Starport: Zeta Prime (Alt) by S.A. Jackson

ransacked, then he could make his
special announcement.
    This was all a very necessary exercise
if his plans for the woman were to be realized. His mind was made
up and her future now decided.
    The sun was
starting to fade back in the village, and subsequently the heat
from it. Even though her security uniform was thick, Jillian
started to feel a chill and pulled a piece of fur from the pile to
huddle under. She looked on enviously as groups of the
aliens–mainly women and children, she noted curiously—made their
way into the largest of the huts.
    She deduced that it must be some kind
of communal dwelling, and the envy came from the fact that the orb
of orangey light flickering inside made it look cozy and inviting,
and also because they had each other, while she had no
one.
    The
loneliness was an aching throb inside her and provided the
motivation she needed to start looking for weaknesses in her
prison, the village and the people that were holding her there. She
felt hopeless, just sitting there, not knowing what was going to
happen. Surely a well-trained ex-soldier could figure a way to
escape from a primitive camp such as this?
    She examined the cuff on her wrist. It was solid metal, and
fastened tightly with screws, but it was loose. On a whim, and if
she was honest, more to give herself something to do, she tried
pulling her delicate hand through the metal ring. Her skin bunched
up under it and turned an angry red as she yanked. A couple more
minutes of pulling was all
she could bear, and she sat back on her fur, slightly breathless
from the exertion.
    She fantasized about her freedom, and how she would clear
her name and prove her innocence back at the colony. She knew that
they would not be able to prove her involvement…but then she could
not prove her innocence either. If this rebel operation had
occurred from inside the military, she was sure that they would
have covered all bases in setting her up to take the fall for
the gateway’s
destruction.
    Unless Mikey
had managed some sort of miracle to convince the leading powers
otherwise…but he just was one man, against a powerful group of
goodness knows how many. Jillian wanted to go back home, wanted to
go back to Earth and try to rebuild her life. Sorrow stabbed her,
but even that was not even a possibility now–even if she could have
waltzed right into a colony who considered her a terrorist–the
gateway was no more. The re-construction would take decades, at
least as long as a rescue ship back to Earth. Every human on Zeta
Prime was now totally cut off, and would have to find ways of
surviving without support.
    The gooseflesh on her arms had nothing
to do with the cooling of the day, and she had to bite her lip to
prevent the prick of tears in her eyes developing into lonely,
desperate sobs. A noise ahead of her made her raise her head, and
she saw the unfriendly female again, this time carrying
food.
    Once she had
placed the bowl down, Jillian was flashed a false smile, which she
faked back. Going about her duties as she’d been asked by her
leader, Misha lit the fire in the center of the prison hut, turning
Jillian’s smile to a genuine one, grateful for the
warmth.
    “ This is my last visit
tonight, so make hat food and water last. I do not care for
attending to you like a slave when you are so
undeserving.”
    Keeping the
shock from her face, Jillian gave the alien an expression that she
hoped portrayed a lack of understanding. She understood her
prisoner status, but she was treated with so much more apparent
kindness from the male. The cold interactions with this woman did
not fill her with much hope, and she’d not seen the male the whole
day. Had he just left her here? Did he not feel any compassion
towards her? She had thought, last night … no. She shook the memory
from her head, realizing she must have misjudged it. She felt …
rejected.
    As the
female left her alone once more, Jillian tucked into her meal,
fears about her internal