Root CGD: Day 14 captivity – 11:44 AM
CinT Ark Loc: Exhibit Housing
Garrett introduced me to each of the other three couples who’d gathered for my ‘Welcome’ luncheon in the small square the four housing units surrounded. I meet Mike first; who I knew was coupled with Ali, and could sense their connection was stronger than she’d led me to believe. I’d probably ask her about it later, because what I was seeing said she felt differently – unless it was an act and she was keeping up with that ‘perceptions’ mantra thing we all were supposed to subscribe to.

I was introduced to the coupled Liam and Cayline next, and they gave off a friendly and welcoming vibe. Liam seemed to have something humorous to say about everything and it was nice to get in a few laughs given how heavily stressed I was about meeting everyone dressed as I was and having them know I was coupled with Garrett in a nontraditional sense. I noticed Liam held Cayline’s hand throughout the luncheon and there were a couple times he kissed her cheek for no apparent reason. That behavior, which I’d also seen from Mike towards Ali, had me wondering if it was all for show and why Garrett insisted on kissing my forehead or cheek those few times yesterday, and even this morning after we’d gotten up.

Garrett and I had walked out of our house hand in hand to attend this gathering, so we were certainly displaying our supposed connection. It was a strange feeling to do that, but not as uncomfortable as I would have thought. Of course we were on full display for the other couples to see, but also to those who were monitoring us as well from above. Given the volume of those sporadic clicking noises, which I couldn’t help but look for the source a few times during the introductions, the answer was clear – we were being watched. As we went through the first of the introductions Garrett had either held my hand or switched to having his arm around me – even those changes in our ‘coupled’ display garnered differences in the damn clicking noises coming from above us.

It seemed like everyone’s behavior was completely normal for coupled pairs, but I help but think most of it was for show. Each couple seemed to be doing the same kinds of things as Garrett and I were. It had to be pleasing those watching and I so wanted to yell at whoever was but held my anger at them in check.

The last introduction was to Jessie and Zenia. Zenia seemed a little reserved, but Jessie I found to be aloof and a bit odd. Their attempts at looking the part of being coupled I was sure was all an act and not a very convincing one at that. Even their hand holding seemed fake and strained. When Zenia left us to do something at the table containing all the food it looked like she had done that just to get away from him. If I noticed it, did those watching us from above pick up on it? I’d have to remember to ask Garrett or Ali later.

Garrett had mentioned last night Jessie would be an ‘acquired’ taste and that he’d only been in the Exhibit Housing for going on four CGD months. Zenia was his second coupling and she arrived a few days after he had because his first coupling hadn’t worked out with a woman named Molly. Jessie had been Keith’s replacement due to health complications – which Garrett said was a rarity for the men in here. Molly, Garrett had said, was a few years older than Jessie and wanted nothing to do with him – she had been removed and replace by Zenia. Their coupling had Zenia pregnant within a month’s time, but they lost the baby after just six CGD weeks.

Miscarriages and mother’s dying during delivery were something Garrett had said no one liked talking about. The emotional tolls were heavy for everyone and the confusion as to why or how those things happened were a mystery with no solid clues to solving that issue. I had asked him what everyone thought was going wrong, but he had no answer.

Generally speaking everyone was polite and friendly during the introductions event. It didn’t mean I didn’t feel like there was a serious trust issue between all of us since I wasn’t an actual biological woman and didn’t fit the norm for someone who should be coupled with Garrett. I think some of my fellow specimens saw me as a threat to their safety within the exhibit, which in their places I would probably have those same feelings. It didn’t make it any easier for me to try and fit in and it was taking everything I had to continue to smile and not want to breakdown in front of these people or leave to go hide in our house.

Perceptions, perceptions – I was beginning to hate that idea to my core.

