Kratos: A Sci-Fi Alien Warrior Paranormal Romance

by Ashley West

  "No?" Kratos said. "Like I said, I haven't seen her. Why would you think she was with me?"

  Keith sighed. "We had a fight, and it got...heated. And she stormed off. I assumed right to you."

  "So you haven't seen her since last night?" Kratos asked, just wanting to make sure he was clear on what was happening before he started to get mad and worried.

  "Right. She just stormed out, and she's been gone since then. If you haven't seen her, Kratos, then..."

  Kratos did not need him to finish that sentence. This was a dangerous time for humans to be wandering around on their own, and if something had happened to Kirsten... Void take The Grey. "We have to find her," he said, voice low and urgent.

  "Sooner rather than later, I should think," Combo said as he moved up, bowing his head to speak directly to them. "I have discovered something...unpleasant."

  "Stars, Combo, what is it now?" Kratos asked. Combo actually sounded worried, which could not be a good thing.

  "It's about The Grey. I was going to tell everyone at once so I would not have to repeat myself, but that's no longer feasible, I think. I've been doing research, looking back through records of attacks, comparing the weapons used with attacks that were never credited with attackers. The Grey have been a legend for many years, and it's only recently that they-"

  "Can you get to the point, please?" Keith interrupted. "If this has something to do with my sister, then I don't really care about the history or whatever else."

  It was astonishing to hear a human speaking to Combo like that, and Kratos had to hide a smile. A small one, of course, because he was still caught up in wondering what was happening, and how he was going to fix it.

  Combo just inclined his head. "Very well. I have evidence to support the theory that at some point in history the Alva and The Grey were once on the same side. Evidence enough to make it clear that The Grey being here is not a coincidence, but revenge."

  Keith's eyes widened, and Kratos looked back and forth between him and Combo. "What?" he asked. "What does that mean?"

  "How did the Alva meet their end, Kratos?" Combo asked. "Think very hard."

  Kratos shot him a rude gesture, but thought about it. The Alva had come to Earth in force, and they had taken humans prisoner and caused all manner of destruction. In the end, the Randoran had come down and put an end to them, with the help of... "A human woman," Kratos murmured. "You don't think..."

  Combo shrugged one elegant shoulder. "I cannot say for sure, but if they're aware of what happened to the Alva and that she is the reason we are here and fighting them, it seems to follow logically that..." He trailed off, but no one needed him to finish.

  Keith swore explosively, causing both Combo and Kratos to lean back in surprise. "This is all my fault," he said, dropping his head into his hands. "If I hadn't jumped all over her, she wouldn't have left. She was going on about how we never listened to her growing up and how we ignored her, and I just got so mad, and I...god." He shook his head.

  "Well, that would've done it," Kratos muttered. "You don't have any idea how she feels, do you? How you and the rest of your family have made her feel. All she thinks about is how she can find her place in the world, somewhere she belongs. Because none of you have ever made her feel welcome, apparently. That doesn't sound much like family to me, but hey, it's been a while since I've had one, so maybe times have changed."

  He was gratified to see that Keith looked chastised. "You can yell at me later," he said. "Right now we need to find her. Who knows what those monsters will do to her."

  Kratos shook his head. "No, you need to stay here. Kirsten wouldn't forgive me if I let you go running headfirst into something that'll just get you killed."

  "So I should just abandon her?" Keith demanded.

  "No, you moron," Kratos replied, rolling his eyes. "I'm going to go get her."

  "But-"

  "Look," he said firmly, leaning down so he was right in Keith's personal space. "You apparently don't like me or trust me, and that's fine. I don't need you to. I can even understand being protective of someone you care about. But you don't have anything that can even put a scratch on one of those things, and if you go charging in there, then you're both dead. I won't let that happen. So I'm going, and you're going to sit here and deal with it. Got it?"

  With wide eyes, Keith nodded. "Okay. Okay. Just...bring her back safe, okay? Please, Kratos."

  "Of course I will."

  Combo had taken a step back while they stood off with each other, and now he sighed, reasserting himself as the only one who really knew what was going on and what to do about it. "How long has she been missing?" he asked Keith.

  "Since about eleven last night," Keith answered. "It's almost five now, so less than twenty hours."

  "Time is of the essence, here," Combo said. "I'm not sure what they'd do with her at first, but they wouldn't kill her immediately."

  "That's good, right?" Keith wanted to know.

  Both Combo and Kratos shook their heads. "Nope. Just means they have more time to break her," Kratos said. "Think of it like this. If you'd caught someone responsible for destroying someone you cared about, wouldn't you want to make them suffer as much as possible?"

  Keith went white. "But it's not even Kirstie's fault!" he insisted. "She didn't do anything."

  "She's a symbol," Combo said. "Of human bravery, of what destroyed the Alva, their allies. They will want to make an example of her."

  They were standing right outside of the building, and Keith looked like he was going to faint. Kratos couldn't blame him. There was a knot in his stomach the size of a walla fruit, and just thinking about Kirstie being in pain, being hurt by these creatures, made him want to be sick. But he had to be the strong one. That was always the case. He had to be the one who dashed into danger and brought them out alive. It was a good thing he was good at it.

