Of Knights and Aliens

Chapter 27

"Dollywood." Alex's confident voice rings out in the alley.

Maggie stands next to her, watching as the slot in the door slides shut. The metal door creeks open despite the alien's suspicious eyes when Alex said the password.

Alex strides inside with Maggie half a pace behind her, who's just glad the DEO finally reached a consensus. Due to the others concerns about possibly causing a panic, they decided on this plan just minutes ago after what felt like hours of debating. Like they first agreed on, Maggie and Alex will be the semi-friendly faces that will kick the aliens out of their bar. If they can, which Maggie doubts and suspects Alex does as well, they won't tell them the true reason why.

The looks they get when they walk in are different than last time. Some aliens give them nods of recognition but most are suspiciously looking them over. And Maggie doesn't blame them, she and Alex aren't dressed like they were the other times they came here. They aren't exactly wearing casual clothes, instead they're decked out in their DEO uniforms.

Alex stops in the center of the room and nods to the people playing the background music. The band stops and everyone turns to look at Maggie and Alex with increasingly wary expressions.

"We need you all to evacuate." Alex's voice rings out in the otherwise uncharacteristically quiet bar.

No one moves. After a moment of silence, someone stands from where they were seated on a stool. "For how long?"

Murmurs arise from the crowd but stop when Alex opens her mouth to answer. "A few days."

Outraged and disgruntled voices steadily get louder.

"It's illegal to discriminate against aliens here, human. Or do you not remember your own mother's law?" An alien, the one that Maggie remembers Kara had jokingly called "fish head guy" when she was drunk, says angrily.

"I'm not doing this because I'm xenophobic." Alex says. Maggie mentally commends Alex for keeping her tone calm. "My sister's an alien, remember?"

"That doesn't make it okay to discriminate." Fish head guy retorts.

"That's not what I-" Alex stops herself and sighs. "Alright Maggie, you're up."

"I'm very tempted to say I told you so." Maggie murmurs to Alex before raising her voice and addressing the aliens in the bar. "We're not here to kick you out just for the hell of it or because we secretly hate off-worlders. Okay? We're not here to take away one of the few safe spaces you all have. We wouldn't do this for no reason."

"So what's your reason?" Another alien prompts.

"You're in danger." Maggie says, making eye contact with a few people in the crowd. "There are people, humans, who know about this place. So please, sit down and listen up. We'll tell everything you need to know."

***

The boy on his knees screams again when he sees the arrow that went straight through his hand.

"Gods," a woman groans. "Be quiet. Calm down, I'll get it out."

Lena opens her mouth to tell her she's doing it wrong but her words don't even start to escape her lips in time for them to hear it. Plus, she would give away her location. Lena winces in sympathy as the woman goes for the more painful, deadlier, and more damaging option. She yanks the arrow out and the boy howls in agony again. She should have broken the shaft of it and pulled what was left of the shaft out to avoid further damaging the area around the arrow. Now that boy will definitely never be able to fully use that hand again.