Page 14

crocheter’s guide to alien conservation

Elisse Hay

chapterone

eve

I’d hopednext time I opened my eyes that heavy sense of hopelessness would be gone. I’d hoped, but I hadn’t really expected it. So as I watched the guy in front of me coming into focus and that elephant was still on my chest, I wasn’t reallydisappointedso much as resigned.

Iwasdisappointed by the accommodations. I lay on some sort of smooth table, there wasskyabove me, and why did I feel like I’d been hit by a bus? If I’d swapped the hopelessness of the daily grind for broken ribs, I probably could’ve lived with it, but this was just the worst of both worlds.

The guy glanced over and I closed my eyes.It’s a side-effect from the medically induced nap for the journey, I told myself. Your eyesight is fine. He isn’t purple.

Or…I was talking to analien.Aliensateus.

“I wish you a pleasant waking,” he said, his voice a deep, vibrating timbre that made it almost impossible to keep my eyes scrunched closed. “Is your body comfortable?”

Was mybodycomfortable? I looked up at where he towered over me, his dark green hair falling to frame his exaggeratedly square jaw and strong, beak-like nose. Whatever I was going to say dried up.

He wasn’t purple. He waslilac.

I was utterly fucked. I wasn’t supposed to be anywhere beyond humanity’s reach. My destination was only two planets over from Original Earth. No aliens, no way. I was going to be the saltiest snack this guy had had in awhile becausefuck. this.

“Do you recall how you came to be here?” he asked me, but the movement of his lips didn’t match the words.

I closed my eyes again. Five years ago, I’d married my dream guy, I’d just landed my dream job, and I’d been organising to move into my dream home. Except they hadn’t really been that; they were only dreams if they came from theDreamregion in France. They’d just been sparkling toxicity. And now I had dreams of being able to afford more yarn for my knitting.

“Oh yeah,” I told him, grimly. “Yeah, I do.”

“Have you anyone remaining?” he asked me, the question so gentle I kind of wanted to throat-punch him.

I’d signed up fornewanddifferentand, sure, the program had obviously been predatory. They didn’t invite plebs like me to assist in populating a relatively new planet without adding some catches, and I hadn’t felt the need to ask a lot of questions. I could have an adventure with predators. At least I’d known what I was getting into.Go away, leave everything behind, have a fresh start, sell my soul to a different mega-corporation and eat cereal for dinner on a different planet.

I hadn’t signed up fortherapy.I’d signed up forget the fuck out of here.

“Nope.” I tried to sit up and pain radiated through my whole body, taking my breath away. My eyes popped open, but he wasn’t about to try to hold me down or whatever. He was just standing there, like a big, weird, lilac lump.

Maybe this was some sort of mindfuck orchestrated by the program to ensure my compliance? I watched him, giving myself at least four chins with the unflattering angle of my face and in way too much pain to care. He watched me back. Behind him, the indigo sky seemed so close I could almost reach out and touch it. It had a different texture to what I was used to. Velvety. The stars glowed in unfamiliar patterns behind him and I wished I could try to figure them out, but Ihurt.

“What’s the deal?” I asked, and the question came out somewhat pleading, because the bench I was on made all the other hurts into bigger, shittier hurts.

“You have a need to be comfortable,” he said, and I sure as hell didn’t disagree. But it was a weird way to say it, and again the movement of his lips still didn’t match the sounds he was making.

In the background, I could hear waves, and for some reason that normalcy alongside this alien’s strange speech made me want to puke.

“I am not informed of your body’s requirements,” he added. “I do not recognize how to aid.”

That’s what they all say.I cleared my throat and glanced around, but couldn’t see anyone. Someone had built rough-hewn stone walls arranged aesthetically around us to make it a semi-sheltered outdoor area. I saw some baskets that probably would’ve cost a fortune at the local farmer’s market and a lot of sand. Everything was a strange colour palette, though. Was this a side-effect of the medically induced sleep? That would probably make sense, if their drugs had fucked my vision.

Unease overcame hopelessness and pain. I struggled up despite the bolts of pain that shot from my chest and up one leg, though my head swam and my stomach rebelled. I looked down at my body and was utterly unsurprised by the rudimentary splint on my left leg. I was scraped, bruised, and one of my favourite shoes was missing. If I tossed my cookies on this guy, well, he wouldn’t be the first to suffer that fate.

There had been hundreds of us. We’d smiled and sat and run our phones down waiting for our turn to be put into long-term sleep and sent to the mystery land where we’d start over.

I couldn’t see anyone, though. Only rocks, plants I didn’t recognise, and a choppy, uninviting sea crouching over the horizon in various purples and oranges with the odd splash of pink for that sweet accent shade. “Where’s everyone else?” I demanded.

He shook his head. Black hair that shone with green highlights swung hypnotically around his strong neck and settled on his shoulders. “No others lived. I express regret and sadness appropriate.”

My head spun. “What happened?”