(based on a world created by Stephanie Meyers in her novel "The Host")
Chapter 1It was such a surreal feeling: walking down the grocery isle of a store, people with carts walking by and smiling at you while they choose food for dinner... feeling for the first time in so many years at home, and yet completely alien. Here Conor was, surrounded by the familiar that had now become unfamiliar, by people who were not people. He was a lone human in a sea of Souls- all it took was one wrong move, and he would join them, too.
Souls- an alien race that survived by living on the brain-stem of a host. When their host died, they simply were removed and put into a new body. They were on many worlds, but only more recently had acquired Earth. Earth was now a peaceful world, a place where wars and violence never occurred unless the few remaining humans were the cause... and humans were almost entirely extinct, save for their bodies that hosted the soul.
The young man felt his hands shaking slightly, unsure how much was adrenaline and how much was just fear. He had spoken with their 'rogue Soul'- that is what she called herself, though others called it different things. They were the few ones that, often through extraordinary circumstances, ended up among the surviving humans. Of their small, lone tribe of humans, Adrienne- or Addy, as Conor liked to call her- was the only Soul among them. They thought themselves insane for letting it happen, maybe even fatally deceived, but then they met other groups. Some, like the one with an apparently famous wandering Soul, had two or more among them. They were not so unique as they thought, and Addy's abilities as a healer were crucial. At first she had acted more as a slave, forced to serve them and help them under close eye- but then things changed.
She was taken on a raid, not allowed near civilization, but Seekers struck- and she easily could have run. Instead of joining her own kind, she ran with the humans. She helped heal the sick, carry a young man who could not walk till she collapsed herself. She even threw rocks at the seekers, something everyone was shocked to hear, considering how terrified of violence Addy had once been. That she would employ it, even weakly, on their behalf... feelings began to change. She could have fled, but she stayed. She could have let them die, but she saved them. She was willing to attack her own kind to fend them off. To treat her like the monsters they were fighting would make them the real monsters.
So Addy gradually became one of them. It took time, some were more willing to give her freedom than others, but after meeting other groups and hearing of Souls who had become a part of human groups, sentiment changed. Addy was no longer an outsider. With that change, the realisation dawned as to just how useful Addy could be, were she willing. And she was, though it pained her, and she was horrible at lying.
A middle aged woman was talking to him, and he realised with sudden terror he had been ignoring her for his thoughts. He smiled and apologised, saying he needed to go find his mother- but when he turned to leave, she took his arm.
"Excuse me... what is your name?"
He turned and tried not to look frantic, "Ahhh..." The name they had thought of vanished from his mind instantly, and he was frozen in place. "Tells... Tall Tales.." He made it up on the spot, and knew if the others had been there they would groaned.
She began to smile widely, however, not showing a sign of the suspicion he would have expected from a human at such a poorly told lie, "Oh... a see weed?! I was as well! Which..."
Her words blurred together as a sinking horror filled him. Of course, he would choose a name that sounded like a see weed, and it would be his luck that the Soul would have lived there.
You are royally screwed, Conor.
But oddly enough, though it did not make him feel any better, he never had to give himself away due to lack of knowledge. The lights in the grocery store did it for him. The woman stopped suddenly, and was staring at his eyes. Belatedly Conor realised the light was glaring right into them, and instead of seeing the expected silver shine in response, there was an obvious lack thereof. Just as her eyes were beginning to widen and the hand on his arm pulled away as though burned, he felt a hand on his shoulder.
"Conor, there you are! You know you need to stay close to me!" He drew in a deep breath as he realised the firm, anchoring hand on his shoulder was none other than Adrienne. "I'm sorry, I hope he did not scare you. My son... he tries not to stand out, and act like a Soul, but I try to keep him close to avoid... misunderstandings. I'm Addy, nice to meet you."
The other woman was speechless at first, but Adrienne made sure to position herself so the light reflected from her eyes, and the silvery sheen seemed to put the other soul at ease. "Oh... ahhh... I had... heard about some... who made the choice to have children without souls... I have just never met one." She turned back to Conor and smiled, genuinely apologetic but still with a hint of nervousness, "Forgive me, that was very rude of me. That was a very creative name, too!" The older woman laughed despite herself, "Tells Tall Tales! How delightful- you do, indeed. Much better than I would have. Just be careful... you don't want a Seeker to misunderstand and think you were... wild."
"Yes, he should know better by now than to leave my side in public, though really, I don't think there are any wild ones left." Conor could hear the lie easily, but still, Addy was getting much better at it. She hated doing it, but it was necessary to go out. "Ahh, Shelby, there you are! Addy, Tall Tales" the woman grinned and winked conspiratorially at Conor, "This is my daughter, Shelby. Not... quite like you, of course. We aren't that daring, ourselves."
The girl who walked up seemed to be in her teens- he would have guessed fifteen, but she could have been older, though if she was she was rather short for her age. Sunset red hair fell in waves almost to her waist, framing a very fair, delicately beautiful face. Her upturned nose only added to her youthful look, topping full pink lips that turned up into a somewhat shy hint of a smile as her ocean eyes looked him over unapologetically. He saw the brief flash of silver from behind her eyes, erasing any doubt that she was not hosting a soul.
Conor let out a regretful breath, and his disappointment must have shown on his features because, quite unexpectedly, she reached out and pinched his arm.
"Ouch! Why the... heck... did you do that?!" Conor asked, consciously choosing his language carefully as he noted Addy's eyes watching him sharply. Shelby's mother was not paying any attention, she instead was shocked herself.
"Shelby! What on Earth!"
