My Star by Christine Gasbjerg Page B

control room or lab... or possibly both. The window is at the top level that I’m on, and looking out over the hall from the wall furthest away from me. I can see a couple of white coated people moving around in there, but they’re so far away, that I wouldn’t be able to recognize any of them. A door opens below me on the ground floor of the hall, and one of the white coated people from the station crosses the floor of the hall, and finally exits through a door in the furthest corner. I find a staircase that takes me to the ground floor, and approach the translucent vessel. There’s a fence on the floor around the ship. I skip the fence and walk under the hovering vessel. It’s just close enough to the ground for me to be able to touch it. The surface is smooth and hard, but not hard as steel, more like the way that wood is hard. There’s no visible doors or windows and I’m curious about how to enter the vessel. I’m presuming that it indeed is a vessel—perhaps even an ET vessel, but of course I could be mistaken. As I’m exploring the lower surface with my hands, trying to find cracks that would reveal an entrance, the surface starts to respond ever so slightly to my touch. I’m wondering if I’m playing myself a mind trick. The lowest point of the vessel is so low that I have to bend a little to go under it, and strangely that part seems to become softer under my touch—almost as soft as skin.
    “Find anything of interest, Miss Hunter?”
    My heart stops. My body is nailed to the floor. I don’t dare turn around.

EIGHT
     
    captivity
     
     
    I’m pretty sure that’s the voice of Captain Alvah. I’m caught red handed and now my ship goes down.
    “This is peculiar. What is it?” I try a ‘childish curiosity’-approach, turn around and smile innocently, as if I don’t know that I might be doing something wrong.
    “What’s your game?” The captain sounds calm.
    “Sorry. I got lost looking for a toilet.” I’m trying an excuse. His calmness disturbs me. I wish he’d get angry, and that way show lack of control, but he’s not. He’s calm, unsurprised, and completely in control. I’m sure he can kill me in a heartbeat without a second thought, if he sees fit.
    The captain’s face reveals vague signs of amusement over my lame attempt at an excuse. Like a cat playing with a mouse, he knows he’s got the upper hand, and just enjoys to see me squirm and squeal.
    “I think we’ve found our ‘volunteer’.” Captain Alvah is addressing his space station companion in the white coat.
    “I see... Interesting.” The man sounds strangely intrigued.
    “This way!” The captain orders me abruptly to follow.
    There’s not doubt in my mind that the captain finds me annoying and completely expendable. I can’t escape the feeling that I’m about to be executed. I follow them through narrow halls into a huge room that looks like some kind of test lab. In the middle of the room, there’s a cage of triple layered glass surrounding a heavy table with a human-like creature lying on it. As we get closer, the creature appears lifeless, and is held down by a web of metal wires. It looks somewhat humanoid, but still other-worldly. I am sure it’s an Extra-Terrestrial Being.
    A woman from the station, wearing a full body suit, hands us each a similar body suit to wear.
    “No, not for her.” The captain takes my suit and gives it back. “Only oxygen.”
    The woman pulls a small bottle with a mouthpiece out of the suit, and hands the bottle to me. She puts the mouthpiece properly on me, and opens the nozzle of the bottle.
    “Now you go in there unprotected, and release the ETB from the restraints.” Captain Alvah sounds almost cheerful.
    I really don’t like that man.
    “Turn off the current.” He’s addressing another station guy in full body suit sitting behind what appears to be a control board.
    I suppose the wire web holding the ETB down is electric. I approach the double door entrance of the