by Viola Grace
Under attack and the sole repository of information that could topple her government, Seeri chooses a death in the cold of space over endangering her ship further.
Alpha Tor has been watching the communications during the attack and the moment that the pod is sent toward his station, he sets out to retrieve the beauty within. Feisty and focused, Battle Commander Seeri is a woman to be reckoned with, but as Tor is aware of the fear and hostility caused by his appearance, he stays clear of his guest.
She has to go to him.
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Asylum Mine
Copyright © 2011 Viola Grace
Cover art by Martine Jardin
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Asylum Mine
By
Viola Grace
Pain seared along her ribs and blood trickled through her fingers. Battle Commander Seeri trembled as she tried to get a clear reading through her watery gaze. The radiating agony made it hard for her to concentrate, but it was up to her to get her men to safety.
“Can you see anything?” Vorner was intact, but nervous. He was far too green to be on this ship, but due to the sudden and nasty case of dead that broke out, he was her second in command.
“I am still looking. We need to find somewhere they can’t track us.” She tried to keep her voice calm, but she was fading fast.
There. It was a tiny blip, it faded quickly but she knew exactly what it was. A hidden station. If she was very lucky it would be a medical station, but lucky was not the word to describe the last few days.
Horrifyingly complete betrayal was how she would describe the last few days. The Northern Star was being hunted by its own people. The information that Seeri had gleaned from her sources would turn the entire Coalition on its ear if she was allowed to go public. Her life was the stake and her men had refused to let her give it up.
Commander Darkour led the arresting force on the refuelling station, the moment she balked at coming with him, his men had opened fire.
Her men had returned fire and now, here they were limping through the stars and looking for a place to hide.
Blood coursed over her fingers. The last battle had sent shards of metal rocketing through sickbay and into her body. It was as if they knew exactly where she was at any given time. Her doctor was dead and she was about to follow him.
She quickly laid in a course for the invisible station. Fate had let her see it once, and thanks to her eidetic memory, she would never forget where it was.
“Vorner, I want you to take the ship to safety. Hide it behind the station or make a run for it, it will be your choice. You are in charge now.” She was swaying on her feet.
He reached out to support her, but there was no place on her that he could grab without getting covered in blood. “What are you talking about?”
“I am either dead or they are tracking me. When the beacon sounds, I want you to launch a stasis pod torpedo toward the station and get away from the pod as soon as you can. If they are tracking me it will buy you some time, and if they find the station, my corpse will end the chase.” She sighed and coughed. Her lung had been nicked, the blood that she had coughed up was not a good sign.
Vorner was almost wringing his hands. “What will we do?”
She grabbed his shoulder and winced as it stretched her wound. “You will survive, Vorner. You will get the rest of the survivors out of harm’s way and hide until you can find out what is going on. If you are caught, tell Commander Darkour that you mutinied and sent me to my death. He should accept it.”
She started to make the long journey to the stasis pod while Vorner hopped restlessly behind her. She dragged in a breath that gurgled ominously. “Vorner, take control of the ship and go. When the beacon sounds, launch me. If you don’t, I swear I will haunt you in your next life and possibly this one.”
He swallowed and straightened his shoulders. “Do you need help?”
“Sure. Hook me up to the lines. I will take care of the rest.”
He helped her into the pod and inserted the lines into her veins. He saluted her as the lid to the pod closed.
Seeri didn’t have the heart to tell him that she didn’t need the lines. He looked so happy when he got them into place.
With the pod closed, she activated the recorder and started to talk. She expounded on the mass assassinations and genocides she had discovered, the deaths that were all in the name of rapid colonization.
She talked until her vision swam again and she had no choice but to activate the stasis pod. If it worked, she would be unconscious and dying at one fifth the rate she would if she was out and talking. Hooray.
Fractured images of the interior of the pod mixed with the stark lighting of a station hangar. Seeri’s fuzzy mind recorded each and every image it saw as she drifted in and out of consciousness. Some images didn’t make sense. If the station was abandoned, then why was a set of bots lifting her from the pod to put her on a medical bed?
Who was the shadowed figure that came to her and with a light touch, eased her pain sending her into a deep sleep?
She wasn’t given time to ponder it. He touched her and she slipped into darkness.
All she knew before that moment was that she wasn’t dead yet.
It was the monitoring computer that woke her to the peculiar sensation of someone licking at her ribs. She would have jerked her body away if not for two facts. Fact one, she was limp as a noodle, her body had no strength, and fact two, her hands and legs were tied down and slightly splayed from her body so the creature licking at her could get under her arm easily.
