“Is she… supposed to come with us?” Mika’s hand bands my arm and not out of fear. She sounds… excited.
“I think so? Maybe… look.” I point to her left wrist. A display is set into her wrist, framed by her dense orange scaling.
“She’s an alien .” Mika practically squeals the last word, vibrating.
“And she’s in bad shape.” Half of her body looks scorched. She was in an explosion, maybe whatever blew her through the door. Her other half is scored with thousands of small cuts. None of her wounds are bleeding, somehow; something about her physiology?
The alien convulses once, lifting free of the ground, and I get the briefest glimpse of a huge gash across her back, a cut that could only be made by a giant blade. “The Shepherd.”
Mika swallows. The back wound oozes dark red blood, thicker and deeper hued that human, but I’m still surprised to see the color. Considering her scales, I pegged her as a reptile of some kind.
Mika gathers a nearby tablecloth, and I lift the alien by the shoulders as gently as we shove the material behind her to soak up blood. There’s no staunching it, though, and we sit back, helpless, as the alien groans again, claws at the ground. Her fingernails are far shorter than when she tore through the door, but they’re still deadly sharp, and as she runs her hands across the floor, she digs little furrows into the metal. “What can we do for her?”
“I don’t know,” Mika says, brow furrowed. She rests a hand to the alien’s forehead and swears. “She’s burning up. Crazy bad. Or…” She shrugs. “Maybe that’s natural for her? I have no idea.”
Before I can answer, there’s a hum above us. The ceiling peels back above the alien, and a familiar orange, pulsing light lowers from a dock in the ceiling. The healing rays are bright, stronger than any I’ve seen so far. “Damn, not fucking around this time.”
“They were stronger before. When you…” Mika swallows. “Your arms.”
“Ah.”
We watch rapt as wounds close before our eyes. Slices in the alien’s incredible scaling close like she’s never been injured. The burns across her torso fade, and a rainbow of color underneath bursts forth, incandescent in the light. Her breathing steadies.
“When she wakes up, be ready,” I say. “If she went all Kool Aid man on the door, I don’t think we’d stand much of a chance. Stay calm, soothing tones. No karate moves.”
“Maybe we should pour some of that liquor down her throat,” Mika teases, but her words are tense. She’s half dressed, I’m not at all, and we’re both weaponless.
We crouch next to her, ready to help her, subdue her… something.
When her eyes snap open, everything goes to shit.
One powerful arm snaps out and smashes Mika’s shoulder.
She cries out and tumbles across the room and into the hot tub, headfirst.
“Mika!” I spring up to grab her. If her arm is broken, if she hit her head in the water…
The alien has other ideas. She flows up from the floor, quick as a viper and crushes my throat. I gasp, choke, struggle to get away, but she squeezes tighter and pulls me close. “Stop struggling,” she orders, her words sibilant, lilting, and almost a hiss. “Answer my questions and I will kill you quickly.”
“Mika,” I gasp, pointing to the thrashing water.
The alien spares her a glance. “If she is strong, she will live. For a little while.”
I swing for her, try to catch her unawares across the face. She’s like liquid, tilting her head around my fist. She answers with a punishing squeeze, a few long seconds where I start to feel purple.
The lights overhead pulse madly, and I glance upward as the alien releases her pressure. A bank of them have opened over the water, too. Thank Christ.
“Now,” the alien says. “Who are you? Why have you brought me here?” She holds me at arm’s length, taking me in. “Human. I should have been more cautious. Is this your revenge?”
I can’t answer, have no fucking idea what she wants or what she’s talking about.
She laughs to herself, a bitter choking exhalation. “And to think I tried to help. ”
Mika’s splashing slows and stops.
The lights… shouldn’t the lights save her? I struggle to pull away.
My captor’s grip tightens. The lights heal me as fast as her fingers crush and it’s a distinctly unpleasant feeling. “Please. Let me help her.”
The alien turns her head, taking in the pool. Her eyes narrow. “Watch.”
I follow her gaze, terrified of what I’ll see. Mika’s body, floating face down. Or the water, crimson with her blood.
Instead, an arm bursts forth, clawing at the edge. Then another. Mika pulls herself free, coughing.
I sag. I’ve never been much for praying, and I don’t know if God or anyone else can even hear me in this place, but I send thanks into the nether all the same.
Mika clears the water, dripping and bedraggled. In her eyes there’s nothing but murder. She staggers toward us and I put one hand up, warning her back. But she doesn’t stop. I don’t know if she can be stopped.
The alien watches, bemused. “One more step, and he dies. You can answer my questions just as well as he.”
“Oh, shut the fuck up,” Mika says. She comes on with shoulders hunched like she’s ready for war and stops inches away from the alien. She holds up her wrist, puts her glowing display right in the alien’s face.
00:31:27
“Look familiar? We’re just like you.”
The alien’s eyes widen, and she lets me go.
“Now, if you’ll use your goddamn brain for two seconds,” Mika says, spitting fire, “and think, you’ll realize we didn’t chase you here, we didn’t attack you, and that thing that tried to kill you also tried to kill us. So…” she trails off, waiting.
