by Stacy Jones
“Alright, we’ll need to patch the hole in the retaining wall so no one’s tempted to steal it while it’s undergoing repairs. Right now, I need to know if you’ve figured out how to open the cells.”
“Ah… ”
“What now?”
“There is another cargo area, below the one in which we entered, for aquatic captures.”
“Great. People, animals, or both?
“Both.”
“Of course, there’s both,” she sighed. “Do we have somewhere to put them? Does Zhrovni have anything set up to hold aquatic beings?”
Kix answered, “I do not believe so, aessa. The logs give reference to an arena that specializes in underwater tournaments. That is who requested the… shipment.”
“Okay, let me think.” Aria paced the length of the flight deck, one hand falling to stroke the grip of her resonance gun. “First things first, we need to get everyone out of the hold, transport them back, and get them settled in. Treat anyone with severe injuries, get them fed, clothed, and bring them up to speed on what kind of world they just crashed upon. We need to patch the wall as soon as possible and get to work on repairing the ship. And figure out where the hell we’re going to house water-breathing people and animals.” Pausing, she turned to face the three of them. “Do any of you ever remember Zhrovni having an underwater tournament? Or transforming even part of the arena into a lake or an ocean?”
Tirox and Kix shook their heads, but Rellik offered, “If he had, we would be able to discover that information. I would imagine he kept records of the tournaments. If any featured a water element, that would be programmed into the reformer.”
“Good. We need to interview the prisoners down there, too. See what kind of skills they’ve got. I don’t imagine all of them will want to actively fight, but everyone can contribute in some way. If we can get this ship fixed or maybe steal another, we’ll need a pilot to fly them so we can return these beings to their planets and retrieve those people these assholes threw away.”
Aria could feel the muscles of her shoulders kinking themselves into knots once she voiced everything that needed to be done aloud. Bowing her head, she blew out a breath but looked up again when she felt bodies surrounding her.
Tirox cupped her cheeks and smiled softly, the sadness at finding one of his people dead still visible on his striking features, but determination and love filled his eyes. “We are with you, my rwy’n la. Tell us what you need, and we will see it done.”
Laying her hand over his, she turned her face into it and kissed his palm, then looked at Kix and Rellik.
“You know you need not question, aessa. I am yours, in all things,” Kix murmured, leaning down to press a gentle kiss to her lips.
Rellik gave her his trademark cocky smile. “I am with you, sarasha. How else am I to woo you, if I am not by your side?”
Aria shook her head and chuckled even as Tirox growled.
“Alright, then. Let’s get to work.”
Chapter 46
Rellik stayed on the flight deck and operated some kind of teleportation beam to free the prisoners, since their cages weren’t designed to open at all.
The first time she watched a cell full of aliens disappear, only to reappear on the sand outside the ship, she almost had a fucking heartattack, but by the twentieth, she was used to it, and the remaining occupants had finally stopped screaming and bellowing in alarm.
They’d emptied about half the cargo hold when the screech of claws on metal signalled Thrasin’s return.
Whirling around from where she was guiding people into one of the runners, she grinned when she spotted him emerging, but her smile quickly faded when she didn’t see anyone on his back.
Squinting, she shaded her eyes and looked for anyone climbing out under or around him. When he was all the way out and still no one appeared, she started toward him and called out, “What happened? Where are Skaa and the others?”
She didn’t really expect an answer while he was a dragon, but he didn’t make any move to transform back, so he could. Instead, his white eyes darted to where Kix was standing a short distance away, directing yet more people to runners.
As though Thrasin had called his name, Kix turned and frowned up at him. Her stomach dropped when Kix’s eyes went wide a second before he ran toward them.
Gritting her teeth to hold in her questions while they stared at each other silently, Aria waited. Impatiently.
Finally, Kix turned to her, but the expression on his face did nothing to ease the dread building in her gut.
“Tell me,” she demanded quietly.
He grimaced. “They have been taken. He searched every tunnel and cave down there. They were nowhere to be found.” Kix cocked his head and nodded. “He is saying there were new smells down there as well as signs of combat. He followed the scent trail back up here.”
Her heart was pounding in her ears and her hands trembled, but her voice was calm when she gazed up at Thrasin and asked, “Do you still have the trail?”
He drew in a breath then dipped his huge head once, his eyes moving to the left in the direction of the breach in the wall.
“Let’s go then.”
“Aessa, wait.”
She jerked back around to glare up at him. “I’m not going to—”
He held up his hands in response and shook his head. “I do not suggest we not search. Only that Thrasin does not need your aid to do so. These people,” he waved to the hundreds of beings standing shell-shocked behind them. “need you. Now. We will do anything you ask of us, my treasure. Yet, this is not a task we can complete. These people need you. Your leadership, your guidance.”
That was enough to make her pause and glance back at the newly freed beings behind them.
She didn’t want him to be right, but she hadn’t missed the way everyone seemed to be looking to her. Even when one of her men said something to them, they’d glance at her before agreeing or complying, waiting to see if she countermanded the statement. But, her friend was out there somewhere, facing who knew what.