The slow strokes weren’t painful, in fact her body was having a rather surprising reaction that reinforced her distance from the state of death that she should have been in. Arousal was rippling through her with every lap of the hot wet tongue against her open wound. The absurdity of her situation wasn’t lost on her.
It took her three tries to speak. “If you are going to start chewing, can you knock me out again?”
Her companion jerked in surprise at her voice. He cleared his throat, “I have a healing ability that is activated through my saliva. I am licking the wound closed. It is almost shut, but you will have to be careful for a few days or the wound will haemorrhage internally. I will release you in a moment, but please wait until I leave before you try and leave the table, the bots will help you.”
He continued lapping at her skin and she had the embarrassment of feeling her crotch grow damp with the constant slow and wet strokes.
She was starting to twist with lust when he reached up and touched her forehead.
With no idea how much time had passed, Seeri was left to sit up and take in her surroundings on her own. It was not a standard medical bay, the glowing lights came on as she sat up and she winced at the resi
dual pain in her limbs. Her injuries were healed but her body hadn’t realized it yet.
Seeri was in a bedchamber with gauzy curtains, silken pillows and sheets that were no more than a breath of covering on her body. She was nude, her shredded battle suit and boots were nowhere to be found.
A shiver ran through her when the sense memory of the tongue on her body washed over her. She had been succumbing to her hormones when her host knocked her out. It was humiliating that he offered nothing but assistance and her body answered his help with its own selfish needs.
Seeri held the sheets to her breast and called out, “Is anyone there?”
A shadow stirred and she jumped. “I am here.”
Her heart pounded in her chest. “Thank you for your help. I thought I was as good as dead.”
“Your life signs were weak. You were lucky I was able to reach the automated weapon system in time. You were almost destroyed before the grapplers could get you.”
He was on her left, but staying in the shadows. She could see an enticing outline, but wasn’t able to make out the details. All she could determine was that he had very broad shoulders and a thick neck on a body that was over six and a half feet tall.
“Why don’t you come into the light so I can thank you to your face?”
He cleared his throat and shifted, “It might upset you. My appearance is a little unusual. It will be better if you don’t see me.”
“I have seen many species and I don’t think your appearance would shock me.” Seeri was trying to cajole him, but he shook his head.
He laughed, it was a rusty sound as if he didn’t do it often. “I don’t want to test it, Battle Commander Seerian Vish.”
That shocked her. There hadn’t been enough of her uniform left to make an identification. “How?”
“This station has full access to all of the communications and archives of the Coalition. I have been watching the attempts of your ship to dodge pursuit and came to the same conclusion you did. You had a tracker inside you. It is gone now. I extracted it.” The shadow shifted.
The bass rumble of his voice was lovely to listen to.
“There are many bots on this station and they are yours to command. They will help you to attend your physical needs as well as provide you with food and access to the entertainment feeds. There is a beacon under your right hand that will bring them to you.”
She shifted in confusion. “You are going to leave me?”
“I have my own concerns and routine. If you wish, I will return for the evening meal.” The question in his tone was cleverly disguised as her decision.
“I would enjoy that. What time is it now?”
He faded back into the darkness. “Before noon, station time. You will have to spend your day alone.”
He was gone. She felt the loss of his presence keenly.
Sitting back in the bed, she realized that nature was calling. Better to test the promise now. She pressed the call button and a wheeled automaton stood by the bed.
A blue light glowed as it spoke through the blank faceplate. “What is your request, mistress?”
“I need to use the lav. I am a little weak in the knees.”
“Not a problem, mistress. Remove the sheet and I will carry you.”
She nodded and flipped the silk back. The bot immediately lifted her and wheeled her into the lav, depositing her and remaining in place. “I can do this without your help. Please wait outside.”
“What if you require assistance, mistress?”
“I promise to call out.” She couldn’t do what she needed to do while being watched. With a sigh of relief, she was able to do what she needed to the moment that the bot closed the door behind him.
That she thought of the bot as a him the moment she met him was peculiar. Normally there was no problem with her knowing that the mechanicals were neutral. There was just something about this one that screamed male.
Seeri completed her task and stumbled toward the shower. She held onto the walls while waiting for the heat to warm to a comfortable temperature. The moment that the water coursed comfortably over her, she used the shampoo and soap while leaning against the tile. She darted back under the water to rinse off and felt better, at least from the front.
Reaching her back while leaning was difficult. Her wounds were still aching as she tried to reach her spine.
“You said you would call, mistress.” A metal hand supported her while the other took the soap and cleaned her back.
