by Aidy Award
It sat in such a perfect spot. A copse of trees surrounded the back and a meadow opened up right outside of her front door. She had sun in the morning for the solar panels and shade in the afternoon to keep the house cool. It had taken a solid week to get the satellite dish for her internet connection just right.
If these aliens ruined her sanctuary, she was going to kick their butts. As soon as she learned how to use the Force, or some Krav Maga.
Although that would require going to town and talking to people and that meant getting out of her pajamas and, well, talking to people. People sucked.
People pretended to care but didn’t. People abandoned her without even so much as a have a nice life in the foster care system.
Plus, there was that whole working out thing she wasn’t really into. Still, as soon as she established first contact, she’d find out if the aliens had the technology to repair her little abode with the flick of their wrists, or some cool-ass tech.
That is, if she or any of them survived. She looked back up at the whizzing oncoming collision and gulped. Kady picked up her pace and gasped her way to the tiny house. She threw open the front door and scanned the room. “Percy? Where are the truck keys? Percy?”
No response and no keys. “Shit, shit, shit.”
She tossed throw pillows, her Xbox remote, and an R2-D2 quilt over her shoulder. Maybe they were in her comfy chair. A Cheeto, two food pellets, and three swear words later, no keys.
“Why do I do this?” If she and her tiny house survived, she swore to finally get rid of everything that didn’t bring her joy and clean up her clutter once and for all. She pushed her glasses up her nose and spun around glancing at every flat surface and some bumpy ones too, hoping for a glimpse of her She-Ra keychain.
Nothing. Her gut went wackadoo like she’d eaten a big bowl of Kep-mok Blood Ticks. Time was running out. She really didn’t want to cut and run without Percy.
She glanced out the window and saw that the spaceship, which resembled a big lizard when she squinted just right, was close enough to see with the naked eye a fire from its center that lit up the meadow.
“Dear and sweet universe. Where the fucking fuck are my fucking keys?”
There, on the windowsill, in the plant. She-Ra, Princess of Power. “Yesss.”
Percy was going to have a rough ride.
She bolted out the door, slammed and locked it behind her, and jumped into the old red pickup truck. It took her three tries to reverse into the right position to get the trailer and the hitch lined up.
She’d only done this on her own twice. Once when she picked her tiny house up from the manufacturer in Colorado Springs and again when she’d hauled it up to her brand spanking new one point seven five acres of land in Larimer County.
She’d hadn’t planned to leave if she could help it, and up until tonight she hadn’t needed to. Damned space alien bastards.
This was not the way to start a friendly relationship.
The noise of the ship descending on her was a low rumble, which sounded almost like a growling animal. Hurry, hurry. The only thing she had to do was get the tiny house and the truck hitched and move out.
The rumble in the sky turned into a screech. She fiddled with the ball of the hitch, her hands fumbling in her hurry. “Come on, come on.”
She glanced up at the death ship hurtling toward her. It jerked up, to the side, took a steep dive, and then its nose aimed right for her.
The metal of the hitch clanked into place, jamming her fingers right smack dab in between. “Ouch, ow, owie, ow, ow, ow, ouch.”
She yanked her purpling fingers free and sprinted to the truck cab, ramming the keys into the ignition.
Rrrr, rrrr, rrrr, rrrph. “Don’t do this to me, Herbie. Start, damn you.”
Rrrr, rrrr, rrrr, rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrph.
The lizard-like ship jumped, then fell a hundred feet straight down, screaming right toward her.
Oh, crap. She wasn’t going to make it. The vessel was only twenty yards away.
She twisted the key one more time.
Rrrr, rrrr, rrrr.
“I’ll be damned if I’m going to die here and now.” Kady jumped from the truck seconds before the boom of the spaceship passed over head, missing her by no more than half a foot, tossing her into the sky for an aerial cartwheel.
