Alien Coffee (3 page)

There was absolutely nothing there but a
scenic vista overlooking the lake and a flower dotted field
surrounded by trees. “Yeah, it’s a clearing with nice views. I
haven’t been here in a year because it makes me sad.” Jillian
glared at him with her arms crossed, realizing that all the stupid
bunnies were the reason she hadn’t been able to come to her
favorite place.

“Don’t look at me like that, dude. It’s right
here.” He took a few steps and pushed a button on his belt. An
invisible door slid to reveal a lighted metal interior with two
steps leading up to it. Everything around the opening still looked
like clearing. “It’s the best in invisibility technology. It can
handle everything expect getting pushed down stairs,” Sclurp stated
accusingly.

Jillian narrowed her eyes. “Don’t call me
dude,” she told him flatly. He motioned her to follow him inside.
The door closed behind them and another one opened in front.
“Aren’t we supposed to be decontaminated or something?” she
asked.

“We’ve all been immunized, so you can’t
infect us with any of your diseases,” he reassured her.

“Gee . . . good for you. I wouldn’t want to
infect you with my diseases,” Jillian mimicked sarcastically. She
was offended at being treated like a second-class citizen on her
own planet.

They walked into a circular sitting area with
gentle lighting. Aromatic alien flowers in planters were
interspersed between cushioned lounges. Other types of seats filled
the area and Jillian imagined they might be for races that were
formed differently like Sclurp with his three legs. “You wait here.
I’ll get the others. You’re not allowed in some sections . . .
actually, you’re not allowed in the station at all . . . but here
is better than the other areas.” Jillian folded her arms and
watched him enter a passage to the left.

It was mostly quiet with the exception of a
small fountain running down a section of wall behind a planter. The
environment was warm and humid after coming in from the cool
mountain air. She considered sitting, but didn’t want to get too
comfortable in a dangerous situation. The flowers were pretty and
she was about to go smell one before thinking it might eat her
nose.
One never knows with alien plants,
she thought to
herself.

“Hello, Jillian. I’m Nyxulla,” a woman’s
sensual voice lilted through the air. Sensual was the only word to
describe it, like one of those sultry sirens portrayed in old
detective movies. Only the individual coming into the sitting room
was not human. She had creamy, dark green skin, emerald eyes and
violet hair cascading down her back like silk. She was everything a
virile starship captain would want in a five and a half foot tall
alien woman. “Sclurp tells me you attacked him and broke his
invisibility device.”

The accusation infuriated Jillian. “I did not
attack him! He keeps stealing my coffee!”

The alien woman made a calming gesture and
chuckled pleasantly. “I know. Sclurp is a terrible addict and while
he’s good with equipment, he’s an idiot in every other aspect of
life.” She put a hand on her hip and glared at the three-legged
alien who had followed her into the room and was hanging his head
in shame. Even in that pose, Nyxulla was sexy. Jillian was
disturbed by that fact.

Buffy the BEM entered the room. Jillian knew
it was Buffy because of the big bug eyes and monstrous appearance.
The new alien wasn’t large, only about four feet tall, but two
enormous eyes covered each side of its oversized head. It had a
large jaw with sharp teeth and multiple nostrils peppered in the
front of the face. Unlike a bug, it only had two arms and legs, but
at the end of each hand were three fingers interspersed with three
talons. Jillian couldn’t imagine how the digits would work
together.

“Nonetheless, we are presented with a very
serious problem,” Buffy stated with the air of a well-read
individual who sounded half like a man and half like a proper
Victorian lady. It was disconcerting. The translators seemed to
deliver distinct personalities for each alien. Jillian wondered if
they were individual preferences or if the translators portrayed
the personality of their owners through some sort of
programming.

Jillian chose not to respond. She was in so
far over her head that any attempt to guess the best words would be
futile. Everything was surreal and she was looking at the aliens
with a detached fascination by that point.