To distract my mind for losing my composure, when I wasn’t being engaged directly, I spent time observing our surroundings. It was the first time I’d been outside our house to see what this exhibit looked like and to fully understanding how confined this enclosure was. Sure, we had a computer generated landscape I didn’t recognize on the walls of the exhibit and a blue sky above us, but from one wall of our exhibit to the other it wasn’t more than thirty meters in either direction from that small square in the middle of the four houses.

Each of the houses, according to Garrett, were no different from the one we were assigned. Each had a single small bedroom, a kitchen and outer room area maybe the size of the holding pens we had been held in before making it to the Exhibit Housing, and of course a tiny bathroom. There were no windows in the houses and the only doors were on the front of the house and the bathroom – like that gave anyone any privacy with the open ceilings above our heads! We were being watched from above and who knew if our hosts didn’t have some other methods of keeping tabs on us from inside the houses. Augh!

Furniture was sparse within the houses, the bed we’d slept in together last night wasn’t comfortable at all, and it was smaller than expected – which meant our bodies were touching each other all night long. Last night being the first time we’d shared the bed I was thankful that Garrett had been a gentleman. He’d woken up aroused this morning with what I hoped was typical ‘morning wood’. Luckily he just needed to pee – not that I would have willingly participated in any other ideas he might have had.

I remembered the last time something like what Garrett had experienced had happened to me was the morning before the ship had been crippled or attacked. If Ali was right, that I’d been pumped with female hormones for six CGD months or more, that not only explained my body’s radical development, but maybe why I hadn’t had any nocturnal erections. Was that why what remained of my manhood was smaller and unresponsive to self-stimulation? All of this stuff was a concern and difficult to not look or be depressed about.

I found it funny that our captors assumed all we were capable of doing or spent every waking moment thinking about was what Ali had alluded to yesterday - having sex. That made no sense to me as we’d each been captured while on ships in open space from what I’d understood from the others. That alone should tell them we were technologically advanced beyond some primal need to only want to procreate! And how was it they knew about how humans dwelled or interacted or the foods to synthesize so we could eat or the clothes we wore – but boiled our existence down to a singular focus? I had so many questions without answers and I know I had bored Garrett to death last night asking these and so many others.

While I was getting food from the table that had been set up Ali joined me, since I was alone, to check in on me. I tried to keep it positive, but felt none of that. She said I looked cute, which she meant to tell me earlier, but had complained Mike had kind of dominated the conversation when I’d been introduced and she hadn’t had a chance to get that message across. I doubt she knew what that meant to me and that I needed to hear something positive – though it was odd I appreciated her saying that since I was wearing a coverall type dress for some unknown galactic organization.

All the head games that were laid on me would take years of psychotic drug treatment to fix when I finally got out of here and got my damn body back.

“You sleep alright?”

“I think I asked too many questions of Garrett last night, he’d fallen asleep on me, like afterwards,” I said smiling.

“He did? And you guys are alright?”

“Yeah, I think so, why?” I asked looking at her closely to try and understand where that question had come from.

“So you tried then?”

“Huh? Tried what?” I asked, but it hit me what she was really asking. “Oh, no, no, no… I mean we just lay there, and talked, so no. I mean he may have held me most of the night, and no, yeah no, nothing happened.”

“Alright, easy girl… Can’t blame me for asking and you’d said he’d fallen asleep on you… I just assumed it was from exertion,” she replied with a giggle.

There was no mistaking the mischief in voice or the tiny smile on her face concerning her curiosity about how we managed our first night together. There wasn’t any escaping this places expectations, even if his and my coupling wasn’t the norm.

“I bored him to death, not anything else. It was our first night,” I whispered. “I heard enough clicking going on above us from the rest of you though, you guys were coupling on and on and on,” I said trying hard to suppress a knowing giggle, but gave up and laughed at my admission.

“Wasn’t us… Well, at least not last night,” she said looking like there was more to that statement.

“That chorus of clicking this morning? That was you two?”

A shrug and sly smile was my answer as she grabbed something from the table that looked like a roll saying, “Might have been...”

