Worth Fighting For (Little Blue Book 1) Page 9

“And what an event!” Juno heard the announcer say.

  “Boy, you said it.” Benny stood up and began taking empty, dirty dishes to the kitchen.

  Maggie jumped up to help.

  “Remember, nothing breakable or sharp,” Jeri teased her.

  Maggie stuck her tongue out at Jeri.

  “Hey look,” Kaycee pointed at the TV. “They’re interviewing our governor.”

  “What can we expect next, regarding the aliens?” the reporter asked.

  “Well, uh, we’re concentrating all of our time and resources on the events following tomorrow’s lottery.”

  “Yes, what can you tell us about the lottery?”

  “Uh, where to start.” Both the governor and reporter laughed. The governor continued. “Actually, each name given has been run through the system first, to check for any serious criminal records, and such. The names left have been added into a secured computer system, which will pick them at random.”

  “What will happen after the drawing?”

  “It gets a bit more complicated after that. Each county, in each state, will be responsible for picking the women up and delivering them, and their belongings, to designated areas, to be sorted further, depending.”

  “And this will be taking place around the world, in every country?” the reporter asked.

  “Uh, yes, but I’m not sure how much their methods will vary. Many are doing it similar to how we are, but I understand some countries have different methods.”

  The governor had to excuse himself, and the reporter flagged over others to interview. Juno yawned, and her eyes drooped.

  “I’m heading to bed, guys. Night.” Juno slowly got up, and headed for Jeri’s room. They were sharing the same bed. Luckily we’re like sisters.

  Chapter Ten

  Juno leaned back into the spray of the shower, enjoying the hot water washing over her skin. Aside from the walk into town to register for the lottery, she had been staying at home and taking it easy to allow her ribs to heal, but they still hurt, and the hot water eased that ache some. The fan, which was on to suck away the heavy steam, drowned out all other sounds outside the bathroom, giving her the feeling like she was finally alone. Privacy was hard to come by since they had taken in Maggie, Paige, and Amanda. Not that she would want to kick them out. The girls fit in nicely with her and her friends, so they were now like extended family.

  Someone knocking on the bathroom door caught her attention. A breeze cooled her heated skin as the door opened. “Juno, you better hurry up and get out here. We have company.” Pressure pushed at her eardrums as the door closed.

  From the serious tone she heard in Jeri’s voice, Juno didn’t think it was pleasant company. She turned off the water and toweled off. After she was dressed, she made her way out to the living room where twelve uniformed men were standing.

  Juno’s stomach knotted as she looked around the room at her friends. One of the men stepped forward.

  “Are you Juno Lavender?”

  “Yes, what is this about?” Suddenly a thought struck her and she gasped, then immediately winced in pain, instantly regretting the sudden inhalation.

  Benny walked up behind her. “Yep, all of us got drawn in the lottery.”

  “All?” Juno took in quick shallow breaths. She hadn’t thought about the lottery since they signed up, and the drawing was done privately, only just yesterday. Wow, they’re moving fast.

  One of the officers quickly approached her. “Sit down and take a moment to calm down, Miss Lavender. You need to take slow, easy breaths.”

  Juno was too out of breath to speak. She had to let the man lead her to the couch and help her sit.

  “Juno has some cracked ribs from the riots. She can’t take in deep breaths yet,” Benny said, as she rushed to her side.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” he said, looking genuinely concerned.

  Benny shook her head at him. “It wasn’t your fault.” Then turning to Juno, she said, “Juno, you rest here, and I’ll go pack your things.”

  “Here, Juno, drink some water.” Maggie rushed over with a cup, but tripped. The cup flew forward and splashed all over her and the officer.

  Juno gasped in shock at the cold water hitting her warm body, and winced again from the ache in her ribs.

  “Oh no! I’m so, so sorry. I’ll get you some towels.” Maggie took off down the hall, returning with a towel, and several others trailing behind.