The alien’s eyes grow distant. “A connection.” She sharpens, recoils. “To you? To two humans ? This is some sort of cruel prank.”
I rest my ass against a nearby high table and laugh. It hurts where Syl’s fingers bruised my larynx, but the healing lights are already fixing me up. “We’ve been saying that since we got here. But here we are and so far, there’s no sign of getting out.”
“Do you have a name?” Mika asks.
The alien stiffens and considers us. I see the look in her prismatic eyes: Are we worthy?
She utters a long string of syllables and a few guttural clicks.
Mika and I blink at each other. “Uhh… I think I heard ‘Syl’ in there?”
She nods. “Syllara, yes. That is the name bestowed by my broodmother when I fought my way from the clutch. It indicates I killed ten broodmates in my efforts.”
I gape. Mika makes a dial tone sort of noise.
Syl smirks. “Not really. It means tempest in my language.”
“Seems fitting,” Mika murmurs. “What was the rest of that?”
“My family line, the place I was born, my father’s rank, the season of my birth, the –”
“All that?” I shake my head. “Let’s go with Syl.”
“Sufficient,” she says, shaking her head like I’m slow on the uptake. She's an alien, but the movement familiar that it makes me wonder if some things come naturally to all humanoid races.
Humanoid races. Here I am, making mental observations about a fucking alien like it’s not crazy that she’s standing in front of us right now. I see why Mika was so excited before.
This place has really done a number on my head.
Syl holds out her closed fist. “And your designations?”
I reach out, awkwardly grip her fist and shake it. Syl draws back as if I’ve slapped her. What was I supposed to do? Nothing now but to push on. “I’m Sam. My dad’s rank was asshole and I’m a Taurus.”
“Sam,” she says, hesitant, turning the S into a long hiss. “What is a Taurus?”
“A bull. Crazy strong beast.”
“Well done.”
“And I’m Mika.”
“Mika,”
Syl says, equally slowly. She squints at Mika’s face. “You’re a different race?”
“Mhm.”
Syl nods. “A heartier one than Sam.”
“Snap,” Mika whispers, glancing at me.
“Strange designations,” concludes Syl.
“Normal, where we live,” I say, daring a wink.
Syl mimics me, closing and opening one eye with comic slowness. Then she shakes her head. “Earth. Sol system. Yes.”
“Where are you from?” I ask. “Not all that other stuff that was part of your name. Just the planet?”
“Threvia. You would not cite it on your stellar maps. It is… distant.”
Mika’s grip around me tightens. “You knew we were human. If we’re so far from you…”
Syl looks at Mika like a frustrated geography teacher. “Is it out of the realm of possibility to you that we might have the ability to observe other species?”
Mika isn’t backing down. “No, not out of the realm of possibility. Just unlikely. The universe is fucking huge, and if you’re so far away …”
Syl considers her. “You are savvy. And he is strong. I can see how you have survived this long. You are both worthy.”
I’m about to point out she didn’t answer Mika’s question. My observation dries up when Syl sidles closer. Her movements are languid, comically so. It would be funny, if she wasn’t the most exotically beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
“Ah… What are you doing?”
Syl runs one long finger along the stubble at my jaw. “Yes, definitely worthy,” she says, her words low. She slips out her tongue. It’s pink and slightly mottled, glistening. And it keeps coming. Her tongue stretches, a foot long, two, then three, bridging the still air between us as Mika and I stare, wide eyed. Syl runs it along Mika’s belly, a slow, wet pass that trails up between her breasts.
I open my mouth to speak and can’t. I watch transfixed as Syl’s tongue tastes Mika and retracts. “Mmm. Delightful.” She flicks her tongue over me, runs it down my chest, parting the smattering of hair. It’s not rough like I expected; it’s slightly pebbled, just enough texture to drag with pleasure I can’t deny.
She runs it down my belly, and I can’t move, can’t believe this is happening, feel like I’ll wake up in a moment. Syl’s tongue flicks lower, running across the top of my cock. She halts and purrs from low in her belly. Her tongue wraps around me, deliberate.
“What… are you doing?” Mika’s question breaks the moment. “Get your… Get off me and get off him!” She smacks Syl’s tongue away, breaking contact with my shaft. “We don’t know you. Two minutes ago you tried to kill us.”
I glance to Mika. Thank you I tell her with my eyes. The sensation wasn’t unpleasant, but this is all too fucking weird.
“And then we exchanged designations. I thought we were civil now.”
“Middle ground,” Mika grumbles.
Syl dances back a few steps, her tongue retracting like lightning until it’s a normal length. She licks her lips and closes her eyes in delight. “You two are pleasant and sensory–”
“Look,” I manage. “Where we come from it’s customary to… have some conversation. Maybe ask before you go…”
“Probing,” Mika finishes.
“Fascinating,” Syl says. She continues backward until she falls slowly against one of the beds in the room, and then lays backward across it. “I’m not well versed in human mating customs. And my people are far less modest.” She appraises us. “You two are clearly warriors, and we are meant to battle through this together,” she says, tapping her wrist plate with a dark fingernail. She wriggles further onto the bed, spreads her long legs wide. There’s nothing between them, just smooth scales, but it doesn’t diminish how dirty and how inviting her snakelike movements are. “Logic dictates that as the strongest, we should mate.” She takes another look to her display.
