I used to be writing a novel. Sort of. You see, it was many things tied into one thing that I decided was a book. I didn't have too much of a plan, just a lot of characters I thought were fun and a lot of concepts I liked. For a long time I'd just write and see where it took me. It was fairly entertaining, but after a while I realized that it was just going in every which direction and I wasn't having much luck tying everything together like I figured I eventually would. So I stopped working on it and turned my attention to other things. Some of the bits of the novel have become short stories, and some are getting adapted into a newer and more consistent story idea that I'll probably never have time to work on. Other bits I'll provide, stand alone, here.
Like this.

Chapter Five

It was a little too dark in the subject's room for ZeB's taste. From his position floating just outside the subject's third floor window he gestured with his three spindly gray fingers to FiTh, who was hovering in rear support position directly under the hazmat ship. FiTh was there to redirect any such field modulations as were required by the retrieval team ZeB was leading.

FiTh saw the signal and pulled some light down from the hazmat ship. An intense shaft of light only a few photons wide came down from the ship and struck him at the peak of his bulbous head. FiTh internalized and redirected the densely packed light, creating three powerful beams that shone into the small room of tonight's subject.

The window was open, so all ZeB had to do was quietly de-matter the thin metal mesh covering the opening. ZeB decided to leave the lighting on high intensity until after he and YiHz had climbed through the window. He felt that their thin outlines would make nicely eerie shadows, which would help set the mood.

Once inside, ZeB let the lights sweep across the room a few more times and then made a different gesture to FiTh. The lighting switched from three harsh beams to a diffuse bluish glow whose source couldn't be placed. The room itself was rather smallish, and the subject was sleeping on a platform elevated to nearly twice ZeB's height. These two facts allowed him to identify the subject as either involuntarily confined as a form of societal punishment, or as living here as part of the strange rituals that were considered pursuing what passed for advanced education on this planet.

ZeB was slightly disappointed that the subject was in a raised bed. The glaring lights couldn't have woken it up like they were supposed to and it probably didn't even see the retrieval team's ominously silhouetted entrance. ZeB led his retrieval partner, YiHz, through the floor's scattered array of foul smelling body coverings, clunky, unwieldy electronic devices, and other unorganized terran items.

When they reached the subject's lofted sleeping platform, ZeB could see by the human's biorhythmic field that it was currently in a deep but wildly fluctuating sleep pattern. ZeB generally preferred acquiring subjects that woke up when the bright lights shined through their windows. The ominous shadows in the eerie lights usually gave the subject the proper stunned awe.

Since this had subject stayed unconscious throughout the retrieval's beginning ZeB decided change the tone from foreboding and spooky to shock and sudden terror. In the time he'd spent on subject retrieval teams, ZeB had learned that a high level of anxiety and chill dread in the subject was ideal for ease of management, but at times when the ominous entrance failed it was most effective to attempt instant subject paralysis by fear. Once frozen in terror, the subject can easily be carried back to the hazardous materials ship for the night's experiments.

He had YiHz go back to the window to tell FiTh to change the light. When YiHz returned the room was almost totally dark, lit only sporadically by high-contrast yellow-white flashes similar in pattern to the occasional electric discharges in this planets atmosphere. Then the two of them took positions on opposing sides of the elevated platform, and levitated until they could easily observe the subject.

To ZeB the subject's body seemed, like most humans, overly long, angular, and in some places weirdly lumpy. It was also unpleasantly covered in areas with hair, in this case black-brown strands that were longest on its unhealthily small head. ZeB parted the subject's hair and pressed a small metallic disc to its scalp. The disc emitted a faint hum and the subject stirred slightly, muttering something faint and unintelligible.

The little disc was scanning the subject's cranium for the intricately rewoven neuron clusters that served as identification markers for terrestrial subjects left in the wild. The scanner found the nerve fibers it was looking for and sent information to ZeB's black, dome-like eye shields. On the inside curves of the ovoid eye shields he could read that the subject was human, male, answered to "BriAn CreNsHaw," and had been brought in only once before, as part of Xenobiologist GiYTeuR's basic genetic survey of this planet.

