Lab Tech Support

By M. A. E. 

“Your blood is purple.” I stared ahead, absolutely dumbfounded. “Your blood is purple,” I said again. I was going well over eighty miles per hour, and I’m ashamed to say I didn’t even see the road ahead.

“Shut up and drive!”

Somehow, I got us onto a highway. Draiyan directed me to a bridge, and I parked underneath it. In a movie, there would have been sirens and pulse-pounding music and screeching tires. My car radio was silent, as if in shock. No one had followed us. Places like this often serve as homeless camps, so I quickly scanned the area before returning to the car and my extraterrestrial passenger.

Draiyan slumped against the seat with his feet tucked under him, clutching his bleeding arm. His hands, usually covered by gloves, were pale lavender. Beige makeup partially obscured his face, but the exposed half grew paler with each passing minute as deep purple blood dripped over my car seats. They were vinyl; it would wash off.

I took a first-aid kit out of the glove compartment and went to work. Despite the profuse bleeding, it turned out to be a superficial wound.

“Did a bullet graze you?”

“I, um, sliced my arm on something sharp in the alley when we were running.”

Hope it wasn’t rusty. Can aliens get tetanus?

I tied off the bandages, poured water onto old fast-food napkins, and wiped down the center console and passenger seat while Draiyan scrubbed the sticky purple substance off his forearm and hands.

I crumpled the napkins in my fist. Cleaning the car was a waste of time. We had to ditch—no, burn it. It was registered in my name. My fourth alias, that is. With this, my latest identity would go up in flames. Witness protection couldn’t shield me anymore if I chose this path.

I could get a gallon of gasoline from the gas station we passed a half mile back. I glanced over at Draiyan. Maybe we could find some makeup, too. The left side of his face, where the concealer rubbed off, looked like a huge bruise. One stick-on eyebrow was gone.

“Your blood … is purple,” I muttered through gritted teeth.

“I wish you’d stop saying that. You know I’m squeamish.” He grimaced.

“Just my luck. One minute, I’m interning at a research lab. Now, I’m on the run with an alien with purple blood, and he’s squeamish.” I rolled my eyes in mock disgust.

“And my life is in the hands of a human lab technician who thinks I’m a wimp,” he challenged, raising the remaining eyebrow.

“A wimp wouldn’t have disguised himself as a human and infiltrated the same facility he escaped from. You did. Why?”

Draiyan stiffened. “I came here—to your planet—to gather information on your recent scientific and technological advancements…”

“You mean ‘steal intellectual property’?”

He frowned before continuing. “…to aid in creating countermeasures to weapons developed by the opposing side in our civil war and save millions of lives. Unfortunately, we weren’t aware of the tremendous advancements humans made in radar and spectral imaging since our last visit.”

Hence his capture a few weeks ago. Anxiety had flooded over me when agents in black suits had swarmed my workplace. I’d been in WITSEC since second grade, when my father agreed to testify against a powerful criminal and turned my life upside down. I was shocked that they weren’t there to uproot me once again, and neither I nor my co-workers were told why they’d stormed the lab. Only a few scientists were allowed to enter the room they sealed off.

“I broke in to download data off your servers and got caught,” Draiyan admitted.

“But you escaped.”

“Of course I did.” He grinned proudly.

“Those agents were furious the next day. They called all the lab workers in for interrogation. They wanted our alibis for the night before, but revealed nothing in their line of questioning.”

“I returned to retrieve the data and erase the files they had on me.” He pulled a thumb drive from his shirt pocket.

“I read those files. Did my own digging and came up with reports that described a pale purple alien who materialized in the IT department. They fail to adequately describe your personality.” I was assigned to train the new intern and soon decided he was an overconfident borderline idiot.

“At least you made it a week before getting discovered this time. Obviously, I wasn’t the only one who found it strange that the so-called med student nearly fainted at the sight of blood.”

“You knew?”

“I suspected. I didn’t know until you nearly trampled me while screaming ‘help!’ I had no idea parking on the street and coming into work through the back door would make me such a convenient getaway driver.”

“Thanks for getting me out of there. I can only imagine how much trouble this’ll cause.” He shrugged apologetically.

“Technically, I only broke traffic laws. I’m not aware of any legislation against aiding and abetting escaped alien lifeforms. But there isn’t a law to protect beings from other planets, either.”

“My rendezvous to leave earth isn’t until next month.”

“Of course.”

If I ditched him now, I’m sure I could talk myself out of this mess. But that clueless interplanetary tourist would get recaptured eventually. I’d been in the lab where he was held. I shivered. It was where they dissected mice.

Draiyan rubbed the last smudge of purple blood from his arm. “Now what?”

I stared down at the ID tag clipped to my uniform. “I never liked this name. I think ‘James’ suits me better.”

Draiyan and I watched the car burn for a minute before walking away. With a few touch-ups of drugstore concealer and a new pair of gloves, he looked human again. Of course, I had a million questions for my extraterrestrial friend.

I decided to start with one of infinite and immediate importance.

“Do purple-blooded freedom-fighting aliens like tacos?”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

M. A. E. is passionate about all things creative and can usually be found painting, baking, reading, writing, or discussing sci-fi film plots. She believes that imagination and creativity are gifts from God for His glory and our joy and encouragement.

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