CLUNK
Darkness surrounds me. Not proper darkness, just the kind you experience when you walk into a room with the curtains drawn after being outside on a hot and sunny day.
It takes a minute or two for my eyes to adjust, so I am dependent on the king to guide me from the hot air balloon, which no longer looks like a hot air balloon. It looks more like a cardboard box.
“This is so weird,” I murmur to myself.
“You will become accustomed,” Tyrant says. “Your species is remarkably adaptable. It has to be, because you are otherwise very weak and unable to impose mastery.”
“Have you seen what we’ve done to our planet? We impose all day long. You think the thing came with cities and highways?”
“Do not mistake infrastructure for true dominance,” Tyrant says in a tone which implies some kind of mystery. I wonder what true dominance is for an alien king who believes his species to be absolutely essential to the universe.
“Hm,” I say, hoping that the noncommittal sound gets me out of whatever conversation might follow. I find myself strangely stirred by his talk of dominance, and I am already feeling vulnerable. “Excuse me, Mr. Tyrant?”
“King Tyrant,” he corrects me gruffly.
“Apologies. King Tyrant. Is there anywhere on this ship I can get a change of clothes and a shower?”
“Usually accountants want to start with the numbers,” he says, his eyes narrowing suspiciously, as if perhaps I am not a proper accountant after all. I certainly don’t feel like one right now.
“Accountants are usually properly dressed.”
“You are clothed. Though I must say, it is more alluring a display than seems strictly professional. Perhaps you should get changed. I will have you escorted to your chambers.”
His eyes glow even brighter when he looks directly at me. There’s something in that alien gaze which I find deeply unsettling.
It occurs to me that I must be quite honored if he came to get me himself. I don’t know many CEOs, let alone alien kings who personally retrieve their own accountants. Most of the time people like me are incredibly low on the totem pole. We make sure that nobody goes to jail, and they ignore us as much as humanly possible. Or inhumanly possible, in this case.
I do not know how Tyrant summons an aide. It is a process which seems to happen without any kind of obvious sound or cue, but the results are more or less immediate.
Doors to what I suppose are a cargo or landing bay open, the walls themselves peeling open in a way which makes them look very much not like walls. I have the feeling that this ship is not made in the way I understand things being made. The not-at-all-a-piece-of-toast shuttle proved that.
The aperture of the walls is suddenly occupied by a slightly smaller version of Tyrant.
Unlike the king, he is only seven and a half feet tall. He is wearing a shiny black uniform which clings to every line of his masculine frame. Besides the tail. I keep waiting for him to turn around so I can see how the thick, muscular tail works with the back of the pants.
As alien as they are, they’re human enough to give me tremors of very human attraction, especially King Tyrant. He is hot in a Jason Statham, sort of rough but incredibly powerful sort of way. If Jason Statham’s eyes were like a nebula and he had a fin on his head. His assistant’s fin is far smaller and more swept back, and his brow ridge is likewise shaped which creates a never ending expression of disapproval.
“This is the human accountant. Her name is Tania McMillan.”
The assistant, or attendant, or whatever he is gives me the sort of withering up and down look usually reserved for people who try to convert you on your doorstep or sell you a vacuum cleaner which doubles as a therapist. He looks at me as though I am garbage dressed in trash, which does nothing for my self-esteem, because that’s basically how I feel.
I’m holding onto what vestiges of notions of professionalism remain in me, but it’s not easy. First, the whole staying in my apartment for months on end thing sort of eroded all the little human niceties, and now I’m on an alien craft bound for I don’t know where. At this point, melting down into a screaming mess feels like a legitimate option.
But I keep it together, even as the assistant gives me the sort of look which would usually make me want to go and hide under my bed covers for hours. Social anxiety be damned. I’m going to make it work with these aliens. I’m going to impress them with my efficiency, and my…
“Are you coming, human?”
King Tyrant has sort of… disappeared, and the assistant has strode off at great speed only to have me stand there staring into the middle distance. I snap to attention and run after him, apologizing profusely with a thousand excuses, none of which he is listening to.