Alien-Under-Cover by Maree Dry

place to sit that wasn’t disgusting but the floor was too awful to even look at closely and there were no chairs. “This place is a sty. If the reverend or Raiders don’t get us, we’ll probably die of some illness or get bitten by fleas and ticks and who knows what else?”
    Taking off his jacket he spread it over the dirty floor. “Sit.”
    “Why so chivalrous all of a sudden?”
    Whatever crack he was on certainly changed his personality. None of his actions fit the man she used to know. The John she knew in Denver would never sacrifice his jacket to give her a clean place to sit. He’d tried to claim her before but in a brutish almost casual way. Now he focused on her all the time, emotions boiling in his smoldering eyes. Still, she didn’t get the overwhelming feeling of evil that she used to get around him.
    “You said we have to wait here. What are we waiting for?”
    She sat down gingerly and clasped her arms around her knees. She would’ve liked to brace her back against the wall, but some oily sludge and other unidentifiable objects coated it in a greasy film. He crouched opposite her and she refused to admit that his large presence comforted her. Her creepometer was off the scale but more from her memories of him than his actual presence.
    “We need to wait here. That is all you need to know.”
    “Couldn’t you break us out of here? Then we can wait outside. This place is nauseating.”
    She pressed her hand against her nose but it didn’t keep the stench out. If she could convince that drug-addled mind it would be a good idea to escape and not wait for this mysterious person to arrive, she might be able to get away from him.
    “The man I am seeking will come here,” he said.
    “So I guess we wait.” Julia traced a finger over her jean clad knee and braced herself to ask the question. “John, what happened to you? Is it drugs?”
    “Nothing happened to me,” he said as if she had asked if the sun was shining outside.
    “You are different, before you would never have protected me.”
    She looked at the other cages and shuddered. Moans echoed eerily through the basement but none of the other captives made eye contact. He narrowed his eyes on a cage in the darkest corner. She peered at it but could only vaguely make out a man’s form.
    Julia looked at the children in the cages opposite them and closer to the door.
    “They’re so thin. The reverend must have kept them here for a while.” He didn’t answer, just stared at her with that unblinking gaze.
    “It doesn’t make sense. Why would he keep them and not sell them?”
    “He is waiting for payment. The people who ordered them will not agree to his price,” John said with frightening calm.
    “I’m going to be sick.”
    “The smell will only make you sicker,” he said matter-of-factly.
    “Don’t you feel anything for these people, some sympathy?”
    This was the John she remembered--the man without compassion or mercy for those weaker than him.
    “No.”
    “How can you even admit it? When we escape, we are helping them.” She’d find a way to get everyone out and safe and away from here.
    “We will have to move fast when we go. They will hinder us.” No emotion in his voice.
    “I don’t care. We will help them.”
    “No we won’t,” he said.
    “I really want to hurt you,” she snarled at him and could have screamed when he didn’t react.
    It felt as if they sat like that for hours. But according to her watch, only an hour passed.
    “I wonder if they feed everyone once a day or something.”
    “You are hungry?”
    She shuddered at the thought of eating anything in this stinking place. “No, I was just thinking if they bring food, then you can break the bars, overpower them, and we can let everyone out and escape.”
    “No, we will wait here.”
    She tapped her foot on the grimy cement floor and glared at him. “I thought nothing could be worse than being haunted by a demon but being trapped in here with you is