Nyxulla’s beauty was mesmerizing even to
Jillian who normally didn’t find women attractive. The alluring
alien sat on one of the lounges and rested her arm over the back of
it. “Jillian, we’d like to hear what happened from your point of
view. Please have a seat and tell us everything. I promise we won’t
bite.” She gestured to the lounges against the wall. Jillian wasn’t
sure if the part about not biting was true, but she sat on a
cushioned seat across the way from Nyxulla. The female seemed more
dangerous with her charming magnetism than the other two did with
their peculiarities.

Jillian proceeded to tell them about the
missing coffee and how angry she had been about it. She mentioned
waving her arms about and knocking Sclurp down the stairs
unknowingly. Then she told them about Sclurp demanding another cup
of coffee like a street addict looking for his next fix. Both of
the other aliens stared at their companion harshly. At least
Jillian thought it was harshly from what little she was figuring
out about alien body language.

When she was done relaying the story, they
all sat in silence for a while. Sclurp had perched himself on an
adjustable stool to one edge of the room while Buffy had taken the
next lounge over from Jillian. It was a little too close for
comfort, but she resisted the urge to run away screaming.

“How long have you lived here, Jillian?”
Buffy asked pleasantly.

“Raymond and I have been in Priest Lake for
three years now. We love it here. The lakes, mountains and forests
are just so beautiful, the people are friendly and there’s so much
wildlife. It’s amazing,” Jillian responded with the first smile
since meeting them. It didn’t last long as the reality of being
trapped in a room with three aliens crossed the front of her mind
again.

Buffy wasn’t done putting her at ease. “It is
a beautiful area. The last planet I was on was all rock and
deserts. Earth has many more mammals than I would like, but it is
truly beautiful.” He tapped a computer screen on the wall and a
steaming drink appeared from a nearby slot. He took a drink and
asked, “Where did you live before that and what made you decide to
move out here? I’m not addicted to coffee like these other two, so
haven’t been down to your house to snoop.” The words were pointed
and Nyxulla’s skin grew a darker green from blushing. Jillian
looked at her with a raised eyebrow at the knowledge that Sclurp
wasn’t the only one sneaking into her house for coffee. The
squishy-lipped alien was still sitting quietly while looking at the
ground in shame.

Neither had anything to add, so Jillian
answered the question. “We used to live in New York. I was an
editor for one of the big publishing houses and Raymond was an
extremely successful ad executive. We were doing really, really
well.”

“And you chose to leave that success behind?
I must say that I’m curious as to why.” Buffy’s tone was extremely
pleasant and Jillian found herself relaxing in spite of his
frightening appearance.

“As far as my success goes, we knew I was
going to lose my job soon. Traditional publishing has been replaced
by a bunch of uneducated hacks who call themselves Indie Authors.”
She waved her hand and sighed. “Don’t take me too seriously. It’s
just a little frustrating. Some have talent, but they can’t spell
worth a darn and most have never met a sentence with good grammar.
Anyway, I received a request from an author I had known awhile and
he asked me to edit his works. He wasn’t the only one who was
looking for a good editor, so I quit my job and began freelancing.
It was much more pleasant . . . and challenging.”

Buffy ordered another drink and handed it to
Jillian who looked at the orange liquid suspiciously. “Go on,
drink. It’s just orange juice. You said your husband was an ad
exec. Did he have a problem with leaving his job?”

Jillian took a small sip, not willing to
drink too quickly in case the alien was lying to her. “Not at all.
He was tired of cutthroat politics and manipulation required to get
anything done in the business. He loved golfing and even though he
wasn’t good enough to go pro, everyone looked to him for advice on
how to improve their game. One day he called in sick in order to go
golfing. He liked it so much he stopped showing up for work.”

“How extraordinary. Did his supervisors not
chastise him for such behavior?” Buffy asked incredulously.

“You would think, but it took his company two
months to realize he wasn’t showing up even though they were still
paying his salary,” she relayed with a gleeful laugh. “After they
finally fired him, Raymond realized his job wasn’t fulfilling and
he really preferred golfing anyway. So we talked and it came out
that we had both always wanted to live in the mountains since
childhood. We traveled for a few weeks before finding Priest Lake.
We found a house and moved all our things. Then Raymond took a job
at the local course as their golf pro while I stay home and do my
editing here.”

