Femme Metal

by Nathalie Gray

  “Good old Yithians. You guys don’t change.”

  The grin slipped off his face. In one long stride, he came up to her and leaned in close. “We are not all the same. Some of us are worse than the rest.”

  Alex responded with her knee. It worked and at the same time didn’t. First, she barely made it to his groin but managed to hit his inner thigh a split second before the inhibitor kicked in and she collapsed to the floor in a silent, quivering heap. The jolt had ground her teeth together with electricity. Her heart leaped in her chest. Saliva pooled under her tongue and she feared she would vomit. Jesus, not in front of him. Please. Through the haze of tears, she felt his hands snake under her arms and lift her up.

  “If you do not learn to control your emotions, this thing will kill you. And it is set back to humans standards.”

  Was that concern in his voice? She didn’t care. With a snort of defiance she pulled her arm away and tumbled onto the cot with much less grace than she would have liked. “How come it’s on me? You couldn’t have taken it off without it IDing you.”

  Sekmeth crouched with his knees on either side of hers. “The woman-child took it off for me.”

  “Kim? She’d never do that.” Lying sack of space debris.

  “She needed convincing, of course.”

  Alex meant to grab him by the collar but thought of the inhibitor and calmed down rather quickly. One learned when faced with pain. “If you touched her, I’ll chop your balls off. And I know you Yithians have them.”

  He grinned. “We do.” He leaned back and sat on his heels. “I did not touch the woman-child. To me, she is what a five-year-old would be to you. All I had to do was threaten to harm you. She deactivated it right away.”

  So he’d convinced Kim to remove the inhibitor so the sensor would only pick up human DNA and not a Yithian trying to fiddle with the lock while the settings were tuned to his species. The nasty little things had a good memory too, and would even jolt the mixed breeds.

  “Yeah, whatever.” Alex tried to ignore the heat rising up from between her thighs. He was just too close for comfort. She practically had him between the legs. Any other time she would have loved it. Now it just added to the chaos. “Where’s my crew?”

  “The woman-child is at her post on the bridge, properly restrained. The rest are safe in their cabins. Since I occupy yours, you had to be temporarily displaced.”

  “Don’t make yourself comfy. I intend to claim it back.”

  He chuckled. “Perhaps we could share?”

  Alex tried to ignore the heat rising along her arms and the hardening of her nipples. Of all the times to get aroused! “So what now?”

  “I take you all back to the Gorgosh where my employer will transfer a lot of credits to my name.”

  He set his pearly gaze on her face and stared. His silver hair was tied high behind his head, almost on top, and cascaded around his chiseled features. To add to her growing embarrassment, he let one hand, the one with the ring, travel all the way up from her kneecap to her thigh and rest there, his palm hot like a just-fired ammunition round. Her heart had just started to quiet down from the jolt she took then it began to beat crazily again. She stared at his hand with what she hoped was a “get-that-thing-off-me” look. It didn’t seem to work.

  “Human females in their second cycle are so very… What is the word you use? Sexy?” He leaned in and smelled her. He smelled her. The thin nostrils at the end of his long and narrow nose flared ever so slightly. “We use the word kashaak. There is no proper translation into English. ‘Delectable’ is the closest word I can think of.”

  Well, she had a few words for him too, but feared triggering the inhibitor. Plus, she didn’t trust her voice right now, blocked as it was by the growing lump in her throat. He was just so goddamn gorgeous. Alex noticed another lump growing elsewhere. In his pants.

  He noticed her gaze and smiled one big, proud, toothy grin. “Yes, I find you very, very kashaak, Alexandra Novona. Unfortunately, you are not mine to savor.”

  At last, Alex summoned enough control to cross her arms over her chest and turn her head away. “You better jettison me right away and save yourself a world of trouble. I’m not going to that brothel.”

  Sekmeth stood, his crotch right there in front of her. Alex sneaked a quick peek. Holy hell!

