Snake Keeper by Alexandra Norton
CHAPTER THREE
EVEN THE SOUNDPROOFINGwould not muffle the crashing and cursing emitting from Dad’s office the next morning. I took the eggs off the heat and ran to his door. Normally I’d knock, but this sounded like an emergency. I threw the door open to find his antique typewriter (inherited from his grandmother) smashed on the floor. Judging by the wood splinters and books strewn about, he had launched it into his walnut bookshelf.
“Dad, what are you doing?!” This was not normal behavior for my usually composed General father.
He lowered his cellphone from his ear and hunched still as stone over his desk, white knuckles digging into the surface. I couldn’t see his head, just his receding gray buzz-cut as he stared down at the grains in the wood.
“Dad?” I asked in a small voice. Something was very wrong. “Is it the vaccine? It didn’t work?”
When he finally looked at me, his hard face had aged ten years. A contorted scowl etched deep lines into his skin. “They want to take you.”
“W… what do you mean?”
“Xioumar, the damned fucking alien, doesn’t want the delegate we chose for him. He wants you.”
Dad leaped into action. He unlocked his lower desk drawer and withdrew a pistol, then shoved past me and thundered down the hall.
“But they can’t do that. And why?!” I winced, my back having hit the door frame when he nudged me aside.
“We have to go,” Dad called from his bedroom. I heard him rummaging in his closet and knew he was in the gun safe. I recognized the sound of the lock. “Get essentials only.”
I ran to my room and threw my phone charger, laptop, my spare N95s, and a couple of wads of spare clothes into a denim backpack.
This can’t be happening.
We were in the driveway, Jeep keys clutched in my fist, when the black vans pulled up to our curb and four secret service agents stepped out (I knew that’s what they were. I grew up around them). Dad moved to unclip his holster. I could see the next few moments perfectly, seeing four suited arms reach for their hips…
“Dad, no!” I screamed and grabbed his arm, pulling his hand away from the gun.
“No.” I clutched his hand in both of mine, tears stinging at my eyes as I fought back the incoming breakdown. “I’ll go. I have to go.”
The next few seconds were a blur as the agents, attempting to look sympathetic but clearly on high alert, escorted me to one of the vans. They allowed us a single parting hug before hands ripped me out of my father’s arms. Dad squeezed my face in his calloused hands.
“Maybe it’s a mistake. It could be. If not, I’ll see you in five years,” I assured him.
They put me in the van. I wiped my eyes with the sleeve of my sweatshirt. The blacked-out windows prevented me from getting any idea of where they were taking me. They spoke to me throughout, but I didn’t really hear them. An incessant buzzing filled my ears. Both my head and my heart felt like they were being split open as I bit back my sobs through the ride, chest heaving silently with each attack.
I exited the car at a hangar of some sort. A sharp gust of wind ripped the hair tie out of my brown hair, sending tight curls whipping across my tear-stained face. My legs prickled with goosebumps under the thin black leggings I’d been wearing; I hadn’t exactly been dressed to leave the house, much less the planet.
At least my feet were warm as they guided me through muddy puddles to a white hangar building. I had thrown on a comfortable, well-worn pair of leather boots as Dad and I ran out the door to make our escape. He had always taught me the importance of suitable footwear.
It took a few seconds for my eyes to adjust to the dim lighting inside the hangar. The only source of light was an opening in the roof and some faint LED strips embedded into the floor, guiding the way to a black, smooth rock; I recognized it from the hours I’d spent watching the sky: a Federation shuttle.
It had been a dark day, thick clouds having rolled in from the East. I looked up. A shadow of one of the aliens’ giant ships loomed overhead, ever present in the Washington sky. I stumbled, overtaken by the sinking realization that I’d be up there soon. My head spun with vertigo and I wasn’t even off the ground yet.
“Breathe, Miss Robinson,” the female agent at my side steadied me under the elbow, giving me a moment to regroup before steering me firmly down the middle of the LED strips toward the shuttle.
It looked to be about 30 feet long and 10 or so wide, about the size of a Cessna I’d flown once on a birthday test flight. But the thing couldn’t look further from an aircraft. It was more akin to a slab of black river-rock, perfectly smooth, with asymmetrical dips and dents where years of water molded it to time’s liking.
As we approached, a round opening materialized as though the rock had swallowed a part of itself. Two Snakes emerged. The female was taller than me, but a head shorter than the male at her side. Her yellow eyes held slightly rounder pupils than that of her companion, but even this male’s orbs were not as threatening as what I had remembered of Xioumar’s bone-chilling gaze.
The aliens wore black skin-tight material that reminded me of latex, but seemed to flow around their bodies. It did not crease when their limbs moved, but shifted on top of them, reshaping itself to their form.
So much for similar fashions.
“Why are you doing this?” I barked at them as the agents led me forward. “You had a willing delegate. Why don’t you take her?”
“Your Keeper has decided that you are more compatible with our kind than the proposed delegate. We only want to give your kind the best chance for success in the evaluation process,” the female said simply.
“I’m sorry, Emily,” a familiar voice behind me echoed through the hangar, accompanied by rushed footsteps. I turned around as President Rickson walked up behind me.
“We didn’t want this. The Federation’s conditions… changed.” He threw a glance toward the Snakes.
“But believe this,” he took a firm hold of my shoulders and that graced me with that warm, charismatic smile I had seen in all his speeches on TV and in person. “You are a Hero. You are saving us, Emily. Your father will be taken care of. And hey…” - he squeezed my shoulder. “We’ll see you in five years, Delegate of Earth.”
What a fucking load of bullshit.
I did not dignify the bastard who had authorized my kidnapping and selling off to an alien species with a response.
The crumpling smile on his face as I turned my back provided some amount of satisfaction. I shook off the agents and held my chin high, walking forward to the shuttle of my own accord.
The Snakes placed their hands on my shoulders. Even through my sweatshirt, I could feel the uncomfortable heat of their skin as they led me through the opening into blackness.
The world tightened around me. The enclosing blackness was the last thing I would remember from that day.