A dauhter must find the courage to tell her military father that she believes there is an alien conspiracy.

“I have to be sure you are my father.” She stared at his face for any signs of mistrust.
“What, you think I’m an alien,” he said raising his hands and wiggling his fingers about his head, partly grinning. “I’d expect nothing less of you. You are a chip off the old block.” Charles didn’t hesitate and walked into the kitchen and pulled a butcher knife from the drawer and returned to Mera in the living room. “Here,” he said as he sliced into his arm, wincing slightly. “See, no alligator skin under there.”
“Snake skin.” Mera said.
“Oh, of course, let’s keep our reptiles in order.” Charles said.
“You can make fun if you want dad, but this is about the most scared I could imagine any one could be,” Mera confided.
“It’ll be all right. We’ll get them before they get us. I promise,” he told her, squeezing both her shoulders between his large gruff hands. “There’s one more thing, my dove, you’ll know a friend if they say to you, ‘The Moon Is Dark’. It’s our pass code; they’ll also know you as a friend.”
“Pass codes, men, comrades, have you been planning something for a while?” Mera asked, surprised by his readiness.
“What do you know that you aren’t telling me?” She nearly pleaded of him.
He tipped his head down slightly. “About a year ago, there was a woman I met. We became close friends, very close.”
“You were dating someone and I didn’t know it? Why didn’t you tell me?”
Charles held up his hand to stop her. “It all developed so quickly, I was nervous at first that you would think it was too fast to be serious about someone. I felt almost foolish that I had fallen for her. She was quite a few years younger.” He put his forearms on his legs and interlaced his fingers and leaned forward.
“So, what happened? You broke up because she was too young?” Mera pushed.
“No, but she was ten years my junior and as far as I knew she was a data sorter, you know, cataloging new files and information technology systems. Sort of a librarian of the techno age.” Charles cleared his throat. “She was spending the night, as she did a couple times a week. I had gotten out of bed to get a drink and accidentally knocked her I.D. pouch onto the floor. When I picked it up the little clip that held her badge on was broken and flipped over. I went to see if I could fix it and saw a small recording device on the back of it.”
“A recording device? Why would she have that?” Mera questioned as she began pacing across the floor.
“At first I thought it was a mistake and that she might not even know it was there. That maybe that was part of their surveillance for people in her line of work. Working so closely with sensitive materials.” Charles sat back in the chair. “I didn’t confront her right then, I’m not sure if it’s because I didn’t want to know or that I didn’t want a confrontation in my apartment building.”
Mera could feel her heart hurting for him. “I’m so sorry, dad. Do you know if she was recording you or was it for someone else?”
Charles stood and turned away from Mera. “It was to try and record me and my friends. We’ve been snooping and a few of us have been caught in places we shouldn’t have been. Believe me, I’m sure. That’s enough for you to know!” Charles said, raising his voice and turning quickly to face her.
“You can’t tell me all that and then not tell me what happened between you two. Do you still see her?” Mera continued to push. “So you asked her and she just told you?” Mera needed to know the full story.
“Damn it girl, she’s dead!” He stopped and closed his eyes, wrinkling his brow. “I killed her.” Charles sat on the arm of the chair and began talking more slowly and softer. “A couple nights after she left I asked her to take a walk with me, I wanted to understand why? She agreed and we walked out by the edge of the big dunes. Charles shook his head. “It was obvious by her reaction that she knew. She flew into a rage, yelling that I had invaded her privacy and that I shouldn’t have found it.”
“She told me she actually worked as a Security Officer for the Circle but since she hadn’t gotten any good evidence against me, would surely be demoted. She was quite angry with me for that.” Charles put his hands on the arm of the chair and began slowly rocking. “This next part I’m not too proud of, my sweet daughter. You see I got angry that she had lied and used me. I guess I felt like a silly old man used by a young woman, very stupid. I grabbed her arm and jerked her around a bit. She kicked me in the groin and pulled away, falling back over the low guard rail and into the sand. Her rather potent kick winded me for a minute or two. By the time I had caught my breath, so had she, she was sitting up in the sand.” Charles got up and walked over to the window in the living room and looked in the direction of the dunes. “You see, I buried her in those dunes that night.”
Mera spun around and looked over at her father who was still peering out the window. “Oh my god! You killed her for using you to get ahead in her career?” Tears flooded her yes.
Charles turned around and the wrinkles deepened on his forehead as he spoke. “Mera, I’m not that straight forward of a monster. When she fell she tore her leg open a bit and I saw the grey blood seeping out. At first I wasn’t too surprised since I’ve seen some people’s blood affected by the poor atmosphere. Then I knelt down to help her and saw that second layer of skin just like what you’ve seen.” Charles shook his head and shivered slightly. “It was the eeriest feeling I’ve ever had. She let out a shriek like nothing I’ve heard and flew at me; like an animal. I just reacted; I began to choke her and I guess I was squeezing pretty hard because I suddenly heard her neck snap and I knew she was dead and that I had to get rid of her. If they found her they could have easily traced her back to me. By the time they found her out there, the body was too decomposed to leave much evidence that could track her back to me.” Charles could see the shock on Mera’s face. “I had to do it, it was her or me.”
By Brenda Munday Gifford
Author: The Charon Covenant