She had a smile on her face and I couldn’t help myself, “Oh my... Well good for you! You crack me up, Ali!”

We rejoined the group sitting on the artificial padding that might resemble a type of grass from ancient Earth or some other planet and no sooner had I sat I was asked to tell those gathered about how I’d come to join them. I recanted my story again and it seemed to hold everyone’s attention. I got the feeling that since I’d been asked to repeat the story, there was a want to see if my story would change or if I’d innocently left out some important detail. I was going to ask Garrett about the need to repeat my story later and ask about the feeling of mistrust I got from a few of the others.

Great interest was given to the fact that I’d piloted, navigated, and even captained several different types of freight carrying space craft over the past twelve CGD years. Mike had plenty of questions for me after I’d made that bit of my skill set known the first time around, not as many the second. The few he asked contained follow-on questions, some that Liam would interject a point or concern. Bottom line for all that questioning was that both men wanted to know whether I thought I could board an alien craft and figure out how to fly it cold, aka without any instruction.

The best answer I could give was ‘maybe’ and it depended on the technology imbedded in whatever craft I was expected to fly. Generally speaking, ‘maybe’ meant the odds bordered on five to ten percent without any basic familiarization or training, but I wasn’t going to share that with them. I’d piloted, though briefly, a few crafts that weren’t at all traditional and of various alien species design. Two of those had relied on a neuro-link to operate them and weren’t much fun to pilot due to what it had taken out of me during and afterwards. The first couple times I’d barely lasted thirty minutes at the helm and I had a headache and random nose bleeds for a CGD week after the last time I’d done that with a Sunginian troop transport craft.

When that topic of conversation dried up, Liam asked about my transition, and I shared again that I had not set out to transition or be transgendered or whatever label they wanted to throw at what was happening to me.

“You never had a want to be a woman?” he’d asked skeptically, but without accusation.

“No, it never was something I’d considered doing. Like I said, my First Officer had identified that our hormonal differences, when our ship had been hit by whatever disabled us, was what she thought was causing all the men of my crew that debilitating pain we were experiencing. She wasn’t affected and she reported that none of the other women from my crew were affected, so I allowed her to give me a dose of female hormones. We lost four male crew members that day,” I finished speaking that last fact softly.

“I’m sorry about that… I don’t remember anything after we got slapped by whatever my ship was hit by before ending up here,” Liam replied.

I heard pretty much the same from Mike and Garrett.

Jessie had just said, “Yeah, same I guess…”

I think the only reason he spoke was to not look like he was avoiding participating in the conversation. I got the sense my not being a biological female concerned him the most. He had barely said anything to me after we met and spent most of the time watching me as if I were going to do something unexpected, like attack someone in the group. It was odd behavior and I think Zenia sensed my being uncomfortable with him and had whispered something to him an hour into the luncheon and he stopped being so creepy for a little while.

The gathering wound down after the second hour and a barely perceptible look from Mike to Garrett speed up the ending. I assumed the gathering was over because both men were speaking quietly to their coupled partners after that apparent signal.

“We’re going to go talk about some stuff. Can you please help the girls get things cleaned up?” Garrett asked softly in my ear.

The look on my face told him clearly I wasn’t happy about being relegated to cleaning up or being excluded because someone thought I was nothing more than one of the ‘girls’.

“What is the brain trust going to be discussing?” I asked next to his ear so as to hide my displeasure from the others.

“I’ll tell you about it when I get back to the house, but for now I need some understanding, trust, and less attitude,” he said smiling a fake ass smile that annoyed me as much as being told to go help clean up.

“I can give you or anyone else here all kinds of attitude if you’d like,” I hissed softly and smiled back at him with a smile that was as genuine as his.

“Please Cameron, just play along for now,” he pleaded quietly.

I saw Ali getting up, Mike saying something to Jessie and then nodding to Liam to follow him to his house. Zenia and Cayline were already moving towards the table of food; Ali was gathering the few plates she and Mike had used, and I was feeling like the ‘odd woman’ out in too many ways to count.

