Out of Place- Episode 4: Somewhere New

We opened our eyes to the sleek white interior of the craft.

Both of our heads were spinning but I assume Dell felt worse, seeing as how he’d never done that before. Even before I had fully realized where we were, I was angry with the situation. I looked around, Dell was behind me 

“Wh- where are we?” He asked, trying to steady himself to alleviate the sudden vertigo. “We were just on the drive and your watch and the light and-” He seemed to notice my annoyance rather than shock with the situation. He furrowed his brow at me. “What? Where are we?”

I put my face in my hands and decided that I wasn’t ready to answer yet.

After a minute of thinking it through, I gave the best answer I could.

“We just need to find the captain.”

He didn’t get it, I didn’t expect him to, it wasn’t even much of an answer but it was too much to explain in the moment.

I jammed a button and the door slid open, I looked out and walked into the corridor. Dell remained in the room, still in awe of the sudden shift in surroundings. When I stepped out, I heard a woman's voice welcoming us aboard the ship. 

In the hall, the giant gallery windows blinds were closed. I shifted on my feet trying to regain my composure. After listening to the woman's introduction for a short while, Dell stumbled out of the room.

“A spaceship?” His stormy grey eyes were wide.

For the first time in a while, I avoided his gaze. “Mnh yeah. Don’t worry, I’ll get this sorted. Just- trust me.”

I don't think he believed me fully, but he tried to trust me.

We got to the end of the hall and hit the button to open the door.

The woman turned from the controls “Ah! Welcome onto Astrosafe ship num…” Her voice trailed off when she saw me and her expression quickly soured. “You.”

I stared in anger and awe, “Enly.”

Why did it have to be now? And with her?

“Lraie… what are you doing on my ship?” She growled

“I'm asking the same thing… Rescue service is a bit ironic.”

“You know damn well why I left you there.”

“Well you can take my companion and I right back down because my need for rescue is over.”

“I. Can’t. Do. That.” She accentuated every word through gritted teeth.

My heart sank deep into my stomach. “What?” The first soft word I had said since being in her presence.

“Don’t look at me like that, you made the call, now we have to go all the way back to Serin.”

“I made that call four years ago when you first dropped me off on the godforsaken planet!”

“And now you want to go back?!”

“It was only a struggle at first when you dropped me off in Russia! I can only speak Sero and American English.”

“Well then maybe next time you’ll learn not to be-”

Dell cleared his throat and placed a hand on my shoulder, he was shaking a bit.

“Dave,” he said meekly “if you don’t mind pausing the argument with the large purple woman, I have several questions.”

I felt my face go red. I didn’t exactly realize the impact of just suddenly being in space for someone that’s never been there. Especially when hearing an argument that he could only understand one side of.

“Yeah, uh, now isn’t a great time…” I glared at Enly as I turned to Dell.

We all avoided each other's eye contact for a moment.

“Well, let me show you where you’ll be staying.” she said in English to Dell as she guided him to another hall, he threw a frantic glance at me as I followed them.

We were given a large room with two beds on opposite walls from each other, a counter with rudimentary cooking items hung on the back wall in the middle of the beds. The floor was similar to linoleum and there were a few rugs lying around the floor.

Dell tried to make small talk with Enly, it was awkward for me specifically because I think they’re actually starting to become acquaintances. I’m just glad he’s becoming acclimated somehow… even if it’s because of her… I need to chill out dammit. Just because they’re being nice to each other doesn’t mean he’s gonna leave me.

I think the worst part of it was when everything started to settle and information started to click for Dell.

“So you're an alien.” In that moment he was unreadable.

I looked down “Yes.” Dell would never do anything to hurt me, but it was an anxious feeling, him pointing it out.

“And your name is Lraie?” He softened a little, but I still couldn’t tell what he was thinking.

“No, well, I mean it’s- it’s not anymore. It was the name I was born with but- I’m Dave.”

“Well I at least know that one first hand, Dell isn’t the name I was given at birth either.”

I was a bit surprised. “Well, I like Dell anyway.”

“And I like Dave.”

For a moment, the terror of the new situation faded away and we were somewhere familiar, his house or mine, the diner, his car, any one of the normal places we could have been. But it couldn’t last, he remembered his phone.

“Oh gosh, I- crap I need to see if I can call my mom.”

I twitched a bit, I was sure it wouldn’t work. He tried to dial his mom but it immediately wouldn't connect, he tried his brother next but that didn’t work either

“Oh they’re gonna be so worried about me…” he said shakily “I- I try to call them every other day. I hope they’ll be okay.”

“Dell I’m so sorry, I didn’t realize-”

“No, no it’s okay. They've gone without me before, maybe we can find some space tech to get me connected or something.” 

I really hoped we could, I know his family has a tendency to worry for him.

We sat together on his bed. Out the window we could see Earth, about the size of a marble now. Earlier when we first came in, if we looked out the window of our room we could see it almost fill the whole view, it was beautiful. I didn’t get the chance to look at it when I was first dropped off there. But now it looks like just another speck, it’ll take us four days to get to Serin and I don’t know how ready I am to stay that long around Enly. At the very least, we were lucky that two of our bags got transported up with us so we have just a few pairs of clothes. 

It’s pretty late, I think Dell is asleep and I’m just sitting here. I guess I’m just stalling by writing, I’m just not sure how well I'll be able to sleep anyway. Things are really quiet here in the cabin, all I can hear Dell's breathing and the constant soft drone of the ship as we swim through the empty space. I can only see a few tiny lights on the walls and the illumination from my computer. Crap, I hope I’m not bugging him with the typing and the light from it.