by Anna Carven
Because I want to live, assholes.
No matter what she was forced to endure, Layla wanted to survive. Even if she never got to Miridian-7, even if she had to go back to the chaos on Earth, she didn’t care.
Suddenly, life on Earth looked pretty fucking good, and all the human-created hassles didn’t seem so bad.
The Kordolian released her, pushing her down so she was forced to slam her hands against the floor to avoid falling on her face. The pain in her ribs intensified, and Layla stared down the long, dark tunnel of despair.
It threatened to suck her in.
“What do you want?” she asked bitterly, picking herself up off the floor. She rose to her feet, ignoring the protests of her aching body, ignoring the faint electric tingle from the crippling device around her neck.
She looked straight ahead, refusing to show them the full extent of her suffering.
The half-metal creature’s face twisted into something resembling a smile. “This is the very last time I will allow you to ask questions, so let me explain it in terms that your simple human mind can understand.” He looked her up and down, his gaze coming to rest on her lower half. “For some infernal reason that only the Goddess knows, your species is genetically compatible with ours, but only an uncivilized soori bastard would actually want to physically mate you.” Disgust crept into his voice. “That’s why I need to study you. I need to know why you can do something that our females can’t.”
Genetically compatible? Mate?
Layla shuddered.
At least he seemed repulsed at the thought of mating with her. On Earth, Layla turned heads and drew stares whenever she walked into a room, but here, she was just another alien, a lowly being these oh-so-superior Kordolians wouldn’t ever find attractive.
Thank the fucking stars for that.
The mad scientist/cyborg/doctor/whatever-he-was turned to the soldiers. “Kash!” he snapped—it was obviously an order. Captain Pradon exchanged curt words with him, sneered at Layla, and stalked out of the room, his men following silently behind him in single file.
She glanced over her shoulder just in time to see the black fiber doors silently weave shut behind them, becoming indistinguishable against the dark curving walls.
There was a sense of finality to it all, as if Layla had just gone past the point of no return.
But instead of crushing despair, she felt something else.
Hatred.
It burned inside her chest like a solar flare, giving her strength. Her eyes snapped back to the scientist. He beckoned to her with his black metal finger. Come.
Layla glared at him, refusing to budge.
She realized she hated these Kordolians. She hated their smug sense of superiority and their mirthless laughter and the way they seemed to get off on her pain and humiliation.
She hated their arrogance, the way they thought they were God’s fucking gift to the Universe.
Actually, these Kordolians reminded her of someone back home, an asshole called Damien who had turned her life into a nightmare.
So when the half-metal creep shook his head, activating a small device he kept tucked into the palm of his cybernetic hand, a device that apparently controlled the god-awful collar around her neck, Layla was able to endure the pain that ripped through her body.
She focused all her energy on hating the man, and found it strangely rejuvenating. It gave her strength. Now she understood what Enki had been talking about when he told her to endure.
He obviously knew his own kind too well.
Now she understood why there had been such venom in his voice when he said these people were his enemies, and that was a good thing, because it gave her hope that not all Kordolians were alike.
As Layla gasped, blinking tears of pain from her eyes, she remembered the small knife she’d hidden at her back. The Kordolians must really not see her as a threat, because they hadn’t even bothered to search her or remove her jacket.
Her captor loomed over her. “Come now, human. You are well on your way to learning that any form of resistance against me is futile. I can cause you immeasurable pain, and I can make it constant. I can deaden your nerves and immobilize your muscles with the flick of a needle. I can sedate you so that you won’t be aware of a single thing, but that would be far too easy for you. What you need to understand is that like all the other lesser species in the Universe, you need to obey.” He delivered his little speech with fanatical intensity, as if he were trying to prove something to the infinite Universe. “Now get up and follow me, little human.”
There was a time when Layla had people at her beck and call, when a single link-command would have had her agent, her personal assistant, and her concierge all scrambling to attend to her needs.
She’d been on top of the world back then, but now she was reduced to this.
A fucking test subject.
Valuable only for the cells inside her battered body.
How fucking foolish she’d been to dismiss the very real dangers of the Universe, to believe the Infinity-8 sales reps and legal advisors when they told her the chances of accident or abduction were one in twenty-five million.
Or maybe she was just really, really unlucky.
Lucky to survive.
Lucky to be found.
But unlucky to be captured.
Layla was quickly losing hope that this mysterious Enki, who might have been just a figment of her delirious imagination, would come for her.
Even if he did, what were the chances he would turn out to be a demon, a creature strong enough to infiltrate this floating fortress and break her out?
Slimmer than getting hit by a micrometeorite storm, probably.
Slimmer than her emergency transmission getting picked up by a lone alien ship.
And slimmer than being captured and tortured and studied, all because her body apparently held the key to the survival of the Kordolian race.
Endure a little longer.
Oh, she would endure for now, but if she ever reached the point where there was no hope left, Layla would do her best to make sure she gave this pompous metal-faced asshole a taste of his own cruelty before she went down.
