Assistant for the Alien Prince by Tammy Walsh

Zai

The bar wasa dark and seedy place with shutters over the windows that blocked out the worst of the sunlight—and “worst” appeared to be the right description in this place.

Inside, the walls were painted black and grungy music groaned from pained speakers.

Overweight Ev’vat lay spread across the tabletops, recovering from what had clearly been a long and heavy night.

Back on the shuttlecraft, I’d switched on my holo-collar and selected the appearance of a weak and weedy accountant-type, thinking he was the least threatening disguise I had and he wouldn’t be bothered by these rougher types.

Now, I wished I’d gone for something a little more dangerous looking, something these guys would be intimidated by and wouldn’t want to tangle with.

It was too late to change now.

Already, a dozen pairs of eyes from various points in the bar had latched onto us and leered over empty glasses.

I hesitated about entering, not wanting to take Jessica into such a seedy joint but she bustled forward unperturbed.

The patrons ran a bloodshot eye over me and quickly decided I wasn’t a threat before focusing their attention on Jessica.

They leered at her openly, a couple even licking their lips and grinning sadistically.

My blood temperature spiked to bubbling and I clenched a hand into a white-knuckled fist and swore that if anyone so much as laid a hand on her…

Jessica selected a table in the corner, seeming not to pick up on the danger we found ourselves in

“Is this okay?” she said sweetly.

“Yeah,” I said distantly. “That’ll be fine.”

Jessica fell onto her side of the table and I sat alongside her, keeping my attention on the others in the room.

I needed a good view of them so we wouldn’t be taken unawares if they attacked.

Feeling a little awkward, Jessica scooted over to the opposite side.

“Is this typical of an Ev’vat bar?” Jessica asked innocently, shrugging off her jacket to reveal her bare shoulders.

I wished she hadn’t done that, as now she’d attracted the interest of even the most drunken and slovenly of the patrons.

“Ah, no,” I said, “this isn’t exactly what you would call a regular drinking hole.”

Just a hole.

Jessica smiled beautifully as the bartender approached.

He squinted around one eye and one of his horns had been completely shorn off, the other dry and cracked like it needed a good layer of varnish.

His apron was damp and stained with alcohol.

“What can I get for ya?” he growled in the guttural tones of the Ev’vat.

Jessica cocked an eyebrow at me.

“What do you suggest?”

“Two auggis, please,” I said. “And a bowl of ecac.”

“What about food?” Jessica said. “Didn’t you say you were hungry?”

Not hungry enough to eat in this shithole.

“I lost my appetite,” I said.

“Is that all?” the bartender said.

Jessica turned to order something else—I suspected it was food, and I wasn’t about to let her make that mistake!

“Yes,” I said quickly. “Thanks.”

The bartender turned and marched toward the bar as Jessica frowned at me.

“Are you okay? You seem a little… on edge.”

Who wouldn’t be in this place?

“I’m fine.”

I decided to try to take my mind off the bar and its inhabitants.

“Tell me about Earth. Do you drink much?”

“Sure. Not as much as I used to though. A lot of humans drink. It’s probably the most popular social activity going. How about you? Do you ever step outside the palace or do you get your servants to bring your drinks to you?”

Her tone was sharp, an open challenge.

Despite the seedy surroundings, I felt my shoulders relax.

A little.

“It’s difficult for me to go anywhere without someone recognizing me,” I said.

“Is that why you wear that collar?”

I nodded and tapped it absentmindedly with my fingertips.

“You know, with your past, the bartender would probably be happy to serve you,” Jessica said.

“Why’s that?”

“You used to buy everyone a round the moment you stepped into a bar, didn’t you? Isn’t that why they called you ‘the Round Man’?”

My eyes snapped to Jessica’s.

There was a playfulness in them I hadn’t seen before.

“I forgot they used to call me that.”

“They used to call you many things. ‘The Loverboy Prince’ was another one.”

I rolled my eyes.

“Easy to come up with when you want to sell papers.”

“Growing up, I saw you many times in the gossip magazines,” Jessica said. “And on holo-TV. That sort of thing.”

I ran an eye over her dowdy dress and the crow’s nest of hair curled atop her head.

“You don’t strike me as the kind of person who reads celebrity magazines,” I said.

More like Accounting Monthly.

She shrugged her slender shoulders.

“It was my sister that bought the magazines. I read them because there was nothing else around. It couldn’t have been easy growing up as a prince—”

The bartender placed our drinks on the table, sloshing a good portion of it over the stained tabletops.

He tossed a bowl of snacks on the table and extended a payment receiver.

I ran my communicator over it and the receiver bleeped, taking payment.

The bartender turned on his heel without another word and wheeled away.

