Over the next couple days, I discovered what the little alien liked to eat. It still wouldn’t come out of its blanket bundle, but it had no problem using its tentacles to pull food towards it. So far, it seemed to really like meat—mainly that’s all it would actually finish. It would snack a little on fruits and vegetables, but it never finished them. It almost seemed like it only went after the really fibrous greens and ate just enough of them to balance out its diet. Did the alien understand nutrition?

  I hadn’t seen any sign of the little eye again, and strangely the cage remained pretty much entirely clean except for some discarded food I’d need to clear out. The alien didn’t seem to produce any waste that I noticed. It didn’t seem to have any set mealtimes, it just ate when it wanted—a rather random schedule, and I tried to clear out the old food around that schedule, not wanting to scare it.

  Once though, it really freaked me out; I was pulling out the old fruit it barely nibbled on, and a couple tentacles quested towards my hand, and they gently wrapped around my index and pinky finger. My breath caught in my throat as I froze, worried it would be like that scene in Life when the alien snapped the scientist’s fingers and arm and eventually killed him. But it gave me just a gentle little squeeze, then returned back to the blanket bundle. I was sure I was reading into it wrong, but I swear the little alien seemed grateful.

  I continued talking to the alien, just nonsense honestly, talking about my hobbies and interests. It seemed to enjoy it—always stopped shivering when I spoke. I was convinced it was shivering when it was scared or nervous, so my conversation must’ve been calming. Maybe it was like how you’re supposed to talk to plants? Either way, I actually found it rather therapeutic myself, and with this new mission of taking care of an alien, my mental health was better than it’d been in a long time.

  Turns out we both needed each other.

  I had my physical and got bloodwork done and everything came back clean; no bleeding out the eyes, no bloody diarrhea, no alien cancer. Sure, earth doctors probably didn’t make it a habit of checking for alien contagions, but I was sure something weird would’ve popped up in my bloodwork if there’d been something sinister.

  On the third day of taking care of the little alien, the dreaded meeting I’d been expecting finally happened. Gramps was handling some errands in town, and Gram made it a personal protest to never answer the door, so it was up to me to greet the government agents.

  They looked pretty much exactly how I expected; dark suits meant to look casual, but their car was too fancy—totally Men in Black. There were two of them, both men, one was white and the other black—exactly like the movie.

  “Hello, we’re with Homeland Security. We were wondering if we could borrow a few moments of your time.” The white one said, flashing me some badge I would never recognize because who the hell actually talked to Homeland Security on the regular?

  I knew why they were here, obviously, but I tried to act how I would as if I didn’t—belligerent and railing against authority. I crossed my arms and glared at them, “What the hell is Homeland Security doing here? Lose a spy drone in the woods?”

  The black guy just chuckled, “No, all the spy drones are safely in the sky for now.”

  The white guy nodded, “I’m Agent Carlson.” He nodded to his partner, “This is Agent Buster.”

  I barked out a quick laugh, “Agent Buster, seriously?”

  Agent Buster heaved out a heavy sigh.

  Agent Carlson ignored it, “We were wondering if you noticed anything unusual during the meteor shower a few days ago?”

  I quirked an eyebrow, “There was a meteor shower?”

  Agent Buster nodded and pulled out some folded papers from his suit, “From our satellite imagery, we believe some orbital debris landed on your property.”

  I rolled my eyes, “Let me guess, some busted ass satellite with foreign or domestic secrets landed in our backyard?”

  Agent Buster smiled, “Something like that.”

  “We’re going to need to canvas the area; there’ll be a sweep and a study conducted by Environmental Services as well.” Agent Carlson said without preamble.

  I waved a hand around then recrossed my arms, “Don’t you need a warrant for this shit?”

  Before I even finished speaking, Agent Carlson produced a folded paper from his suit pocket and presented it to me in a rather official fashion, “Here’s the warrant.”

  I gave the warrant a quick once-over, “Do we get a reward or something if you find your spy shit on our property? A finder’s fee?”

