Three Alien Generals

 In a world where everyone is the extreme of themselves, Jeremiah and Nikita speak of their benign captor J'onn Jo'nzz. J'onn would be a Captain not a General but it still fits.

“He's trying to make sense of us. More specifically, of me.”

“Does he know who you are?”

“In that I'm an alien. The rest? He has a nearly accurate picture of just about everything. And I'm starting to get the suspicion that I'm 15 degrees off in everything I know about him.”

“How do you mean?”

“Either he's extremely a-typical for his race or I got them confused to begin with.” She looked down. “Then again, he would've had even longer than I did to learn otherwise.”

Jeremiah looked sad. “I take it by 'to learn otherwise' you mean 'to learn the things living on Earth would have taught him'.” Nikita nodded solemnly, her straight auburn hair shaking slightly with the motion. "How long have you had to learn the conventions and realities of life on Earth?”

“I first landed on Earth not too long before you landed on the moon.”

“Okay one, you do not look that old. And two, how much older do you think he is?”

“My people live about 120 of our own years. I don't know how long that is in yours. And... he's been here for at least 300 years.”

“Okay how do you know THAT?”

“He's a Martian. No matter what else he is, he's a Martian. Which means it's been 300 years since he's been able to go home. But I don't know...”

“Wait, are you saying that depending on which race of Martian he is...”

“Jeremiah, if that man wanted us dead we'd BE dead.”

“Then why the hesitation?”

“Because while I'd rather believe that the way he's been talking to me is a result of him living on Earth for the last 300 years and not because I got it wrong which race of Martian was which, the thought that living on Earth has changed a person in this way and to this degree is not something I would otherwise hope.”

“Okay, now you really do need to sit down and vague out.”

“That sounds like a good idea.” She sat down on the floor, feet together, knees high, looking rather like butterfly or a very awkward spider. Her head dropped and she entered what Jeremiah knew to be a meditative state. Her knees were almost as high as her head was low. She could have been sleeping except her eyes were moving around, she was clearly aware of her surroundings. When the alien came in the next morning, Jeremiah could sense something was wrong. In the 20 something days they'd spent in his care, his attention was split evenly between Jeremiah and his charge. If anything he had payed slightly more attention to the middle-aged human male than the unskilled but confident female with him. Perhaps he'd recognized the custodial role Jeremiah had in her life. Something was different today: the man's eyes never left Nikita's face.

“Come with me, now.” He said to Nikita, who still did not raise her head. “I'll not ask again.”

Jeremiah stood between Nikita and the alien. “Leave her alone.” The man raised his hand, as if to backhand Jeremiah. In the last instant he pulled himself back. Jeremiah gave a grateful look before continuing. “Please, whatever you have planned for her, take me instead.”

“For all you know I'm about to take her away and execute her. Do you still volunteer?”

“No, but I know you're not going to. Nikita was right if you wanted either one of us dead we'd BE dead by now. What you want from us, is answers.”

“And it's about time I get them.” He took Nikita by the wrist. Jeremiah grabbed him by the shoulder and forcibly pulled him away. Strangely the alien looked both pleased and amused at the gesture. “Your actions are heroic, if remarkably unwise.”

'What do you want with her?' Why the sudden interest in her specifically?' 'Leave her alone you animal!' These expressions stretched themselves across Jeremiahs face in 2 seconds. He said none of these things. Instead he held out his hands in an emphatically non-threatening posture. “Sir, and I call you that because I have nothing else to call you, for what must be almost a month by know we have been nothing but civil with each-other, though exceedingly impatient. A friend of mine told me that even enemies can give each-other compliments. If you hurt her, my restraint will go right out the window. And I will probably die trying to take you down. But I swear on my life if you let her go, you can do whatever you want to me__in payment of that debt.”

This speech did not have quite the effect he'd intended. The green-skinned Martian actually backed away from his human charge and cast down his eyes. “You, care for her?”

“This surprises you?”

“Yes. What IS she to you? I mean...who is she to you?”

