Strain

by Amelia C. Gormley

  “Back off, Kaleo. We’ve got the shot.” Toby’s voice was steady as he sighted his gun, but Kaleo drove another fist into the rev’s face. Darius heard bone crunch.

  “Stand down, Kaleo!” Darius barked. Kaleo froze with his bloody fist cocked back, something feral sparking in his normally twinkling eyes. Darius held his gaze until humanity leached back in. Panting, Kaleo pushed himself up off the revenant. Its groaning stopped when Toby took the shot.

  Kaleo’s shoulders rose and fell with each harsh breath, his muscles quivering with unspent fury. After a moment, he turned his gaze to Rhys and Houtman, who were coming up from their crouches now that all the hostiles had been neutralized.

  It was Rhys Kaleo stared at the longest, still breathing heavily, an erection swelling the front of his fatigues. Rhys swallowed audibly and stared back, paling beneath his sunburn and frozen in place like a terrified animal. Darius felt his own muscles bunch, anger churning in his gut, seeking a reason to intervene before Kaleo could grab Rhys and loose that uncaged aggression on him. But in the end, it was Houtman whose arm Kaleo grabbed, dragging him off toward a nearby barn.

  Looking shaken, Rhys stood there in the tall, golden grasses long after they were gone, while the rest of the squad went to work disposing of the corpses. As if compelled by Darius’s stare, Rhys turned his head and met Darius’s gaze, a visible shudder running through the boy’s thin form. Fear shadowed Rhys’s wide eyes, but there was also something hungry and yearning there. Darius’s hands curled into fists as he fought his own urge to haul Rhys off. After an endless moment, Rhys shook himself and walked away to begin gathering firewood, but not before Darius had seen the fly of his jeans bulging.

  Darius growled to himself as he went back to work. Understanding that boy was going to make him crazy.

  Far too much of Darius’s attention was spent contemplating Rhys the rest of the day, all the way up to making camp that night.

  How was the kid who responded to all the others with such reluctance the same kid who was turned on by Kaleo nearly going bestial on his ass back in that field? Or by Darius damn near killing him? Was it just the lack of privacy driving the kid’s self-consciousness when he refused to respond?

  Darius couldn’t offer Rhys the sort of solitude they’d had in the dorms two nights ago, but he could do better than the previous evening’s campout near the hospital. They chose the clubhouse of a long-overgrown golf course north of Salem. The only piece of furniture that didn’t get recruited to barricade the windows and doors was the pool table. They left that where it was, less because of its weight and bulk and more for the entertainment it would provide for the evening. Someone had actually put a cover over the pool table before the clubhouse had closed for the final time, and the felt was intact and dust-free, unlike every other bar they’d ever bunked in. Such a rare and unexpected find gave preparing camp an almost festive feel.

  Even better, there was a bar that partitioned off one end of the room. Darius laid his and Rhys’s bedrolls behind it, hoping being out of sight of the others, at least, would ease the boy’s embarrassment.

  As usual, Rhys kept his head down and went about silently lending assistance wherever he could. Some days it seemed like Xolani was the only person he spoke to, probably because she was one of the few people he was reasonably certain wouldn’t bend him over, ream his ass open, and breed him. He was reserved even with Toby and Joe, who to Darius’s knowledge hadn’t touched Rhys yet.

  Of course, given the way Rhys seemed to like a rough and dangerous edge to his sex, maybe it was time for that to change. Toby and Joe might be right up his alley.

  The problem was that the more Rhys drew into himself—and he was withdrawn, even for all his responsiveness when Darius fucked him—the less Darius trusted what might be going on behind those skittish hazel eyes. Even when he was compliant, there was a deep-rooted streak of rebellion in Rhys that was never extinguished. He didn’t surrender; he just chose his battles, awaiting his moment.

  In a way, that was good. Reassuring. However weak he might be physically, Rhys was no one’s victim. On the other hand, that stubbornness kept creeping up at times when it was unproductive, not to mention bad for the boy’s chances of survival, which left Darius in the position of needing to protect the boy from himself.