  With the shock from the hit of cold water, added to the spectacle Maggie now provided, Juno lost her composure and began laughing. Maybe it sounded a bit hysterical, but it didn’t last long because of the pain it caused, so after a minute, she dried her eyes and was able to calm down. The hysterics seemed to have purged her of her panic, so she eased up off the couch and headed to her room.

  Juno shut the door and stripped off the wet shirt. Benny was still there packing her things. “Thanks, Benny. How much do you think I should take? I didn’t read the pamphlet.”

  “When we’re escorted out, we won’t be coming back. They have teams that are set up to pack up all of our stuff, to take it to us during the orientation phase. They said the best thing to do is just pack some clothes and whatever valuables you don’t want someone possibly stealing, and leave the rest.”

  Juno stopped when she finished getting dressed and looked around her room. She felt numb as she realized she would be leaving here for good. She walked over and grabbed her jewelry box, and helped pack some more clothes before joining the others back out in the living room.

  Juno continued to feel numb as they were driven to the nearby Air Force base. Many women were already there, being processed, and more were coming. The men led the girls to the table that was lined up, and handed one of the men sitting behind it a stack of papers. Without saying anything further, their escorts left.

  The girls huddled together as the man behind the table looked over their paperwork. He printed up white hospital bracelets with their names and a bar code on it. Even little Amanda got one. Others were placed on their luggage, which they put into separate plastic bins.

  “Your luggage will be left here while you are being processed. Once you are assigned a designation, it will be taken to the relevant destination.” Then he handed each of them their papers and pointed to a long dark green tent. “You’re first going to be given a physical. Follow me and I’ll get you started.”

  After they ducked inside, they were handed off to someone else. The girls were separated—each put in separate makeshift exam rooms. The tests weren’t anything too invasive, just some questions, and a quick look around her body. But there was one weird thing. One guy had a little wand the length of a pen, and maybe an inch wide. The guy who used it on her didn’t say anything. He just used the wand to scan her bracelet. After it beeped, he held it against the skin on her wrist briefly until it beeped again, and then he left the room. She was led into another tent where she met up with the other girls. Benny had her nose in the packet of papers that had been given to them, while the rest of them talked about what they just went through.

  “What’s up with that wand thingy?” Juno asked.

  Kaycee perked up. “The girl who examined me said that it takes a reading of our blood instead of drawing it out with a needle.”

  Juno’s brows shot up. “Well, that’s handy.”

  “There’s more,” Kaycee told them. “When they scanned our blood, it sends the information to a computer that looks for certain markers, and based on what they find, will determine which group to classify us under.”

  Paige looked hopeful. “So we’re not just going to be handed to some random alien?”

  Benny tilted her head. “Not exactly. It says here that each alien is classed into groups, A, for land, B for flyers, and C for aquatic.”

  “Huh, you would think the ‘A’ would be for aquatic,” Juno snickered.

  Benny continued without missing a beat. “Once we are sorted into our classes, we will be given information on all of the alien
s’ races in that class that we get to choose from to be a mate for.”

  Juno frowned as she looked around at the girls. “So we are all likely to be split up?”

  Benny looked sad. “We don’t get to choose between the classes, so the chances are high.”

  Paige leaned back with her sleeping daughter on her lap, and stroked Amanda’s hair. “At least they are giving us some kind of choice. Granted, not much, but it is something. That makes me feel less like cattle.”

  Juno felt the weight of the somber mood, so she tried to improve their frame of mind.

  “If any of you could choose a class, what one would it be?” she asked, cheerfully.

  All of the girls looked over the page with the list of categories as they thought over the answer. Paige was the first one to answer.

  “Class A, the land class, for me.”

  Kaycee wiggled happily. “I’d like class B, the flyers. That would be a total trip to have my man fly me around.”

  “Mate,” Benny said, waving the page she was reading in front of her. “It says that all of the races mate for life, and they call their other half a ‘mate’.”

