Her fears had settled slightly as the leader truly sounded concerned with her safety. Or that of her baby, anyway.
“Our people have been infertile for decades. Your child can change all that before it’s too late.”
“I know all about that,” she said. “The Trenuians plan to create a cure to help everyone.”
He laughed. “No, they would save themselves. They’d be more than happy for us to go extinct.”
“Why?”
“You don’t know anything about our history. Not the truth, anyway. The male you’re with helps ensure we are kept on the fringe of society. They won’t be happy until every last one of us is gone.”
“I don’t understand.”
He used his hands in animation as he spoke, much more human-like than Dhiro and the others on his planet she’d met. “A long time ago, there was a civil war of sorts. One group wanted progress, the other wanted the status quo. Politics, as you’d call it. We were labeled dangerous for being too curious, too inquisitive. The government cast us out, called us criminals, animals, and future generations believed it. That was nearly a century ago.”
“Dhiro’s not a bad man. I’m sure there was a misunderstanding.”
He pounded a fist on the metal table of instruments, sending them scattering to the ground with a clatter. She cringed, wishing she’d kept her mouth shut.
“You’ll send her into premature labor. The child needs to be born healthy for any of this to work,” said the woman from earlier.
Her words appeared to calm him somewhat.
“What will you do to me? My baby?”
He approached her, leaning over so they were almost face to face. She held her breath.
“We’re not animals, little human. Unlike what you may have heard about us, we have no plans on murdering your child … or even you.”
“What about the cure?”
He stood back up straight and shrugged nonchalantly. “They wanted us wiped out, so why should we care about them? The cure will be ours alone.”
“But there are millions of Trenuians that will go extinct without it.”
“Feed her and keep her locked up.”
He left the room with his team. She was their lab rat. And she felt lonelier than ever.
Once everyone was gone, the woman came and sat in the chair near her. She was beautiful in her own way. “My name is Khirana.”
“Will they let me go?”
“No, they need what you have,” she said.
“And after?”
“I will try my best to advocate for you. There is no reason to harm you or the child once we get the umbilical sample.”
“So all your people are infertile?”
“Yes, all. Our scientists, in all their wisdom, created a plague to fight this ongoing war between our people. In their haste, they didn’t realize they’d also render their own people infertile. Fools,” she muttered.
“Your people caused the infertility?”
She shrugged. “I don’t even think they know why they’re fighting each other anymore. The original feuds were with men long since passed on. The plague went too far, and it cost us everything.” Khirana touched her own stomach, her expression solemn.
“The Trenuians don’t even know. They’ve been trying to find a cure for decades.”
“They know. They were the ones to try first but failed. Scientist pitted against scientist. It’s an old battle that needs to end for the sake of all Trenu Zel.”
One of the men from earlier stepped back into the room. “Don’t talk to her,” he said. “We need you in engineering.”
Once she was alone again, her thoughts went wild. She’d been studying the infertility issue for months when she was back on Dhiro’s planet. It didn’t make sense. There were no natural indicators. Now she had answers. Some anyway.
For days, she was kept in the infirmary. She was fed and given all her essentials, but nothing more. Khirana didn’t visit her again, and Ella hoped she wasn’t in trouble for saying too much. She knew the ship was landing when all the crew were on high alert, rushing back and forth outside her door. A low siren sounded, and an emergency light flicked on inside her room when the main power went out. After a hollow boom sounded around her, she knew they’d landed. She prayed Dhiro was also able to land safely. Over the past couple of days, he was all she could think about, to the point she made herself sick with worry. She hated not knowing what the future held for them.
Ella listened near the door.
“It’s the taskforce,” one of them shouted.
“Get to the weaponry.”
“Don’t open the hatch!”
“Protect the human.”
When she heard footsteps right outside, she rushed back to the center of the room. The leader from a couple of days ago rushed in and put a collar around her neck. He tugged her along like a dog on a leash. She held the thick leather with both hands, trying not to stumble. All around them was chaos. And fear.