  He clasped Keith on the shoulder, trying to be reassuring. They butted heads all the time, but he was Kirstie's brother, and Kratos knew this wouldn't be easy for him. "I will bring her back," he said.

  "But how? There's so many of them, and you don't even know where they are."

  "Listen to me, Keith," Kratos said. "I will bring her back." He said it slower this time, enunciating every word.

  "If that's decided," Combo interjected. "Let us do something about you not knowing their location. I have two theories."

  Even armed with Combo's theories and one of his sensors, Kratos felt woefully unprepared. Milara and Sanaal had gone off to investigate a supposed cluster of humans who had been pinned down by members of The Grey as they tried to make their way to safety, so Kratos had only a handful of the underlings with him.

  Combo had been of the opinion that this could be a diversion. Splitting their attention in two, possibly three ways, so that they could launch an attack on the apartment building, the heart of the human resistance in this area, and wipe them out. As such, he'd remained with the rest of their forces at the building, getting the humans to safety and battening down the hatches as best he could.

  When Kratos had expressed his surprise that Combo wasn't urging him to stay put and help fight the real fight, all he'd received was another of those shrugs. It was enough, really. Kratos knew that Combo was fond of Kirstie in his own way, which honestly was just more evidence of the impact she had on people.

  He wasn't going to let anything happen to her.

  He had his sword on his back and determination, and it was like those first days setting out before he'd found The Kilan. Like those days when it had just been him, his weapon, and his opponent. Granted, he'd gotten his backside handed to him almost as many times as he'd been victorious, but this was different. He had a real cause now, someone to fight for. And he was older and better than he'd been then.

  Kratos was going to make them regret ever laying a hand on someone he cared for.

  Combo had given him two locations to check, and they were on opposite ends of town, so he started with the one that was
closest. If they weren't there, then he'd just have to liberate a vehicle and make his way to the other one.

  The first place was a rundown collection of industrial looking buildings. They seemed like they'd been shut down long before The Grey had even shown their faces here, and crept along the shadows, trying to see what he could find.

  It was still early enough in the evening that the sun hadn't fully set yet, which made it harder to be sneaky here, but he didn't have time to wait.

  In his pocket, the sensor vibrated quickly and silently, and Kratos stopped, pulling it out of his pocket. Combo had programmed it quickly before Kratos had left, locking it on Kirstie through some method involving Keith and genetic material that Kratos didn't understand and probably didn't want to.

  The fact that it was buzzing now, boded well. She was in there somewhere, and he just had to hope that she’d be in one piece when he found her.

  The blinking red dot on the rough map on the screen represented Kirstie, and all the blue dots around her represented The Grey. There were a lot of blue dots, and Kratos swallowed hard. Getting around them would be difficult, and going through them would be even harder. As he watched, though, the red dot glowed brighter and started blinking faster, which Kratos knew meant Kirstie was in distress. There wasn’t enough time for being indecisive about this. He needed to make a move, and he needed to make it now.

  Around would take longer, so he was going through.

  It was times like this that he almost wished he believed in some higher power, so that he’d have someone to appeal to. Wishing to the stars for Kirstie’s safety would have to be enough.

  Whoever had designed this building was an idiot, in Kratos' book. There were so many doors, so many corridors, and lurking down each one was someone who wanted to kill him. Even looking at the map on the sensor screen wasn't helping because the place was like a maze. Hallways led to dead ends and when he thought they were heading in the right direction, one wrong turn had sent him around in almost a complete circle.

  Everything looked the same, the walls painted some shade of off white that was dull and uninspiring, and all the doors were made out of either some dull grey metal or wood. He wanted to go around kicking them in, but he didn't want to attract too much attention to himself.

  From what he could tell from the sensor, most of the hostiles in the building were centralized in the room with Kirsten, which didn't make him feel better, but made it easier to go down the halls quickly. The last thing he needed was to get into a fight right now in one of these narrow halls. It would make this whole thing take longer, and he wasn't in the mood for this to take longer.

  And the dot that symbolized Kirsten was still flashing and flaring. She was hurting, Kratos knew it. Whatever they were doing to her was terrible and causing her pain, and he gritted his teeth because it made him so mad.

  Whatever grudge The Grey held against humans and human women in particular, that wasn't Kirstie's fault. She had been so brave, and so good. Trying to defend her people. Trying to make sure that they would be safe. She didn't deserve this at all, and when he got his hands on the people who were causing her pain, he was going to make sure they knew that they had messed up.

  He just had to get there first, which was just making him more and more upset.

  Finally, after long minutes of roaming, he found the hall he wanted. If the map was right (and if he was reading it right, he supposed) the door in front of him led into a large room in the center of the building where Kirsten was being held.

  Kratos let out a breath, tucked the sensor into his pocket and then drew his sword. His fingers curled around the hilt of it, familiar and warm. He knew this weapon well, knew how to fight with it. Knew how to use it to protect himself and others. He'd use it now to save Kirsten.

  "Please be alright," he whispered. And then he kicked the door in.

  It was one of the metal ones, so it crumpled and dented as it swung inward, metallic clang echoing down the hall and into the room when it swung forward and then banged against the wall.