I felt myself being pulled gently to my feet by Garrett, hugged quickly, and watched him turn to catch up to the other guys.

What the just happened?!

Root CGD: Day 14 captivity – 2:59 PM
CinT Ark Loc: Exhibit Housing
The women made short work of getting the luncheon mess straightened up and put away. Dishes were washed in Zenia’s house and Ali and I got the remaining food items put onto plates everyone could take home with them. Cayline had commented she wouldn’t have to cook dinner tonight, and while that might have held true for all of us it made me bristle again to think these men might consider my role here the same as these women.

When there was nothing left to do I thanked everyone for the welcome and left. Ali followed me home, since the ‘men’ were in her house doing ‘manly’ things, and once inside the door I couldn’t hold my tongue any longer.

“What the hell was that?” I barked.

“Look, I get it and I’m impressed you didn’t tell Garrett or the rest of them to piss off,” she said carefully because she knew I was struggling to not boil over and not wanting this conversation to get too loud since there wasn’t a roof on this house. “You got our stories; none of us women have much in the way of skills, other than Zenia who did some nursing in a clinic on some outpost that might have seen twenty patients in a CGD year by the sounds of it. I get it you’re not the kind of woman who…”

I cut her off, “Ali! I’m not a damn woman!”

“Yes, of course, but you kind of are… You’re being here is complicated for these guys and I think they’re struggling to navigate bringing you into the decision making group right now. Mike was a soldier with the Planetary Guild, so was Liam, so they kind of have that ‘command’ attitude at times. Jessie, I’m not sure he hadn’t just gotten off his moms teat before ending up here, though he says he worked on bilinear whatever blah blah blah propulsion systems no one has ever heard of before. And Garrett was a technician for relay satellites, so he’s got technical skills I think.”

“Yeah, I got all of that when they each told their stories… But who’s most qualified to fly our asses out of here if we get the chance?” I complained.

“Understood, but… Look, you’re new here and different than anyone else who’s ended up here, so I don’t know,” she said looking like she was thinking about what she really wanted to say or how to say it diplomatically. “Can’t you sit back, observe, figure out their little boy hierarchy bullshit, and for now just wait to insert yourself or whatever? I’ll be behind you if you think you can lead this group of misfits, though I don’t hold much sway.”

“I’m not trying to be the leader,” I complained some more, though not as forcefully.

“Alright, but you need to know they’ve got something you don’t, experience here. Not to mention they know a thing or two about this place,” she finished saying with a little more confidence since I still hadn’t lost my shit completely yet.

“Sure, but are we part of this team? Do these guys think we’re of no more use than what our hosts think our roles are here?”

“I don’t think that’s how they see us,” she challenged.

“What do they know about this place we don’t?” I asked. Ali looked like she’d hoped I wouldn’t have asked that question, so I followed up with another to reassure here I would keep her confidence, “Who am I going to say anything to?”

“You can’t say anything to anyone, understand?”

I nodded I did.

“The last thing Mike told me a week ago was they may have figured out some way to disable or get around the stores port opening. If you say anything about that to Garrett it could put me on the outside with Mike.”

“Okay, so I won’t say anything, but you’re saying they have some kind of a plan then?”

“To get through the stores port opening, yes, but beyond that they need to know what’s behind these walls so they can plan the next steps I guess,” she replied, but I could tell she wasn’t happy about having told me any of that.

“Do you know how they plan to do that?” I asked and the look on her face told me she knew something but was hesitant to say any more than she had already. “You’ve given me part of the story; you can’t exactly put it back in the vault now…”

“All I know is they plan to have some of us distracting the crowds while Jessie and Zenia see how far they can get.”

“Why those two?”

“We’ve experimented and they’re not as ‘followed’ as the rest of us.”

“Followed?”

