A Plain Jane Book One (9 page)

Lucas cleared his throat again
and straightened up a little. ‘I believe you are aware of the
slight security issue we had on campus grounds last night,’ Lucas
said, the command back in his tone. ‘I am here to discuss the
matter with the woman that was involved in the
incident.’

For a second the manager looked
crestfallen, and then he nodded, and his smile returned to his
face. ‘Of course, of course, Lucas Stone always has the security of
the Galactic Force in mind,’ he winked, ‘and we can all feel safer
having you on board. Please, take all the time you
need.’

Lucas gave a brief nod,
sighed, and finally turned on his heel to face Jane.

Mandy was still draped
over Jane's shoulder, her tail flashing with keen
interest.

Lucas gave Mandy a polite
but very careful look. Then he appeared to notice as Jane's eyes
flicked up and glanced at the dancing tip of Mandy's
tail.

‘
Your co-worker has just been
involved in a traumatic incident with an assassin robot, I would
suggest that you do not refer to the incident as fantastic. It was
harrowing. Also,’ he glanced again at her tail. It was obvious he
was about to tell Mandy to jolly well tuck her tail away, because
only last night Jane had almost been stabbed by one, and obviously
in his mind that meant she would cry at the mere sight of
one.

Jane sniffed and shook her
head. ‘I'm fine. It doesn't matter how Mandy refers to it,’ she
followed up quickly, ‘because nothing much really
happened.’

Lucas frowned at her, his eyes
narrowing in apparent frustration. He gave a short chuckle. ‘I
think you'll find, Jane, that something did happen. I was
there.’

She straightened a little.
She was suddenly completely aware that all her coworkers were
staring at her. Obviously Mandy was being the least subtle about
it, as she was still draped over Jane's shoulder, looking excitedly
between Jane and Lucas.

Lucas gave a gruff cough. ‘I
was wondering if you'd have some time to answer some
questions.’

Before Jane could tell him that
she was actually quite busy, Mandy suddenly snapped up. ‘She has
got plenty of time. I can do all of her work. Jane,’ Mandy now
looked down at her, her eyes still wide and glittering, ‘you go
with Lucas and you tell him everything he needs to know,
everything. Don't leave out a detail, Jane,’ Mandy said, voice
forthright and loud.

Jane knew enough about
Mandy to realize exactly what she meant. She wanted Jane to go and
speak to Lucas alright, but what she really wanted was for Jane to
come right back and tell her and everyone else every single detail
of the conversation.

When Jane still sat in her
chair for a moment, Mandy acted by looping her tail into a bunch,
and pushing gently but pointedly in the center of Jane’s
back.

Lucas got another terse look on
his face, and before he could snap at Mandy to have some dignity
and respect, Jane stood quickly, stumbling a little, and finally
making it around the side of her console. ‘I suppose I can spare a
couple of minutes,’ she said quietly, with only a single glance
back to Mandy who now had both of her thumbs up and was grinning
wildly.

‘
Don't you leave out a detail,’
Mandy said as Jane walked out of the office with Lucas.

When the two of them were
finally out into the corridor, Lucas gave a heavy sigh. ‘I
sometimes forget how . . . forthright Hoyans can
be,’ he shook his head for a moment. Then he returned his gaze to
Jane, just a hint of concern obvious as it stretched at the corners
of his eyes. ‘Are you okay?’

While Jane was trying hard to
maintain the exact angle of frown to her mouth, and the exact hint
of frustration and irritation as it narrowed her eyes, she just
gave a shrug. ‘I am fine.’

He nodded, and she could see
that his hand went up to pat his head, but this time, rather than
have it glance off his transparent helmet, he did manage to flatten
down his short sandy blond hair. Then he looked down to the ground
and finally back up at her. ‘You told everybody it was an assassin
robot,’ his voice wasn't exactly angry, but he didn't sound pleased
either.

‘
Nobody told me not to. I
overheard the doctor talking about it. I don't know what one is,’
she added at the end for good measure.

