by Viola Grace
Life on a space station is hard for a Terran, Nenita has adapted as well as she could. A raider strike on her station sends her and her crew to the battle stations as support and she ends up between a psycho and two of her best friends. Only two out of three survive the attack, something which burns in Nenita the whole time she is being tortured and altered to suit her captor's ideals.
With her talent out of control and her refusals getting violent, she is sent into the wilderness to await a selection of raiders and prisoners who have fought for the dubious honour of three days in her bed. Up a tree, she meets her matches, but unless something drastic happens she isn't going to come down to face the two men who defend her. Will the Oefric win her heart, or just a night in her bed?
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Chase
Copyright © 2011 Viola Grace
ISBN: 978-1-55487-862-8
Cover art by Martine Jardin
All rights reserved. Except for use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, is forbidden without the written permission of the publisher.
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Chase
A Terran Times novella
By
Viola Grace
Chapter One
Nenita Chase sat with her friends and toasted to the upcoming wedding. "To Mari and her beloved Nishino. May you be together in harmony for the rest of your lives."
The group of women cheered and raised their glasses. The Venith Station ground crew was together to celebrate the marriage of one of their own and they were having a lovely time doing it.
Nenita smiled at Mari and the glow of happiness that she had. She stifled her feeling of unease when she thought of the groom-to-be. Nishino was on Nenita's crew and he had been making fairly strong advances toward her since the moment he landed. His engagement to Mari had not really slowed him down. Six months later and Nenita was still nervous about turning her back on Nishino.
"So, Nene, when do you choose a mate?" Sarcothra elbowed her in the ribs.
"When the Alliance allows me to. It is out of my control and has been since I left my world behind." She was raising her cup to her lips when the alarm sounded.
"Balls. All right, everyone on call, to your stations!" Nenita was out of her chair and running for her station in seconds. Three of the party members followed her, splitting off as they reached the launch bays.
The claxons continued for five minutes before the lights went to minimal ambiance. Nene shuddered at the implications as she set the ninth defensive ship into place with a few deft strokes of her keypad. Her station was filled again and ready as the next ship came up.
The crew of the battle ship was in place and the alarms sounded again when the outer hull of the station ruptured. Whatever was attacking them was well armed.
Nene took comfort in the soothing motion of gears and the whine of the launch gear as ship after ship was hauled into position. When she had gotten all of her pilots out to defend the station, she helped Sarcothra launch all of hers.
Nene asked her friend, "What do you think it is?"
"Raider attack. I heard the pilots talking. They have come to the station in force and I have no idea why." The Sheesin shoved at the final ship when it lodged in the launch gear.
"Stop shoving. Let me see." A few light touches and she knew the spot to press. It was the stupidest of talents, but it worked well for her. When you struck the right place, little to no force was needed to move it. Her talent was finding that one little spot and knocking things loose.
A light tap with her wrench and she was forced to duck out of the way as the ship swung into position.
Sarcothra yelped and jumped out of the way, tumbling to safety in an instant.
"I wish I knew how you do that." She was lying on the floor and watching the last ship deploy through the airlock.
"I wish I knew how I did that. It doesn't matter. Let's get to the armoury and load up."
They sprinted through the shuttle bay and toward the armoury, pausing only to grab breathers as they went past the safety station. The rocking and shuddering of the station was freaking Nenita out.
At the door to the armoury, Nenita felt a presence behind her. She whirled to see Mari with tears in her eyes being held by Nishino. His arm was around her neck and a blaster was to her temple.
"I knew you would try for the weapons, Nenita. How charming that you are predictable." His grin made her queasy.
"What is going on?"
He laughed. "Well, we have been looking for someone with your skills for some time, but since you couldn't be seduced into joining us, perhaps you can be blackmailed into it. Remove your masks or I put a bolt through Mari's skull."
Nenita removed her mask and Sarcothra did the same.
She screamed as Nishino moved his hand and fired at her friend. Sarcothra fell to the ground and Nenita knelt at her side to put pressure on the wound.
"On your feet. I don't want to have to drag two women to my shuttle." His tone was cold.
Nenita used pressure points to relieve the bleeding. "I am not going to leave her here like this."
Nishino walked forward and aimed at Sarcothra's forehead. "I could make it easier to leave her."
Nenita put herself between her friend and the blaster, looking down the barrel with surreal calm.
Mari was sobbing with her arm now in Nishino's grip.
Almost sitting on Sarcothra, Nenita pressed the distress beacon in her friend's belt.
It was a silent alarm used for self-defence of station staff, so someone should be coming to Sarcothra's assistance in a few minutes.