  “I am a Hunter first, Alexandra Novona. If you behave in a way that jeopardizes my assignment or if you damage yourself and cost me credits…then I will have to adjust your attitude.”

  Alex snorted. “You don’t scare me. I’m going to do what I have to do.”

  Sekmeth smiled again. Now there was something menacing, excitingly so, in his grin and the way he brushed a finger along his chin. “I was hoping you would say that.”

  * * * * *

  Trying to control her emotions so the inhibitor didn’t kick in proved much harder than Alex ever thought it could be. She walked the perimeter of the tiny compartment several times, thinking about ways to escape, to make him pay. She looked under the cot, around the hatch, along the base of the bulkhead. Nothing. She may as well have been sitting inside an armored vehicle locked from the outside.

  Oh, but she was hot. No air in this place. Alex sighed and rolled her eyes. The vent barely stirred her hair. Filaments of dust clung to the grill, which looked rusted and barely holding. Alex froze. The vent looked damned tight, but maybe she could fit through. Then what? She knew her ship inside and out but had never bothered to check the schematics for air ducking and ventilation units. She wished she had now. Kim had gone in one once to fiddle with some system out of easy access. But Kim was what, one hundred pounds soaking wet with a pair of stunners in her hands and steel boots on her feet. Alex weighed a hundred and seventy-five pounds the last time she checked. In her underwear. Plus, at six foot, she’d never make the bends.

  “Shit.”

  She had to try. She wouldn’t be able to relax until she’d settled the matter. Hell, she just might fit in the opening. The rest, well, she’d jump that hyperpoint when she reached it.

  After dragging the cot right under the vent, she stood on it and was happy to see she could easily reach it. A couple of tugs and the vent fell in her hands. Dust and particles of rust floated down on her. She’d been expecting silver tubes or something. What she found instead was darkness. Total darkness.

  “Well, think happy thoughts,” she muttered. If the inhibitor activated while she hung there, she’d break her neck.

  She pulled herself up to the opening and scrambled to catch a foot inside the vent. With her heel firmly caught around the ledge, she pulled herself completely in. Alex had to squeeze and wedge her hips in, then her torso and finally her shoulders. Doing this hanging upside down wasn’t easy. Sweat slicked her limbs by the time she lay inside the vent, her ass hanging in the opening. Not the most respectable position, but at least the thing around her neck hadn’t picked up aggression. Not that it wasn’t in her mind, though. As soon as she got her hands on him, she’d make the big, sneaky Yithian pay for this.

  She slid the grill back where it belonged. It rested precariously along the dented ledge and looked as though it could fall anytime. Now for the good part. Where to go? The brig took a tiny corner of the back end of the Femme Metal. So, technically, she was sitting—or lying—on top of the main thruster, hence the heat in the brig. If she followed the air conduit, she would eventually end up in the engine room where the ship’s main computer was.

  “Or on the damn bridge.”

  By that time her eyes had adjusted to the darkness. Well, she wouldn’t find out where this thing led unless and until she moved her butt out of there. Wincing from the effort, Alex squirmed away from the vent and followed the conduit until she came to a bend. She coughed.

  “When I get my hands on his blue neck…”

  Control. No spikes of aggression, remember? She didn’t want to faint in there and wake up in the Hunter’s hands.

  Heat rose to her face. His hand on her thigh
had kicked her heartbeat up a few notches. Those long, pliable fingers—the smooth skin. Alex shook her head. No time for this. Get to work.

  After what felt like an hour, Alex managed to squeeze past a narrow bend. Sweat dampened her entire body. And she reeked. After a while the conduit widened. Crawling forward on her elbows and knees and fantasizing about the death of a certain Yithian, Alex made enough headway she began to entertain the plausibility she might, just might, make it. A rhythmic whirr told her she neared the thrusters. Reddish light filtered in along the conduit ahead of her. She quickened as much as she could and reached a vent. By the sound of things, she was right above the engine room.

  “Not bad, girl, not bad at all,” she murmured.