  Jeri looked like she had sucked on a lemon. “Humph, not me, thank you very much. I’m not an animal.”

  “Give them a chance, Jeri,” Juno told her in a gentle but firm voice. “We did sign up for this. It could possibly be something great, if you let it. Don’t set yourself up to fail. I think I would like either class B or C. Although I am curious how they would expect us to live under water.”

  Maggie tapped her finger on her lips as she looked over the list. “I don’t know which one I would choose. I can just as easily fall, or cut myself, or drown, in all three classes.”

  Benny laughed. “I would suggest you stay away from class B. If you fall, it might be from a thousand feet up.”

  Maggie stuck her tongue out at Benny before laughing herself.

  An older woman appeared. “Ladies, when I call your name, please step forward.”

  As the woman called out names, she scanned their bracelets when the girls did as they were told. One name caught their attention, “Paige Miller”.

  When the woman was done, she started handing out folders as she continued to speak. “You ladies are in class A. Follow me, and I’ll take you to the barracks assigned to your class. Your luggage will be sent over there.”

  As quickly as she could, Juno got up. “Wait!”

  The woman turned and looked at her expectantly.

  “Will we be able to keep in touch with our friends?” Juno asked.

  The woman’s look softened a little bit. “We’re still learning everything as we go, but you should be able to see them during your orientation time here. After that, I think it is up to your mates.”

  The girls gathered around Paige and hugged her, and placed a kissed on her sleeping daughter’s head. Then Paige and the others were led away.

  A short time later, another woman, younger than the first, approached the area they were in.

  “If I call your name for class B, please step forward.”

  The woman did the same as the first, calling names in alphabetical order and scanning their bracelets. Juno’s name was called, and to her surprise and huge relief, Benny, Jeri, and Kaycee’s were called for the same class.

  After receiving their folders, Benny was the first to give Maggie a hug. “This isn’t goodbye, I promise,” she told her.

  Maggie began crying and squeezed Benny back. Juno and Kaycee joined the hug, and Jeri followed. After a moment, they wiped their eyes, and followed the woman to their temporary new home.

  ****

  Juno was lying on her side, on her bed, filling out some of the paperwork the girls were piled with. Benny flopped down heavily on her bed, which was the bottom of the bunk that they shared.

  Good thing I was writing in pencil.

  “You’ll never guess who I ran into today when I went over to visit Paige and Amanda.”

  Juno finished erasing her unwanted squiggle and looked up at Benny as she brushed away the rubber flecks. “Who?”

  “Ronnie. She entered the lottery, too, and got drawn, and she’s in class A. I’m beginning to think every girl who signed up, got drawn.”

  Juno shrugged the shoulder she wasn’t lying on. “I don’t know, maybe, but I haven’t been able to see the news or even a newspaper since we got here. Did you finish going through your personal effects?”

  “Yeah, I did that before I went over to visit Maggie. Crazy how fast they brought everything in our apartment over here. It’s only been two days since we got here. It would’ve taken me that long just to pack up my room, if I had done it.”

  “I doubt that. None of us had much. Besides, we aren’t going to want any of the furniture and stuff, so it was just our small stuff like pictures and books.”

  Benny was resting her hands on the edge of the bed as she leaned over to look at the paper Juno was working on. “They sure do give us a ton of paperwork to fill out. As soon as I finish a stack, they give me more.”

  Juno scooted up, wincing as she did, and sat with her back against the bed. “Yeah, but it’s all to help us find which alien will suit us best. I don’t want to screw that up and end up with a race I may discover I hate. These matings are for keeps, no divorce.”

  “Yeah, some of the girls are more than a bit freaked out by that. They did put in there that if a male abuses his female, he would be severely punished, and the female is allowed to choose if she wants him back or not.”

  Juno snorted. “That would be if they don’t execute the male for it. It’s a scary new world of rules that are different from the ones we grew up with.”