“How extraordinary,” Buffy stated. “Just
remarkable.”

“I make more money than I did in New York.
Between the sale of the apartment and our savings, we were able to
buy our house outright and still have enough money to live off
comfortably awhile. We work because we enjoy what we do now,”
Jillian stated blissfully. She and Raymond had been truly happy
since moving. Once again, reality came rushing back. “So what do we
do now? Are you going to turn me into an emo bunny and ruin our
lives?”

“No. We’re not going to transform you or hurt
you in any way,” Nyxulla stated decisively. “The fact that you’ve
seen us is a serious problem though and I’m not certain how we’re
going to handle it yet.”

“Well I’m having a tough time dealing with
this right now. I’ve always believed there was other life out
there, but the three of you. . .” Jillian gestured helplessly. She
was coming to like them, but they were still aliens and had a
secret they wanted kept. How was she supposed to go back to her
pleasantly mundane existence knowing they were right next door?
“What is this place anyway, since I already know too much?”

The three exchanged looks as though trying to
decide how much to tell. It was Buffy who answered. “This is an
observation station. We monitor deep space signals for the most
part, but also gather data from your sun and solar system as
general research. I am a data analyst, meaning I spend most of my
time looking at numbers and filing reports.” He gestured toward
Sclurp. “Your coffee addict friend is our maintenance technician.
And Nyxulla is in charge as well as being a fine young deep space
scientist.” He bowed toward the green-skinned alien
respectfully.

“Earth is a perfect place to put an
observation station, but as far as anyone is concerned, we don’t
exist. Earth doesn’t officially exist,” Nyxulla said with a
frown.

“What do you mean?” Jillian asked in
curiosity.

“I mean this is an outlawed planet not on
galactic charts,” Nyxulla answered, leaning over to inhale the
aroma of a plant. “And it’s not just the fields of coffee. The
reasons are so classified that
we
don’t know anything more.
We’re never allowed to tell anyone we’re here or that this station
is here.”

“I’m fairly certain even you aren’t allowed
to know you’re here,” Buffy interjected with a light laugh that was
neither masculine nor feminine. “That is part of the dilemma. We
should report that you’ve seen us to the nearest hub, but they
don’t want us to report anything if it can be avoided. Dealing with
even the slightest problem without anyone noticing the outpost is a
daunting task for them, so we’re under orders to handle situations
ourselves wherever possible.”

“Which actually benefits you in this
situation,” Nyxulla stated. “Normally we would have to report you,
but that would cause numerous problems, so I don’t intend to. The
question is what
do
we do?”

“Let’s not do anything,” Sclurp suggested
hopefully. He stood and held up a suction cup finger. “She won’t
tell anyone about us and we won’t tell anyone about her. It’ll
work. I know it will.”

“That plan has some flaws in it,” Buffy
observed.

“So does turning her into an emo bunny,
reporting her or executing her,” Nyxulla pointed out.

“Executing?!” Jillian exclaimed in alarm. Her
heart skipped a beat, but she was too shocked to notice.

“We’re not going to do that,” Buffy assured
her quickly.

“No, definitely not,” Nyxulla agreed. She
came over, sat next to Jillian and took her hands. She smelled
faintly of lilac, a fitting scent that matched the color of her
hair. “We’re not going to do anything to you. I ask that you not
tell anyone about us though. Is that something you can do?”

“I can’t erase it from my mind, but I promise
not to tell anyone,” Jillian agreed readily. It was better than the
alternatives. “My word is good and I doubt anyone would believe me
anyway.”

“Erasing it from your mind is a bad idea.
Mind wipes have been known to turn human brains to mush,” Sclurp
stated helpfully. “That’s why we transform humans into emo
bunnies.” He patted the ray gun.

Jillian looked at him in horror and inched a
little closer to Nyxulla who reassured her, “Don’t worry, we’re not
going to do that.” She paused for a moment and Jillian turned to
her. The pretty alien smiled. “Is there any chance we can still
stop by for coffee occasionally?”