guys at this level of attractive belong in the mythical category (his differences to humannoid-ness matter not in the face of the way his hip bones fit under his Apollo’s belt like he’s been sculpted with interlocking parts), which means he’s basically a unicorn.
Unicorns aren’t supposed to make girls cry. It should be a rule. (Then again, he has two horns. Maybe bi-horns do make girls cry and that’s why there are no legends of bi-horns, no matter how hot they look.) But his words apparently do more cutting than a deli counter meat slicer.
So why hasn’t anyone hauled his ass out of here and put a nice boss in his place? Why the heck are the women coming back day after day and putting up with his mean word-slicing-ness? I can’t say for sure, but I think this is a case of the strange and wonderful power of attraction.
Nobody is going to tell a man this beautiful to leave. Everyone is hot and bothered yet terrified at the same time.
But anyway, the objective he nonverbally required of us was simple: ogle while you work. So that’s what I did. I kept my head down—mostly. I chastised my eyes when they would sneak peeks every time they heard a masculine grunt of effort. The alien did me no favors by lifting heavy things and sometimes throwing heavy things.
Despite this, I did good. I didn’t fuck up and lick him even when he moved into my space. I was having quite the you-behave-damn-it discussion when we’d reached for the same general area.
I knew I’d screwed up though when his hand froze, his fingers—and thereby all his killing-claws—had spread, his arm extended, muscles leaping like he was about to rake his sharp points over me for not getting myself out of his space even though technically he’d been the one to encroach on mine.
I’d done what prey do in the face of a vicious predator: I retreated. Fast. (P.S., watching him from the back is a real fine view too.)
Therefore, I’d been stunned when he brought me the drink.
He didn’t have to do that. So far as I could tell, I was the only one he’d brought anything for. Past experience set me up for guessing he’d noticed my one-arm status and felt compelled to do something.
I would have stopped and gotten something myself, but all anyone can talk about is how serious this guy is about working. And I get it. He’s the boss. If you want to be the best, you have to earn your way, and it’s clear he’s done that. He’s head honcho, and he doesn’t slow down.
I didn’t slow down either, because I can’t afford to. I figure it’ll take me twice as long to collect the same amount of rocks as someone with two hands, therefore, I better hustle twice as hard. And that’s fine. I’m no stranger to stepping up my pace in order to break even.
But everything stops when Bash makes his cripple joke.
Even Bash stops. Actually, Bash looks stunned.
...I don’t think he knew. I don’t think he noticed—which is not as unbelievable as it sounds. Just putting it out there for the record, I have almost an arm-and-a-half.
(That would be between both sides, not like one extra-long arm on one side. Just to clarify.)
Although it doesn’t fill an entire shirt sleeve, people not noticing that I only have ‘one arm’ happened to me on Earth too, especially when I wore hoodies or bulky sweaters, where a partially empty sleeve didn’t look empty or limp, just maybe a little stiff. Your brain expects two arms, so you see two arms.
And now Bubashuu, who insults and talks down to the weak humans so much that he’s famous (or make that infamous) for it has dropped a Bash-ism, a thing everyone warned us he’d do. But he must not attack us personally—because there is not one person or alien here who isn’t suddenly staring at him in shocked disapproval.
All the girls are giving Bash some serious ‘you’re an asshole’ glares, which warms my heart. Because hey, they’re protecting me! This means they like me! But the males here, the other aliens, they’re giving Bash killing looks. This makes me a little uncomfortable. Although I appreciate that there are aliens who will stand up for me if I need it, no one needs to die just because Bash didn’t notice one human was not like the others. Actually, I’m pretty darn happy the great Bubashuu didn’t see