The Hybrid Girl (Andromeda Book 1)

Chapter 9

The girls recount the story of our attack to the adults, with Alex and Andre occasionally jumping in to add bits of information. I remain silent, feeling unable to even look at them. Carly and Norma listen intently and Norma gets extra perturbed when we mention the hooded figure. When asked if she has any idea who the alien that saved us was, she shakes her head.

"It wasn't you?" Leigh asks in surprise, earning a confused look from the rest of us. She explains, "well, since you're an actual alien too, I figured it was you, trying to look out for your daughter."

I scoff in response. As if she was actually looking after me. That would require her caring about me and there isn't a tiny bit of care in her cold, dead heart. Flitting about from country to country, living her best life whilst I was here, unravelling in the hurt that I was unloved by the woman that gave birth to me.

Look out for her daughter, my ass.

"As much as I want to protect my daughter, no, it wasn't me," Norma replies, sending me a longing look. She furrows her brows as if she's trying to figure something out in her head.

"That's not the biggest problem right now," I sigh, taking charge of the situation. "That chemical is harmful to humans. In every way. I couldn't clock it at first but a thought occurred to me. This guy isn't really a guy."

"He's an alien," Leigh-Anne continue and I nod, smiling slightly as she understands where I'm going with this. My smile grows as I recall her unknowingly following my train of thoughts before too.

"So we don't actually know what it will do to him, because he's an alien," Jesy concludes with wide eyes. I can see strong guilt shining in her eyes but I don't have time to comfort her because another question pops into my mind.

"How would he know what it does to an alien?" I wonder, stating another one of the million questions that have amassed in my mind, "it could kill him for all he knows."

"Things don't work on us Navitosapiens the way they do on Homosapiens," Norma says, "our bodies are different. Stronger. Especially those who are born back on our home planet. Some things that are fatal to humans aren't fatal to Navitosapiens, they could have the opposite effect."

A momentary silence takes over as we all try to take in what she just said. I've had a few more days to come to terms with all this extraterrestrial nonsense but when I turn to look at my friends, a small smile escapes my lips as I see their discombobulated expressions. Andre rubs his temples and Alex stares at the ground with wide eyes. Leigh-Anne and Jesy look dumbfounded.

"What?" Alex asks looking baffled. "Homo...? Navit...?"

"Homosapiens are humans," Jesy says, mainly for his benefit as everyone else already seems to understand that part. "Are you and Jade... Navitosapiens?"

"From a different planet?" Leigh adds awkwardly and I mentally face-palm.

"I thought the term alien implied that I was from another planet," Norma replies to Leigh and then turns to Jesy, "and to answer your question, yes. That is the human-given, scientific name for any creature from my planet. Universally, we go by Nirinox. And technically Jade is only half-alien. A hybrid, if you will."

"Or a Chimera," Alex suggests, his eyes dancing in excitement.

I let out a small chuckle and shake my head, "You watch too much Teen Wolf."

"For a teenage show, it is a lot more accurate than you'd expect it to be," Carly says and I roll my eyes.

"Guys, let's stay on task here," I assert, folding my arms, "we know that the chemical is harmful to humans, but we don't know what it will do to an alien."