Because after what she’d gone through on Earth, she wasn’t going to go down without a fight.
Never again.
Chapter Eight
“Well, well. Will you look at that? Now there’s a familiar sight.” Lodan grinned savagely as the Ristval V appeared on the holo. “It’s just like the good old Imperial times, except now we have official permission to kick Daegan’s ass. He’s such a shitbag.”
They were close enough now for the Virdan X’s powerful sensors to see through her cloaking and perform a thorough analysis. The 3D image that appeared before them was incredibly detailed, allowing Enki to see everything, right down to the damage. One of the thrusters was on half-power, and parts of the hull had been crudely patched.
“Looks like she’s limping,” Nythian murmured, raising his silvery eyebrows. “So Silence really did some damage last time, eh? Can’t fix a battle cruiser without a Fleet Station… or a crew of stubborn human mechs. Just ask Kalan.” He laughed. “Hard to believe they’ve just been lurking around in the Ninth right under our noses all this time. You’d think they would have made some noise by now. Daegan will shit asteroids if he finds out we were able to trace them through the Alerak brother’s House comm. Sometimes I truly think the nonexistent Goddess is just fucking with us for her own amusement.”
This is not because of some deity, shadowkin. This is curlae. The strands of the Universe. Everything is connected.
This time, Enki didn’t fight. Instead, he pushed the Tharian’s meaningless chatter to the back of his mind as he watched the black ship. As it slowly rotated on the holo, he recalled the moment when the Ristval V had appeared in Earth’s orbit and threatened the planet with total annihilation.
Because General Tarak al Akkadian had stolen their Fleet Station, and they were enraged.
&
nbsp; A complicated game of threats and subterfuge had followed, and somehow they’d managed to lure the battle cruiser away from Earth. Engaging in a vicious firefight, Silence had forced the Ristval V down the throat of an uncharted wormhole, and the massive battle cruiser had disappeared.
Blinked right out of existence.
And now they’d just found her.
Limping.
“The boss is going to be happy. Too bad Silence is deployed to Bartharra right now.” Lodan stared hungrily at the holo-image. “It’s the only ship that can match the Rist for pure firepower.” He turned back to the controls and closed his eyes, leaning back in his chair. A gentle shudder coursed through the ship and Enki felt its speed drop away until it came to a complete stop.
Now they were just hanging.
Waiting.
“This is as far as we go,” Lodan said. “Any closer and we risk getting picked up by their surveillance, even though we’re cloaked. We’re just too close now. You’re going to have to use a Stealthstalker to get inside.”
Enki grunted in agreement as summoned his exo-armor, visualizing the familiar forms in his mind. The black nanites emerged from his bloodstream, flowing over his lower arms and hands. A million tiny pinpricks of pain lanced through his skin as the microscopic machines coalesced to form a light but impossibly strong barrier, a sleek black outer shell that allowed him complete freedom of movement.
It was a monstrous feat of bio-engineering, turning him into something not quite Kordolian; something other.
Only a monster like Enki could break into a Kordolian warship and hope to come out alive.
“Ready, brother?” Nythian regarded him warily. Although none of them would ever say it aloud, they were all well aware that this was Enki’s first solo mission in a very, very long time.
Usually, he would have his offsider Torin nearby. With his even temperament and very un-Kordolian ability to diffuse tension, Torin was a stabilizing influence on Enki, especially when the Tharian got too noisy inside his head.
But during their last mission on Zarhab Groht, Torin had disappeared, somehow ending up on a Bartharran pirate ship bound for the War Planet itself.
And in the process, Torin had found his mate.
Madness.
Right now, Enki couldn’t even contemplate taking a mate of his own. First, he had to get his head straight, and this mission—finding Layla—was quickly becoming an integral part of his… healing, or whatever the fuck he was supposed to do.
But there was also another reason he specifically wanted to get onto the Ristval V. Ever since Zharek had given each the First Division warriors their datacubes—the secret personal files that told them who they were before the experiments—Enki had carried an infuriating secret in his heart, one he hadn’t even shared with the General.
Oh, he really wanted to encounter Righal Daegan the Third, if only to tear out the bastard’s fucking throat.
“I am ready.” He crossed his arms and glared, feeling defensive for some reason. You think I cannot handle this?
I won’t hinder you, Kordolian. The Tharian had been unusually quiet, but now it spoke. In this instance, I want what you want. Wanting to save the life of an innocent… that is so unlike you.
Instead of casting further doubt, Nythian just shook his head. “If anyone’s gonna blend in amongst Daegan’s crew, it’s you. Me and Lodan would be found out within the first siv. We ran missions with them in the old times. Someone’s bound to recognize our faces. Sorry to harp on about it, brother, but you’re the best fit for this job. If Tarak says so, it must be true.”
“Yes.” After being briefed on the situation, the General had issued a curt series of orders and approved Enki’s request to infiltrate the Ristval V, and for good reason. Enki knew very well that his distinctive features marked him as the son of a noble House. With the right uniform, he would be indistinguishable from the rest of Daegan’s troops. Nobody would recognize him as a First Division soldier. They didn’t know his face, because hadn’t had much contact with the other side of the military. After returning from Tharos, he’d spent a considerable amount of time locked up… for his own good.