“Come on Cameron, the ‘clicking’, the reason for all that noise above us,” she said with a little exasperation.

“Oh… Experimented like taking turns to see who’s most entertaining for…,” I started saying but was interrupted.

“Yes, that… They’re either not very interesting while, well ‘coupling’ or whatever they’re doing together for that matter. Also, their house is closer to the stores port opening and we’ve had them outside a number of times trying to… You know, look uninteresting to our audience, and they’ve seen the thing opening and part of a room behind the opening.”

When I didn’t have anything to say she asked, “What?”

“Jessie’s age makes him the least experienced and isn’t Zenia valuable here for her medical skills?” I asked concerned.

“I’ll give you that on Jessie, but are you concerned about him just because you don’t like him?”

“I don’t like him, but that’s first impressions because he was just odd all afternoon until Zenia said something to him. That reined in his creepiness, but I caught him leering at me a few times and I didn’t like the way that made me feel,” I complained.

“Get used to it, guys tend to do that when there’s an attraction,” she said chuckling. “He’s done that with all of us and once confronted it slows his creepiness down. Cayline and I think he’s getting more arousal juice than the other guys since they aren’t as popular a couple.”

“Augh, don’t tell me of that! I certainly hope that’s not the case about arousal drugs or whatever…”

“Believe me, Zenia is certain he’s either getting more of it somehow or it’s having an adverse effect on him.”

“What’s that mean?”

“She said he’s erect nearly all the time. That isn’t normal. And like I said, for us girls, well we’ve agreed our own ‘drives’ are way different than before coming here so it’s for certain their spiking our food with something...”

I thought about Garrett this morning and wondered if there was more to his being erect than needing to pee – like somehow getting more ‘arousal juice’. We hadn’t talked about it but it was probably something we…

“You notice something with Garrett?” she asked like she knew what I was thinking.

“No…”

“Okay,” she replied not at all confident I’d told her the truth. “Are you feeling any different?”

“Yeah, no… Nothing like any of that,” I assured her.

“Zenia thinks you’re getting the same hormones as the rest of us girls.”

“Maybe… I guess it could explain some of these radical changes, especially if it’s been months and not just the result of a single dose like I thought.”

“You know, if you’re going to feel anything like aroused…,” she began but I cut her off quickly.

“That’s not happening!”

“Gotcha, but let’s say you were or whatever, you’re going to experience all that differently. It’ll be more cerebral and certainly not like the guys single ‘Pop!’ and then needing time to recover to be ready to go again. Yeah, you’ll ride a few intense waves that maybe sneak up on you and then you’ll chase that next one hard trying to let it consume you,” she replied seriously, but the little grin on her face made it difficult to take her seriously.

I was positive she was screwing with me and needed to get serious about shutting this conversation down.

“None of that is happening… Or is going to happen.”

“Your face tells a different story, just say’n...”

“It doesn’t say anything, come on Ali!”

“Cayline was watching you pretty closely with Garrett, she said there was a ‘twinkle’ in your eyes when you looked at him.”

“What! No! I am attracted, no, I’m NOT attracted to him and there is no twinkle or whatever in me,” I said feeling a little flush.

Root CGD: Day 14 captivity – 4:22 PM
CinT Ark Loc: Exhibit Housing
I’d just said there was no ‘twinkle’ in me when a small chorus of clicking caught my attention. I was looking up and around, and then back at Ali. “What now?” I asked.

“The boys are probably done with their meeting and I’ll bet Liam just got home to Cayline or less likely Jessie to Zenia?”

“And that happens?”

“Doesn’t take much to get,” she stopped talking as Garrett opened the door and walked in on us.

He looked confused that the conversation we were having ending abruptly and asked, “What’s going on ladies?”

“I asked about the clicking,” I replied.

“Ah… Well that happens when the couples get together after a break,” he said.

“You realize that’s messed up right?” I asked him.

“Get used to it, because it’s going to follow us around,” he turned to ask Ali if that was true, “Right?”