‘
Sorry, I didn't mean to sound
annoyed. It's just . . . ’ he trailed
off.

The two of them were
walking down the corridor slowly, and Jane had absolutely no idea
where they were headed, and wasn't in fact sure whether Lucas knew
either, but she followed him nonetheless.

‘
The doctor said that she sent
you home, why are you back at work so quickly?’ Lucas
asked.

‘
I'm fine,’ Jane found herself
repeating, as if it were a mantra.

‘
I would have thought that you
would have wanted to rest,’ Lucas said as he glanced her way, an
intrigued look on his face, ‘the doc said that you don't sleep,
something about the fact you can rest while you're awake. Sounds
cool,’ he added, though it seemed awkward, and he instantly
grimaced at himself.

‘
I guess. I have never really
thought about it like that . . . ’ she trailed
off. ‘I know that I don't sleep, but, well, I never really knew
why,’ her voice grew steadily quieter until she dwindled into
silence.

Lucas got the kind of look
that suggested she was all kinds of crazy for not knowing or
bothering to investigate earlier in her life why she never
slept.

‘
Okay,’ he managed quietly. ‘I
guess there are always so many differences between alien
physiologies,’ he supplied politely.

For some reason Jane
latched hold of her ponytail, and was now twisting the edges around
and around her fingers.

‘
I . . . I guess I
want to ask you some more questions about what happened last
night,’ Lucas managed, though his words did not flow smoothly,
almost as if he had to think about each and every one of
them.

‘
I told you everything I know,’
Jane said plainly.

Lucas tensed, and the look
he suddenly shot Jane seemed to suggest she’d caught him out on a
lie.

‘
Look, I've gone over the
security parameters that have been put in place, and I have
confirmed that they are . . . okay for now. But
still, I think you should be careful,’ that note of authority was
back in his tone.

‘
But it was just an accident,’
she repeated, and she was aware of the rather innocent note in her
voice.

He stopped in the corridor,
turning to her fully, brow completely compressed and creased over
his eyes. ‘We don't know that. Not for sure, and until—’

‘
But nothing like that happens to
me,’ she repeated again. Yes, she was aware of how stupid it
sounded. Though people sometimes accused her of being slow, or
painfully naive, Jane wasn't either of them. She was aware that
simply repeating that nothing like this ever happened to her was
useless in the face of recent events, but she couldn't stop herself
from doing it. It felt like something was hardwired into her brain
that made her believe and act like she was normal, and shun
anything exciting, dangerous, or adventurous, even if it were just
a suggestion of it.

‘
Okay . . .
actually, not okay. Jane, look, I don't know if you know much about
how the Galaxy works . . . ' he
began.

That would be when Jane took a
sharp step away from him. Bloody Lucas Stone. Accusing her of not
knowing how the Galaxy works, typical of someone like
him.

Before she could get too
irritated at him, he put up his hands, and looked genuinely sorry.
‘Sorry, I'm sorry, that came out wrong. What I meant
is . . . look, until we know why that thing was here
and what it was really after, we shouldn't
assume . . . look, it's just always safer to put
security measures in place until we know the full truth.’ Lucas
gave another awkward shrug, and even put a hand up to his neck and
tried to stretch out one of his shoulders. ‘What I'm saying is that
until we complete this investigation, it is probably safest for you
to stay somewhere where there are a lot of people, somewhere
populated. I know you live out in the country, but do you know
anybody in the city—’

Jane frowned at him. How
did he know that she lived out in the country?

Yet again he put his hands up.
‘I read your file, and in order for us to put up a proper security
field around you, we needed to know where you live.’ Once again he
looked thoroughly awkward.

Jane was starting to
realize he put his hands up quite a bit, as if there were a lot out
there that the great Lucas Stone was willing to surrender to,
despite his usual reputation.

‘
It is
just . . . ' Lucas trailed off
again.