  “We’re the ones who’ll find it.” Agent Carlson insisted.

  “In the meantime, we’ll be cleaning up your property of any debris—a free government cleanup job isn’t a bad reward, right?” Agent Buster offered nicely.

  I rolled my eyes, “Whatever, just stay off the farm—we don’t wanna see you lurking around while you do your espionage cleanup.”

  Agent Carlson’s mouth was a hard line, “We’ll be out of sight, trust us.”

  I gave them an icy smile then closed the door in their face. I watched them from the window return to their car before I released the tension built up in my chest. Seriously, what the hell was I doing? I was just a normal guy, now I had a secret from Homeland Security? To what end? There’s no way I could keep the little alien a secret forever. How would this all turn out?

  “Who was it?” Gram asked, causing me to nearly jump out of my skin.

  “Government spooks, something about environmental studies of the woods.”

  Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

  Gram harumphed, “Probably looking for oil or something, and if they find it they’ll try to take it from us—kick us off the property without one red cent.”

  I went to the den and knelt down to scratch Charlie behind his ears—he slept through the whole thing, “Should we be worried?” I asked, knowing full well this wasn’t about oil and we damn well should be worried.

  Gram waved it off, unconcerned, “Wouldn’t be the first time your grandfather had to chase some miscreants off our property with his shotgun.”

  I smiled but didn’t say anything, knowing it would absolutely be the first time it would involve aliens.

  ***

  I headed back to my room, weirdly feeling like seeing the little alien might reassure me. Well, not really see it, unless I was lucky enough to catch a tentacle. I sat down next to the tank and saw the little bundle of blankets was shivering again. “It’s okay, sweet-thing, I scared off the evil government creeps.” I said gently, and right away the shivering slowed and eventually stopped.

  I really did want to see the alien again, but I knew better than to force it. A big part of treating injured animals was letting them control how much they were willing to be involved with you—nothing could be forced unless it was lifesaving. It might take a while, but hopefully the little alien would come to trust me eventually.

  I realized there really wasn’t anything in the tank for stimulation—just a bundle of blankets, rocks, sand, water and food. I decided to grab some old dog toys Charlie had long since abandoned and put them in the tank. I put in a chewed-up ball, a little tied rope, and some jingling stuffed animal. I watched to see if the little alien would react to the toys, but the little blanket bundle started shivering again instead.

  I let out a sigh, “It’s okay, they’re just toys, something for you to play with.” I tilted my head to the side, “Do you understand fun? Play?” I really had no idea how much the alien understood from me—probably nothing. It was more than likely just my gentle tone that soothed the creature. And as always, as I spoke, the shivering stopped.

  I went over to my laptop and got to work on some writing while keeping an eye on the tank to try and catch a glimpse of a tentacle, but no dice. I realized the alien was bundled up tight and wouldn’t be making an appearance anytime soon, so I decided to put all my focus on my work. I’d been working on a screenplay over the last decade I was constantly revising—a horror movie with an amazing twist ending that made me work backwards to turn the twist into a full story. It was probably shit, but I enjoyed working on it—I had a thousand interests and flitted back and forth between them all constantly. Before my breakdown, I was always spending time on some half-finished project and skipping onto the next. To be perfectly honest, that’s why I got into the fire service in the first place; I wanted a job that only worked like 10 shifts a month. Work a 24-hour day at the fire station, then spend the next couple days completely free at home to pursue my passions—I never wanted to be a career medic or firefighter, it was supposed to be a day job.

  And yet it drained the life out of me and killed away so much of my passions…

  I got quite snacky whenever I was writing and reached over for a chocolate bar on my desk. I took a couple bites before I looked up to see a little golden eye peeking at me from the bundle of blankets in the terrarium.

  “Oh shit!” I said excitedly and jumped up to the tank. When I got close, the little alien flitted right back into the bundle, its eye hidden once more. “No no, it’s okay sweetie. I promise I’m not going to hurt you.” I said soothingly, but the alien remained hidden.

