Alienus

Chapter Four

Everyone fell silent. I watched as my alien went to stand beside the C'Riel who'd come onto the stage. I looked between them, back and forth and realised they could be related. Father and son, perhaps. Though the C'Riel near my alien didn't show any sign of having aged, he looked...elder somehow.

My eyes tried to take in as much as it could, as more C'Riel assembled behind them in a straight line facing us. A female C'Riel came to stand beside my alien's maybe-father.

My alien's mother?

They had the same hair colour, so it was possible.

His father was however blonde/golden haired. They all shared the same eye colour though.

When he spoke, all of us stilled.

His voice held a note of threat that wasn't hidden in the least.

"You are here as a mark of our good will. You will work for a living unless you are ten years or less. You will work for the time allotted to you. You will eat the food given to you, not a single morsel is to be thrown out. You will be given exactly the amount of nutrition you need. No more or less. You will be given communication devices that will be monitored. Your consumption of any resource will be limited and monitored strictly. Your education will not be interfered with, but we will add on necessary knowledge to yours. You will be split into areas to work and study. You will be employed in areas we see fit. And finally, you will not do anything to jeopardise our planet. Do not take this lightly, for we are threatening you."

Silence prevailed after he stopped speaking. The elder waited for sometime as if to see if any of us would object, but when none of us did, he nodded curtly and turned on his heel, said a few words to the C'Riel behind him and to my alien.

Then he walked out with his (possibly) wife.

I sighed and looked at Ren, who threw me a wry grin.

"At least they aren't hiding the fact that they're threatening us." He murmured.

I nodded my head at him.

"Optimism shall keep us alive." I said, winking at him.

When we saw movement in front on the stage, we all looked up.

They held what looked like sleek data pads in their hands, I couldn't exactly tell because these data pads seemed transparent.

They were calling out names. The people's whose names they called out, quietly shuffled towards the C'Riel that called them and stood in a line.

I watched as a dark haired C'Riel called Ren's name and my eyes widened. He threw me a regretful glance and walked towards the line that stood in front of the C'Riel who called his name.

I sighed and dad and I waited for our names to be called. Kylee and Jasmine were called and she squeezed my hand and walked towards the line in front of her. When I looked up to see who'd called her, I stilled. It was my alien.

I have to stop calling him-

"Gerald and Amour Hills," his voice called out and I stilled. My eyes flashed up to look at him and I knew he was looking at me despite having a long-ish line in front of me.

I followed my father and stood in line. My alien nodded his head and turned around indicating that we follow him.

"That was not.." My father murmured something under his breath and I looked at him.

"What?" I asked, looking at him.

He met my eyes and his eyebrows furrowed.

"We were the last to be called." He murmured to me.