Thargen grasped the latch handle and turned it. The lid released a soft hiss as it unsealed, and a moment later it swung open silently.
A pair of identical black weapons lay in cutouts in the interior padding. Their hafts were a little longer than Thargen’s forearm, and they were topped with stylized axe heads. Thargen picked one up and turned it in his hand, examining the head; it was blunt, with tiny slits on both ends and a shield-shaped cutout on the back.
His thumb brushed over a slight depression on the grip. When he pressed down, the weapon came to life—an orange hardlight blade formed on the front end, a smaller, more abrupt one on the back, and simple, flowing orange patterns glowed amidst the otherwise black haft and head.
“That’s fucking awesome,” he said, words garbled by the stun baton between his teeth.
Now it was time to leave.
He deactivated the hardlight axe, knelt in front of the chest, and set his backpack down. Removing the baton from his mouth, he collapsed it and tossed it into the pack with everything else he’d gathered. He secured the axe along the side of the pack using a couple small fastener loops attached to the fabric. Once the backpack was sealed, he slung it over his shoulders, snatched up the other axe, and strode toward the hull breach.
Yuri was a few paces away, crouched over her backpack.
“Time to go, Yuri,” Thargen called.
She stood up and lifted her backpack in one hand, reaching inside as she hurried toward him. When she withdrew her hand, she was holding a balled-up piece of black material—probably a pair of pants or something—which she offered to him after swinging her backpack on over her other shoulder.
“Here,” she said, taking in a wheezing breath.
He glanced at the pants and was about to reach for them when a new sound commanded his attention. It was soft but distinct—hissing and crackling. Thargen turned his head toward it.
The big door on the wall opposite the cage room was bathed in a reddish glow cast by the plasma cutter slicing along its left edge; someone was trying to get through from the other side. Flecks of molten metal rained onto the floor beneath it. Based on the cutter’s slow but steady progress, the door would be breached within a few minutes.
Rage clawed to the forefront of Thargen’s mind. His skin went taut, his muscles swelled, and his heart quickened. In a few short minutes, there’d be blood to spill, bones to break, enemies to slay. He’d finally satiate the primal bloodthirst at his core.
Yuri, he roared from the back of his mind. Her name echoed in his skull and made his temples throb, forcing his Rage back just enough for Thargen to maintain control.
“Pants later.” Thargen tore the pants from Yuri’s hand, tossed them aside, and grabbed her extended arm. He ran toward the gap in the hull, pulling her along.
“Pants not…important. Got it,” she rasped behind him.
The thunderous beating of Thargen’s heart intensified, drowning out all other sound. The light from outside was intense compared to the shadows gripping most of the hold, nearly blinding him for a few seconds, but he pressed on. His lungs burned more with each breath.
His eyes adjusted to the change in light just as he neared the breach.
The landscape outside was as familiar as it was alien. Gray clouds spotted a blue sky that possessed just a hint of green, beneath which stood huge outcroppings of gray and brown rock with rusty stains. There were tall, rugged trees with clumps of tiny, needle-like leaves beyond the ground where the ship had come to rest, which itself was an amalgamation of short, reddish grass and patches of exposed stone.
“Fuck,” he growled.
The ship had come to rest at a slant, and that slant meant this breach in the hull was nearly three meters above the ground.
It was too late to stop.
Thargen yanked Yuri forward harder than he’d meant to. Her little cry of pain pierced the pounding of his pulse, striking him directly in the heart, but he didn’t let it give him pause. The instant she was alongside him, he released her wrist, looped an arm around her waist to lift her, and jumped.
She screamed and wrapped her arms around him. With her body tucked against his, he couldn’t help the thought that flitted through his mind—wish she hadn’t put clothes on.
His feet hit the ground, and his knees bent to absorb the impact—which was barely noticeable thanks to the loose dirt and his Rage-enhanced muscles. The ground near the ship had been torn up, leaving a several-meter-wide buffer between the hull and the start of the red grass.