"Leave her alive and I won't fight you. I will come willingly." She raised both hands in surrender.
His handsome face twisted with suspicion. "Very well. Step away from her and head for shuttle bay three."
"You go first and I will follow once you are out of firing range. My word as a Terran." She wasn't moving until he had that weapon moved away.
He didn't look convinced.
"You still have Mari and I won't see her hurt either."
Nishino wrapped Mari in his arm again and backed down the hall until they turned the corner. Nenita kept herself between her wounded friend and the gun, heading down the hall toward her enemy. When she reached them again, she widened her arms to keep Nishino moving backward. He shoved Mari behind him while maintaining his grip.
"Move it. The attack will only distract them for so long." He herded Nenita along. A subdued Mari hauled in his wake.
She hiked to shuttle bay three and paused.
"The Tival shuttle on the right. Get inside." His snarl was right behind her and she closed her eyes and wished for help. Her wish wasn't answered. She entered the shuttle and froze at the top of the stairs. There were only two seats in the shuttle. As the reality sank into her, she turned to see Nishino fire the weapon point blank into Mari's skull.
As her friend fell backward, her eyes blanking in death, Nenit
a heard her own scream a moment before a stunner was jammed into her ribs and pain racked her into unconsciousness as her nerves overloaded.
Her last thought before she surrendered to the dark was, he will pay.
Chapter Two
Nenita raised her head warily as the door to her cage opened. Nishino was watching her with light gleaming at his back.
"Have you changed your mind today?" He crossed his arms and she swore she could see the muscles bunching under his skin.
When she arrived, they had done two things, enhanced her talent with a viral infection that surged out of control when she got emotional and implanted a collar into her neck that was wired into her spinal cord. Her chances to escape were slim to none with the locator woven into her collar.
"Go to hell, you murdering bastard. I am never going to agree to be your mate."
He sighed and leaned against the doorframe. "Not mate, breeding partner. After I get a talented child from you, you will be passed to the next male of compatible genetics. I am not an ogre, it won't be too bad, I promise."
She shifted, the chains wrapped around her limbs clanking as she sat up. "Get bent. Go to hell. I hope your dick falls off and your skin erupts in boils."
His jaw flexed with anger. "Enjoy your time in the wilderness. You will be the target of the next hunt."
Her muscles clenched as the urge to claw his eyes out became overwhelming. Memories of the collar changed her mind. He was perfectly safe taunting her. If she attacked him, she would be brought down by a searing pain that would continue until she released him.
He waved in two of the guards who were stationed outside her cell and they approached with caution.
She stood, the chains falling to the floor in a heap. They didn't ask how she managed to unlock her shackles, it was her only hobby locked in the cell with nothing else to do and a collar around her neck. At this point, she was able to measure every twitch of their bodies and the strike zones that would render them unconscious as well as those that would kill them on contact.
The medical wrap she wore was stained and filthy, but it covered her from shoulder to knees. Nenita walked out of her cell, the guards nervously fidgeting behind her while Nishino led the way out into the bright light of day.
Nene shaded her eyes with her hand, the group of males in collars watching her made her uneasy. The ones who were not wearing collars frightened her more.
Nishino raised his voice. "This is a Terran who has decided that she is too good to carry the next generation of talents. She will be allowed one hour of a head start and then you can chase her. You will have the opportunity to fight for the right to follow her first. Each pair of men to win will get to follow after one hour. At that point, a pair will be released every hour until she is brought back. Anyone who catches her gets three days with her, no permanent damage, but anything else goes. Let's see how she likes it when the choice is taken from her."
The men muttered to each other, grins were breaking out and the men were shifting from side to side with eagerness. She could almost smell their anticipation.
Without ceremony, the gates to the compound swung open. Knowing that they would cheat, she ran for it. He may have stated she had one hour, but that was a gross estimate. In her experience, men could get fighting in a matter of seconds and win just as quickly.
Nenita sprinted out through the gates and headed for the thick foliage and the hills. If she could get far enough away, she might just have a chance to set up a defensible position. Here was hoping that her enhanced talents could help her out.
Nenita hid behind the waterfall, her body submerged as the hunters milled around the pool. While she watched the men stalking around her trail, her hands worked at the back of her collar. The release point was obvious, but finding something both thin and strong enough to press it was a problem.
Watching the men argue and come to blows while her body cooled rapidly was frustrating. They could either leave or kill each other, but they needed to make up their minds, she was getting cold.
As she watched the men fight, she noted their weak points and got frustrated with their inability to find the weak spot in their opponent. Knowing that they were too wrapped up in their battle to notice her, she hoisted her body out of the water and warmed herself in the steamy air.