Aria’s first instinct was to drop everything and go after her. It felt wrong to stay behind and send someone else, even when that someone else was Thrasin, who she knew was perfectly capable of searching without her, as Kix said.
Thrasin lowered his head and rubbed his snout against her stomach, drawing her gaze back to him. Moving his head so he could meet her eyes with one of his, he gave a soft, purring rumble.
She didn’t need Kix to translate. She understood what he was saying.
Swallowing hard, she nodded jerkily and rasped, “Bring them back, Sin.” She grabbed his nostril before he could turn away and guided his eye back to her. “And be safe. Come back to me.”
Surprise flashed in his white eye before something both fragile and hungry replaced it. With a final nuzzle, he was gone, running a few steps before leaping into the air.
In a handful of seconds, he was soaring high above, a black spec in a vast purple sky.
By the time they got everyone in the main hold back to the complex, it was night. Thrasin hadn’t returned, and every hour that passed sent another frisson of dread and worry spiraling through her.
She blocked it out as best she could and focused on the million different tasks pulling her in every direction.
When they arrived, she had everyone gather on the ground floor, then sent them to the lab level in groups under Kix’s supervision. Some people needed more healing than the rings could provide, and everyone needed translators. She left Tirox with the ones awaiting their turns, directing him to pass out food and water pouches to keep them calm and distracted.
It was going to take hours more before everyone was healed and fitted with translators so, leaving her mates in charge down there, she and Rellik strode to the elevator, his arms laden with dinner-plate-sized disks. He told her they were basically portable electric fences that he planned to use to temporarily seal the breach in the wall.
Nodding, she automat
ically laid a hand on his arm in praise. “Good thinking. We don’t need anyone else coming in here and stealing people.”
Sighing, she rolled her shoulders, trying to loosen some of the tightness that constricted a little more every time she thought about her friend.
“Do you have enough of those to set a secondary fence around the ship?” she asked, tipping her chin at the disks in his arms.
They’d left the animals in the hold until they figured out where to put them, and she didn’t want any of the predators, some downright unnerving, that she’d seen in there getting loose on accident. Or, more likely, one of the hysterical people they’d rescued getting the idea that they could fly the broken ship back to their homeworlds only to end up destroying it beyond repair in the process.
“I do, yes.” Dipping his head to catch her gaze, he added softly, “Your dragon will not fail you, little Queen. He will find your friend.”
Forcing a smile, she murmured, “Yeah.”
But she wasn’t so sure. Her gut told her that her friend wasn’t going to be easily found.
Chapter 47
Aria left Rellik on the elevator and got off on the twelfth floor, headed for the room in which the Gaelli were being held.
Inputting the code Kix gave her, she drew in a deep breath and stepped inside when the door opened.
The space was huge, close to the size of the warehouse room where the gladiators’ original bodies were kept, but this one was set up very differently. There were pallets set in rows on the far left side, what looked like a gathering area in the middle, and a fifteen-by-fifteen-foot pool off to the right.
Throughout the room were the tall, gaunt-looking Gaelli who turned to stare at her as one when she entered then quickly moved to huddle in the center.
Smiling politely, she began, “Hello. My name is Aria. You may know me as Vhraress. I realize you don’t speak verbally, but I’ve been told you can understand me.”
Kix said they had something of a hive mind and seeing them clustered together, noting there were no perceptible differences to designate sexes, reinforced her theory that they were truly genderless. Both of those things made addressing them somewhat tricky, but she decided to address the group as ‘you’ and individuals as ‘they.’
Vicious killer gladiator or not, I still remember my sensitivity training.
She paused for a moment longer, waiting for a nod or some sign of acknowledgement she never received, before continuing, “I’ve killed the Overlord, Zhrovni, and his guards have either left or are dead.”
Pausing again when she saw them stiffen, she gave them a moment to take in that information.
“What that means is that you’re all free. Free to go or stay. It’s up to you. If you want to stay, I would be more than happy to have you.” She smiled a little wryly. “I could definitely use your help figuring out the technology in this place. If you decide to leave, I can provide you with supplies and a runner. If you come from offworld and want to return, we’re working on repairing the spaceship that crashed into the arena. I can’t make any promises we’ll get it operational, or find a pilot to fly it, but if everything works out, you could return to your planet. In the meantime, I could offer you sanctuary, freedom, and safety. I will never treat you like slaves.”
The mass of Gaelli crowded in the middle of the room shifted, making way for one slightly taller than the rest, with a darker shade of yellow skin, to walk between them.
A quick scan told her the person was unarmed, so she stood still and waited for them to approach. They stopped two feet away and raised a long-fingered hand in a way she interpreted as asking for permission to touch her.
It was a risk since Aria didn’t know what abilities these people possessed. A touch could kill her, but she didn’t think that was this being’s intention. Finally, she nodded once and braced herself when they laid their palm on her forehead.
A tickle inside her skull, and a slight feeling of vertigo, preceded a soft, androgenous voice speaking in her mind.
