Backwater Girls from Backwater Worlds

Chapter 02

France. That was where she was headed. The captain had stuffed her into the backseat of a cop car, and she'd been escorted to La Guardia where she'd been placed into a private holding room to wait until it was time to leave. Two hours later, she and a few other girls were put on a plane bound for Paris. The flight had been . . . odd, to say the least. The private plane was incredibly luxurious and she wondered which of the politicians and government higher-ups who were also aboard, that it belonged to. The politicians and their attachés kept their distance from Rey and the three other girls, the curtain to their cabin drawn closed. The atmosphere on the plane was pretty somber and quiet-for the most part.

Rey had not looked at any of the other girls since she boarded and most of them returned the favor. She'd known that there would be others that shared some similarities with Rey . . . but knowing and seeing were two different things. They could have been her sisters, and Rey found it more than a little unnerving. The four of them all had the same dark hair, the same eyes and facial structure. It was like being in some kind of crazy fun house.

One of the girls, Bianca, was excited. She'd been on the airplane phone for almost two hours after the plane took off. Rey was now aware that she was from Mississippi and she was currently a student at a beauty school. The other girl been spinning every shade of hyperbole about whether or not she was a long lost princess or queen. Rey thought she was delusional but kept her mouth shut. Black Mask didn't seem like the type of person to go looking for someone who would have power over him. But then she'd only heard a modulated voice and seen a vicious looking mask. It wasn't much to go on.

She'd seen one of the ships from the airport in New York. All air traffic had been grounded but she'd overheard that there was some kind of communication going on between the government and the aliens. They were aware that the plane she'd left in carried at least one person matching the image. Were they watching? she wondered-scanning and probing their plane and looking?

Rey had her ipad and headphones out, and she couldn't help watching the video again as she nibbled on one of her chocolate bars. The man in the mask had spoken perfect english and she'd heard from some of the newscasts that the message he'd given had been spoken in over twenty different languages around the world. She'd rewatched the video in every one she could find on Youtube. Perhaps there was some clue as to why he was looking for this girl or perhaps she'd spot a giant mole that would disqualify Rey from the selection. She couldn't tell much from from the video except that the background was dark with low red light that shone off the almost checkered black fabric of his hood. And, seriously, who the hell dressed like that?

He looked human in form. He had a head and a torso with arms and his eyes seemed to be in the right place. But he could have purple skin with seething pustules under there. Rey had been around good looking people her whole life and if instagram had taught her anything, men and women weren't so different when it came to sheer narcissism. Black Mask was covered completely which didn't bode well for him in the looks department, as far as she was concerned.

She'd eventually given up on finding some way out of this and shut the machine down. Bianca was softly snoring in the seat behind Rey so the plane was quiet for now. The other two girls were reading or listening to music. Were they internally panicking like she was and just better at hiding it? You'd think a girl could pick up on facial cues from other people who had the same face.

A man in a navy suit came from the front cabin and passed by them. He inconspicuously looked all four girls over before continuing towards the rear where the bathroom was located. He didn't introduce himself or stop to speak, but something about the way he'd looked at them didn't sit well with Rey.

There was nothing to be done about it, she thought looking out her window again. Her eyes began to drift shut and it felt like only a few minutes passed when she was abruptly awoken by the loud voices of the other passengers. Bianca was oohing and ahhing over something in the seat behind Rey. They were still in the air but everyone was looking out the tiny windows. Rey blinked several times before looking towards her window and peering out into the dawning light of Paris, France-only it wasn't quite the right amount of sunlight. Everything was in shadow.