She landed hard ten feet away and rolled another five. For once she was glad for the extra padding on her ass. The crashing sound of the treetops breaking in the path of destruction made her curl into a ball, trying to protect her head and body from the debris.
KA-BOOOOOOOOM.
Kady’s stomach imploded with a drop like a thousand cannons on the fourth of July and her ears rang with the squeal of the longest, meanest train whistle in the world. She swallowed to keep from tossing her cookies, because that would be a waste of cookies.
When she was sure nothing was coming up, she pushed herself off the ground but stumbled, falling back down with a plop.
Great googly-mooglies, had she blown an ear drum? She couldn’t hear anything but a ringing echoing off the mountains and inside her head.
Where was the spaceship?
She stood again, put her hands out to keep her balance, and felt like she was on a fishing boat in the perfect storm. It took her a second to find her sea legs. Luckily her glasses had stayed on her face and she could see a clear path of eviscerated ground and trees that pointed toward the highway. Somehow, miraculously, thank you universe, the ship had missed her tiny house, her truck, and twenty yards into the trees, her bath house.
Kady thrust her fist into the air. “Heck, yeah.”
And she fell on her ass again. A couple of presses to her ears helped some, so she tried again, holding a finger in one ear, which seemed to work.
“Holy crap on a cracker.” She could see the ship, and there was something or someone, yes, a man, glowing and lying on the ground next to it.
A super big, super muscly man who sparkled red and black. Not glowing like he was radioactive, and not shining like a force field, but shimmering like he’d been planning on going clubbing and put on every bottle of sparkly lotion from Walmart’s clearance section.
Could she, should she get closer? See if he was breathing?
She ought to jump in Herbie Husker and drive far, far, far away from here. Maybe set up shop in a park in upstate New York. Surely, no one would bother her there. Plus, she'd heard the changing of the leaves there rivaled the Colorado mountains.
But he was an alien, and he could be dying.
On the other hand, he and his spaceship almost killed her and ruined everything that was dear to her. Where was the spaceship? Had it disintegrated in the atmosphere? No, she'd clearly seen its flying lizard-like shape go right over her head. Must be further into the trees or something.
This was her chance at first contact with an alien race. Who cared about the ship?
She shook her head. What, was this, Star Trek? She was no Uhura, T’Pol, or Captain Janeway.
The authorities would be coming any minute. They would take care of everything. Probably in all the wrong ways.
Men who thought they were in charge would come marching up her side of the mountain. Authority types were the worst of the alphaholes in the world in her experience. They never understood her. Better if she bolted now.
She opened the door to Herbie, paused, stared at it, and slammed it shut again.
Damn it. She couldn’t leave a possibly dying alien lying in her backyard. He could be suffering and if he wasn’t now, the sound of those sirens coming up the mountain meant he would be soon.
They’d put him under a microscope and never let him go. People were bastards, that she knew.
If she could save another being in the universe from being poked, prodded, bullied, and hurt, then she would.
Saving another living being from the bad guys would add to her karma bank and maybe someday be returned. Not that it ever had before. No one had ever saved her.
Kady glanced in the direction the emergency services were coming from and then into the burning trees. She didn’t have much time. It might work if the alien or aliens were conscious. Which would be a miracle.
She grabbed the flashlight from Herbie and headed into the hole in the trees.
“Please be a nice alien species here for first contact and not the point man in the alien invasion, because I don’t know any fighter pilots that look like Will Smith.”
The alien groaned, or maybe growled. Oops. Had he heard that? Was he awake?
Another twenty yards and she could see him head to toe. And what a hell of a head, and toes, and muscled legs, and wide shoulders, and holy cannoli, look at those abs.
If all aliens were built like this guy, she volunteered to be Earth’s ambassador to his planet. Although she wouldn’t get any ambassadoring done because she’d be daydreaming all day and all night about the dirty, fun things she could do with a man like that.
Not that he’d be interested in her, but a girl could fantasize all she wanted.
