Probed

POV: LUCY

I’m in the middle of a nightmare. I must be. This can’t be real.

But how does one wake up from a nightmare? I roll my eyes in my head. I tell my arms to move, but they’re as heavy as logs. My legs are worse. I’m stuck, trapped, immovable. It’s a horrible sensation—having no control over my body. It’s like being trapped in my own skin.

I take deep breaths. Be calm. Be calm. I must be imagining things. The darkness does that to everyone.

What’s that?!

My heart flips in my chest at the sound of tapping on my ceiling.

What the fuck is that?!

Out of nowhere, my room suddenly floods with light, so bright it burns my eyes.

All I can do is watch in horror. The light is coming through my window, drowning my bedroom, getting brighter and brighter and brighter, until I can hardly see anything.

I manage to make a choking sound in my throat as my bed begins to shudder.

Oh God! Oh God! Oh God!

There’s no denying it now. There’s no more fooling myself. I’m being abducted! Never in my wildest dreams…

Oh Jesus. Oh Jesus. Oh Jesus.

I choke some more, screaming inside my mind, as my body slowly lifts from my bed. Several photo frames on the walls crash to the floor as my whole room begins to shake. How does my roommate not hear anything?

Mellissa! Mellissa! I try to scream.

I roll my eyes toward the sound of a metallic screech. It’s my window—it’s opening. Bit by bit it gets wider and wider, until it can open no further. For several heartbeats nothing happens. Then, with a bang, the screen is sucked out. One moment it’s there; the next it’s gone.

It’s the scariest thing I’ve ever seen in my life. Is that going to happen to me?

I begin to turn through the air, slowly, inexorably, until my feet face the window. And then I start moving, floating toward it.

Before I know it, I feel the cool breeze of the outdoors against my feet. The wind rustles the leaves of the big maple tree in my front yard. The light remains blinding, and I’m glad I can’t lift my head to see what lies ahead. My house is bad enough as I watch it slowly drift away. Drift and drift.

Getting smaller and smaller. Along with the ground. Along with what’s left of my sanity.

Then I’m up and up and up until the road looks like a stream and my skin grows icy against the cold air. I can hear it now—the ship. It emits a faint buzzing that I feel in the roots of my teeth. The light turns from a blinding white to a sickly yellow. Nausea stirs in my stomach.

I’m so high up! What if the beam fails? I’ll be spaghetti on the pavement!

There’s a faint metallic whine, almost imperceptible against the buzzing. Then the blazing bright light steadily fades away as I enter the… as I enter the…

There’s metal everywhere. Strange lights. Something green flicks on and off in the corner. And there I see it—a little platform the size of a single bed just for me.

Now that I’m no longer going to splat on the road, I try to struggle—but it’s still no use—and slowly, I lower onto it. I choke at the icy feel of steel against my back. I still can’t move.

Something loud buzzes in my ears. My heartbeat throbs in my throat. My eyes zero in on a moving shadow, and I choke again. It’s one of them. It’s one of them! It’s come to collect me. And what’s that in its hand? It looks like a spider. It takes me several moments before I realize that it’s its actual hand. Such long, freaky fingers! It’s standing in the shadows, but I can see the glint of its eyes.

I look at it, and it looks at me.

Its enormous staring gaze is the last thing I see before darkness sweeps me away.

POV: GRYABRILGEL

The human looks like just another body, and I think nothing of it as the gray drone with its long fingers pushes it into my laboratory. The first thing I notice is that it’s female. I can tell because those big mammary glands of hers press hard against her top.

She’s a strange species. Of all the lifeforms I’ve experimented on, none have such large accessory reproductive organs like she does. It’s a sign of slow evolution; a sign of a feeble brain failing against the instincts of a primitive body.

I won’t lie—I feel contempt. I can’t help that, and I’m not sorry about it. I’m a scientist, after all. But I do appreciate her. She’s a fine specimen to work on. Discovering more about her robust reproductive system will help my own species and many others who are slow procreators.