Thargen drew in a breath as he straightened his legs.
The air was like fire blazing down his throat, and it made his lungs feel like they were about to simultaneously burst and collapse. His head spun, and his vision wavered. This shit must’ve only barely crept into the hull.
Yuri struggled in his hold, one of her hands clawing at her throat while the other clutched at Thargen, nails digging into his skin and scraping. “I can’t… It hurts,” she rasped between wheezing, desperate breaths.
It had been a long, long time since his body had been forced to adapt to a new atmosphere on the spot—but he had been through this before. He knew this pain, and he knew it would pass. The stuff vorgal soldiers were injected with to enable such reactive mutations was potent, but it was nothing compared to the compound the Consortium pumped into every citizen of Arthos.
Thargen exhaled and forced another lungful of the fiery air in through his nostrils. The sting was diminished now, but only slightly. He shook his head to clear away the fog forming on the edges of his awareness.
“Breathe,” he said, his own voice ragged. “You’ll adapt.”
Her eyes met his. The fear in her gaze was like a kick to Thargen’s gut. His Rage growled impotently, incapable of helping her in these moments. Her face was turning a shade of red deeper than any blush he’d seen on her cheeks.
“Breathe, terran.” Thargen lowered her until her feet touched the ground but didn’t release his hold on her. “Fucking breathe.”
She took in a deep, gasping breath and nearly doubled over; only his arm kept her upright.
The burning in Thargen’s throat and lungs eased a little more. He set his focus on the trees ahead and walked forward. Yuri took a couple staggering steps and sagged against him, coughing, her feet dragging in the dirt.
“Walk, zoani.” Now he could smell a hint of sweetness on the air—the fragrance of the grass, or the trees, or both? His next breath came easier. “The compound will force your body…to adapt. The stuff they gave you when you came to Arthos.”
She drew in another strained breath and tightened her hold on him, pulling herself up to stumble along as he walked. Her next breath sounded a bit smoother.
“Keep breathing, Yuri. Keep walking.”
“Remind me…to never go…on vacation to another planet…again,” Yuri said. “This fucking hurts.”
Thargen grinned and increased his pace. “Fuck this planet. But fuck that ship harder.”
Hushed voices came from the hull breach, accompanied by more wheezing breaths. Something hit the ground behind Thargen with a thud. An agonized scream followed.
Thargen turned his head to look over his shoulder. The female volturian lay on her side below the breach with her face in the dirt and both hands clutching her injured leg. Another captive dropped down beside her, the male azhera with dark, bristling fur. He cast a single, guilt-laden glance at the fallen female and hurriedly stumbled toward the trees.
Thargen felt Yuri slow and begin to turn as though she meant to look back, but he strengthened his hold and pressed on faster. “Keep going. Don’t look back.”
“But she’s—”
“We can’t help her.”
The reddish grass was surprising soft underfoot, even more so than the loose dirt that had been kicked up around the ship, but it was contrasted by the cold, hard patches of stone interspersed throughout. The trees looked increasingly alien as Thargen neared them; he didn’t allow himself to slo
w until he and Yuri were beneath those unfamiliar boughs.
Shouts emerged from the ship.
Thargen knew instinctually those shouts weren’t from the captives, though he could not make out the words. Rage coursed up his spine, crackling along his nerves and sweeping through his veins. His legs stopped moving only a few meters past the tree line.
Tightening his grip on the haft of the hardlight axe, Thargen released Yuri to turn and look back toward the ship. The female volturian was writhing on the ground where she’d landed. A few flashes lit up the breach; their pure white suggested shock staves or something similar.
A figure appeared in the breach, nearly large enough to fill the entirety of that hole—a red-skinned, four-armed onigox. Mortannis peered out before turning to yell something into the ship.
Running. I’m running from a fight.
Thargen’s legs carried him a couple steps back toward the ship. When had he ever run from a fight? Vorgals didn’t run. Rokkashi Vanguards didn’t fucking run.
