Alien Tango

but not much of the things it wanted. It was more powerful than anything I’d ever experienced, like getting electrocuted but not dying from it.
    I felt it brush the little wisp of Terry inside my mind, and then it pulled her away from me. I wanted to cry, but it stroked my mind. “Not fair, to her or you. Must be what you are, must let her be what she was. Here, with us, when you need her.”
    The power flow continued, it felt as if it was a long time, but I couldn’t tell for certain. Then, finally, it was over. I felt as if my mind were floating around outside of my body as I watched Brian slide to the floor onto his back. Gower fell against my body, which knocked me down and on top of Brian. I wasn’t so out of it that I didn’t dread Martini’s reaction to this, but I couldn’t do anything about it.
    “Thank you,” the entity’s voice was in my disembodied mind. “We will never desert you, either.” Something hugged my mind, making me feel loved and protected, and then it let go.
    My mind whizzed back into my body and I whizzed right into unconsciousness.

CHAPTER 37
    I WOKE UP IN SOMEONE’S ARMS. I felt two hearts pounding, and the arms around me were very familiar. “Jeff?” I wanted to open my eyes, but it was as if there were sandbags on my eyelids.
    “It’s okay, baby, I’m here.”
    I could hear other people. “Is Paul awake?”
    “Not yet.” Martini’s voice was tense. “The astronauts are just coming around.”
    “The entity is inside Paul.”
    “James told us.” Martini didn’t sound relaxed or relieved. “Baby, can you open your eyes?”
    “I’m trying. I’m so tired.” I was. I just wanted to curl up, put my face into his neck, and go to sleep.
    Martini shifted me, and my face was right where I’d wanted it. I wrapped one arm around his neck and went to sleep.
    My dreams were interesting—I was very aware I was dreaming for starters. I saw things I’d never imagined, things I guessed were from another solar system. I saw a system with three suns—two larger, one very small and red and much farther away. There were a lot of planets. I couldn’t count them all, but they moved oddly. There were two sets of three planets that moved around one each of the two bigger suns. The rest moved in odd figure eights around the big suns. I realized I was looking at the Alpha Centauri system. I tried to pick out Martini’s home planet as well as Beta Twelve, but I was whisked away before I could.
    I flew through space, danced through comets, crossed endless nothing, heading toward a tiny light in the distance that grew into a small, yellow sun, much like the two I’d left. I passed things I recognized as my own solar system’s outer planets, circled Saturn and Jupiter, then raced on through the asteroid belt, past Mars, to the blue and green shining jewel that sat out here, so alone. I wrapped myself around it, and then I waited.
    The loneliness hit, so hard and all-encompassing that I started to sob. The entity, more than any human on Earth, understood how very alone this planet was. And it was more alone than Earth, because no one on Earth knew it was there.
    I woke up still sobbing. Martini was rocking me and kissing my head. “Kitty, wake up, baby. Please, baby, it’ll be okay.” I clung to him and nodded while he held me tight and kept on kissing me. “Relax baby, I’m here, you’re safe.”
    “Are . . . the others . . . all right?”
    “Not so much. They all did what you just did, sort of woke up, then went into a deep sleep.”
    “Are they crying?”
    “Yeah. It’s kind of horrible.”
    I hugged him. “I’m sorry. It’s not trying to hurt you. It’s just been so alone.”
    “It isn’t hurting me. I think it’s blocked this from me. I can’t feel anyone’s pain, at least not yours, Paul’s, or the astronauts’. I can feel James, but not you.” I heard the fear lurking in his voice.
    “It’s just for now, until this passes. It doesn’t want you to suffer.”
    “Watching you cry isn’t exactly a fun time.”
    I forced myself to stop, and then I sat up in his lap. “I know.” Martini’s expression was so tense, and his eyes were so worried, I couldn’t stop myself. I kissed him. He kissed me right back, and the pain washed away.
    He ended our kiss slowly. “When will it let me feel your emotions again?” He stroked my face and the back of my neck, and it made me want to purr—and do other things as well. He grinned. “Oh, right now, I