The drone pushes her trolley into position. The green light of the levitator does a quick scan, blinks, then flashes brightly as it attaches onto the tiniest of her molecules. Slowly, she rises from the trolley. It is the same as what beamed her into the ship. Old but reliable technology.

I study her briefly as she hovers in the air, taking note of her bone structure and musculature. She’s long and strong. That’s good. My initial scans of her revealed that her ovaries are full of eggs. I’ll need them, along with anything else that I deem worthwhile.

Slowly, she drifts toward my workbench, the final of the three. My two other subjects are lying unconscious on their own benches on either side of her. To my right is species 505 from the seas of the planet Dorm. From it I’ll learn all I can about appendage regeneration.

To my left is species 636 from the outer moon of the planet Quinox. From it I’ll learn how to withstand extreme atmospheric pressure.

Then there is species 821 from the planet Earth. From her I’ll learn everything I need to know about fertility and rapid reproduction.

Everything I need to know to advance my own species. A good set. I’m going to be busy.

First, I have my drones cut away her clothes, their large eyes blinking dully as they work. I watch as her body is slowly revealed to me. I feel nothing. She’s just an animal, after all. Useful and only important enough to study.

I see the bony prominences of her clavicles and the muscles in her shoulders. She’s relatively fit but not thin. A healthy specimen. I see the wobble of her mammary glands as they continue with their cutting, their long gray fingers carefully peeling back her top.

Her nipples are large and soft—it’s warm inside my lab. I like to keep my specimens comfortable while I work, so her nipples won’t harden until I touch them. It’s one of the many interesting things I’ve come to know about her species. My kind has no nipples.

Ribs. Abdomen. Bellybutton—again, an interesting feature. Our kind are grown in tubes. The last of her top is pulled away, and next they start on her pants.

“Be careful,” I say to them as they cut along her inner thighs.

I can’t have her damaged, particularly in such a critical area. Soon, her clothes are gone, and I can see her pubic hair. It remains a mystery as to its function. Is it meant to keep her clean? To keep out the dirt and dust? Is it considered an attractive feature to the opposite sex?

Curious.

Her thighs are long and hard looking. I see moles and freckles and what looks like a scar on her left knee. Folding my hands behind my back, I keep well away as my drones pull down the hoses from the ceiling and pump my sterilizing chemicals onto her.

Soon, she’ll be clean enough to approach. I can’t risk being infected by any alien bug or stray spore that might be dangerous. My drones are immune to most diseases. I am not.

When the time is right, I’ll study that too, but not yet. I already have enough to do.

Once she’s safely sterilized, I don my face shield and gloves. My instruments are ready to go, lying on a bench beside me, but first I study her with my eyes and ears. I listen to her breathing. I feel the heat of her core temperature.

Research is always about starting simple, even when as advanced as we are. I touch her arm, then gently grab it. She’s warm, and her skin is soft and smooth. Her muscles are hard. I can feel most things through my gloves, designed for protection without losing tactility.

She doesn’t move, her eyes closed.

I look down the length of her naked body, moving along the bench as I do. Her hips poke out. I grab her left one, feeling the hardness of her bone. Her hips are wide, but I can see she is yet to bear children; the skin of her pelvis is smooth and unwrinkled. I touch her there, massaging her gently.

Her hands lie limp beside her hips. They’re small and delicate compared with those of the male of her species and compared with mine, but I can’t help but admire them. Her personal hygiene is satisfactory, her fingernails clean. They shine against the light in the room.

Next, I want to look at her vagina. I direct my two drones to place her legs in the stirrups. She doesn’t move, and she won’t; my gas keeps her immobilized. It’s the same gas I pumped into her habitat back on her home planet. It doesn’t affect me, designed specifically to infiltrate her species’ blood brain barrier.

Now she’s revealed to me. The drones lash straps around her legs so they remain wide open. I can’t see inside her yet—I’ll have to open her up properly later—but I take my time studying the pink wrinkled skin of her labia. It looks soft. A wet, white substance makes the tissue glisten.

“Hmm.”

I walk up and down her body, taking note of every little detail important enough to write in my log later. Though she’s alien to me, I can’t help but admire her.

Turning to my bench of tools, I pick up my first instrument.