Twisted Nerve - Tomaz

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Dawn finally crept over the horizon and those bright green eyes groggily forced themselves open. Her back as screaming and she felt like she wanted to vomit. She groaned as she stood and stretched, trying to alleviate her discomfort. She only succeeded in popping her lower back and it had her doubling over in pain. Well.. A lot of good learning to speak with the locals had done her.

Her first encounter had been a rather confusing and exhausting attempt to transfer her language and exchange it for his but, before she really had the chance to fully explain herself afterward, the human had angrily demanded she leave. That was over three months ago and Seluna was sick. That gigantic human had somehow infected her with some horrible plague. The smell of food made her violently ill. And this primitive backwater planet probably didn't even have a cure. Well wasn't this just fantastic!

And to make matters worse, her belly felt sore and looked slightly distended, and even though the smell of food made her sick, she found herself wanting to eat the strangest things. But, Seluna just continued smiling. Complaining didn't fix anything. She brushed herself off and smoothed out her tin foil hat and placed it up her head with a smile. Another glorious day. She made her way through the little village by the sea she had found.

The human she had encountered had made it adamantly clear he wanted her as far away from him as possible. She huffed, her face turning bright red as she remembered the encounter. Ugh. Why was she still thinking about him? Well none if that mattered now. She didn't need him.

“Alright. Today's adventure: Currency!” she grinned, speaking aloud to herself. If she was to be stuck on this planet, she had a lot to learn. She needed to blend in. She'd had to steal a few things the last few weeks and she felt rather guilty for it. But she had needed regular clothing and not that light blue tunic she'd been wearing before. She'd also needed food.

Well, things were going to change. She would be a thief no more! But, Seluna hadn't the faintest idea where to begin. So, Seluna did what she did best. She slipped on a pair of large rose colored heart shaped sunglasses and a fake beard she had found on the side of the road. “For Science! For Research! FOR ADVENTURE!”

But her adventure was cut abruptly short when she rounded a corner and bumped right into... him. “Oh.. I... “ she backpedaled, taking the beard off as she looked up at him. She smoothed out the shirt she wore (which still had the shop tags on them) trying to hide the embarrassment bulge to her abdomen and turned to run from him. She didn't want to be in his way. After all.. He had made it clear he didn't want her around.

@tomaz

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The first month after the Crazy Alien Lady had finally left him, Tomaz was still hiding. He was just a temporary manual labor worker – he wouldn’t be noticed if he disappeared for a while. So, Tomaz packed up and left his tree house. He had enough money and resources to build a new tree house elsewhere. And anyway, he always packed light. He couldn’t take the chance of her finding him again, and she would if he hadn’t fled. 

Thankfully, his plan seemed to have worked. He hadn’t seen her in nearly three months. He had just gone back to the docks to continue his work a few weeks prior when he was beginning to lack the money necessary for food. He was never much of a thief – he was skilled at pick-pocketing and thieving, sure, but he nearly always returned the stolen goods out of guilt. Who was he to steal someone else’s hard work? The seventeen year old stuck his hands in his pockets, his shirt slung around his shoulders.

He heard a familiar voice screaming about adventure and he rolled his eyes. He didn’t think to place the name. He assumed it was one of the girls who fawned over the shirtless workers where he worked. They had plenty of those sorts of girls. Instead, who should round the corner but a small bearded girl in sunglasses? He stared down at her, blinking. He looked past her – his tree house was in view. He was so close...

Tomaz stared at her, wincing when she took off the beard and peered up at him, smoothing her clothes out. Her abdomen bulged out slightly, and he quirked an eyebrow. “Are you pregnant or fat?” he asked bluntly, not one to mince words when he was confused. He put a large hand on her shoulder, holding her in place gently. “These streets aren’t safe for a girl.”

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“Are you pregnant or fat?”

Seluna shrank away from his grasp and used her small hands to shove his hand away and she huffed indignantly up at him. “I am Neither, Plague Bearer!” she snapped hotly and turned her face stubbornly away. She'd never been pregnant before so she had no idea that her symptoms were morning sickness. And other than the slight swell of her belly, she looked unhealthily thin. Tomaz could easily feel the ridge of her shoulder bones beneath the fabric before she had shoved his hand away.

“These streets aren’t safe for a girl.”

“I can provide adequate care for myself. And I am no child! I am nearly six annuals!” she fired back at him. “Let us come to an agreement!” she declared. She pointed her toe on the ground and drew a line in the dust of the walkway. “You shall stay on your side” she mimicked him. “And I shall stay on mine. Do we have an accord?” she asked before her face went a sickly pale and before Seluna could take a polite step back, she doubled over clutching his arm and proceeded to vomit. Once she had finished emptying the contents of her stomach onto his shoes, she looked up at him, her eyes brimming with tears and her lip hung with the most pitiful expression. “By the gods, I am dying. What have you infected me with??!”

