Authors: Julia Sexton
"Where am I? Who are you? What am I doing here?" Mary was too confused. Ow, her head hurt. She put her hand on her forehead.
"My queen, it was time. I had to take you."
"Take me? What are you talking about?"
"Do you remember? We met once in the hall. I knew then you were the one I would take home. You were the only one. Your hair. Your curves. So right."
"You are not making sense. Tell me your name."
"Ac'von, my queen. And now that you are here, you are Ac'ver, wife of Ac'von. I can call you Mary in private, but to the world you are Ac'ver."
"Hold on, buddy. I had a bad night. I have a headache. My stomach feels queasy. I'm not awake." She gave her cheeks a couple of slaps. Maybe that would make this all disappear.
"Whatever you think is going on, I'm going home." She started to get up and realized she didn't have any clothes.
"Now that you are chosen, that is impossible. Do not worry, anything you want is yours. You are the queen. I have claimed you. No one can oppose our mating, not even you."
"Mating! Mating? I don't even know you."
He reached out his arm covered in the flexible see-through fabric.
"Yes, mating. But it is too soon. You woke up too soon. As soon as you are scrubbed we will mate. That is the tradition."
"Scrubbed. Tradition. I really don't understand." Mary clutched her head willing the headache to go away so she could think clearly. She moaned.
"I will remedy this early waking." He walked over to a panel, pushed a switch and Mary fell back on a pillow...out cold.
When she woke up again she was in a different room. Luxurious in gold and silver. There was a window covered with gold drapes. At the end of the bed she found a robe woven of fine golden cloth. Mary put it on grateful for the covering and went to the drapes. As she approached the drapes pulled back.
On the other side of the window was an unimaginable city, something from the mind of Moholy-Nagy, light playing on different colored buildings of planes and angles. It was beautiful in a way.
"You are awake, Ac'ver," a female voice called from the door. "Tu'ver, mother of Ac'von. I'll help you get dressed for your public appearance."
Mary turned to a lovely woman in her 50s, blonde hair, blue eyes, svelte and curvaceous body, and a golden skin that seemed to glow. She wore a black gown that flowed as she moved.
"My name is Mary. Mary Smith. There must be a mistake. I am very confused. I met Ac'von earlier. He said something about a queen. None of this is making any sense."
"Oh, yes, he told me your adjustment might be difficult. I persuaded him to let me help you. My mother was a stolen queen as well. She was quite resistant in the beginning."
"Beginning of what?"
"Her royal reign, of course. The king, just like Ac'von, found her and knew she was the one for him. That was at the beginning of our research. She was from Earth, just like you. I'll show you." Tu'ver reached in a pocket hidden inside her gown.
She brought out a small tablet, something like a mobile phone. "She's here...yes...family...mother's side," she said as she searched.
"Here, my mother." She held out the tablet so Mary could see the image.
"Oh, she was lovely," Mary said as she looked at the face of a woman with the same bronze skin, dark eyes, and a wavy mane of dark brown hair.
Tu'ver pocketed the device. "Now it is time to get ready. I have two garments for you to choose." She walked to the wall and two doors slid back to reveal an immense closet.
Everything in the closet was black. Tu'ver walked in selected two garments and held them up one at a time against under Mary's face. "This one," she proclaimed.
Mary had an awkward moment standing in the robe as Tu'ver waited impatiently. Oh, well. It might as well be the locker room at the fencing academy. No one gave it a second thought there.
Mary shed the robe and Tu'ver slipped the black gown over her head. Without resistance it clung to every curve of Mary's body. At the same time, it was supple and non-restrictive.
"For The Combat you need these." Tu'ver walked into the closet again and came out with boots that came just above the ankle. Like the dress, they were form fitting and supple. There felt like going barefoot but protected all at the same time. In a way, they were like her fencing shoes.
"Now, as the future queen you need one last detail. The crown." Tu'ver opened an ebony colored box. Inside was a golden crown studded with black cut stones. It sparkled like obsidian. "Our precious Stone of Ac. We've found it nowhere else in the universe."
"What is The Combat?" Mary was confused and stunned. Tu'ver was assuming it was somehow normal to be abducted to another planet with strange names, strange clothing, and events with startling names.
The door opened with a crash. Ac'von strode in. He, too, was dressed all in black. His form-fitting suit covered his body like a second skin. His magnificent shoulders swung as he entered. The leggings showed off the strength and musculature of his thighs and calves.
"Ah, Ac'ver, my queen. You are ready. Let us go," he commanded holding out his arm for Mary. "Mother." He nodded to Tu'ver as they passed.
No hello. No thank you. Just orders and the briefest of acknowledgements. What a...a...barbarian! Mary was intimidated by his size. He was huge. He must be at least 6' 4" and all of it is muscle. And he wanted her to be his bride! This would not happen.
Mary walked alongside Ac'von down a wide hall. At the end of the hall two large translucent doors opened onto a garden. It's almost Earth like, Mary thought. There was a large rectangle of lawn surrounded by trimmed trees and porticos on three sides. They walked to the end of a portico. The entire city spread out before them in colored planes and angles. They were very high up. The end of the garden had a glass (was it glass?) wall. They stood by the wall.
"The first time I saw you I knew you were the one, destined to be my queen. Look, all of this," he gestured with his arm to encompass the city, "is yours to command after our ceremony."
"I've never seen you before Cherryvale," Mary said emphatically. "How could you think such a thing?"
"Ah, but you are wrong. We met at the Lab, in the hall. It was your first day."
A flood of emotions overwhelmed Mary. The Lab! Was this all part of the same nightmare. The one she tried to forget. The reason she had fled to Cherryvale.