  With as much force as she could muster, but keeping in mind she had to catch the vent before it clattered to the floor, Alex put her shoulder to it and heaved. It gave right away. She just barely caught it before it dangled over the ledge. Sweat made her grip seriously clammy. She held on tight as she lowered her legs over the very hot, very dangerous converter elements. Alex let go. She landed a couple of feet below, both feet on a ridge along the converter. Right away she jumped off it before her boots melted to the spot. Wouldn’t it be grand to be found there, glued to the dumb thing by the soles of her boots?

  After hiding the grill behind some conduits, she padded to the comms unit and activated it. The girls were locked inside their cabins, but Kim was on the bridge. Chained to her post, or so the alien said. Alex pressed the “transmit” button but didn’t say anything. Hopefully, Kim’s lightning-quick brain would kick in and she’d guess it was one of the crew calling in.

  A few seconds later, the “receive” light came on then switched off right away. Alex sighed. Kim really was a genius. She deserved more than the five percent she received. Alex resolved to double it when she retrieved her ship. And to have that alien stripped naked and bolted to the goddamn prow.

  Alex switched the “transmit” button on again and leaned in close to the panel. “You there?”

  “Yeah. He’s like real close.” Kim’s voice was, for once, very soft.

  “Can you get at the environmental settings?”

  A long pause. “Yeah,” came the reply, so faint Alex wasn’t sure she heard it.

  “Wait ‘til he’s not right beside you, kill the gravity then reverse engines. Full blast, my girl.”

  “Got it.”

  This last comeback had been quick and sounded tight. The Yithian was probably getting too close. Alex left the comms unit and searched the engine room for anything she could use as a weapon. One of Kim’s many pouches of tools lay on the floor beside the electrical distribution system. The ship’s “brain”, as Kim called the massive thermoplastic panel, resembled those Old Earth communication switchboards to Alex. She rummaged through the pouch. Most of the tools were for electrical jobs, nothing serious enough to be used as a weapon. Just as Alex was starting to look elsewhere, she spotted a handle protruding from the pouch’s side pocket. She grinned.

  She had one shot at the alien before the inhibitor kicked in and floored her again. With any luck, she’d have time to conk him on his pretty head before she passed out. With even more luck, Kim would manage to stay conscious through the reversing thrusters and unlock the girls’ cabins.

  Luck, though, hadn’t always been on her side.

  “Today’s my turn, dammit.”

  Chapter Five

  Sekmeth buzzed the dark woman’s door. She replied right away. He enjoyed her voice—smooth yet raspy around the edges, like lak, his favorite Yithian fruit.

  “Why have you called me here?”

  She wore what humans called a “tank top”. He’d never seen a tank and couldn’t possibly link it to what he saw now. Nonetheless, he enjoyed when human females wore these revealing things. They dressed so differently from Yithian females who basically dressed identical to their male counterparts.

  The woman stood with her back against the bulkhead. Her frizzy brown hair stood out in thick tresses he found interesting. She still hadn’t answered him. He came into the cabin and noticed a strange smell floating in the air. It emanated from some small cone burning in a dish.

  “How much are you getting for us?” she asked. She peeled her robust frame from the bulkhead and approached.

  Sekmeth thought she looked very much like one of those great black felines populating a world he had once visited. The same slow walk—the look in her eyes. “Stay where you are.”

  A grin pulled her fleshy lips to one side. “What? A big Yithian afraid of me?”

  “Not fear. Caution.” He crossed his arms over his chest and watched her come even closer. This one embodied everything the captain didn’t—curves, sensuousness and willingness. Yes, a lot of that. Somehow, the dark woman didn’t please him as Alexandra Novona did. An easy or, in this case, eager prey never did engage his senses. He’d much rather have to work for it. Work hard.

  “They’ll pay you in credits, but I have something much better.”

  Her breasts looked heavy and firm, and Sekmeth toyed with the idea of caressing the woman before him. “Something much better? In exchange for what?”