Thargen didn’t run—unless it was headlong into the fray. He was the front line, the first in, last out, the thing his enemies screamed about in their nightmares.
“Thargen?” Yuri said.
Need to keep her safe.
But now, Rage was resisting him. It growled and laughed, taunting him, calling him a coward. The smugglers, the people who’d hurt Yuri, who’d captured her and intended to sell her into slavery, were only forty or fifty meters away. How could Thargen run? Wasn’t he supposed to make those smugglers pay?
“Stay here,” he heard himself say. He walked forward a few more steps.
No!
He clenched his jaw against a sudden, piercing pain in his head. For a few seconds, he felt like he was being pulled in two different directions, like his mind was being ripped apart. His muscles trembled with unspent power and fury.
Then Yuri screamed, and the conflict within Thargen was over. His vision was already stained crimson as he spun toward her.
Iljibi stood behind Yuri with his arm looped around her neck. Her furious struggles seemed to have no effect on the much larger cren, not even her frantic punches to his chest and kicks to his legs. He held an auto-blaster in his other hand, its barrel pointed toward Thargen.
“Iljibi taking this one. Vorgal just needs to move on.” Iljibi backed away, dragging Yuri with him.
Yuri reached up, grabbed a handful of the cren’s orange hair, and yanked it down. She brought her other hand up simultaneously, raking her nails across his eye. Iljibi snarled and wrenched back to lift Yuri’s feet off the ground. She made a choked sound and clamped her hands on the cren’s forearm, fighting to break his hold.
The glint of fear in her eyes pierced Thargen to his core and ignited something inside him unlike anything he’d ever experienced. It was Rage, but it was more than that—it was stronger, deeper, and even more primal.
The entire universe shrank down to Yuri, Iljibi, and the distance separating them from Thargen.
Thargen sprinted forward.
Iljibi’s eyes rounded. He depressed the auto-blaster’s trigger, and his eyes widened further when nothing happened.
Only a few meters remained between Thargen and the cren.
Iljibi shoved Yuri aside, spun around, nearly tripping over his own legs, and scrambled away.
He didn’t make it more than a meter before Thargen tackled him.
Fury burst from Thargen’s throat in a roar as his arms swung with lethal strength and speed. The pent-up Rage of the last week—of a lifetime—drove him. His conscious mind barely perceived the person pinned beneath him. If Iljibi made any noises, they were lost within Thargen’s roar, muffled by the dull sounds of flesh being hacked and pummeled. Warm blood splattered Thargen’s hands, arms, face, chest. It was indistinguishable from the crimson haze that dominated his vision.
When Thargen stopped, he wasn’t sure how much time had passed. Instinct said it couldn’t have been more than a few seconds, but it had felt impossibly longer—and like it hadn’t been nearly long enough. His breaths were harsh and ragged, and his heartbeat thumped in his ears as he pushed himself away from the mangled corpse.
He glanced at the axe in his right hand. He didn’t remember activating the hardlight blade, but it was on, and blood glistened on its blade, head, and haft.
Shouts sounded somewhere behind him—masculine shouts from the direction of the ship.
The smugglers.
Yuri.
Startled out of his daze, he swung his eyes to her. She was standing a few steps away, breath labored and skin even paler than usual. Her wide eyes were locked on the body behind Thargen. Her lips parted as though she meant to speak, but only a shuddering breath came out. Then her eyes rolled up to display their whites, and her knees buckled.
Thargen lunged toward her, catching her on his left arm before she could hit the ground.
The shouts were louder now. He turned his head to see several of the smugglers outside the ship, a couple of whom had taken the female volturian by the arms. At least three others were walking toward the trees, shock staves in hand.
Thargen deactivated the hardlight axe, peeled off Yuri’s backpack, and crouched to lift her onto his shoulder. Her weight was slight, but she was limp.
“I got you, zoani,” he said gruffly, wrapping his arm around her legs and hooking a couple fingers through the little loop on the top of her backpack.
He drew upon his Rage, willing it to flood his muscles with fresh strength, and ran.
