Jewels are rare things to find on land, but even rarer in the sky, and in the mountains of Arizona, on a Sunday night, the most precious of all found its way to earth.
“What the hell Is that?” A man said, turning the nob of his giant telescope to better focus upon the bright blue object. It resembled a comet somewhat, but as he looked closer he realised it was no a comet at all.
“It must be a helicopter or something.” He said.
The logical, scientific part of his brain told him not to jump to conclusions, but he felt very strange about it. The longer he observed the object, the less certain he became of it. It was close, real close, only one or two miles above at most, far too close to be anything in space. He figured it must have been some sort of a machine but there was no sound of an engine or propeller so it couldn't be anything from the airport.
“A…drone?”
That was the next thing that came to mind, and yet even this could not be the thing that he observed, for it was too big and too bright for that. It looked like a giant globe that emitted a blue light, perfectly uniform and almost natural looking like a star. He took out his smartphone, unlocked it, and opened the recording app. He then pointed the camera into one of the eyepieces of the telescope, while continuing to look with the other. He hoped to capture an image in digital form so he could analyse it on his computer later on to debunk it. After only a few seconds of recording, he was startled to see the blue light begin to flash and dimmer, and then right after out fell a small object that resembled that of a human body.
Panicked, he stopped the recording on the phone, and pulled up the footage. He eagerly watched the replay on the small LCD screen, keeping an eye on the blue light, expecting to see something fall out from it. And then there it was. His heart jumped in his chest when he saw the same thing on video than he did with his bare eyes. He paused the footage, rewinded it, and then double tapped the screen to zoom in. Even though the image was pixelated and grainy, the object was undeniably resembled a body, or rather, a person of some kind, either human or not. His brain scrambled for an answer, and the first thing that came to mind was some type of practise dummy ejected from some strange flying machine, whether from the government or from the private sector.
That must be it, he thought. He hoped.
Curious about it, he jumped off his observatory chair, grabbed his coat from the work bench, threw it around himself and then raced for the door. He hastily put on his boots and after wrestling with them, he reached for his trusty torch that hung conveniently across the wall. His hand shook violently as he unlocked the door, whether from excitement or fear, or both. He slammed the door open, and then ran as fast as fast as he could through the arid outdoors not even caring to close the door behind himself.
He did not often run, but the adrenalin that coursed through his body made him feel like an olympic runner. He wanted to see the body up close so badly that he did not even care if his own body could even handle running so quickly. He was glad that he worked out every so often, not as much as he would like but enough to keep himself relatively fit. He sprinted for what seemed like a mile, madly alternating the torch across the red sand and sparse green fauna in search of anything that lay amongst it.
After only a bit of searching, the torch came across something of interest. It was difficult to make out in the distance, but as he came closer it became very clear what he was looking at. His insides twisted with anxiety as his original hypothesis appeared to be correct.
It was indeed a body turned over and laying on its side across a patch of overgrown grass; a woman with skin paler than usual. She wore no clothes whatsoever, not even a robe or any sort of undergarments. She looked thin and frail, and did not seem to be the type to be involved in any strange experiments.
The man cautiously approached her with his torch dead on her the whole time, watching for any signs of movement. There was none, and when he noticed she was not even breathing, his emotions rapidly switched from fear to concern. He ran to her, dropped his torch and then knelt down to inspect her closer, wondering exactly what he could do to help. He was trained in CPR back in the day, but he was slow to react in the moment. His mind was full of questions and his gut laden with fear. Regardless, he still felt the need to try, and as he to turned to lay her flat across her back, he was momentarily stricken by her beauty. Her hair was short and barely reached her shoulders, aqua blue and cut into a round mesh with perfectly trimmed ends.
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She had a soft, yet firm face. Pretty and young. Younger than him. He was only twenty five, but she must have been around twenty if not even younger. Her lips were thin and icy looking, colored in the same kind of aqua blue as her hair. Around her eyes there was a soft layer of a dark eye shadow that reminded him of a kind of war paint from some fictional character in one of the recent movies he watched. It was most odd. This girl was most odd. He looked at her face and wondered if this being was even in fact human at all. She looked like a human, and as he grabbed her hand she even had the body warmth of one.
As he attempted to revive her, he almost had a heart attack when her eyes suddenly opened and a pair of ocean blue irises focused directly upon him. They glowed in the dark and were notably unnatural looking, digital even like lenses from a camera. They stared at each other for a short while until her eyes closed once again. As he continued to stare at her he felt strange about the fact that she was completely naked, so he took off his coat and placed it around her body to cover her up. He then and then reached down to carefully picked her up in in a bridal position. He made sure to be gentle and rested her head against his shoulder to support her neck.
“What…are you?”
He moved as quickly as he could back to his observatory. He must have ran faster than he thought because it seemed to take forever. After all, It had been a while since he had a woman in his arms. That didn't happen since he was in college, and that was only for a stupid initiation contest his classmates forced him into.
When he finally reached the observatory, he closed the door behind him with his foot, and then lowered her across the couch that was near the kitchen, making sure to position her so her head rested against one of the pillows . He then opened a nearby wardrobe and pulled out a warm yellow blanket to put over her in addition to his jacket that thus far had kept her warm.
As he watched her sleep he pranced around the room, thinking whether to pick up the phone and call someone, 911, or someone from his university. He only thought for a little while before his thoughts were interrupted when the girl began to show signs of waking up again. Fear permeated through him as he began to genuinely wonder exactly who or what she was. If she was an alien, at least she was a pretty one. He could not keep his eyes off her. He watched for about a minute before her eyes began to open yet again. He held his breath, but she did not look at him. Instead she sleepily looked around at her surroundings, curious as to where she was.
He approached her slowly, waving to get her attention but still not getting it. It was like he was invisible, and only when stood in front of her did she finally seem to take notice of him.
“Hi. My name is Michael, Michael Dugarti. What's your name?” Michael said, and rather nervously at that. He wasn’t sure if she understood him but he sure hoped she could.
It creeped him out a little, the way she would stare at him like a ghost, mindless and stale. He began to wonder what was going on in her mind, if anything at all. But as he looked into her most fascinating eyes something inside of him clicked. Something was telling her she needed nourishment.
He raced to the kitchen and grabbed a mug from the cupboard, filled it with water from the tap, and then looked for whatever he could find from the food tray. There wasn’t much, only a half eaten energy bar and a packet of jelly beans his lab mate had clearly left behind again - one of many things. He grabbed them both and then returned to the couch. He knelt down beside her continued staring at him like a newborn kitten.
“Are you thirsty? Here have some water.” He said as he moved the cup to her mouth, gesturing for her to drink from it but still she did not react.
He gave her a warm smile before moving his hand behind her head to gently guide her lips to the cup before slowly pouring the liquid into her mouth. But she did not drink. The water wastefully ran down her face and spilt into the couch instead. Michael put away the mug, and tried again with the energy bar. He broke it into small pieces and moved one of them just under her nose so she could have a sniff before placing it near her mouth which to his surprise, began to open her mouth. Her placed it inside to which she chewed only once and then appeared to swallow the tiny bit of food down.
Almost instantly the strength appeared to return to her body. She sat up straight, doing so slowly like a hospital patient recently out of a coma. Her face was rather expressionless but he swore he could see the beginnings of a smile develop across her lips.
“Divona,” The girl said in a soft voice. “My name is Divona.”