YiHz pointed out that the subject had recently suffered damage. There were a few small bone fractures and several places where the skin and muscle tissue was damaged. Worried that transporting the subject to the hazmat ship would aggravate these injuries, ZeB had YiHz smear some glowing blue biorepair jelly on the subject's wounds while he attached vibration inductor pads to its temples. The two thin inductor pads would put sound frequency vibrations directly into the subject's skull. This would serve the dual purpose of translating the words ZeB entered via the pads' control glove (which was incredibly thin and the specially color matched with ZeB's skin to be virtually undetectable) into human speech, and give the subject the impression of receiving telepathic rather than verbal messages. Once again, it was all about getting the subject awestruck and manageable.

Satisfied that the sleeping human was suitably prepared to be gathered, YiHz and ZeB hovered slightly lower. Their smooth, grayish faces were barely peeking out above the edge of the subject's sleeping platform. They were laterally even with its head, on opposite sides, so that whichever way this BriAn CreNsHaw faced he would be staring directly into one of their dark, mysterious pairs of egg shaped eye coverings. The way the subject was laying at the moment, it would be looking at ZeB when it opened its unnaturally small eyes.

Zeb placed his hand with the control glove under the elevated platform, pointed his fingers upward at the subject's cranium, and wiggled them in the activation sequence.

"Wake, BriAn CreNsHaw," the induction pads made the words reverberate in the subject's skull.

The subject mumbled incoherently and pawed blearily at its face. It shuffled around under its covering blanket, and eventually opened its tiny eyes. In one bright yellow flash of light ZeB could see the familiar look of slow, certain realization on the subject's face. He waited for it to turn to utter awe and finally grim acceptance and helplessness.

He kept waiting.

And waiting. The subject blinked leisurely and closed its eyes.

"Wake, BriAn CreNsHaw," ZeB repeated through the vibration inductor pads. "You are coming with us now."

The subject reopened its eyes and stared intently, though somewhat blearily, at ZeB.

"No," the subject yawned, rolling over and pulling the blanket back up close to its face, "I don't think so."

ZeB was very pleased that his black eye shields rendered his face expressionless in appearance. Behind them his eyes were wobbling bewilderedly in their sockets. This sort of response was unheard of in earth subjects. He wiggled the volume of the inductor pads slightly higher.

"You have been selected," the vibration inductors told the subject, "As part of an important series of experiments. You will come with us."

"Bugger off," muttered the impatient subject, "Lemme sleep." It opened its little eyes and was face to face with YiHz, who was peeling away the subject's sleep-cover.

The subject stared at YiHz for a moment, then looked back over its shoulder at ZeB. It shook its head disdainfully.

"C'mon guys," the subject yawned, "Just give me a break and let the probing wait until some other night."

YiHz placed his fingertips on the subject's chest and began reweaving his levitation field to include the subject.

"Hey, knock it off!" said BriAn CreNsHaw.

The subject easily brushed YiHz's arms away with one hand and shoved him roughly in the face. Since YiHz's levitation field was already in the unstable expansion phase, the push sent him careening backwards and he lost field concentration. YiHz dropped head-first to the floor with a soft crack.

YiHz made little mewling noises as yellow cerebral fluid leaked from his gray head. ZeB stared at YiHz in stunned horror as he floated down to assist him. BriAn CreNsHaw, noticing only that the alien faces were gone from his bedside, pulled his blanket back up to his chin and promptly fell asleep.

ZeB quickly placed a glowing pink biosealant patch on YiHz's head wound and extended his own levitation field to carry YiHz back to the hazmat ship. On the way, he began preparing his mission report, which would be the most difficult of his cycle.

"Subject designated BriAn CreNsHaw displayed incredible resistance to standard emotional paralysis techniques commonly used in retrieving human subjects. Damage to team member YiHz seems to be minor, but he must be inspected for earth atmospheric infections. It is unlikely that the human subject intentionally harmed YiHz through sentient malice. It was instead most likely acting under animal impulse reaction to irritant stimulus.

"As team leader ZeB I recommend slating human male subject designated BriAn CreNsHaw for dissection to study the biopysche source of its unusual behavior, as soon as the experiment queue permits. Due to the mission's non-retrieval of the specified human male subject, the scheduled Human Reproductive Endurance Experiment must be postponed. Return human female subjects designated PatRicia FOrd, EliZabeth HurlEy, TrAci LorDs, and TEA LeOni to respective natural habitats until replacement human male subject is selected."