“Do you want to raise your voice a little more?” I hissed. “I don’t think the people in the back heard you say I was the prince!”

“Sorry.”

I took a deep gulp of my drink.

It went down the wrong hole and I coughed and spluttered, choking.

“Are you okay?” Jessica said.

“Peachy,” I croaked.

Jessica braced the weight of her glass in both hands, barely able to lift it.

She took a sip and grimaced at its sharp taste, but as it rolled down her throat, she must have felt the familiar shot of adrenaline that trailed it, and her eyes lit up.

“So?” she said.

“So what?”

“Was it tough growing up as the—” She glanced over her shoulders before spelling out the word: “P-R-I-N-C-E?”

I rolled my eyes.

“Do you really think these guys can’t spell?”

Jessica cast an eye over them.

“No, actually. I don’t think they can.”

She was probably right there but I wasn’t about to spell out every word I needed to say.

“It wasn’t that hard. I mean, I had everything I needed. I never had to worry about food or a place to live, somewhere to put down my head. Not like the guys in here. A lot of them probably don’t even have homes.”

“But there are other challenges when you’re rich and powerful, right? I’ve seen the movies.”

I ran an appraising eye over her.

“Yes, I suppose there are.”

“Not everybody is constantly under the threat of being K-I-D-N-A-P-P-E-D.”

“I suppose not. Still, I didn’t have to react the way I did growing up by becoming the typical troubled prince and being the favorite topic of every newspaper and magazine.”

“‘The Bad Boy Prince.’ Another favorite.”

I snorted and almost choked on my drink again.

“Boy, you’re really taking me down Memory Lane today! Yes, I was the Bad Boy Prince. It was the go-to headline when editors couldn’t think of anything better.”

Jessica took another sip of her drink, and this time relished the cool shot of adrenaline as it hit her system.

“How was your upbringing?” I said. “You don’t come across as someone who takes challenges lightly.”

Jessica chuckled before glaring at me in what I supposed was meant to be a threatening manner.

“That’s because I don’t. And if you come at me with a challenge, you’d better be prepared to back it up with some action.”

“Just as I thought. A real ball breaker.”

Jessica threw back her head and laughed boisterously, catching the ear—and interest once more—of the bar’s regulars.

Jessica looked at me over the rim of her chipped glass and, in that split second, a brave shaft of light penetrated a crack in the shutters and spilled across her face, drawing out the oaken glint of her eyes and high cheekbones.

She might try her best to hide it, but she was in fact a gorgeous specimen of her species.

A shiver traveled the length of my spine.

She lowered her glass and took a moment before speaking.

“I come from a wealthy family, believe it or not.”

With her plain clothes and direct way of speaking, I’d assumed she came from a more working-class background.

It added a layer of complexity to her that I hadn’t considered before.

“So what happened?” I said, genuinely interested.

“Who said anything happened?” Jessica said, her expression turning a little blurry from the auggis.

The traditional Ev’vat beer had a powerful kick if you weren’t used to it.

Hell, I was used to it and it still kicked my ass if I disrespected it!

“I don’t think you’d be doing this line of work if your family was still wealthy,” I said, meeting her challenge head-on.

My wild stab in the dark paid off as she made a popping sound with her lips and nodded.

“Yes, you’re right. I should be the CEO of a family-owned string of shopping malls. That was our business, once upon a time. Actually, it wasn’t even that far back. It was my father who lived beyond his means and ruined the family.”

I blinked in surprise at her admission, that she was being so open and honest with me—far more than I had been with her.

“He was charming,” she went on. “Sophisticated. And a total playboy.”

As she said the word “playboy,” she glanced in my direction before aiming her eyes back down at the bottom of her glass and took another sip.

Playboy?

Was that how she thought of me?

It shouldn’t have come as much of a shock seeing as that was how I’d spent the vast majority of my life before.

But things had changed.

I had changed.

If she couldn’t bring herself to believe that, what chance did I have of convincing the rest of the kingdom?

“Do you think people can change?” I asked seriously.

“Change?” Jessica said, wavering a little in her seat. “Sure. They can change their clothes, the color of their hair—”

“No, I mean really change. As in change their temperament, the kind of person they are.”

For some reason, her answering to the affirmative became vitally important.

“Yes,” she said after a long pause. “But usually it’s something that shocks or surprises them into making the change. The fat guy who refuses to diet or exercise until he sees his wife checking out other men or an overbearing mother who worries she’ll lose her daughter if she doesn’t give her some freedom. People can change, but it’s usually only after a big realization. At least, that’s how it works with humans.”

Had that been what I’d had? I wondered. A big realization?

In a way, yes.

