She was but a human; one lost somewhere in space. Duty or not, if anything happened to her, it was of no consequence to him. She wouldn’t put it past him to ditch her.
She had no family out there and the only friends she had were probably the other four human women who’d been abducted as well.
But even now, they weren’t there.
She had no idea if she would ever see them again and with how unpredictable everything had been so far, she wasn’t putting much hope on it.
Just as she had no idea if she would ever see her family again.
Her father. Her mother. Her older brother.
To think that she’d been a week away from mid-term break. She could even see the plane ticket back to Tokyo sitting on her dorm room bookshelf.
She’d been so excited to return home, if only for a short time.
Her family had been living in the United States for ten years but when her parents had gotten homesick, they’d decided to move back to Japan and she would follow after. She’d only had to complete her studies and she’d had one year left.
One measly year.
That year had seemed like it would take forever.
Now, that might just be the case.
Forever.
It had only taken one unlucky instance, but she’d lost her family forever.
The thought made tears well in her eyes but she pushed them back. She’d cried enough while on that slave ship, shed so many tears, and it hadn’t gotten her anywhere.
Sniffling, she let her forehead fall into her palm.
After Kyris had flown off, she’d realized he’d left a sort of fabric bag behind.
She hadn’t meant to be nosy but after waiting for a while, she’d opened the bag to take a look at the contents.
It looked like it had a first-aid kit, several pouches of something that she assumed was food, some rope, a small blade similar to a ratchet knife, and a large brown pouch that looked like animal skin. She assumed that last one was like a waterskin, but she didn’t dare drink its contents even though she was thirsty.
She didn’t want to poison herself accidentally.
She’d ask him when he returned...if he returned.
There were also some strange-looking hard tubes in the bag and she had no idea what those were. They all had the diameter of a regular candlestick and about the same length but there was no wick and they weren’t made of wax.
There was nothing in the bag that could make a fire so she just had to curl up against the stone wall, eyes turned to the entrance, hoping he would return.
Oh how she wished he would.
She wasn’t going to lie. This whole experience had been terrifying so far.
She only wished she could go back home and by home she meant Tokyo, not even her dorm room in California.
She missed California, but she missed her family more. They were everything to her.
What she would do to see her mother’s face right about now, to feel the warmth of her father’s embrace, to curl up under the kotatsu with her brother watching movies, and drink her mother’s homemade butajiru...just...for things to go back to the way they were and to know that everything was going to be alright.
She didn’t have much experience with the world; she knew that.
For her, life was just starting out and she’d been in the process of finding herself and her independence.
It had taken a lot of convincing to get her parents to leave her alone in the U.S. They hadn’t wanted to return without her. It was only after months of pleading that they’d agreed. She had to grow up sometime and it had been the perfect opportunity.
But not even a full year had passed since her parents had left and she’d found herself where?
In. Fucking. Space.
And where in space?
She didn’t even know. Nowhere near Earth, that was for sure.
What did she want? Independence.
What happened when she got it? She was abducted by aliens.
Talk about epic fails.
Ha!
She couldn’t even make it up.
The worst thing she’d imagined happening after her parents had left was running out of the money her father had given her and having to juggle retail jobs to get by. Well, hadn’t she grossly underestimated her future or what?
Still looking toward the cave entrance, her worry grew.
Kyris had been gone for really, really long.
The sky was dotted with stars, constellations she’d never seen before, and if she wasn’t in her particular predicament, she’d have stopped to be awestruck by the view.
Crawling toward the entrance on hands and knees, the slight pounding in her head was still there but the wound that was on her forehead was closed.
She didn’t know what he’d done or what he’d given her to make the wound close so quickly but she was thankful for it.
She was thankful for all he’d done so far.
So, so thankful.
And that was why, even though she would completely understand if he abandoned her, she sure wished he hadn’t.
He and the other aliens on his team were the only good things to happen to her since she was taken from Earth—them and the fact that she wasn’t the only human that was abducted.
It was sort of a sick thought, but she was happy she was one of five women who made it out alive. At least, she wouldn’t be so alone. She couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to wake up in space and find out that along with being abducted she would never see another human being again.
It was an unpleasant thought.
Letting out a sigh as she reached the cave entrance, Song stared out into the darkness.
A slight breeze played with her hair, throwing the dark strands over her shoulders.
Swallowing hard, she peered out into the night. There was still a little visibility but the darkness was coming in fast.
She was cold and the temperature