He groan-growled again and one leg moved, revealing more skin through the tears in his clothes. Plus, she swore she saw black scales.
Huh. A humanoid with scales was plausible. Lizard people was a known alien conspiracy. That had to come from somewhere. Maybe that's where they got the design for their ships. Or maybe he just hadn’t exfoliated and manscaped properly.
She shone the flashlight across his body, mostly to figure out what his injuries might be and to see if she could figure out how to move him, and a little bit to see more of his, uh, scales.
Her light caught on some sort of pendant hanging from his neck. The cord was torn and ready to fall off. The stone looked like a large piece of crystal with swirls of magic inside. She reached out, wanting to touch it more than anything else in her life.
A siren echoed off the mountain. The authorities were getting closer. Man, they were fast.
No way she could help by standing here gawking at him and his pretty jewelry. She took several tentative steps, and with each one, the medallion’s light grew brighter. Hopefully that was a good sign, like E.T.’s heart light.
“Hello? Hello? Mr. Hotty Alien Lizard Man. Can you hear me?”
He groaned and the sound went straight to Kady's heart...and then worked its way down her spine and settled into hot arousal right between her legs. Whoa.
A Hot Tub Saved My Life
A female voice penetrated Neo’s broken-ass head. Was it the White Witch coming to call him to the afterlife? He wasn't ready to go. He had battles to fight, women to bed. A mate to find.
He forced one eye open, shut it again against the piercing light, took a breath that hurt to his scales, then tried again. He opened his eyes, blinked, and found the most beautiful girl creature he'd ever seen standing over him. No, she wasn’t a girl. This was a woman. If his head would quit pounding for one damn second, he’d do his best to woo her straight into his bed.
Unless she was a one of Inanna's priestesses come to take his soul across to the afterlife. Then she could go fuck herself. He’d stay and watch.
“Oh good, you're not dead. Well, not yet, anyway.” She smiled and blew out a breath. Her body language and smile said she was relieved that he wasn't dead.
A priestess to the goddess Inanna wouldn’t ask such a question, would she? No. So, not a harbinger to the next life. That meant she was a luscious, warm, slightly out-of-focus, but gorgeous nonetheless, woman.
“Can you move? Oh wait—maybe you shouldn’t move. Hang on one minute while I go see if I have a neck brace. I took CPR in the eighth grade.” The woman stood from her position next to him and he felt her loss before he'd even touched her.
“No. Do not go.” The words felt thick coming off his tongue. His head must have taken a beating in the crash, shaking up his brains.
“Okay.” She squatted back down beside him.
If his arms didn’t feel so limp and heavy, he would have grabbed those luscious hips and pulled her on top of him. Licked his way up her belly to those ripe breasts and...
Whoa. While he was just as horny as the next dragon, now was the not the time or place to have sex on the brain.
“I’m Kady. Can you tell me your name?”
“What's a K-D?” Maybe more than the language center in his brain was broken. What’s a K-D? Such fool things hadn’t come out of his mouth since he’d followed Jett out of Hell and met Yvaine for the first time.
She laughed, and it felt like moonlight and the strongest liquor laced with Dragon's Breath all rolled into one. Both his head and his cock wanted to hear more.
“I'm a Kady. I mean, that’s my name. I’m a human.”
Of course she was. This wasn't Hell. If he had to guess, they were probably in Colorado. It had taken him more time than he could afford for him and his team to get across the mountains, and it was a long ass way to the East coast. He blinked, trying to force his brain to work.
His team. He was here to find a way to fight the shadow warriors. Not to find a woman. Well, dammit, he’d found one, and she was going home with him and straight into his bed if he had anything to say about it.
Hellfire, he could hardly wait to sink his cock into her soft flesh.
No. He didn’t have time for that sort of pleasure. He had a war to win.
