Karyn stared at her friend Jon, terror stuck in her throat. Even though Harc had left them alone, she couldn't reconcile the fear that was overwhelming her normally rational mind. She could feel the cold metal of the chair beneath her naked body, she could smell the sterile, acrid smell of the recirculated air in the low-ceiling cell she and Jon shared, she could even taste the gel that Harc had used to seal her mouth shut.
She wanted to cry, she wanted to curl up and hide, but she was paralyzed with fear.
Jon, naked as she, looked her way. His eyes seemed calmer than hers, sad, nervous, but calm. He seemed to notice her panic, and climbed out of his chair. Karyn had never seen Jon naked before, and although she'd always held a secret crush on her friend, she'd hoped that the first time they saw each other naked would be in a more romantic setting, not abducted by aliens.
Watching Jon approach her, crouched low so that his head didn't hit the ceiling, gave Karyn something to focus on, something to pry her mind out of the panicked state she was in. She felt the ship tremor slightly, which made her friend stop, but only momentarily. Soon enough, he was standing over her chair, examining the gel on her mouth.
"Let me see if I can figure out how to get this off," Jon told her in a soothing voice, "Don't worry. I'll get us out of this. Everything's going to be okay."
Karyn loved that he was so brave, but his courage wasn't contagious. She was sure that any moment Harc would return and devour both of them. It didn't matter how calm the jelly-based life-form was, she'd seen too many movies to trust her captor.
There was a pulling sensation as Jon pulled the gel from her mouth, allowing her to breathe freely.
"Ow!" she exclaimed, the pain of Jon removing the gel causing more than a little discomfort, but distracting her from her panic. She brought her hands up and rubbed her now sensitive skin.
"Sorry," her friend said, sympathy on his face, "I was worried that it wouldn't come off so I pulled as hard as I could."
She forced a smile, trying not to think of their situation. Jon leaned in close.
"What do you think he meant by contaminated? And why did he call the rock a parasite?"
Karyn had been so terrified that she hadn't process any of what Harc had said. Now that Jon mentioned it, though, it did seem strange. Was Jon's grandfather wrong about the rock? What had it done to them?
"Maybe the magic is bad for humans," she ventured, "Maybe it changed us somehow."
"Or maybe Harc is lying," Jon told her, "Maybe Harc just wanted the rock for itself. I don't know that I believe a word that alien said. All that garbage about side effects? Tell you what, when it comes back in here, how about you and I try to..."
Jon didn't get to finish his sentence. The tremor that Karyn and he had felt earlier returned, but this time it was much greater. The whole ship seemed to shake. Jon stood up straight, banging his head on the ceiling above him, then fell onto Karyn's naked body. It wasn't a hard enough fall to hurt either one, but when they touched...