  Everyone in the room, and there were a lot of them, looked up at once, heads turned in his direction.

  It was a lot to take in.

  Whatever this room had been once, it was now something horrific. A wide open space with several metal tables pushed into corners and lining one wall. Where the tables had clearly once been shiny metal, they were now somehow warped. Twisted and tarnished and...blood-stained.

  Kratos' stomach turned over.

  Chains hung from the high ceiling, and there were hooks attached to some of them, wickedly sharp and pointy, and he didn't even want to know what they'd been used for.

  Along the back wall with the tables was a large machine. It was tall and curved with a bulb at one end. The bulb was emitting some kind of electric ray from what Kratos could tell, and it was pointed directly at one of the tables.

  A sick, horrible feeling welled up in Kratos' gut, and when he took a step forward he could see that, yes, the bulb was aimed at a person, and yes, the person was Kirstie.

  She was lying flat on her back on the table, wrists and ankles strapped down, holding her in place. Her eyes were closed, but her face was contorted into a mask of pain, and even though she wasn't screaming and the machine made no noise, Kratos could tell it was hurting her.

  "Stop it," he said, voice coming out as nothing more than a croak to begin with. He was horrified, and he wanted to go to Kirsten more than anything, but there were at least fifteen members of The Grey between them, and he didn't have any illusions about being able to just barrel his way through them.

  The Grey didn't seem to have been expecting him, which was honestly their mistake, and they finally stopped staring and exploded into a cacophony of different languages. One of them rushed at him, claws out and ready, and Kratos planted his feet and killed it with his sword.

  He kicked the body away and leveled his weapon at the rest of them. "Let her go," he said, voice low and deadly. "Right now."

  There was more muttering that he didn't understand, and then one of them stepped forward.

  They were all hooded and cloaked, and he wanted to rip the cloaks off and see each of their faces. Make them see him before he killed them all.

  "You want the human," the creature said, finally in a language he actually understood.

  "Yes," Kratos replied.

  "She is ours."

  "She is not yours," he snarled. "I won't let you keep her."

  "Humans have done much against us. Killed the Alva, ruined them. And you, killing our brethren in Grey. You will all die."

  "No," Kratos said, and he didn't think his voice had ever been so cold before, so harsh. "You will." He could feel the creature's eyes on him for just a moment, and then it stomped one foot on the concrete floor.

  At first nothing happened, but then the machine emitted a high pitched noise, followed by a piercing scream from Kirstie. They were hurting her worse now.

  Kratos saw red. There was no more time for talking. No more negotiating or whatever it was he'd thought he was going to do to get Kirstie back. No more of that. Now they were going to pay for what they had done to her.

  It was like he was moving on autopilot, his body taking over while his mind raged. He'd fought so many battles before, so many different kinds of opponents, and his body knew what to do. Muscles remembered how to duck and dodge attacks, how to parry, how to run. His arms worked constantly, using the broad blade of the sword to deflect smaller blasts from their guns, and he spared a moment to be glad that apparently they didn't want to risk blowing themselves up and weren't using their larger blasters. That would be their undoing.

  It was brutal, it was methodical. Kratos took no notice of his own wounds, barely caring when he was nicked or burned or grazed. He just had to keep moving.

  When it was all over, he stood in the center of the room, bodies all around him. Ten, fifteen, twenty. Some had come in through the side doors when they'd heard the commotion, and he'd cut
them down, too. His chest was heaving with labored breaths, and his arms burned from the exertion, but there was now no one between him and Kirstie.

  He dropped the sword with a clatter on the ground before thinking better of it. It was possible that there would still be more to fight before he could get Kirstie home.

  He sheathed the sword at his back. It would need a thorough cleaning later.

  Heart in his throat with fear for her, he walked up to the table. Her body was twitching where she lay, and she seemed to be fighting the restraints, arching every now and then, broken screams and whimpers spilling from her lips.

  And she was still unconscious, which, at this point, Kratos could only be grateful for.

  Kratos undid her restraints, and she screamed again, body trying to curl in on itself.

  The machine was still hurting her. Kratos figured he could either look for the off switch or do this the easy way. The easy way seemed best, as he watched tears spill down Kirstie's face. He drew his sword again, and demolished the machine, leaving it as a smoking pile of rubble.

  Once the sword was back in place, he leaned down carefully and lifted Kirstie into his arms. "I'm so sorry," he whispered when she flinched at the touch. "I'm so sorry." She squirmed for a moment, obviously uncomfortable, but then she went limp.

  For one heart stopping second, Kratos thought she was dead. Somehow, removing her from the machine's ray had killed her, and it was all his fault.

  But then she heaved a shuddering breath and turned her face to his chest, and something eased inside of him. He'd get her to Combo, and Combo would know what to do. He'd make sure she was alright.

  "Come on," he whispered, even though he knew she couldn't hear him. "Let's get you home."

  The walk back to the apartment building seemed to take forever, and as they approached, Kratos knew something wasn't right. He could hear the sound of blasters, of fighting, and his eyes widened in horror.

  The building had been attacked while he was gone.