Better not fucking fail me now.
Nine
Yuri groaned, her eyelids fluttering open as she came to—only for her face to slam against something rough and hard. Something equally hard was digging into her stomach, and her weight was driven down upon it with teeth-clacking force each time she bounced.
What the hell?
She grunted and braced her hand against the thing in front of her, peering at it through the tangle of black hair hanging around her face. It was a backpack, which was settled against a span of solid green flesh contoured with toned muscle and raised scars.
Thargen.
She looked down to see the ground rushing by dizzyingly—and his tight ass flexing as he ran.
Why was he carrying her over his shoulder? Why was he running? What had happ—
The blood.
She could smell it. Yuri closed her eyes and groaned as nausea swept through her. Though having some of her weight braced on her arms helped reduce the impact on her abdomen, the bile threatening to rise from her stomach grew a little more insistent every time she came down upon his shoulder.
“Thargen?” she said, voice strained.
He didn’t respond.
Yuri said his name again, and when he still didn’t answer, she reached past the backpack and slapped his ass. “Thargen, put me down!”
He grunted in an oddly pleased fashion, but his stride didn’t falter in the slightest. “Can’t.”
“If you don’t put me down right now, I swear I’m going to puke all over you.”
“Go ahead.”
“Please.”
This time, his grunt was decidedly less satisfied. “They’re chasing. Can’t stop yet.”
She swallowed thickly, temporarily tamping down her nausea. “Put me down so I can run with you.”
His arm, which was banded around the backs of her thighs, squeezed a little harder. “I’m faster. Close your eyes and be quiet.”
Yuri scowled at his back. Reaching down again, she pinched his ass hard.
“Fuck,” he growled. “Keep that up and you’re not gonna like what happens when I stop.”
In some messed up way, his words sent a shiver along her spine that sparked something hot in her core. She knew exactly what he was threatening—and part of her was eager for him to fulfill that threat.
“If you won’t put me down, then at least carry me a different way. This is making me sick and it hurts.”
Thargen muttered someth
ing—probably a curse—and slowed, each of his steps slamming a little harder than the last until he finally halted. He bent forward, swinging her torso upright, and let her slide off his shoulder. Yuri staggered backward, hit by an immediate wave of dizziness that made the world spin and forced her to shut her eyes.
Thargen clamped one of his big, strong hands over her shoulder, steadying her. “Take these.”
Yuri opened her eyes just as he thrust her backpack and one of the axes toward her. She reflexively wrapped her arms around them, clutching them against her chest.
Before she could do anything more, Thargen stooped down, curled an arm behind her back, and swept her legs out from beneath her. He caught her legs behind their knees with his other arm and drew her against his chest before breaking into a run.
His speed rattled the equipment in the backpacks, and it was anything but a smooth ride for Yuri, but it was much better than all her weight driving her stomach down on his shoulder repeatedly.
She looked up at him, and the warmth drained out of her cheeks. There was blood on his face; that quickly, she was aware of its smell again. Squeezing her eyes shut, she hugged the backpack and axe a little tighter and turned her face against his shoulder, which had been surprisingly clean.
Probably because all that blood is on me now.
“So, what’s the plan?” she asked, desperate for a distraction from her resurging nausea.
“Survive.”
She wanted to lift her head and give him a blank look, but she resisted the urge. No good would come from another glimpse of his blood-spattered face; a bit smartassery wasn’t worth vomiting.
After a while, Yuri’s stomach settled enough for her to chance opening her eyes. She made sure not to look at Thargen directly, instead turning her attention to their surroundings, surveying the alien scenery over his shoulder.
Thargen was running across a sloped meadow that was filled with the same rust-red grass that had been outside the crashed ship. Other plants jutted from the grass here and there—strange, pale stalks ending in bulbous orange and violet growths were the most common, the tallest of which must’ve stood to her knee. But mostly there was grass—and rock.
Savage Desire (The Infinite City Book 4) Page 14