but without the sharp pop of feedback in her ear, she could hear the clicking chirp they gave.

“Oh god, I don’t know if I’m even physically equipped to say that,” she muttered. It sounded sort of like cray-tash, but with a trill at the end that she just didn’t think she could do. “Cra--Crray-tashee?”

The alien laughed again, though she didn’t get the sense it was mean-spirited; then they winced and pressed one hand over their bandaged side. “That was…surprisingly close, for someone with only one set of vocal cords.”

Well, that was certainly interesting to know.

“Alright, lemme try again… Kre’tashe?” She put a little more emphasis on the first syllable and let her voice warble out on the “ahh” sound.”

The alien nodded in a manner that she hoped was approving. “It will certainly suffice. Yes, I am of a species known as the Kre’tashe. My name is--” Again, the translator failed to find an equivalent. No surprise there. But their name seemed to be quite a bit longer than their species. Long enough that she could feel the rhythm of it for several seconds before her earpiece chimed in again: “But I don’t think that will be a particularly easy moniker for you to use.”

“I don’t suppose you have an Earth name?” she chuckled awkwardly.

They shook their head. “Not as yet, no.” They paused, then continued slowly, “Perhaps…you have already aided me well beyond anything I could expect--but perhaps you might help me choose one?”

Huh.

Still moving slowly, as though she was half-convinced one wrong step might send her sliding sideways out of the universe, Melody took the chair opposite them and set her tea on the table beside their medical kit.

“Yeah. I think I could do that.”

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