Maybe my mistake was blinking?
Now, Cora had every intention of getting on the bus. She'd left her cashier job, waited, and tried to get on the bus. But she certainly wasn't there now.
"What the Hell?"
It was a white room, maybe the size of a gas station bathroom. Definitely not the bus. At some point, she'd blinked, and in that span of time...
There was no way to rationalize this. Cora tried to talk herself through what happened as panic rose in her chest.
"I was at the bus station. The bus pulled up." She began pacing the white room, racking her brain. "And then I-"
A loud humming interrupted her. "Oh! Hi- hello Miss Human!"
Cora froze, mid-pace.
"I'm- I am-" There was a long pause. "We're-" It kept pausing, like it was cutting out. Or the speaker was nervous. The voice was coming from some kind of PA system, Cora reasoned. She waited for the voice to continue. It sounded layered, as if multiple people were speaking at once. "I'm sure you're very excited, sorry, nervous? But we're just here to learn more about your kind!"
Oh.
"Seriously?" Cora had figured it out, maybe. "Like... aliens?"
"Oh!" There was a furious rustling, accompanied by static. "A- Yes, that is correct! If you- you'll just step to the front of you, there will be a rain- oh, no- shower! That is the," There's another pause, with what sounded like a cough. "Decontamination process."
Cora didn't want to think about this too much.
Mom always warned me to lay off the energy drinks.
A cold, drenching, miserable downpour hit Cora out of the blue. Like someone had dumped a massive bucket of water on her head. She gasped, immediately inhaling some of the water. Choking ensued. It was in her eyes, in her ears. All she could do was flounder. A pair of hands seized her, and the water was wiped out of her face with a soft cloth. Everything was blurry, but there was something tall in front of her. She rubbed her eyes, blinking. There were three tall creatures in front of her. Much taller than any human. They all had four arms. One of them, slightly shorter than the others, seemed to be angry at the other two. Then it turned back to her. With the same soft, layered voice she'd heard before, he apologized to her. "I'm sorry, Miss. This officer should have waited before he started the decontamination process." He cast another sharp glance at the humanoid (officer?) on his right, who huffed and walked away. The one on the left continued patting Cora dry. Her panic subsided.
Everyone here seemed kind enough. She looked down at the hands of the one drying her. His, as she assumed they were all male. They all seemed to act like human men and were shaped the same way. His hands were the same color as the rest of him, a kind of soft brown color. Like a rabbit? Cora reached out to brush a single finger against his hand. He stiffened for a moment, then continued. It felt different than human skin somehow, and very warm. She risked a peek up at his face as he patted the towel against her hopelessly soaked sweater. His eyes were green, almost catlike.
This must be what rescue animals feel like.
The one drying her off sighed gently and began peeling her sweater off. Cora froze and looked around for the one that had spoken to her earlier. He wasn't around. There was no point in resisting. Cora raised her arms, letting him take it off. Immediately, his fingers dipped under the waistband on her jeans. His very warm fingers. She uttered a soft
oh
, causing him to pull back.
God, that was embarrassing.
"Sorry," she apologized before reaching down to unbutton them herself. The cold, wet fabric clung to her skin, and required peeling off. He had stopped trying to help her and was now looking away. All that was left was her underwear.
Am I supposed to take these off, too?
Cora wondered how similar these guys were to human men.
Well, time to find out.
She certainly wasn't staying in a wet bra. Quickly, she removed both. He reached out, took them, and took off running.
Huh.
"Oh-" The other, shorter one had reappeared. By the time Cora looked up at him, he was looking away, holding out what looked to be a set of flannel pajamas. She took them and started getting dressed. "So-" Cora was going to ask what she was doing there, but that seemed rude. "Do you have a name?" He paused, thinking. "Well... Our names don't really translate to English. But I picked a name that you can use. And you can call the other two by their job names. The one that was drying you off is the Engineer and the one who tried to drown you is the Officer. You can call me Ray."
Cora frowned. "What's your job?"