Authors: Alyssa Ezra
The strange men stared at Cole for a moment after the door closed behind her, sharing sidelong glances between each other.
What type of experiments are they doing here that their eyes would change color?
“Hello, Coletta Harper.” One finally spoke, while the other two men merely nodded their greeting.
“Hello. Call me Cole, please. The only person to call me Coletta was my grandmother and that name was reserved for when I made her angry.”
“Ahh, well Cole,” the man said her name slowly as he were trying out a new word on his tongue. “Thank you for coming in and agreeing to the terms of the arrangement.”
Wouldn’t it really be ‘experiment’ as opposed to ‘arrangement?’
“Well, I’ll be honest – as someone who comes from the lower hundred, this was an opportunity that I couldn’t pass up.” Cole noticed another shared, sidelong glance. There seemed to be some confusion over her comment, but they appeared to shrug it off and continue.
“Well as to the terms that lie on our side of the arrangement, I am required to give you further details than we might have originally, but High Prince Rayer was insistent.”
High Prince? There haven’t been royals who use titles in more than a century…
“We learned that Sigert’ech was seeking women with whom to test the compatibility of Earth females with alien races, so we added the Sii-race to their testing scope. It turns out that there is a portion of the population that are capable of breeding with our race…” as the man, who Cole now realized was an alien, continued to speak, she could feel her eyes widening. Cole strove to keep a look of mute abject horror off her face; however, she couldn’t keep her surprise from showing. “You see, you are actually the first Earth woman to come forward that fulfills the requirements and is compatible – able to naturally conceive an offspring with our race.”
“So, what exactly are you wanting from me?” Cole’s voice was so soft that she wasn’t sure after the words had slipped past her lips whether the aliens would be able to hear her. Apparently, they could when another of them answered.
“We need you to mate with the High Prince Rayer. It is required that a path of succession be established before he is considered the next High King, once the current High King, his father moves beyond the limits of his body.”
“You want me to mate with an alien male that I know nothing about?”