  Jeri and Kaycee hurried in with more papers. They handed each of them a set of two right before they plopped down on the bottom of the bunk that they both shared, which was next to hers. Juno looked down at the new papers in her hand. “What are these?”

  Jeri sat cross-legged on the bed as she answered. “These are the two races we get to choose from. They said there were only ten races they were allowing a mate from the first lottery. Only two are in our class: Zori and Nanstrahi.”

  Kaycee leaned sideways, against the headboard, with her legs bent so her feet were snug under her butt. She was looking down at the papers she held in her hands. “Oh, I like the Nanstrahi. They are so pretty.” She groaned as she spoke. “You remember that one we saw on the boob-tube.”

  Jeri rolled her eyes. “You aren’t giving up calling it a boob-tube, are you?”

  Kaycee looked up and smiled at her. “Nope.”

  “Anyway.” Jeri drew out the word before continuing. “I’m leaning more towards the Zori. They are a warrior race, which is something I can more relate to, rather than just something pretty.”

  Juno studied the papers. “It says the Nanstrahi are from a planet that is mostly a tropical climate.”

  “I love the tropics,” Kaycee said with a sigh.

  Juno looked up at Kaycee and studied her. “Then you should choose them.”

  Kaycee’s shoulders slumped, and Juno could see tears welling in her eyes. “I don’t want to be separated from you guys.”

  Juno leaned forward and put an arm around her shoulders. Jeri and Benny—also with tears in their eyes—sat beside her, and held her from the other side.

  “We’ll find a way to keep in touch,” Juno said with conviction. “Don’t settle for something less than what you want. We’ll always be your family, and all we want is for you to be happy.”

  Kaycee wiped away the tears that started to fall, and then wiped her hands on her jeans. “When do we need to decide?”

  Jeri leaned over and picked up a different sheet of paper. “By tomorrow, because they’re shipping the entire B class out the day after that, to designated bases, to prepare us for the different mating rituals. Class C leaves tomorrow, so they have to decide by tonight, and A class is going to be the last to leave.”

  Juno leaned back and looked at the papers
again. She flipped them over and back, but couldn’t find what she was looking for.

  “They don’t say what the rituals are for either of them.”

  “Guess we won’t find that out until after we can’t back out of it.” Benny said, drying her face on her sleeve. “Why are B and C going before A?”

  Jeri shrugged her shoulders as she continued to look over the paper she was holding. “It doesn’t say, but I think it has to do with several different variables. First, the A group is the smallest, which is weird because when we saw Paige, she said their class has six races to choose from. Even so, maybe they are waiting for more of them to show, before they ship them off. It could also have something to do with where they are sending us. Some closer, some further away. And maybe some of it depends on what the rituals entail. I could probably think of more reasons.”

  Juno grunted unhappily with what she just read. “Says when we choose, we’ll be getting yet another packet of papers that will tell us where we’re going and what we’re going to be doing there.” She handed the paper back to Jeri and sat back. “Anyone else feel like a plastic bag blowing through the wind?”

  Benny giggled. “Katy Perry rocks.” Her face grew serious. “If the C class has to choose by tonight, we should head over and see if Maggie could use some help deciding.”

  When the girls arrived at the barracks, Maggie crushed them in a hug.

  “I already chose.” She told them after they all sat down. “There was only one other race to choose from, but they wouldn’t be here for another week, and then, since they refuse to mate with us here, we would have to travel two weeks away. That wasn’t what I wanted, so I chose the Larent.” Maggie showed the girls the paper with the information on the race.

  The girls crowded together to look at the information and profile picture of a Larent male.

  “Oh wow, the scales they have are more like snake scales, and they’re iridescent,” Benny said.

  Juno smiled as she admired the picture. “You would think that would be creepy, but it’s actually quite beautiful.”

  The girls handed the paper back. Maggie shrugged a shoulder and looked down at the page in her hand. “I never had any problems with snakes, but I never thought they were beautiful before either. I don’t know if I can do this. I can’t even swim.”