  I sighed and returned to my desk and was about to take another bite of chocolate when I saw the little eye glaring at me once more. I looked at the eye, then the candy bar; I waved the candy bar back and forth, and sure enough, the little glowing eye followed it wherever it went. A wide grin spread on my face, “No way…”

  I got up from my desk and slowly made my way to the terrarium, keeping the chocolate before me the entire time. I broke the chocolate into separate sections and dropped one into the tank. A couple little tentacles quested out slowly, curiously, and when they held the chocolate, they pulled back rather greedily, and the alien disappeared into the blankets as it ate the chocolate. After only a couple seconds, the eye reappeared and looked up at me expectantly. I put another piece of chocolate into the tank, this one a little farther away. Moving faster than ever before, the greedy little tentacles snatched up the chocolate and ate it right away—so fast the little eye didn’t even have time to disappear.

  I laughed excitedly, “The little alien loves chocolate.”

  I put another piece of chocolate into the tank, then another and another, always farther away, trying to coax the alien out of its blanket bundle. But no matter how far I placed the chocolates, the tentacles had no problem stretching that far. Growing bold and desperate, I placed my hand in the tank holding a piece of chocolate. The little tentacles snaked after my hand, but I kept it closed so it couldn’t get to the chocolate.

  “You’ve gotta come to me. Come get the chocolate.” I insisted, moving my fist a little and barely opening my hand so it could see the chocolate.

  It was definitely a risk, but I was very thankful to discover the alien was being gentle with me—or maybe it was just weak, but when it wrapped its little tentacles around my hand, it could barely move me with soft little touches. “Come on, sweet-thing.” I said gently.

  The little glowing eye looked up at me, then back down to my hand, and it almost seemed like it came to a proper decision, and with a look of determination, the little alien finally freed itself from the bundle of blankets.

  Calling it alien was definitely appropriate—nothing else fit. It seemed like a mix between a squid and a jellyfish, a ball of black tentacles with a two-pronged translucent veil draping around it almost like floppy rabbit ears. Its core still had all those twinkling little white stars that seemed to flash and shimmer. It was a little bigger now than when I first found it, but not by much. Its glowing eye was placed in the middle of a break in the tentacles. It moved in a strange sliding kind of way that reminded me very much of an octopus. It was slow and cautious the entire time, and when it was right before my hand it slowly wrapped all its tentacles around my hand, wrist, and even forearm.

  My breath was coming out short and quick, I was very nervous now but tried to show confidence and command—like you’re supposed to with most animals. Slowly. I opened my hand to reveal the chocolate. Strangely, the little alien didn’t lunge for it like I thought it would; it looked up at my face, as though asking for permission—perhaps trying to verify I wasn’t trying to trap it. “It’s okay sweetie, go on.” I urged quietly.

  The alien climbed into my hand on top of the chocolate. I couldn’t see its mouth—no idea what it looked like—but it felt some kind of suckling on my palm that tickled a little. I couldn’t feel anything sharp—no beak or teeth I could detect. It was quick in eating the chocolate, and when it was done, it moved off my palm, but kept its tentacles wrapped around my hand. I smiled at the little critter, “That was the last of the chocolate for now. I’ll get you more later, but not too much—don’t want to make you sick.”

  The little alien kept looking up at me, holding onto my hand as it was, I got the feeling it was starting to trust me—it knew I wasn’t going to hurt it. I decided to continue my boldness and reached my other hand into the tank to try and pet the little thing, gently stroking my fingers against the floppy long veils. In response, the little alien closed its eye and seemed to trill in a cute, musical sort of way; it was hard to describe the noise, almost like a bird if it was supposed to be a fish—if that made any sense. It was a foreign kind of sound, but it was soothing—I realized it was being soothed, and the noise it made was portraying that.

  I had a brilliant smile on my face the whole time I was stroking the adorable little alien as it made that beautiful trilling sound. At that point I didn’t care about the government or what would happen in the end, I was going to take care of the little alien—I would keep it safe, and nothing was going to stop me.