“Unfortunately, but you’ll tune that out soon enough,” she said.

“I seriously doubt it,” I complained to them both, but was looking directly at Garrett.

Ali, was turning to leave and I followed her to the front porch, closing the door behind me for a moment of privacy. She looked confused as to why I’d followed her out.

“Any chance we could meet out here and talk later?” I asked in a hushed tone.

“I guess… Why?”

“If I can’t say anything to him about plans or being included in their club, I’d like to at least know what the meeting was all about and if it accomplished anything. Mike will likely tell you, right?”

“Oh, sure, I guess, though I don’t generally ask, he just shares. I’ll come back around 8 if that’s good…”

“That works, thank you and thank you for listening to me vent, I really do appreciate it. I just want us all to get out of here…”

She leaned in to hug me, which got a couple clicking noises from above us, and then walked across the courtyard to her house. When she walked in, without looking back, I turned and entered my own house. Garrett hadn’t moved and looked like he wasn’t happy I’d just walked out on him. Whatever!

“Your meeting was productive I take it?” I asked walking towards him to wrap my arms around him, but he held me back. I was trying to play to the crowd and all that perceptions crap and here he was stopping me? I couldn’t help but stare at him confused.

“Yes, and no,” he said expressionless.

Something was wrong. This anti-coupling mode he was pulling wasn’t his normal behavior.

“What’s that mean?” I asked still confused.

“We’re working on something, but to make that work might require some changes.”

Like being repulsed by me now and not looking like we’re a couple any longer? What had changed in the past two hours?!

“Like what? There isn’t much to this existence that could even change, so what are you even talking about?”

He was slow to answer, “The coupling…”

“Changing the couples around? I thought that practice was given up a long time ago?”

“It was, but it might be necessary in the short term to furthering our escape.”

“You’re planning an escape then,” I asked trying to sound like it was the first time I’d heard such a radical idea expressed.

“I think you knew we were working on that. I’m sure Ali told you something… I don’t for a second think you have a ‘let it lie’ personality.”

“I’m more of a get involved type. I’d hoped to be more of a participant in the planning… So, you want to tell me about this plan and what change to coupling is coming?”

He explained in higher detail those things Ali had told me, including details about what Jessie had actual seen in the room behind the stores portal. The general plan involved recon, trying to understand the facility, getting back to the exhibit without our hosts noticing or if possible making a break for it.

“Seems straight forward,” I said when he was done speaking. “You mentioned a change though?”

“We need you coupled with Jessie…”

I’m sure the surprise on my face wasn’t lost on him and I felt a rush of anger spike momentarily. Jessie wasn’t someone I’d have hired for my ship’s crew and certainly wasn’t someone I wanted to pretend to play house with in this exhibit.

“That’s not something I really want to do. Why him at all?”

He took a minute to consider his reply, “If you two can get to a ship, the likelihood of there being a Particle-Conveyor (PC) is highly likely to transport us out of here. That’s how they pull the women out for medical care, while everyone is sleeping. We figure its how we were all transported off our ships and ending up here. Jessie says he can figure out operating a PC quickly to get us out of here while you’re getting the ship out of orbit and as far away from this shit hole as possible.”

“I thought you had the technical skills in this group?”

“I do, but not in that area. I’m a communications guy,” he explained.

“I don’t like Jessie, he creeps me out if I’m being honest.”

“He’s harmless…”

“Don’t care and don’t want to be alone with him,” I complained but stopped speaking due to a crescendo of noise coming from above us.

Whoever was watching us was clicking like I’d never heard before from the computer generated sky above us, I looked at Garrett questioning what was going on and he just shook his head.

“What the hell?!” I asked worried.

He didn’t get a chance to as answer because the front door opened and a sobbing Zenia came in and ran straight to Garrett’s waiting arms. I could only watch, my mouth agape, as the clicking noises our hosts were making droned on and on and on...

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Rachel M. Moore