Suddenly, she remembered. Now she knew why he had looked familiar in front of the antique store. Yes, but when she met him before he was in a suit covered by a white lab coat. Dr. Akvon, founder of the research center.
"You!" Mary stammered. "You, The Lab. But what happened to The Lab. It...it..."She didn't know how to explain it. She couldn't explain it to herself. "...disappeared. One day I was using microscopes and fume chambers at Universal Research and the next day...the next day..." She trailed off.
She had thought she was crazy. She drove to work and work wasn't there. The entire research center had disappeared. People just shook their heads when she asked. It had been as though it never existed. But, she...Had. Been. There.
She fled to simple Cherryvale to escape what was incomprehensible. She needed solid people in a small town, farms, animals, crops. Everything very real.
"There were unfortunate circumstances," Ac'von stated gazing out over the city.
"Unfortunate circumstances!" Mary wailed. "I thought I was crazy. I thought I was losing my mind. I was afraid of myself. I didn't know what was real. ‘Unfortunate circumstances’ doesn't begin to explain."
"Enough of what is past. This is why I had to find you," he said. He turned, took Mary in his arms, pressed her against him, and kissed her pressing his lips firmly against hers.
Mary pushed. Nothing happened. Then she pushed with all her strength, separating them. "Stop! I am not yours. I am not a belonging. I am a person. I did not choose this."
Ac'von looked startled. "But I chose you to be my queen. It is a high honor. Many here would cheat and steal to get what I am giving you freely."
"It's not free, as you call it. You've taken away my life. I'm somewhere else. I feel far, far away."
"But, all the others are here already working."
"What others?"
"The other Universal Research humans. There were twenty. They're all here now. You were late to work."
"What? Are you marrying all of them? Most of them were men!"
Ac'von laughed. It was the first time she had seen him laugh. He really was unbelievably good looking.
"No," he said, still laughing. "They are working in the research center here."
"What is here? I don't know where we are. You haven't explained much."
"Here?" He looked startled again. "Here is Our Planet, the place of Our People. In The Way we call it Our Planet, some old-timers use the name of our first Creator, Rama. On Earth you would locate it in Alpha Remidian System.
I will become ruler in succession as soon as I am married. We are the descendants of Rama himself."
"So, I'm some bargaining chip in a power play?" Mary asked incredulously. It was all incredulous. This was the straw that broke the camel's back.
"No, I chose you. I told you. I wanted you the moment I saw you. Now you are mine."
His arrogance fit right in with incredulous. Mary decided that this marriage was not going to happen. She didn't know how she would stop it. But she would never marry this arrogant man. Never.
"But, we must go. It is time for your first Appearance. The People are waiting to see you. They know I have chosen someone, I announced it but they don't know who it is."
He reached out his hand and adjusted her crown. Then he ran his fingers through her red curls. "You really are beautiful."
"Listen, I'm just Mary Smith, unemployed microbiologist. I am not Ac'ver queen of your people. I am not one of your people. I'm from Earth. I am human..."
He stopped her. "I know. That's what Universal Research was proving. Our genes have evolved in the same way. Come. When you see all the people you will understand. Just spend this afternoon pleasing them. It will make more sense to you, then."
"I don't seem to have much choice, do I?" Mary said. Was that what they had been studying at The Lab, the genetic parallels of his people and hers?
CHAPTER THREE
The way to the arena was subterranean. They took an elevator the size of a freight elevator but lavishly decorated in gold and black, down to a passageway. The tunnel walls were embedded with small colored stones so that the entire tunnel was one long mosaic. It looked as though it told a story but Mary didn't know the players.
At the other end of the tunnel they took another enormous elevator up.
When the elevator doors opened, they arrived at a large open air room. Tables were lavishly spread with food and drink. All of a sudden Mary realized she was ravenous. Her last meal had been at Alice's party. She didn't even know how long ago that was. She started toward a table.
"That can wait," Ac'von said. "We have all afternoon to eat. First we must formally greet The People." He took her left hand in his right and lifted them both above their heads. He led her out to the edge of the platform.
As he stood in the light, his dramatically handsome features were outlined against the sky. His full head of dark hair, the dark brows against his smooth forehead, his straight nose. She saw his nostrils flare in excitement. His sensuous lips and strong jaw stood in silhouette against the light. A thought flashed through her mind--he is good looking.
When she looked out Mary was stunned. There must have been 100,000 people in a huge amphitheater. They were close to the ground, but tiers went up above them and all around. And there were sections, clearly delineated with colors: red, green, yellow, blue, white...and black. They were in the black section.
As they stood looking out a great cheer rose up, a deafening roar of approval.
"Ah," said Ac'von. "They like you."
He took her hand and drew it down and behind her back. With his other arm he pulled her toward him. He bent his head down and pressed his lips to hers, pulling her against him, crushing her breasts against the firm pectorals of his chest.
This time Mary felt the kiss. As his lips touched hers, she couldn't help parting hers...just a little. She felt electricity soar through her body as his lips pressed and his tongue explored the inside of her lips.
A chant went up in the crowd. "Ac'ver. Ac'ver. Ac'ver." It rose in pitch and rhythm as Ac'von continued his penetrating kiss. The excitement of being in a strange place, the crowd, the kiss brought her body to a fevered pitch of intensity. She felt her knees start trembling.
Suddenly, Ac'von pulled his head away. He looked at her with a gleam of triumph in his eyes. Then he brought her hand back up above their heads and turned to the crowd.
"Wave," he commanded.
Mary waved. The crowd went wild. Hats, garments, flowers, colored confetti flew into the air as the crowd yelled and cried. Mary was overwhelmed and...she had to admit it...she liked the adoration. Who would believe that Mary Smith, the invisible microbiologist, would be cheered by thousands, just for being...well...for being herself.