“My name is Neo—”
A shrill sound, much like the squeals of dying wyrm, blared rhythmically from somewhere nearby. Had the shadow warriors found him so easily? He could hide himself from them, but humans didn't do well traveling through shadow. He wouldn't leave her to the bastard's vile tortures.
Kady glanced over her shoulder, through the destruction his crash had caused. “Ah crap. They’re coming.”
“Who?” He couldn't believe a lovely creature like her had come across the shadow before and lived to tell the tale.
“The men in black, the CIA, the alien abductees, take your pick. But whoever it is won’t be good. They'll turn us both into experiments.” She chewed on her lip and Neo wanted to suck it from beneath her teeth.
Allowing humans to get involved in the Black Dragon Brotherhood's business had clusterfuck written all over it. There was too much at stake to let any non-supernatural beings interfere. His dragon wavered at the edge of shifting, ready to heal his wounds and take control. It waited, not wanting to scare the woman away.
“I will fight them off, defend you.” Just as soon as he could stand.
“Yeah, I don’t think so. Can you get up? Maybe lean on me and we can hide you in my house until the hubbub is over. Although, you might crush me. Geez, you’re big.” She covered her mouth with both hands. “Oops, sorry. I did not mean to say that out loud. But seriously, if you don’t want to be experiment six-two-six or anally probed, we’ve got to get a move on.”
“Anally probed?” What sort of people were these men in black?
“Oh, wait. That’s what the aliens do. If I take you in, you have to promise not to put anything near my anus.” She wagged her finger at him.
“I promise not to put anything near your luscious ass unless you ask me to.” He blinked and swallowed. How had that popped out of his mouth?
“That will have to do. Come on.” She laced one arm around his torso and helped him to his feet. “Oomph. You are not going to fit through my front door.”
Her touch scorched his skin, burning up his arm across his chest where her body was pressed to his side and straight to his heart. His dragon roared out its claim on her and scales shimmered across his skin.
Neo wanted to both jump away and hold her close to his body and never let her go. He warred with his dragon for control and only some of his scales receded. He'd never lost control of his shift like this before. What the hell?
Nee-ner, nee-ner, nee-ner. The sirens grew closer and there was more than one.
“Can you walk?”
“Of
course I can, I am an elite Warrior, second Wyvern of the...” He took one step and stumbled, falling to his knees and then rolling into some very prickly bushes. Stars circled above him and they weren’t the ones in the night sky.
“Crap. I’m sorry, I should have gotten a better hold on you.” Kady’s face appeared above his and the stars faded into her eyes. “What if I roll you over to my house?”
“No one is rolling anywhere unless it’s around in your bed.” There it went again, his cock controlling his mouth. Get a hold of yourself, dragon.
“You’re adorable, but we do not have time for this.”
No, no one had ever called him adorable, not ever. Tough, driven, brute, asshole, but never adorable.
“I don’t think I can drag you, and I doubt if I covered you in bushes, we’d escape their notice. Hmm.” She patted a finger on her lips.
What a beautiful pout she had.
What was wrong with him? Men who wanted to anally probe him were hunting him and his ship down, while the possible lead he had on the shadow warrior soul stealers was growing colder by the minute, and all he could think about was getting her lips around his hardening dick.
If he could get a hard-on, he could get his ass off the ground and walk. “We will walk to your home. Just give me a minute.”
“Maybe I can whip up a pair of crutches out of these branches.” She lifted the debris of wood he’d created in his fall, rooting around and tossing several branches aside.
“No, lend me your shoulder again. I promise to stay standing if your home isn’t too far away.”
“Only to the other side of those trees, at the edge of the meadow.”
Neo glanced in the direction she indicated. The distance wasn’t far but felt like the length of twelve leagues under the sea. He would have to pull on all his reserves to make it. He was a warrior, the leader of the Black Dragon Brotherhood, and he’d had training, practice, and battle experience in pushing his body to the max.
He sat up, breathed through the pain, and got on his feet. He wobbled until Kady slipped under his arm, doing her best to help support him.