  At the rate things were going, he would lose both his recruits. Until that afternoon with Kaleo, no one had touched Houtman since those colonists had killed themselves days ago, and Rhys was so unenthusiastic the men were starting to feel uncomfortable fucking him. Darius didn’t know what to do about Houtman. If he was making himself disliked by the squadron, there was nothing Darius could do about it. He certainly wasn’t going to order his men to fuck the guy. On the other hand, they were perfectly willing to fuck Rhys. Just about everyone liked the kid. If he could just muster a little enjoyment so they didn’t feel awful doing it, there would be no problem.

  If Darius could just tell his people to use more force with Rhys, not to give him a choice, to demand a reaction from him, it might just work. But of course, they weren’t supposed to mistreat the recruits, so everyone was being nice. Rhys didn’t respond to nice, though.

  None of this was helped by the fact that Darius had wanted to break Bailey’s jaw again when he’d fucked Rhys last night. That same part of Darius had been willing to pummel Kaleo if he’d gone after Rhys there in that field earlier this afternoon. Darius had seen heat in Rhys’s eyes. He wanted that heat to burn for him and only him, and a part of him didn’t seem to be the least fucking bit interested in all the reasons why that could never happen.

  “You got a problem?” Xolani gave him an inquisitive look as she passed by.

  “Nope.” Darius leaned casually against a wall, trimming his fingernails with a pocketknife to keep from hurting Rhys next time he had his fingers up the boy’s ass.

  “Just glowering for shits and giggles. Got it.” She snorted and continued on her way. After a moment, Darius tucked away his knife and fell into step beside her, making a circuit of the clubhouse to double-check the security.

  “How long do our recruits have to have multiple partners?”

  Xolani’s eyebrow quirked up a fraction of an inch. “I’m playing a complete fucking guessing game with this whole thing, Darius. We don’t even know it will work.”

  “Well, what do we know?”

  She tugged at her braid and stopped walking, leaning against a doorjamb and ticking off points on her fingers. “One: we know Alpha is sexually transmissible. Two: we know Alpha infection produces antibodies against Beta and Gamma. Three: we know there is a small grace period after Beta and Gamma exposure before it begins replicating in the RNA, due to the time delay designed into the virus, and that Alpha works a little faster. Four: we know certain other inoculations to various diseases in the past have worked prophylactically soon after bacterial or viral exposure. Think rabies, tetanus, a few others here and there. Based on that knowledge, I’ve formulated a scientifically questionable hypothesis that timely, prophylactic Alpha infection will combat Beta or Gamma exposure. I could be totally wrong.”

  “All right, then, tell me what your hypothesis says about this whole multiple partners issue.” Darius braced a hand against the wall opposite her, forcing his restless fingers not to pick at the peeling wallpaper.

  “Well, first of all, we don’t know what the viral load is in sex fluids. It might vary from person to person, and it might be low to begin with across the board. So the more exposure our recruits get, the better their chances are. Second, some viruses undergo micromutations from one infected person to another, producing different strains that could be more virulent than others. It happened with HIV. Infected people were supposed to use protection even when having sex with other infected people because they might get infected with a different strain of the virus. Bailey or Joe or Kaleo might be more infectious than, say, you or Toby. So right now our recruits’ best chance of infection is to be exposed to as many possible microstrai
ns—for lack of a better word—of Alpha as we can manage.”

  “If we wanted to do that, we should have taken them back to Fort Vancouver.”

  Xolani crossed her arms over her chest, nodding thoughtfully. “Yeah, we probably should have, but it would have set our initial sweep south of Portland behind by at least a week or two based on nothing more than a maybe.”

  “So back to my original question.”

  She gave him a carefully shuttered look. “Frankly speaking, the odds are if they’re not infected with Alpha and producing antibodies by now, after over a week of exposure, this probably isn’t going to work. Beta or Gamma will be replicating in their RNA soon, if it isn’t already, producing antibodies to Alpha, and a few weeks from now, we’re going to have to kill them.”

  “You’re saying we could stop now.”

  “Possibly. But not definitely. That’s the problem. Because I don’t know what’s happening in their RNA, I have to go for the most conservative approach, which is maximum varied exposure until we’re absolutely certain we know what they’re infected with.”