“We thank you for your offer, but we have no home. We are bred to be slaves. We know nothing else.”
Aria frowned up into the being’s large, black, ovoid eyes. “Just because you’ve never known freedom doesn’t mean you can’t learn to be your own people.”
There was a long hesitation before they responded, “We acknowledge the truth you offer, but we would ask to Delve.”
Aria heard the emphasis on the word, but didn’t understand what it meant. “What is Delve?”
“We ask to search your mind to see your truth for ourselves. Do you offer permission?”
So it was something similar to Kix’s telepathy. That hadn’t ever hurt her and she wasn’t sensing any threatening vibes from this being. She was still wary, but she needed these people, and if a show of trust was what they needed to trust her in return, then she was willing to do that.
“Uh, sure. Don’t scramble anything in there, though. I’ve got enough issues with my memories as it is.”
“We will cause you no harm.”
That was her only warning before the vertigo intensified, and the peculiar feeling of fingers whispering over her brain had her face screwing up and goosebumps rushing down her arms.
It was over in under a minute, thankfully. She wasn’t sure she would’ve been able to stand that much longer.
“We will remain here.”
Raising her eyebrows, she peered up at them searchingly. “You’re sure?”
“Yes. We accept your offer. We will remain here as free beings to help you in your coup.”
“Thank you. I’m happy to have your help… I’m sorry. I didn’t ask your name.”
We possess no name.
“Oh.” That made her unaccountably sad. Gazing past the leader, she took in the dozens of Gaelli in the room and tried to imagine calling out ‘hey, you’ anytime she needed to get their attention, never knowing which one she was speaking to. Looking back at the leader, she asked, “Do you want names?”
They hesitated again before answering very quietly, “Yes.”
Aria smiled gently. “You’re free, now. I understand all of you share a mental link or hive mind, of sorts, but you’re free to be your own individual persons, if you’d like. You can dress differently, pick out names for yourselves, pursue individual interests. As long as you aren’t hurting people, you can do basically whatever you want.”
It was damned hard to read their expression, but she got the feeling she’d just shocked the hell out of them.
“We… we will ponder your ideas. We— I thank you, Aria. You have given us a great gift.
She smiled again but shook her head and corrected, “Freedom isn’t a gift. It’s a right and shouldn’t ever have been stolen from you.”
When they didn’t respond, Aria let it go. They’d already told her they were bred to be slaves. Freedom might be a hard concept for them to truly grasp in the span of a couple minutes, but they’d get the hang of it, given time.
“Alright, I’ve got a lot of questions, but first, if you’re willing, I’ve got about two hundred newly arrived slaves in need of healing and translators. And I need help getting them settled in.”
They stood a little straighter, there was a sparkle in their eyes and, unless she was mistaken, a slight smile curling the corners of their slitted mouth.
“We choose to offer our help.”
Aria grinned widely, even as a lump formed in her throat, and her eyes stung with the threat of tears.
She’d never seen anything as beautiful and heartbreaking as that tiny, hopeful smile on the face of a nameless slave.
The possibility that everyone she loved back on Earth could be dead—her family, Foster, her friends—weighed a little less heavily on her heart at seeing that her loss meant these people gained so much in exchange.
Chapter 48
Aria stepped off the elevator and into madness. Everyone crowded on the ground floor seemed to be yelling, there were fights beginning to br
eak out, and, near the edge of the mob, lay the unconscious form of an alien female.
Holding out a hand to halt the Gaelli from stepping off the elevator, she raised the other to her mouth and let out a loud, piercing whistle.
As though someone pressed pause on a movie, everyone froze before whipping around to face her. Most stared at her wide eyed, some were covering their ears, but they all looked like guilty children caught fucking off while mom was out of the room.
Sweeping everyone with a seriously pissed-off glare, she yelled, “What the actual fuck is going on, here?!”
Tirox shoved his way out of the middle of the crowd, a scowl on his face and the beginnings of a bruise forming on his cheek.
“These godsdamned fools are going to push me to madness!” he growled, casting a glare back at said fools over his shoulder.
Signaling the Gaelli to hang back until she decided it was safe, she strode forward to meet Tirox halfway.
“What happened? Everything was mostly fine when I left.”
He let out a deep, exasperated sigh. “The female there,” he began, waving back at the unconscious woman. “Her clan mate was in the first group to leave with Kix. They have not returned, and she decided we were tricking them and were, instead, taking them down to their deaths. She lost her senses, began flailing and fighting, hitting those around her. One of your people punched her in the face. That… did not go over well. Now, they all believe we are taking them away to slaughter them.”
“Awesome,” she grumbled. “Which one threw the punch?”
Twisting around, he scanned the crowd then pointed to the woman who’d been caged with two males, the one who mentioned throat punching.
“Figures,” she smirked.
Turning back to the Gaelli, she waved them forward. “When you communicated with me, I heard you in English. Does it work that way even if someone doesn't have a translator?”
Holding out a hand, she let the leader take it so they could answer.