Vanished with the Alien by Roxy Nash EPUB & PDF – eBook Details
- Author: Roxy Nash
- Language: English
- Formats: PDF / EPUB
- Status: Available For Free Download
- Series: None
- Price: Free
- File Size: 1 MB
Rowan
“Have you tried a reverse Sleeping Beauty?”
Giggles fill the dim cave.
“Please don’t crowd my patient.” I hold the alien’s limp forearm and
press my fingers to his inner elbow.
Thea sloshes her drink over the lip of the gourd that she’s using as a cup.
She and two other women sit on the opposite side of the prone figure, their
shadows wavering on the wall behind them. We’re in a cave that has been
dubbed the Doctor’s Den. No bigger than a studio apartment, it’s a small
offshoot of a massive central cavern. It’s where I’ve been taking shifts sitting
with our alien coma patient.
“How’s he doing, anyway?” Gwen asks. She and Thea are both my
patients, too. I invited them in for a check-up. They brought Cherri, and
Cherri brought bourbon.
“His pulse is strong,” I say. The alien – Trecol – has been unconscious
since his crash-landing a month and a half ago. He lies on a glowing bed of
soft orange moss, the same stuff we’re seated on. He’s connected to a heart
monitor, an IV, an oximeter. From what I know of human comas, the
prognosis isn’t good. From what I know of alien comas… nothing. I know
nothing.
Cherri passes me a gourd. I accept and I sniff its contents – booze and
leftover pumpkin-like pulp. Why do we drink this stuff? I mean, I’ll do it. But
I won’t like it.
“Don’t get the doctor drunk,” Gwen says with a giggle. “She can’t fix us
up if she’s throwing up!” Same quip, different day and face. I’m a doctor on
this space mission – well, pediatrician, technically – and I’m on the clock
twenty-four hours a day. Or however many hours a day is here.
“No wait. I thought a reverse sleeping beauty is where a corpse wakes up
and kisses you,” frizzy-haired Thea says. She takes a big swig of her drink
and grimaces.
“No, it’s where the princess kisses the sleeping prince,” Gwen says.
She’s healed from her dislocated shoulder. I still make her see me
occasionally as a reminder to be careful. Once it’s happened once, it can
happen again more easily.
“That’s not a reverse, that’s just a gender flip,” I say.
Thea scratches around the top of her cast. Her fractured forearm has not
healed so quickly. “Yeah, so reverse would be if sleeping beauty rolled over
and smooched him while she’s still asleep.”
“Fine,” Gwen hiccups. “You should flip sleeping beauty him, doc.”
“And that’s assault,” I grumble. And I sigh. And I take a sip, pouring the
drink into my mouth without letting my lips touch the rind. Gourd-y bourbon
is better than no bourbon, and Trecol isn’t waking up tonight. I honestly don’t
think Trecol will be waking up at all. His passing will bring this planet’s
death toll up to six. It’s drink or cry, and tonight I’d rather drink.
“It’s not assault!” Gwen actually sounds offended. She looks like a
Disney princess herself, with her flouncy blond hair and big blue eyes. “The
prince thought she was dead!”
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