  “So it could take up to seven more weeks?” Darius’s fingers curled into a fist.

  “On the outside. Most cases manifest between three to six weeks.” Xolani tugged at her braid again. “Let’s call it three more weeks at the minimum until we can pare back on at least the multiple partners aspect. Another couple weeks beyond that until there’s no point trying to infect them at all.”

  Darius nodded tightly. “I’m just wondering if one of our recruits is gonna make it that long.”

  Another small twitch of an eyebrow on Xolani’s normally impassive face. “He might not look it, but he’s a tough kid. Are you worried about him making it, or you?”

  Darius’s jaw tightened. No hard-ass of Xolani’s caliber should be so damned perceptive. “Fuck you.”

  She caught up with him before he’d taken more than a couple of strides away from her. “Quite a show you two put on the past couple nights. One might even call it a demonstration. Guys are wondering if they can top it. Getting that reaction from Rhys is going to become a competitive sport.”

  “That boy don’t wanna react.” He refused to let himself bristle at the idea that Rhys might respond to anyone but him.

  “And yet . . .” Xolani spread her hands in an expansive shrug. “Quite a show you put on.”

  Darius grunted, testing a door to make sure it was sealed. “You got a point?”

  “Use it.”

  “The fuck are you talking about?”

  “Use it. Whatever you’re doing. Whatever it takes to make him less miserable, expose him to as many microstrains as possible, and keep you from bashing skulls in.”

  “Don’t ask for much, do you?”

  She gave him a flat look. “I want that kid to live. You do what you have to do to see that it happens or I’ll kick your ass.”

  Darius glared after her for a moment before he strode across the room, grabbed Rhys’s arm, and dragged him to the corner behind the bar where Darius had dropped his rucksack. He’d chosen the spot thinking to indulge Rhys’s need for privacy but what Xolani had said made sense. Under the circumstances, privacy was a fantasy, and the kid was just going to have to get used to it.

  Now he had a better idea.

  Snickers and soft chuffs of laughter followed them through the semidarkened room. The lanterns were all clustered around the pool table and balls clicked against one another.

  “Drop ’em, boy.” He pushed on Rhys’s shoulder. “On your hands and knees.”

  Darius’s cock began to rise, hot blood swelling eager, heavy flesh. He pictured the way Rhys had been that morning two days ago in the dorm room. Desperate. Out of his head with need. So damned willing. Darius’s body tightened, demanding gratification, demanding to spend its heat inside Rhys’s tight, skinny ass.

  The boy looked away and took down his drawers.

  The problem here was that Rhys wasn’t going to respond to the relatively gentle Bravo Company model they’d been trying to emulate. The harder Darius was on him, the better he responded. Xolani was right; he had to use that.

  “Spread your ass for me.”

  Rhys whimpered softly and dropped his head and shoulders, then arched his back, pushing his ass up. Darius growled and grabbed both his cheeks, parting them roughly. “Now put your hands back here and spread it.”

  Rhys made a distressed sound, but he laid his cheek against the blanket and reached back, holding the halves of his ass open.

  “That’s right.” Darius squeezed his soft flesh roughly. “Remember what I said that first night? This ass is mine, boy. Seems you been forgetting that.”

  “Please,” Rhys panted. “I don’t want them to hear—”

  Darius dropped down above him and ground his clothed dick against Rhys’s bare ass, hissing in his ear. “You think I care what you want? Told you the rules right from the start, didn’t I?”

  “Yes.”

  Darius’s hand rounded his hip, and Rhys gasped. His cock was hard, pulsing, the slit dripping pre-cum. “Oh, you want it, all right.” Darius’s voice dropped to a caressing murmur as he stroked Rhys’s lean cock. “You just don’t wanna want it.”

  Pushing himself up, Darius dug in his pack and lubed the plug. Rhys startled at the first touch of the cool plastic, looking back at Darius in surprise, but his eyes slammed shut as Darius began to work it in.

  “Oh God.” He shuddered and arched his back, pushing his ass toward Darius like an offering. Darius eased the plug in slowly, almost to the widest part of the last bulge, when Rhys’s noises began to sound genuinely pained. He drew it out and worked it back in, repeating the process, fucking Rhys with it.