“Someone who has been tortured for years by a man far more blind than I have words to express. A man I served under for years and at one time looked up to. If there is one truth of which I need no convincing it is that she is innocent, that she is precious to me. You are not nearly as blind as Henshaw and yet you are. I cannot pretend to understand it. There is one more truth: I would die before I let her come to harm again. Please, she has been through enough, let her alone.”

“Among my people not to introduce yourself is extremely rude, even among enemies. From what I understand that is a tenet across the galaxies. We have given you our names Sajen. I'd appreciate the same courtesy. Nikita's voice came as almost a balm to the conversation.

“I do not understand.” Jeremiah admitted.

“Neither does our host...at all. He is almost as blind as Henshaw himself and he can freaking read out minds to learn the truth of our souls!” Nikita's voice displayed no anger as she said this. The only emotion to come through her voice was...regret. “You've figured out I'm not Enkaren. You must have known I was not a threat. It follows you thought Jeremiah was a threat, to me if not to yourself. I'm gonna ask a question I've had in my mind for a while: Phobos or Deimos?”

“You know the difference?” The Martian inquired, astonished beyond measure.

“I know what they are, not which is which. That was the entire problem on my part. In the early days of Mars there were two brothers, Phobos and Deimos. Their rivalry and bloodshed was the reason for the split of the Green and White Martians. I learned that from an Enkaren woman I once knew here on Earth. From which I understood that Phobos and Deimos were like Ishmael and Issac from the Old Testament. Except they split along such divergent paths they became two separate races rather than founding two separate religions.”

“You never knew if my kind were...Ishmael or Issac?”

“I've never met your kind before in my life. And the White Martian I met was...Hank's favorite example of how dangerous aliens could truly be. She'd been in that cell for over a decade when I met her. No one could hold completely to their morals after that.” She spoke with unrestrained bitterness. “In case you haven't figured it out yet, Henshaw was a Creech-ta. If not a Chrish-naka Sareth. And until now you seemed equally blinded.”

“Why do I get the feeling that if you had known I belonged to Deimos... you would have...”

“ 'Deimos Pah, Tar-ek Ni-cha.' would have been the first thing out of my mouth 3 days ago.”

“Could someone provide me with a translation?” Jeremiah asked, holding up his hand.

“What she said was that I've failed or disgraced the name of my progenitor. Except if I came from Phobos my behavior wouldn't have been failing my progenitor, but living up to his name. Believe me when I tell you that White Martians are Creech-ta to almost anyone.”

“ 'ignorant, arrogant asshole'.” Nikita translated.

“How in the name of rational thought are you speaking the Enkaren language so naturally if you are not, yourself Enkaren?!”

“Because it's my people native language as well!” Nikita replied, openly laughing.

“But you...you're not...” He rubbed his left forefinger against her temple, as if tracing something that should be there. “Are you Xavallen?”

“Why should that be of particular interest to you?”

The alien actually bent his back forward and backed away from Nikita. “I...my name is... J'onn Jo'nzz. And I must humbly beg your pardon.”

“I...do not understand. Please you owe me nothing. You might owe Jeremiah an apology for so completely misjudging him but you own me nothing!”

“Okay, I'm officially lost.” Jeremiah admitted.

“No less so than I.”

“You...you don't...” J'onn actually stammered.

“My parents taught me more about Enkarens, Brevaks, Zyerilians and such than they did about our own race. That's why I left.”

“There was a coming of age ceremony 2 years before I became a legal independent adult on my planet. But I never had one. My biological parents didn't think I was worth teaching my own races history and culture. So I ran away. And because I wasn't yet a legal adult by our planets laws that's what I was: A runaway.”

“I was as wrong about the two of you as this arrogant human you keep talking about was wrong about her. I am sorry. And I will FIND a way to make it right.” He left without another word.

A few hours later Jeremiah walked up the steps from the basement. Something he very rarely did. He saw J'onn sitting at a dining table, staring out the window. “Most humans, most races in the galaxies at all no matter how much they try to lift the head of another and put the needs of their friends first, would still put their own life, their own survival before anything else at need. Xavallens don't. They are, by comparison to their brethren, Friars and Philosophers.”