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Oh no, thought Tomaz wryly as he stared down at her. Not a child. Just six years old. Great... he’d had sex with a kid. He stared down at her in horror – she certainly seemed older than six years, but hey – people mistook him for being in his mid-twenties, and he’d just turned seventeen. Maybe on Mars that was the normal for girls who were six. Oh God. He was a pedophile. He needed to be locked up, murdered, executed, and... he ran his thumb across the rosary, muttering the acts of contrition.

He watched her in numb horror as she drew a line in the dust. “No, we don’t. My house is that way.... which is why I was walking towards there,” he pointed out kindly, as though he were talking to a small child. But just as quickly as she said that, she was vomiting on his shoes. He blinked down and kicked off most of it. He waited for an apology, but instead she just stared up at him accusingly, as though he’d just thrown up on her only pair of shoes.

“I don’t know,” Tomaz admitted guiltily. What if he had been harboring some sort of alien disease? He squirmed uncomfortably. “Come with me,” he said, grabbing her and placing her on his hip stubbornly. “You need some food and water. And sleep.” And a doctor, but he didn’t have one readily available to him. “I’m sure it’s nothing to be concerned over.” Hopefully.

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She arched a brow as she watched him fumble with the item dangling from his neck when she mentioned her age. He seemed quite vexed, in fact. “I assure you, that is quite a respectable age among my people, Tomaz” she tried to reassure him as her head tilted to the side. Shortly after, lines in the sand were drawn, her stomach was emptied, and accusations were thrown.

“Come with me,” 

“Ah! No! Put me down!” she flailed indignantly. “My legs work just fine!” But it became apparent, he wasn't setting her down. She huffed and looked away from him stubbornly. She felt like a little girl, being lugged around like this. She rested her head against his shoulder and looked up at the sky. The season seamed to have changed rather rapidly in the three months she'd been here. Either this planet was pathetically tiny or it was closer to it's sun.. maybe both. She groaned at the sensation of being carried and felt her stomach turn again and covered her mouth. Fortunately, her stomach had nothing left to give up.

“You need some food and water. And sleep.. I’m sure it’s nothing to be concerned over.” 

“Why are you so concerned for me? When last we spoke you sounded as though you... as though..” 'as though you hated me'. She trailed off and looked up at him apologetically. “I am sorry, Tomaz. For what happened.. I did not intend for things to progress the way they did. But.. I do not regret it” She sighed again, her eyes trailing back to the ground that she was now several feet from. “You do not have to care for me. I am not your responsibility, Tomaz.”

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Tomaz frowned as Seluna struggled to finish her sentence, remaining silent in the hopes that she would. Not that she needed to – Tomaz knew perfectly well how he had acted, and at the time it had been precisely the message he’d wanted to give. “I don’t,” Tomaz said quietly, continuing to carry her along the path towards where his home was. He patted her knee to help her calm down.

He shrugged her apology off with the shoulder she wasn’t on, taking care not to jostle her too much. “I’ve forgiven you,” he replied simply, perhaps with more sincerity in his voice than he actually felt. “And on the contrary, Seluna. If I’m the one who got you sick, then you most certainly are my responsibility.” He gave her a small smile to show that he wasn’t angry or anything, continuing to walk to the tree house. He sighed once they got to it. He didn’t seem to have planned this out thoroughly.

“Here, hold on to me tighter,” he told her, climbing up the tree easily. The inside of the house was much larger than it appeared on the outside. He put her on the bed and frowned down at her. “Seluna,” he said sternly. “When was the last time you’ve had food? Or water? You have to take care of yourself.”

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Seluna huffed, a bit annoyed, not with him, but at the simple fact that he was completely disregarded her attempts to let him off the hook. She coiled her arms around his neck as she maneuvered around to his back, burying her face against the side of his neck with a nauseated groan. Once he brought her inside and set her on the edge of the bed, she stubbornly drew her knees to her chest, as best she could, anyway. When he asked when the last time she had eaten or drank anything, she only offered a lame shrug before meekly answering him, softly using the French she's absorbed from him. “I.. Do not know. Time moves to differently here than on my world. I know that it has been at least twenty of your day and night cycles.” she confessed.

She eventually rolled onto her side. “I.. I admit I am failing to understand your method of currency. I have made several attempts to barter for supplies but.. I do not know what a 'franc' is.. And when they would suggest I could use my body as payment...” Her face went scarlet and she turned all the more away from him. “Needless to say, I have been unable to acquire substantial nourishment. In any case, I doubt it would matter. What little I have managed to acquire, I have been unable to keep down. And... Tomaz? What is wrong with me?” she finally looked up at him, her eyes glistening with the threat of tears.

The last thing she wanted to admit to was being afraid. Very little frightened Seluna, but being stranded on a planet she did not understand, ill with symptoms she was unfamiliar with, and never knowing when she would get her next meal. Seluna was in over her head, and though Tomaz was still practically a stranger, despite the intimacy that had briefly shared, she found herself clinging to him, her face buried against chest as her shoulders trembled.