  “You’re mine, boy. That’s the rules.” He tried not to think how close the pretense was to the very thing he most despised, how easily one could be mistaken for the other. “It’s what we agreed on that first night, isn’t it? I can spread you open, stuff you with my cock, and shoot my load in there anytime I want, can’t I, boy?”

  Rhys whimpered. His hips bucked, and his hands gripped his ass so tightly he was bound to leave bruises on all that pale skin. The widest part of the plug slid easily in and out, and Darius had to restrain the urge to drive his own cock in where the plug went so readily.

  “God, please!”

  Darius gripped what ragged sandy hair he could seize. “Don’t you beg God, boy. He ain’t got nothin’ to do with this. You beg me.”

  Rhys groaned, humping back to meet the plug, his hand moving toward his cock.

  “I own your ass. And I mean to share what’s mine. So you get up and get out there with my men.” He lodged the plug in Rhys’s ass with a firm push and rose. Rhys knelt there a moment longer, blinking as awareness set in again. He turned his head to stare at Darius in incredulous inquiry.

  “I said get up.” The color fled from Rhys’s face, and his eyes widened as he rolled off his knees. But more importantly, his cock twitched and jerked against his belly, dripping from the furiously swollen head. Darius crossed his arms over his chest, leveling a severe look at Rhys. “Move.”

  Flushed, Rhys rose from the floor and reached his pants. The tense knot in Darius’s chest loosened a little at the lack of rebellion. He pulled the jeans out of Rhys’s hands and dug in the boy’s pack for a pair of sweats. “These. Easier to get into and out of.”

  Despite his arousal, Rhys’s expression was grave as he pulled them on, and for a moment his eyes darted around as though he might try to make a break for it. Darius snatched a handful of the kid’s hair, pulling his head back. His other hand rubbed up and down the wood pushing at the front of Rhys’s sweats.

  “You still mine, boy?” His teeth scraped Rhys’s neck, below the patchy growth of hair.

  Rhys groaned. Melted. Clung to him. “Yes.” And something melted in Darius in response. Relieved. Almost content.

  “Good. Go eat your supper.”

  Rhys froze when he rose up from behind the bar a
nd saw everyone’s head, except Jacob’s, snap around, making it all too obvious they’d heard him and Darius. The clicking of pool balls had stopped, and he hadn’t even noticed.

  His face blazed, misery edging out arousal. It gracelessly spilled him out of the peaceful mindset he’d managed to find when Darius had done . . . whatever it was he’d done that had driven Rhys out of his head for a while. Rhys wished he could get it back. All he had to do was listen to Darius, obey Darius, be Darius’s boy, and everything would be fine. No blame. No guilt. No shame.

  But that assurance was a fragile thing, and the reminder of his lack of privacy and dignity almost undid it.

  “Didn’t tell you to stop walking, boy.” Rhys made himself take another step forward at Darius’s growl. The plug nearly buckled his knees with each ill-considered movement. When he eased himself down to sit, it was almost worse than standing, the pressure of the plug sending bolts of sensation searing along his cock. Xolani dropped down beside him, pushing a bottle of Scotch into his hands.

  “I’ve never—” He cut himself off, grimacing at the absurdity of observing the legal drinking age from a system of law that had disintegrated almost a decade ago.

  Xolani eyed him up and down. “Hrm. Underweight as you are, I bet you’re a damn cheap date. All right. One sip, then give it back. You need to relax.”

  Rhys grimaced, taking up the bottle. The fumes from the liquor within were strong enough to singe his nasal hair, and actually drinking it made him shudder and wheeze, coughing as his throat burned.

  Titus reached over and pounded his back, laughing. “Welcome to the team, recruit!”

  Rhys blinked his watering eyes, strangely warmed by the epithet. It seemed to imply he had a place within their ranks. Perhaps not as a full member just yet, but getting there.

  Definitely better than kid.

  “I’ll give him something to choke on,” Kaleo quipped from the other side of the loose circle where they were sitting, passing the bottle around. Rhys felt Jacob’s eyes trying to incinerate him on the spot.