Loving the Alien

Author's Note: I just want to point out, before anyone points it out for me, that I did purposefully change a few plot details to bend the story to my liking. Example: in my version of things, the events of the film take place on a weekend, not on a Monday. And I've neglected the threat of the mysterious men who want the DVD from the house. Reviews are unconscionably appreciated. Oh, yeah, and I don't own anything.

Prologue

My name is Valerie Smith, and at the time of the story I'm about to tell you, I was nearly 22, and a junior in college. I was smart, I'd always done excellent in school, and my college ambitions were lofty. Taking courses in Psychology, Criminology, Criminal Justice, and Forensic Science, my college schedule was pretty tight. However, on this particular weekend, I'd decided to drive up from LA for a visit with my family. Little did I know then that this impulsive visit would change the course of the rest of my life.

One

Perhaps not the most important, but certainly the most symbolic of what I remember of that day, was the faded red pick-up truck near the driveway of the house. I like to think of that truck as a kind of crossroads. Had I been suspicious of the obviously out-of-place truck and said something to somebody - anybody - about it, then I probably wouldn't be where I am today. Yet, my complete obliviousness to this vehicle, my assuming it belonged to one of my seventeen-year-old sister's friends, changed my life. There's a kind of irony in that the simple act of ignoring something could ultimately lead to my freedom.

----

"Tommy?" Moving through the house, Walter Smith called out authoritatively to his youngest child. "Tommy, wha--"

"Hey, don't move!"

Walter stopped abruptly in shock as he moved around the corner and saw an unknown man in his house, roughly holding a hand over his daughter's mouth and pointing a gun at him. "No. No..." Walter's voice was beseeching.

"Don't move, man..."

"What do you want?" Walter asked.

The man, young, barely older than the girl he held, put the gun to her head, asking, "Who else is in the house?"

"Nobody..." Walter replied anxiously.

As if on cue, another man, older than the first, stepped calmly into the room, leading Walter's nine-year-old son in with him. Walter cursed, now seeing his youngest held hostage.

The man with the gun spoke again, moving the weapon back to Walter. "Where's mommy? Huh? Where's mommy?"

"My wife's dead..." Walter answered.

Suddenly, the front door opened, the sound echoing through the huge house. The men quickly turned to face the sound.

"Mars, the door."

Mars shoved the young boy towards his father and ran to the opposite wall, pulling a gun from his belt. Agilely, he moved from the wall and around the corner, gun aimed at the seventeen-year-old boy who'd just entered the house. Mars' posture relaxed and an exasperated look came over his face. "You really should listen to your brother."

----

Disregarding the red truck as I approached my father's house, I easily opened the front gate, parked my car in the large garage, and let myself into the house; I still had the code to the gate and my house key.

"Dennis, man, you can't do this!"

"I told you, don't use my fucking name!"

I opened the front door, and, looking around, saw no one. There was silence in the house. "Dad? Jenny?" I called inquisitively to my family as I moved further into the house.

"What the fuck?"

Hearing the foreign voice, I instinctively began backing away, closer to the front door. I hesitated, and that's when I saw Mars. He rounded the corner of the hallway and appeared before me, holding a gun.

Oddly enough, the first thing I noticed about Mars was not the gun he held, but his eyes. A deep blue-green, though shaded by the dim light and surrounded by his long dark hair, they looked brown, almost black. But, no matter what lighting, environment, or color, I've never seen eyes more emotional. As stoic and collected as Mars can seem, his eyes will never betray his internal feelings. They're perhaps his one weakness, his eyes, but those eyes soon became my weakness as well.

Looking back on the event, I think it was actually kind of romantic. We stood there, staring into each other's eyes, this instrument of fear and death between us, neglected for the brief moment we shared. Then I lost him; his eyes, his emotions, became guarded again, and he lashed out at me, grabbing my hair, and pulling me with him into the next room.

As we entered the room, however, he held me closer, his left hand surrendering its hold on my hair and moving to my waist. I could see the pain in my father's eyes as he now saw all his children in danger.

I was never close to my father like I was with my mother, but, since her death I'd tried to cut him some slack. He was doing the best he could, I knew that. I also knew that not everything my father did was exactly legal. For a long time I had expected something like this. Although I was suspicious at the age and immaturity of our attackers. Certainly not what I would have guessed.

Mars moved his gun to my neck now, and instinctively I pulled my head back, futilely trying to distance myself from the cold metal. In doing so, I'd simply moved that much closer to my captor. This was when I felt for the first time all the conflicted emotions - a kind of love, I suppose. Being so intoxicatingly close to a man who radiated such power. I was lost for a moment. Lost in thinking how good he smelled - cigarettes and leather - and how perfect his body felt behind mine. His stance was strong and unflinching. Almost inhuman, and perhaps I would have thought so, had I not felt his heat and remembered his eyes. I would have thought him inhuman, if I had been anyone else.

I knew, however, that there was more to Mars. More than just the weapon he still held to my throat. Not only had I seen a completely different world with that short glimpse into his eyes, but, I was a psychology major - I knew there was more to everyone. There was even more to Dennis, the inept leader of this poorly planned robbery, and there was certainly more to his younger brother Kevin, who was my sister's age. I was never given the chance to become acquainted with these two, however.

"What do you want?" I calmly asked Dennis, the one who'd earlier had a gun to my sister's head, though he'd released her after Kevin had shown up.

"Shut up," he snapped at me.

I tried again. "Just tell us what you want and--"

"Shut the fuck up." Dennis turned back to my father, the gun directed at him now. "Where are the keys?"

"Keys?" Walter asked, holding a frightened Tommy.

"Where are the fucking car keys?"

"In my office."

"Office. Go." Dennis directed my family into my father's office, giving Jennifer a rough push ahead of him. Mars let go of me now, and I looked back at him briefly before following the others. As was his custom, he walked with his head bowed slightly, his brown hair spilling over his face, guarding his ever-revealing eyes.

Once in the office, however, my father was hesitating in giving Dennis the keys. Dennis and Jennifer were both yelling at Walter, while Kevin looked anxious, and Mars stoic as usual. Tommy and I were sitting on a couch next to Mars. Suddenly, we heard someone at the front gate. The camera at the gate turned on.

"It's a cop. Dennis, it's a cop," Kevin warned.

Dennis started freaking out, which, as the day progressed, I would learn was normal for him. Dennis was nowhere near as poised under pressure as Mars, who at this time, had left my side on the couch and was on his way out of the house. My father was telling Dennis that everything would be fine; that he could talk to the cop and get her to leave. From my seat on the couch, I was straining to see out the window in my father's office, where Kevin was now standing.

Not paying attention to what Walter was saying to the cop through the intercom, I stood from the couch and moved so I could see through the window. I moved just in time to see Mars shoot the female cop at the front gate. At the sound of the second shot, Dennis started shouting and cursing again, and I sighed, sitting back down on the couch, not wanting to be in his way. I hugged Tommy, who promptly hid his face in my shoulder, wanting it all to be over.

We heard police sirens and several more shots. I reached out to Jennifer, who looked too scared to move. I pulled her onto the couch next to her brother. We watched our father again try to calm Dennis, telling him that he had contacts and could help him get out of this. Dennis abruptly turned to Walter, hitting him several times in the head with his gun.

Tommy and Jennifer screamed, running to our father's side. I felt detached. I hung back and watched the chaos from a distance, moving no more than simply to stand from the couch. It didn't feel real. Between the screaming voices of the two pairs of siblings, and the continuing sirens and shots from outside, it felt like a dream, like watching a movie or the news, like seeing it happen to someone else.