00:27:16
Syl nods. “We have time.”
This time, Mika’s speechless. Her face is brighter red, and her mouth opens and closes.
I can’t tear my eyes from Syl’s long body as she stretches like a cat, rolling over to lift her ass from the bed. She’s trim, and despite her hard scaling her ass is perfectly round, begging for my hands. I cough and turn away. “That’s enough,” I manage. “We’re not… mating.”
Mika still doesn’t speak, but there’s something speculative and a little excited when she tears her eyes from Syl. “Yeah, this is… messed up? But also, we said never to a lot of stuff before we got here. I did. I bet all of us did. Never say never and… anyway. And we need to get ready. Get dressed. The next trial…” She trails off.
Syl leaps up with grace. “Understood. We can mate later. Ready yourselves.”
“Wait, wait,” I say. This is all happening fast. “How can we trust you? You bust in here, try to kill us, then try to fuck us…”
Syl frowns. “Fuck. You used this word in several contexts. It is a curse word? Also, a mating word?” She flicks her tongue. “Your language is needlessly confusing.”
“You’re not wrong,” I say, biting back a surprised laugh. “But you also haven’t answered my question.
“You were my enemy. Now you are not.” She says it as if it's the simplest thing in the world, and that we’re idiots for not understanding.
Mika squeezes my hand. “This is going to take some getting used to.” She eyes Syl’s body again and takes a long breath. “For all of us.”
Is she upset by the mating talk? I don’t want her to think–
“I mean changing our dynamic,” Mika says, half answering my worry. “This place brought us together. Astra didn’t seem to think there was a problem. So, if Syl’s supposed to be with us…”
“Yes, excellent logic,” Syl says, nodding. “There are more important things to do than doubt when the truth is evident. We are clan, now.”
“Clan?” I ask.
“Yes. Some clans, you are born to. Some clans are martial, those you fight with.” She holds up her wrist again. “We are clan. I will fight and die for you. You would do the same for me.”
I exchange another wide-eyed glance with Mika. “Y… Yes.” I say.
“Excellent.”
“Syl, did you die?” Mika asks. “Before you came here, I mean. And wake up here after?”
Syl’s face darkens. “Yes.” She hesitates, weighing her words, and when she speaks it’s careful. She sounds like Mika and that’s how I know she’s holding something back. Which isn’t odd, I suppose, considering the fact that we met her five minutes ago. “Through treachery. My unit and I became lost on a sortie, and I died in an accident while on patrol.” She hisses in fury so incandescent I’d take a step back if I wasn’t backed against a table. “My dishonor is a stain on me, one I must lift. I have to fight my way from this place to clean my name.”
“We also died. Just before we were brought here,” Mika says, voice quiet.
“Yes. This confirms we are clan,” Syl says triumphantly. “We will escape together, and together we will have vengeance. Tell me, what foe vanquished you, Mika?”
“A bus,” she says, casting me a wry glance.
Syl grips Mika’s hand in hers. “Then this bus is my enemy, and when we fight our way from this place, we will destroy it together… Why are you two laughing?”
I gasp and wipe tears from my eyes. “I like her.”
“Yeah, this could work,” Mika grins.
“You two are baffling,” Syl says, stung. “If my help isn’t needed… I was fine before. Alone.”
The image of her broken body laying before us only minutes before erases all humor from the situation. “No Syl. None of us can get through here aloe. You were right; we’re clan.”
She nods. “Good. Ready yourselves. Let us take the fight to our enemy.”
We do. I move through the room, collect my scattered clothing in something of a daze. I think I’m long past being surprised by this place, but this is something else, something new. It�
�s been me and Mika until now, versus whatever the Citadel throws at us.
Now, we’re a party of three, and I’m not sure how I feel about it. Syl is clearly impulsive, and volatile. Lacking boundaries. But there’s something about her earnestness and loyalty…
She’s coming. Based on the handprint on the door, this place wants her with us. I’ll keep my guard up, but for now she’s with us.
I gather my clothes, my rifle. Mika’s already at the door, chatting with Syl, fully dressed and armed. Her hair is up, sweeping down her back in her long purple and black ponytail. She’s fresh, ready, like she didn’t spend the last twelve hours fucking and fighting.
A girl who's ready to go faster than me? Definitely keeping her.
I join them, heft my rifle against my shoulder. “Ready?”
They cast me twin glances, Mika’s eyes dark and Syl’s golden. It must be a universal look: Yeah, we were waiting on you.
“Be vigilant,” Syl says, serious. “This place plumbs your mind for ways to torment.”
Mika shudders. “We know. We’ve been through three of these already.”
“Three?” Syl hesitates. “I bested two trials, but the third was… It presented difficulties. I barely escaped that shadow beast.”
“The Shepherd,” I say. “We’ve had a few run ins with him, too.”
“Shepherd,” Syl repeats, real hate in her voice. “An enemy with no honor. How do you know its name?”
Aspirant: A Sci-Fi Harem Adventure Page 13