“Boss says our first priority is the human. Get her out, get her safe, and if you can do it without them noticing, even better. Then we wait for backup. Destruction comes later. Boss has ordered the Warsong and its auxiliary fleet to our location. They should arrive from the Fleet Station in a few revs.” Lodan’s eyes glazed over as he stared at the endless stream of data flowing through the sylth. “If the Rist were at full capacity, I’d be worried, but Warsong’s packing more than enough firepower to take on this crippled beast.”
“Who’s in command?” Nythian raised a curious eyebrow.
“Ikriss.”
“Ah. The level-headed one. Good call.”
“I’m going,” Enki snapped, cutting the conversation short. Impatience ate at him like a starved and crazed varhund. Every siv they spent discussing things was another siv of torture for the human. Perhaps it was because he’d been the one to discover Layla that he felt a certain sense of responsibility for her. He’d heard her voice, and for the briefest of moments, he’d been able to taste her fear. “Once I’m in, I will go dark.” That meant strictly no communication through the comm. “I will not risk an intercept of my signal.”
“Holler only if you need retrieval,” Nythian said softly, still wearing that cryptic look, as if he were somehow concerned about Enki.
“That won’t be necessary.”
Nythian’s expression turned grim. “You know, there’s always a chance that when you find the human, she won’t be—”
“I know.”
“I hope it isn’t the case, but we’re dealing with a real throwback to the old Empire here. These people are animals.”
“I know that too.” Enki was under no illusions as to what his kind were capable of, but the thought of returning without Layla drove him a little bit mad, and he hadn’t even met her yet. Was it because he had given her his word, or was it something else? “If that is the case, I will have no need to exercise restraint.”
The two warriors were uncharacteristically silent as they stared back at him.
“Don’t worry. I won’t implode,” Enki said, trying to sound calm when really, a dark rage was brewing inside him. But he would not let his anger get the better of him, because his anger seemed to give the Tharian strength, and he wasn’t going to let it control him. Never again. “I’ll just kill every last one of them.”
Chapter Nine
“Strip.” The alien led her to another room, a small chamber that was so dark she could barely see inside.
At the entrance, Layla hesitated. She wasn’t even aware of what she was doing until she dug her heels in and stared into the abyss. Who the hell walked straight into a dark room without knowing what was inside, anyway?
“Are all humans this slow to learn?” Her captor’s boot met the back of her ankle, and Layla gasped as she stumbled forward, falling in the darkness, right into the claustrophobic little chamber. Now she couldn’t see a fucking thing. “By now, your obedience should be seamless. Or are you somehow immune to pain?” The Kordolian raked his fingers through her hair and pulled her head up, almost tearing her hair out at the roots. Burning pain crawled over Layla’s scalp. “You reek, human. Take off those filthy garments so I can sanitize you.”
“Fuck you,” Layla muttered in Eskulin.
The collar went off again, wiping her mind of everything except the worst possible agony. Somehow, the more the Kordolian used the collar, the less afraid Layla became.
It’s just pain, she told herself, chanting the mantra over and over again in her head. It won’t kill you. If this thing was doing any real damage, you’d be dead already.
Amidst the haze of her torture, it occurred to Layla that she’d been dealing with physical pain all her life.
The crazy shoes they made her wear for filming.
The fractures she endured when
doing real-life stunts.
The bruises she had to conceal with makeup each and every time Damien lost his fucking temper.
The crippling periods that had plagued her month after month, until she had enough money to afford a permanent cure for her endometriosis.
It won’t kill you.
It never had.
If she wasn’t afraid of pain, then he had no control over her, and Layla was pretty sure that he didn’t want to kill her. The Kordolians wanted her alive so they could… study her reproductive anatomy or whatever. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have gone to all the effort of retrieving her and putting the collar around her neck.
Just pain. It’s not going to kill you.
Somehow, that realization made it so much easier to endure.
“You are a stupid creature,” the scientist hissed, his stale breath washing over her. “And I am no longer amused this stupid game. This is starting to become tiresome.” His metal coated hand clamped down on her neck, and he pushed her down against the floor, mashing her cheek into the hard surface. Fuck, he was strong. With his other hand, he began to strip the cabin-jacket from her body. When it proved difficult to remove, he cursed in his own language and started to tear at the thing with his claws.
Layla knew he was using his claws, because they ripped right through the reflective fabric of her jacket, right through her high-tech suit beneath, and right into her skin.
Warm blood trickled down her arms and back. The pain of his vicious scratches was drowned out by the continuous agony of the collar.
He was treating her the way one might treat a wild animal.
Holy fuck.
His entire weight was pressing down on her, and he was heavy. As he tore away shreds of her jacket and the suit underneath, exposing her bare, bloodied skin to the cold, Layla squirmed as hard as she could, ignoring the fear that the skin on her back had been shredded to ribbons.