But it hadn’t been about losing someone close to me, but losing touch with myself and who I was…

“By the way,” Jessica said, wiping a finger around the rim of her empty glass. “What happened to you for all those years?”

“What years?”

“The years you went missing. You were gone for a while and only returned when the king was sick. How long was it? Five or six years?”

“Four years,” I said.

Funny how she should hit on the exact moment that was crossing my mind right then.

I took off one night and never spoke about it with anyone.

No one knew where I went, and I reached out to no one from my past life, except to let my parents know I was alive and well.

I’d never felt comfortable enough with anyone to tell them about that period in my life, except right then and there in that quiet and intimate moment with Jessica.

Despite what my mother had warned me, maybe I could trust her enough to open myself to her…

“Good morning, miss.”

I’d been so embroiled in my decision about whether or not to open myself up to her that I hadn’t seen nor heard the lumbering Ev’vat approach our table.

I was by no means a small Ev’vat but this creature stood half again taller than me and at least twice as wide.

He grinned in what I guessed was meant to be a friendly manner, revealing half his teeth were missing.

A large golden ring hung like a medallion in his columella.

He had numerous notches in his horns, denoting either rank in the military—which was unlikely, as he sported none of the necessary tattoos—or fights he’d won in the pits…

Or women he’d claimed.

And by the way he looked at Jessica, I feared it was the latter.

If he intended on making Jessica one of those notches, he was going to have to go through me first.

“Oh, uh, hi,” Jessica said, nervously glancing at the creature before returning her attention to me.

The huge lumbering creature bent over Jessica and whispered in a voice that could be heard throughout the bar, despite the thumping music.

“How about we step outside and check out my shuttlecraft, little lady? You’ll get a whole lotta enjoyment out of it, I promise ya.”

I bolted up onto my feet and drew up to the creature.

For the first time, the creature acknowledged me.

He peered down his pierced nose at me, his eyes meeting the bottom of my chest.

I was reminded he could only see my small accountant guise and not the hardened warrior I’d been trained to be over the years.

He might be larger and more dangerous in an open brawl, but that was to ignore the torturous training I’d undergone over the years.

“The lady’s with me,” I said.

“And she’ll be with you again after I’m through with her. Let a real Ev’vat take care of her for a change.”

A handful of the other barflies perked up.

If the big guy was successful in claiming Jessica, I feared he wouldn’t be the only one.

She would get passed from one to the other until there was little of her left.

It suddenly dawned on me that my appearance as a weedy accountant might play to my advantage.

None of them were expecting someone with real training to compete with.

I took a step closer, my muscles tense and ready.

“I said, Jessica’s with me. She’s not interested in being with you—”

The creature struck with a thick fist.

As I expected.

Aggressive assailants always attacked first, and always at a moment when their opponent would be most surprised.

I shifted my weight easily.

His fist missed and slammed into the table.

His face curled into an expression of pain and his mouth formed around a howl.

It wouldn’t be enough to stop him—especially goaded on by his buddies—so I flew at him and threw my fists one after the other.

I must have hit him twelve, thirteen, maybe fourteen times before he went down.

When he fell, he fell hard.

His horns cracked the floor strewn with sawdust and his head swiftly followed.

I straightened up and turned to face the others.

Those who’d been drawing closer suddenly drew to a stop and seemed confused about what had just transpired.

I wanted to goad them into action, to make them charge and attack so I could wipe the floor with each and every one of them, to teach them a lesson about manners and civility that they would not soon forget…

But I had Jessica to think about.

One of them could easily slip behind me and take her.

I wouldn’t take that risk.

I spoke out the corner of my mouth.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Let’s get out of here.”

Jessica sipped from my half-full glass and followed me out.

I never turned my back on the other patrons, not until we were safely outside.

We shared a look, burst into laughter, and bolted for my shuttlecraft.

“What is it with your species and female humans?” Jessica said.

“We may have a few… anger management issues.”

Jessica laughed, her reaction at total odds with how she’d dealt with the previous attack she’d suffered at the spaceport.

The hatch door whirred open at our approach and I motioned for Jessica to head up the ramp first.

She swung around, her momentum knocking her off balance and she tripped on the ramp’s edge.

I caught her before she hit the floor.

She felt so light in my arms, her body so soft and warm.

My mouth turned dry at the sight of her beneath me.

“Uh, thanks,” she said, straightening up. “I’ve always been a bit of a klutz.”

As she headed deeper into the shuttlecraft, I realized with dawning horror that it wasn’t my species that was the reason they felt compelled to approach her, it was the aura she gave off in thick waves.

Her obvious sensual nature contained within a shy exterior.

It was an intoxicating mix far more potent than any auggis.

I was going to have to keep an eye on her.

A very close eye.