It was late afternoon the next day when the Elders emerged from the ship. Adrian and Reya had just returned from an afternoon walk and were sitting inside at the kitchen table, each with a glass of water. There had been no mention about what had occurred the previous night between the two of them. Much like the day before, they’d woken up in each other’s arms late in the morning and lazed about before coming downstairs. For them, their day was only just beginning whereas the Elders had been hard at work for many more hours.

Cirrus entered the house with an unsightly expression. Orryn looked triumphant as she spotted Adrian. “Perfect, you’re here,” she said. “We’ve come to a decision regarding your request.” Adrian immediately sat up straighter and regarded her intently.

“And?” he asked eagerly.

“We’ve decided to grant you your citizenship,” Orryn said. Adrian smiled widely. “Conditionally,” she added. His smile faltered. “We’ve decided to make a special amendment to our immigration laws for your case specifically in a way that neither accepts nor rejects your claims of being an alien. As such, you are now entitled to own land legally, receive pay for any work you do and have access to our banking and medical services. You will receive a special identification card and paperwork as soon as they’re ready.”

“But?” Adrian asked sourly. He knew that getting his wish would be too good to be true. He should have expected that there would be strings attached. It was foolhardy of him not to. He could only hope that what they wanted in return wasn’t too exorbitant.

“In return for granting your request, we would like for you to translate any and all videos concerning people that look like you do, provided you are able to do so.”

“Does that mean I work for the military?” Adrian had been trying to avoid that. He wasn’t certain what exactly military law here entailed. All he knew was that he would prefer it if civilian law applied to him instead, making it so that the military couldn’t causally order him around.

“No,” Orryn said, to Adrian’s immediate relief. “For all intents and purposes, you will be considered an independent contractor working with the military,” she stressed, “and not for the military. You will, of course, be compensated monetarily for your work with us. A special contract will be drawn up for you to sign detailing the specifics of our working partnership.”

Adrian considered the deal he was being offered. It allowed him to remain a citizen and put him on equal footing when working with the military. They were even generous enough to provide him with recompense beyond simply granting him citizenship. The only thing he wasn’t sure of was how much he was getting paid and its relative worth. “How much am I being paid for my services? Am I working as a retainer, or am I paid case by case?”

“Case by case,” Orryn responded. She then listed the amount he would be compensated for each instance his services would be required.

Adrian wasn’t sure, but it sounded like a big number. He turned to Reya, who nodded her head quickly. “Take that deal. That’s a lot of money,” she told him, shocked at the proposal. “You can do a lot with that.”

Adrian trusted her judgement on the matter. “I accept your deal,” he said, “on the condition that no unreasonable demands be made of me and that there is an understanding that I may not be able to translate the videos properly due to language barriers. In the case that I am unable to translate, I still wish to be paid a smaller consultation fee for my efforts.”

Orryn nodded. “That sounds fair. We accept your terms. Congratulations on becoming a citizen.”

“Yeah, yeah, congratulations and all,” Cirrus waved, “but can you actually hold up your end of the bargain? The whole point of this is so that we get the video translated.”

Adrian shrugged. “I have no issue helping out now that my citizenship is assured. I’m just going to have to hope that you aren’t lying to me and trying to use me.”

“We would never!” Orryn looked appalled. “Who do you think we are?” Adrian shot her a flat look, unimpressed by her question.

“The people that have had me imprisoned multiple times, starved, held at gunpoint and are currently holding me hostage in the middle of nowhere.”

“That’s a rather grim way of looking at it. We’ve also done much to protect you.” Adrian remained unimpressed. Orryn faltered. “Right, how about we take a look at that video. We can set it up in the living room.”

Rann entered the house and joined the rest of the group as they migrated towards the holoscreen. Adrian took a seat in the center of the couch, eagerly awaiting whatever was about to be displayed. It had been so long since he’d last seen any humans, he could hardly wait. Reya sat next to him while Orryn occupied the other side. Rann stood behind the couch, patiently waiting.

Connor and Ellie appeared onscreen, paused. Adrian’s hopeful, eager expression quickly morphed into one of hatred and loathing. He beheld his old captors with murder in his eyes and snarled something unkind in English.

Reya paused at the change in his expression, the degree of emotion displayed startling her. His eyes were hard and the anger in his voice as he spoke in his native language was evident to all, taking her aback. She had never before seen Adrian react in such a way and it worried her greatly.

“Is everything alright?” Orryn asked. Adrian responded in English, catching himself when he saw her blank stare.

“No, but that’s not your problem. Play the video so I can get this over with,” Adrian said through gritted teeth. It was like rubbing salt into a festering wound to Adrian as he regarded the pair onscreen, a complicated knot of emotions welling in his chest. Fear, loathing, anger, disgust, and regret warred with one another as he fought to keep his emotions under control. A hard, cold anger settled inside of him as memories of what they had done came rushing back.

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Orryn and Cirrus exchanged a glance, then started the video. Adrian watched intently until it was abruptly cut short. He understood that it was Connor’s tampering with the unknown that had caused the video to end.

“Well?” Cirrus asked eagerly. “Are you able to translate it or not?”

“Yes,” Adrian responded. “Luckily, they speak my native language. Do you want a literal translation of every word that they’re saying, or a summary?”

“Make it as literal as possible.”

“Alright, replay the video – actually, can I have control over it? It would be easier for me to pause so that I can explain what they’re saying.” Orryn handed Adrian the data slate. After having watched so many movies with Reya, Adrian had become rather adept at using the technology. Bearing a strong resemblance to tablets back on Earth, he’d picked up the gist of it rather quickly, much to Reya’s surprise.