Though Jane hardly ever
watched the television and certainly never read or listened to any
of the Galactic news feeds, she knew enough about Lucas Stone. She
knew his reputation, she knew his character, and she knew that
Lucas did not react so awkwardly around people. Lucas Stone always
had a commanding, and quite possibly arrogant, tone and
countenance. He did not put up his hands in surrender, and he
certainly did not mean to pat his hair down only to realize at the
last moment that he was still wearing his helmet.

‘
Is there anywhere you can stay,
Jane?’ Lucas asked again, his voice finally becoming more
forthright.

While Jane still wanted to be
angry and aloof at the man, she shook her head. ‘I don't have any
family,’ she admitted in a small voice. It was probably stupid and
unnecessary, as Lucas had, by his own admission, read her file, and
he would know that Jane had no relatives on Earth. In fact,
technically, Jane had no family at all. They weren't on file, there
was no record of them. That wasn't as unusual as it sounded. With
the number of different races in the Galaxy, and the sheer number
of citizens in the Galactic Union as a whole, it was incredibly
hard to track the life history of each and every one of them. For
every so-called normal human who had grown up at home with two
parents and a stable home life, you would get at least ten aliens
who’d one day woken up on the side of a mountain, all alone, and
with no one to rely on but themselves. Or somebody who’d been the
last surviving member of a cruiser crash, or somebody whose parents
had simply abandoned them at birth because that's what their race
did.

Lucas looked solemn for a
moment. Then he appeared to think. ‘You could stay here, in the
Galactic Force dormitories. There would be plenty of spare room.
And, in fact, it would be the most secure place for you; the
Galactic Force security fields are some of the strongest on Earth.
Now that we know that there has been a breach, they'll be kept
running at optimal strength,’ he looked pleased with himself as he
finally came up with a solution to what Jane honestly thought was
his problem and not hers. She was not in any danger, was she? What
had happened last night had been . . . . Jane
trailed off, finally frowning at herself as she realized just how
stupid her thoughts were. She kept on trying to convince herself
that nothing had happened and that nothing like that could ever or
should ever happen to a girl like her.

Then she glanced up to see that
Lucas was looking at her, expression interested, eyes darting
around her face. ‘You will be fine here,’ he repeated, voice
gentle.

Jane just shrugged. ‘Does it
have a window?’ she asked, the question popping into her head
quickly. In fact, as far as her priorities went, she wouldn't care
a little bit if the dormitory room didn't have a bed or was in fact
completely filled with junk. All she would want was a window,
preferably a window with a lovely unobstructed view of the sky
above.

A strange smile pushed up
Lucas' cheeks. ‘I can get you one with a window.’

A moment passed between
them, and Jane had no idea what it meant. Yet she was sure that
she’d never experienced a moment like that before. It was odd, and
seemed to give her heightened expectations for some reason, but
then, before anything could grow from it, Lucas walked off to the
side, and it was clear he was getting yet another live com feed
into his armor.

Jane stood there and
wondered exactly how many details she should include of their
conversation in her report to Mandy. Though even if Jane tried to
keep some of it back, she was confident Mandy would make her squeal
eventually.

Finally Lucas finished his
conversation and turned to her, swallowing for some reason. ‘I have
to go.’ He half turned on his foot, apparently ready to jog off
down the corridor to whatever Galactic disaster was calling the
great Lucas Stone, but he stopped and turned all the way back to
her. ‘There is a . . .
party . . . ' he began, and then he stopped,
giving an odd smile as he latched a hand onto his jaw and
manipulated it.

Jane simply stared at him,
aware that her expression was still curt, and undoubtedly
thoroughly irritated.

‘
Never mind. I will ensure a
dormitory room is found for you. Stay safe.’ With that he turned on
his heel and walked off down the corridor.

Jane watched him go, her
eyes narrowing with confusion. Mandy often called her naive, and
Tarta said that she was quite probably one of the most innocent
humans he had ever met, even if she wasn't in fact human. Yet Jane
wasn't innocent and she wasn't naive. She could easily tell that
Lucas Stone was being awkward around her. The problem was, she had
absolutely no idea why.