Brides of the Kindred(36)

Baird sighed. “I’ll try but you know patience isn’t exactly one of my virtues.”

“I know but you waited for six months and went through hell to escape from the Scourge ship to be with her. You can wait a little longer.” Sylvan smiled. “Come on, you’d better get going. I’m sure your new bride is waiting for her things from home.” He nudged the cardboard box with his foot.

“You’re right.” Baird reached for the box and the bags of human food he’d bought at the Human Relations market in the Earth brides section. “I’d better go attend to her needs.”

“See that you do.” Sylvan smiled at him, showing a hint of fang. Baird nodded and turned toward the lifts that would take him back to his suite. He just hoped his new bride would be in a better mood when he got home than she had been when he left.





Chapter Ten



“Oh my God!” Liv straightened up abruptly, snatching back her hand. The not-milk container dropped from her suddenly nerveless fingers and its round red cap came off. As white liquid gurgled quietly out onto the floor, Liv backed away from the weird blue teddy bear creature, her heart pounding.

For a moment the creature went to all fours and sniffed at the white alien beverage, making Liv hope that it would forget all about her and get drunk on the stuff. She herself was suddenly perfectly sober—a blinding flash of fear was as good as a strong cup of coffee any day, she decided.

Unfortunately after a few sniffs and one tentative lick of its dark green tongue, the blue animal shuffled forward, obviously more interested in Liv than the happy hour happening on the kitchen floor.

“N-nice teddy,” Liv heard herself saying in a trembling voice as she backed away. “Don’t bite me, just stay away.”

But the bear thing seemed to be attracted to the sound of her voice rather than put off by it. With an interested sounding huffing noise it came closer and Liv backed further away.

She found herself backing down the dim hallway, blinking to see since her eyes had grown accustomed to the light in the kitchen. Still the alien teddy bear followed her making huffing sounds in a hoarse voice and snuffling the air as though trying to identify her scent. Walking on all fours as it now was, Liv estimated that it was probably just a little smaller than a Pomeranian but about a hundred times scarier because A—it was clearly an alien creature with unknowable intentions and B—it had teeth like a freaking shark.

“Nice teddy,” she whispered again, fumbling around for the door to the bathroom. Maybe she could lock herself inside somehow until Baird came back. She didn’t know how the weird bear creature had gotten into the suite in the first place—maybe it was some kind of parasite that needed to be exterminated like a really huge cockroach—but at least Baird was big enough to take it out of commission. If he would ever freaking get back. Where was the human food store located on this ship anyway? And what the hell was taking him so long?

Finally she felt the bathroom entrance and backed slowly into it. But as she went her foot caught on something on the floor and she lost her balance. Windmilling her arms desperately, she shrieked in surprise as she tried to keep from landing flat on her ass.

Unfortunately her big arm gestures and ear-splitting screams seemed to have a bad effect on the creature. Previously it had appeared to be simply curious about her but now it reared up on its hind legs again and let out a hoarse and awful roar that chilled Liv’s blood. Dear God I’m about to be eaten by a blue alien teddy bear, she thought wildly as it came toward her. What the hell are they going to put on my tombstone?

Here lies Liv,

Without a care

She died from the bite

Of a teddy bear.

Okay, so maybe she wasn’t completely sober yet but she was completely terrified. Where was Baird?

The creature roared again, breaking her strange paralysis and Liv stumbled backwards into the bathroom, trying to get away from the menacing little monster. Feeling a hollow space behind her she remembered the alcove with its weird massaging mat. Normally she would have avoided it but she quickly decided a massage from a weird inanimate object was better than having her toes chewed off by a blue rampaging teddy bear.

Hoisting herself up, Liv crawled onto the mat in its recessed alcove. At once she felt the massage begin. The mat had come to life and was kneading every part of her it could reach, mostly her hands and knees since she was crawling toward the end of the alcove and praying the scary blue bear wasn’t able to come after her. It wasn’t very tall even on its hind legs but could it climb? She looked over her shoulder apprehensively but to her relief she didn’t see anything following her into the dark recesses of the alcove.