"Just making sure he's real. Come on- Mom, I'm going to go and wait outside with Tales' here, okay?" She grinned mischievously, and had his hand in her own soft grip and was walking away with him in toe before either 'parent' had time to answer. Conor followed rather helplessly, having absolutely no idea how to react.
As they were walking out the automatic doors, into the warm air outside, she regarded him with a gently chastising look, "You don't have to be so clearly disappointed. Just because I'm not... like you... doesn't mean I am not interesting, or will treat you poorly. You're the first human I have ever met... without, well, one of us in them."
"Well, you're direct, I'll give you that." Conor replied, flashing a grin at the soul next to him, "Are you expecting me to dance for peanuts? Because I don't, you know." Peanuts did sound rather tasty right about now, though.
Instead of the confusion he expected at his sarcasm – many of the aliens did not seem to get sarcasm until they were used to it- she burst out giggling. "I would like to see that! You say that, and I imagine you doing just that.. you certainly are different! I can't help but like you."
Despite himself he found he was smiling, when normally he would expect to be bothered. Just because he liked Addy, did not mean he was comfortable with other souls. His parents had been taken by them, his sister: he was the last human of his family. They were stolen from him, forever, by body thieves. Yet Shelby did not strike him with the discomfort most did. That was odd, since early on even Addy was a bit awkward with humans.
"Have you... were you... did you take her over?" Conor asked suddenly, surprising himself with his own bluntness. Shelby was surprised, too, but did not seem put off by the question.
"Hmmm, no. Like many, I was put into a baby. Very awkward and frustrating, I would want someone older next time. How do you stand having someone else wipe your waste off of you?" She wrinkled her delicate nose, scrunching up her face in a gesture that he found incredibly fetching, which shocked him. She didn't act nearly as alien as he would expect- but then, he had never spoken to a soul in a young person before, either, much less one who had grown up in one and was anywhere close to his age.
"Well, ahhh... we... humans don't really remember that far back. My earliest memory is from when I was at least several years old, you see." Instead of being bothered by this conversation, Conor found the curiosity coming out in him. So, souls were completely aware of everything, even as a baby? He was suddenly very curious about what that must be like. Frustrating, indeed.
"You're lucky! I still remember trying for days just to get my toes to move! It was kind of fun at first, but wiggling toes can get so bo-ring!"
Conor blinked at her tone, "You... don't sound like an para... like a soul."
It was Shelby's turn to flash a grin at him, "I got into some of the video archives, and hid them under my bed to watch at night. Some human videos are..." her eyes dimmed a little, genuinely bothered, "too much, but others are actually kind of fun. Some of my friends like them too, especially see weeds- since, you know, they really like new stories- and we will get together for a sleepover to watch when nobody else is around. It's fun!"
The confidence and youth in her demeanour had drawn Conor in, and he found himself forgetting for a moment that he was talking to an alien. It felt, rather, like he was talking to someone just a few years younger than he was.
"Well... I'm nineteen. How old are you?"
"Maybe fifteen or so..." Conor started to smile, until she added with a giggle, "centuries, that is. I've been around a while. I forget how many years my body is right now... I should know, right? So much has happened so quickly, it just kind of blurs together. Humans aren't like anything I have been in before."
He blinked, drawing in a breath, and for a moment Shelby seemed concerned she had said the wrong thing. "Seriously? Fifteen centuries?"
"Yeah... hey, I'm sorry, I told you that you are the first human I have spoken to, right? I am not used... to that being unusual. I have heard some of us have started having human children, and not allowing them to be hosts... but I don't think there are any around here." Shelby suddenly stepped in, her head tilting as she looked into his eyes. Conor held his breath: her face was so close their noses nearly touched, "You really are just nineteen years old, aren't you? I've known a few who were born here, in these bodies, but... you're different. Funnier, harder... deeper."
Conor took a slow, shaking inhalation of air. He realised he was trembling again, but it was not from discomfort or fear. He could feel her warm breath on his cheeks, as she stood on tip-toe to reach his height. She had put a hand on his shoulder to steady herself, and he wondered what they must look like. Two teenagers, standing outside a grocery store, nose-to-nose. One would never guess one was alien, and one a human- one an invader, the other... the conquered.
She was very perceptive, and just as his smile faded and his thoughts darkened, he suddenly felt an electric shock run through his body. He gasped, his eyes squeezing shut and his arms automatically wrapping around Shelby as she kissed him. Soft, gentle lips parted against his, and quickly the kiss had deepened. It was as though the fire running through him spread, because somehow in mere seconds a sudden, unexpected kiss had become a heated, passionate embrace. Their kiss was deep, hungry, sudden... and then it was over.
Conor stood there, trembling, his face flushed- she had ended it, but he sought to regain composure as he said, "Wh-what exactly do you do at those sleepovers?" That was the first thing to come to mind, and the equally flushed and breathless Shelby was suddenly laughing again.
"Nothing like that..." She was clearly out of breath herself, her slender fingers quickly pushing stray strands of auburn hair from her face, "I... saw movies, shows... I... wanted to see what it was like."
"...and...?"
"...and, I am not sure. We may have to try again." Conor laughed aloud at her impish boldness. He began to suddenly get a sense of their surroundings again, and was not surprised to note several people had been looking at them. They were by the curb outside the store, and it was a rather busy afternoon, the parking lot full of cars and people.
"I... I had better go ahead and get to the car." Shelby said. She seemed a little embarrassed now, after the fact, and turned to head out.
"Shelby, wait... I don't... want you to go, without some way to talk to you later."
She turned, looking at him, and a warm smile slowly spread across her face.
And then it was all gone.