  The last step brought her right next to him where she let a finger run all the way up his stomach. “Freedom. You let me go, and I promise you sweet time with me, baby. Ever been with a human female?”

  Sekmeth nodded. It seemed to take some wind out of her sail, which he thought was sad in some strange way. “I cannot give you freedom. Someone has already paid me for it. Keep your gift for someone else more interested.”

  She looked down and shrugged. “Is that one of those mood rings?” she asked, running a finger over his hand.

  He let her caress the ring, knowing it would remain black, dormant, unless it sensed a change in his level of awareness. A “mood ring” as she called it was a crude but effective term. On Yith, these rings had once been popular, back when mating involved more than physical contact. Nowadays, no one wore them, preferring to not show a mate if they triggered strong emotional response or not. Until he’d met these humans, his ring had been dormant, seemingly without life. Then he’d seen her at the club and it’d taken all his years of training to control his emotions so the ring wouldn’t betray him. Alexandra Novona shouldn’t know what sort of reactions she could elicit in him. No use giving the dangerous woman an edge.

  So while the dark female did her best to arouse him, watching the ring with a bird of prey’s vigilance, it remained a lifeless piece of black nacre.

  The change in her demeanor was night and day. Sekmeth took a step back when her eyes narrowed to mere slits. A look of pure seething hatred flashed in her brown eyes. “You’ll be sorry you didn’t take my offer, Yithian.”

  She added something in a language he didn’t understand. The meaning didn’t escape him though. Sekmeth grinned. “I find you obvious and dull. Do you think you are the first to make such an offer? I am a bounty hunter. Everyone has tried this one on me. Males, females. Everyone. You should rethink your approach.”

  With that, he stepped out of the cabin and locked it again. This one, he’d do well to keep in front of him at all times.

  As he made his way to the bridge, he thought he should go visit the captain again. Just for the pleasure of it. His belly tightened at the mere memory of Alexandra Novona. He slowed then shook his head and continued on to the bridge. He needed to inform his customer he had acquired the goods. His own personal pleasure could wait.

  As soon as he stepped on the bridge, he smelled something wasn’t quite right. The woman-child sat with her back to him, leaning over some instrument on the control panel.

  “What are you up to?”

  She snapped up straight in the seat and crossed her arms across her narrow chest. “Nothing.”

  He went to the main command console and sat in the too-low seat. The captain’s smell floated up to him when air left the foam padding. Sekmeth had to close his eyes briefly to concentrate. Keeping his e
yes on the woman-child, he punched in his access code and waited for his customer to receive the transmission.

  “What did you say?” he asked, leaning over in the seat and peering over her shoulder.

  “Like, whoa,” she snapped, slapping the hand he meant to put on the portable computer by her side. “That’s mine.”

  “If you try anything foolish, child, I will be forced to punish someone. I would not touch you because of your age, but your captain is an adult, even by my standards. Think of her.”

  Tears rimmed the large, dark eyes. She twisted one of the white spikes gracing her head and slipped deeper into her seat. “I’ll be good. Totally.”

  A small beep forced Sekmeth to turn back to his own console. “Receiving.”

  A male Yithian face appeared in the display unit. After a few seconds of static interference and image distortion, his face became clearer. Numerous rings adorned both his ears and nostrils. He grinned widely, showing a set of wicked-looking teeth.

  “How many did you get, Hunter?”

  “Three adult females and one woman-child. Plus their ship. It is small and old but sound.”

  “It’s not old—”

  Sekmeth raised a hand to silence the woman-child. So she understood Yithian. He should have suspected it. A glare was enough to deter her from further observations. “Because of the ship, I expect more credits transferred to me than the agreed-upon fee.”

  The Yithian in the screen shrugged. “Are they pleasing to the eye?”

  “Some of them.” Sekmeth wanted to laugh at the small human glowering at him. Some spirit she had, this one.

  “Good, good. I will inform the entertainment overseer he may be receiving more participants for the games.”

  A twitch pulled at Sekmeth’s eyelid. “Games?”