“I didn’t need help until just now. Thank you, bot, or do you have a designation?”
“You may call me what you wish.”
“Baxter. I will call you Baxter.” She smiled and the blue lights that substituted for eyes flickered.
“Acknowledged. Adding it to order roster.” He helped her to turn and rinse under the spray. “You are not well enough to be out of bed this long, mistress.”
She fought a grin. “Thank you for pointing it out. I believe I am done here.”
He wrapped her in linens and dried her from head to toe. She was clinging to him as he blotted efficiently at every drop of water.
“The housekeepers have finished with your bedding. A meal is being prepared and should be here momentarily.”
“Thank you, Baxter. Take me to bed.” She yawned and collapsed in his arms as he lifted her to carry her back to the bedroom.
“Dinner first, mistress. You will recover faster if you eat something.”
There was no arguing with him. He was programmed for her health and she was going to have to stick to his regulations.
* * * *
Her taste was still on his lips as Tor used the bot to carefully place Seerian in her bed after he had forced her to sit at the table for her meal. He cursed the soft curve of her hip and the lush turn of her lips that had caused him to throw caution to the wind and heal her.
What would a woman of beauty and determination ever want with a splice like him? He would have to be satisfied with the taste of her in his memories, the vague scent of arousal that had stirred in her before he had urged her to sleep. If she had seen his face, the fear in her scent would have overridden anything that her body was feeling. He would have run to save them both discomfort and not come back.
A genetic freak, he was doomed to live out his exorbitant life span on this station, monitoring transmissions and communiqués. Tor sighed and watched her through the bot’s monitors. She was lovely. He had downloaded her military history and found her to be both strong and honourable in all her dealings.
He toyed with the idea of showing himself to her in full light, but a quick look down at his skin with its variegated patterns brought him back to reality. He had no place in polite society anymore. His time was long gone.
With a sigh, he confirmed that she was tucked in for the night and went to take a walk in the arboretum. The flowers needed tending and the watering system needed an overhaul. It would be just the thing to distract him from the warm and real woman in his bed.
* * * *
Seeri waited until the bots had retreated and she set her body for a quick four-hour nap. That should be enough to bring her energy levels back to mobility levels.
When her internal clock woke her, the lighting came on with her motions. Baxter came to her and spoke. “Mistress, you need more sleep.”
“It is not required. I would like some light exercise if that is acceptable?”
He paused. “There is nothing to forbid it. I will accompany you if you wish to explore.”
She couldn’t help it, she grinned. “Thank you. Which way to the oxygen farm?”
He paused again and as he remained frozen in place, a smaller bot wheeled forward with a piece of fabric in its arms.
“A gown for you, mistress.” The bot with the gown raised it up.
She couldn’t help smiling. “Thank you.”
The gown was fitted to her, a lovely purple sheath that allowed her just enough room to move.
“I am ready, B
axter.”
Her metal companion offered her his arm and together they slowly made their way through metal halls. In the distance, she saw bots wheeling around engaged in maintenance and mundane tasks. “How long has this station been on bot-only control?”
“You will have to ask the master. He has given us direction to minimize our conversations regarding him and the station.” Baxter continued to pace her, but her curiosity was up and running.
The mystery of the station deepened. “Who is your master?”
“Information denied.”
She sighed and kept her mouth shut. The halls of the station were pristine and instead of the cold feeling she had experienced on most station she had been on she felt a homey warmth in every inch of the station around her.
The silence around them wasn’t onerous, but it did make her gasp at the lush garden in the centre of the station rather loud.
“The oxygen farm, as you requested, mistress.” Baxter stopped at the edge of the garden. “Please explore, this unit will not join you as the humidity is not good for me. I will remain in the corridor until you emerge or you call for me, mistress.”
“Thank you, Baxter.” She released his arm and took a few cautious steps into the humid air of the arboretum.
Life exploded in violent and gorgeous colours all around her. Flowers bloomed, fruit hung from trees and grass covered everything except the pathway she was on. A bright giggle tried to fight its way out of her throat, but she swallowed it. No noise should mar this moment.
Each step with her bare feet took her deeper and deeper into the wonderland of life. She had never seen a station with this developed of a forest before. This was a once in a lifetime experience for a woman raised in space.
A shift of movement ahead caught her attention. She slowed her steps and approached cautiously.
It was male and it was barefoot and only wearing pants. The patterns on its skin of vines connecting the colours of a dozen races made her pause. She had seen that kind of a patterned hide in history vids. It was a splice. An attempt at a representational peace treaty by making a set of multi-DNA clones. Each splice held the DNA of all races in the treaty.