The video started anew, and Adrian walked everybody present through each instance of dialogue. By the time he was done, the Elders were thoroughly disappointed by the contents. “If you would like, I could add my insights to it based on their reactions,” Adrian offered. Orryn and Cirrus debated for a moment before taking him up on it. “Right, so first, one of them believes that Irric is an alien, while the other dissuades him of that notion, claiming that Irric is dressed in a costume and obsessed with the colour purple.” Adrian looked around the room. “No offense, everyone. The next important thing to notice is how the video ends. The man clearly doesn’t know what he’s doing when using the keyboard, meaning they likely found the terminal by accident and don’t actually know about the gru’ul. This leaves me with more questions than I had at the beginning, but that’s a topic for another day,” he finished darkly.

Orryn hummed thoughtfully. “You had an awfully strong reaction when they appeared onscreen. Would you care to enlighten us as to why?” She understood Adrian’s reasoning during his explanation and had come to her own conclusions as well. Adrian’s insight was much appreciated, but his earlier reaction didn’t make sense to her.

Adrian looked torn. “That goes beyond mere translating,” he said.

Cirrus was outraged at the suggestion. “Is that some kind of a joke?" she fumed. "We’re asking you to help us in any way regarding the video. While this is primarily translation, if you know more information then you owe it to us.”

“I do believe that our deal was for translation only. Why should I give you extra information without recompense?”

“So you do know something!” Cirrus accused.

“Yes, I do.”

“Fine,” Cirrus asked, “what do you want in exchange for the information? We’re not giving you something as big as last time. Make it material this time.”

Adrian thought for a moment. “I’ve given your military technology to reproduce instruments from my home world. I would like access to copies of them once they’ve been built. And I would like for prototypes to actually be built.”

“Done,” Nessah said quickly. She was already planning on delivering to Adrian whatever they were able to build so that he could examine them. He didn’t need to know that, however. This way, it appeared as if they were willing to listen to his demands, garnering trust while not giving him anything they weren’t already planning to.

Adrian nodded in acknowledgement and looked towards the Elders. “Do we have a deal?”

“Yes,” Cirrus practically cried. “Now for the love of the gods, tell us what you know already.”

Adrian took a deep breath. Reya had an inkling of what he was going to say and placed a supportive hand on his leg. “My earlier reaction was so intense before because I recognize the people that appeared onscreen.”

There was a stunned silence. “How is that possible?” Orryn asked. “These are two random people. What are the odds that you know them?”

“Very high, actually. You all already know that I was a test subject for the gru’ul. What I omitted to tell you was that before that, I was also a living test subject, captured by my own kind.” There was a sharp intake of breath at the revelation. “Those two,” Adrian pointed to the still image in front of him, “were the researchers that performed experiments on me, as well as others. They were also present when I was shoved in a pod. The next thing I knew I woke up in the gru’ul facility. I’ll spare you the details.”

“So you were already a living test subject? You poor thing,” Orryn said.

“The world has been unkind to me, yes,” Adrian said. “I’ve long suspected that the two facilities are related to one another, but I have no idea how, exactly. Given the researchers’ unfamiliarity with the gru’ul terminal, I believe that they don’t know about the gru’ul either.”

“What kind of experiments did they perform on you?”

“I’m not saying,” Adrian said firmly. He didn’t want the military finding out what was done to him if at all possible. To have that happen was risking them deciding to crack him open and learn more about his biological changes. And that meant becoming another research subject.

“That wasn’t part of the deal,” Cirrus said.

“I’m not telling you what the experiments entailed for the same reasons I’m not walking you through the experiments the gru’ul performed on me,” Adrian said coldly. “I’ve told you what was relevant. You may do with that as you wish. I’m sure it gives you a lot to think about already. Is this all you need me for?”

“For now, yes. We’ll call upon you if we need you to do something else, but for now what you’ve given us should be sufficient,” Orryn said. “Thank you for your work.”

Adrian stood up off the couch. “I’m going for another walk.” He made his way towards the front entrance. Reya stood up to follow him, but Rann placed a hand on her shoulder, stopping her. Rann gave Reya a slight shake of her head, silently telling her to leave Adrian some personal space.

“You can talk about it with him later,” Rann said. “I can’t imagine he was expecting to see his old captors. He probably needs some time to sort himself out. I didn’t even know he was captured before his time with the gru’ul until he said it. Did you?” Rann gave Reya a searching look. The guilty expression written across her friend’s face told Rann everything she needed to know. “I see,” she said simply.

“It wasn’t my place to share it,” Reya replied. “He didn’t really talk about it at all, just mentioned the fact. He never mentioned what they actually did to him.”

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Cirrus said. “We could have used that information!”

Reya looked at Cirrus coldly. “I already told you I’m not going to act as a spy and reveal what he’s told me. You already have too much power over him as it is.”

“What Cirrus means,” Orryn interjected, “is that you knew something important that even we didn’t. It would have been very pertinent to know that little fact before showing him the video.”

“You tried ordering me to tell you, which we both know you can’t. You had no reason to learn about that. I didn’t know about the existence of the video at the time. I’m not the only one keeping secrets,” Reya accused. “How many do you have locked up? How many of them are related to Adrian? Don’t you think that he should know?” The Elders didn’t say anything. “My thoughts exactly. You have your secrets, I have mine, and he has his.”

“But this is for the greater good,” Cirrus protested.

“No, it’s for your own personal satisfaction. I won’t let you hurt Adrian any more than he already has been. I can’t undo his past, but I can help him now. And that’s exactly what I intend to do,” Reya said with steel behind her eyes.

“Why do you go so far for him? You hardly know him,” Orryn said.

“You see a tool where I see a person,” Reya said. “That’s enough for me.”