Her medical shift clung to her curves and she waited for the hunters to either kill each other or a victor to be declared.
They battled close to the water's edge, fists swinging and legs straining. Nenita felt an evil grin cross over her features as she waited. The moment they toppled into the pool, she jumped in and swam toward them.
Her first victim didn't see her, but his opponent's eyes widened as she swam up behind them and pressed a cluster of nerves under her target's arm. He slumped and floated toward the surface immediately.
The second male backed away from her, but she lashed out with her leg and struck the zone near his spine with a roundhouse kick. He spun upward and she joined him, gasping for air and hauling her victims onto the bank.
Nenita sighed and sat back on the edge of the pool. Two down, over a dozen to go. One of the men unconscious next to her had a collar and the other didn't. She examined the collar closely and noted that it was the same model as hers.
A quick assessment confirmed that both men were still breathing and that she had two hours before they came back to consciousness, plenty of time for her to escape.
The lash of branches against her body irritated her, but while she ran, she kept an eye out for any kind of instrument or creation of nature that would allow her to strike the pressure plate in the back of her collar. Her newly honed eyesight found it in a spine that was reminiscent of a porcupine quill. With a grin, she stabbed it through the fabric of her wrap and ran.
By the time she was aware of pursuit, she had reached the tall trees. Picking a likely hiding place, she scaled a tree, coming to rest over forty feet in the air. Her expanded talent was actually coming in handy. Each time she used it, she had a better grasp of the world and its weaknesses. Handholds that would bear her weight appeared in places she would never have thought to look.
Balancing on her perch was tricky, but her pursuers wouldn't be able to find her unless they enjoyed craning their necks and squinting into the sun.
Her mind chortled with triumph until she remembered Nishino and how she had ended up on this planet.
The bastard had tied her to the passenger seat and flown her away from the station. She woke up with the station as a tiny mark on the navigator screen.
"Why? Why did you shoot Mari?" her voice was hoarse from her screams.
"She was carrying my child. I have sworn to only breed with a talented woman, so she was doomed from the moment she informed me I was to be a father and had to marry her." Nishino's hands were moving calmly over the controls and he turned to face her.
"I chose you as my breeding partner, but you were not receptive, so an alternate plan had to be created. My clan was willing to attack, so the station was targeted as a diversion." His too-handsome face was serious.
"I don't understand. Who was taken?" Her mind was having trouble grappling with his meaning.
"This was all about you, Nenita. Your talent for finding the sweet spot is a valuable asset for the raiders and we hope it will breed true."
She shuddered, the image of Mari's surprised face in her mind as she fell back at the foot of the shuttle steps. "Why did you have to kill her?"
"I didn't have to, but I swore to my clan that my first child would have a talent, so she had to die." He shrugged. "Tival don't have talents in their genes, so that means I require an extraordinary female."
Nausea forced her to gag. But with her body confined, nothing else happened.
"I don't understand your objection. I am very handsome and perfectly acceptable to the majority of women I have been with."
She swallowed. "Including Mari."
"She pursued me and I let her catch me. With you rejecting my ad
vances, I was getting a little frustrated. I realized that if I let Mari start a relationship, you would drop your guard around me. Unfortunately, that wasn't quite correct. Why was that, Nenita?"
The icy silk of his tone ran through her. "You aren't right. Nothing about you feels right for me. You feel creepy."
He nodded. "Your talent at work, no doubt. You have no idea how hard it was to find a Terran who was not guarded. Most other species guard their talents, but yours puts them all over the Alliance and then depends on local governments for protection."
Nenita didn't bother telling him that her government had given her and almost two thousand others to the Alliance as a test. If those two thousand humans could meet their matches in the stars, integrate and grow, their race would be offered a welcome in the Alliance. Phase one was already complete, five champions had been declared in the human bloodlines, exceptional representations of their species.
Each of those champions was female and each had begun a family of her own. Some had been altered for the purpose of carrying babies who did not quite match their genetics, but all were sprouting babies who would have their own place in the stars.
She would cut her own throat before she brought a child of this murderer to term.
Shaking her head, she focussed on the sounds of pursuit from the forest beneath her. A vicious blue brute stumbled into the clearing and he raised his head to scent the wind. She saw, rather than heard, his snarl of frustration as her height scattered her scent to the breezes. The entire area smelled like she did.
She would have to return to the ground in a few hours, her thirst and biological needs would make sure of it. Despite the Terran male propensity for peeing on trees, she really had no urge to try it herself.