by Lia Nox
I held its snapping jaw with both hands, trying to keep its sharp teeth from piercing my skin, and Axar snuck from behind me and finished the job. One quick blow and he dispatched the creature, its body falling limp to the ground.
Just like we had done before, we returned to the main hall. Delia was kneeling by the open panel, the wires still in her hands, and she let out a relieved sigh as she watched the three of us returning without any major wounds.
She tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear as she stood up, her eyes met mine, and I felt something inside me break.
Somehow, this delicate woman had proven herself as more resilient and cunning than I had ever expected. More than just wanting to protect her and claim her as mine, I now found myself respecting her as an equal.
But what I felt went deeper than that.
“I will give my life for her if I need to,” I found myself saying, facing Axar and Tarnan. “We were wrong. She isn’t a prize to be won over. She’s much more than that.”
“What are you trying to say?” Cocking one eyebrow up, Axar looked straight at me.
Tarnan did the same, a confused smile on his face.
“I’m saying that I feel a bond between us. One that can’t be broken.” I made a slight pause, trying to look for the rights words, and I suddenly realized what I truly felt when I found them. “I need her. I love her.”
Before any of them could stop me, I turned on my heels and reached for Delia.
Resting both hands on her face, I leaned down and touched my forehead against hers. “I love you, Delia,” I whispered. “And as long as I’m breathing, you will be safe.”
Her lips parted slightly and her eyes widened with confusion.
And yet, even though I was sure she hadn’t understood a word of what I had just said, I knew she had gotten the meaning hidden behind those same words.
She opened her mouth to say something, but a heavy body slammed itself against the door and ended the moment.
Whatever it was, it made the door rattle in its frame once more, and I knew we were only seconds away from another fight. Yet, as much as I ached to kill each and every one of the remaining creatures, my first priority was Delia’s safety.
“We have to go,” I told her, and then pointed toward the open panel and wires. Connecting two of them in a hurry, she then grabbed me by the hand and dragged me after her.
With Tarnan and Axar in tow, we made our way past the first corridor, nine corpses strewn across its length. At the end of it, the bars on the window had lowered themselves once more.
Working quietly, I grabbed the dead creature stuck on the window and pulled it free. I threw the heavy corpse aside, and then helped Delia climb through the opening.
Ensuring I went about it as quickly as I could, I climbed after her and immediately crouched down and assumed a fighting stance. When Axar and Tarnan finally joined us, the sound of a door breaking reached us.
The creatures had finally broken into the building. We couldn’t hide anymore.
We had to run.
And then fight once more.
Delia
I ran until my lungs felt like two balloons about to pop.
And then I ran some more.
In the distance I could hear the beasts growling and howling, tearing the station apart as they looked for us.
Even though the guys had already killed half the creatures, I knew that the leader of the pack remained unharmed and wouldn’t give up until it picked up our scent.
These creatures were relentless, and only death would put a stop to them.
Moving fast and silently, we went around the outer perimeter of the station and returned to the beach.
Kicking up sand as I went, I only stopped when the salt water lapped at my feet. We stopped then, and I bent over and grabbed my own knees, taking consecutive deep breaths.
“Do you think they’ll give up? I mean, they have to, right?”
I knew I was wrong, but I still held on to a tiny sliver of hope.
“No.” Zuvo shook his head, his eyes narrowed into two slits as he peered into the distance. He didn’t know exactly what I said, but I could tell he understood my question.
His body remained tense and, despite his soft words from before, he looked more than ready for the fight of a lifetime. It surprised me how a relentless man like him was capable of such gentleness, and his words from before still echoed inside my head.
Even though I wasn’t entirely sure on what he had said then, his loving tone had made it clear that our relationship had blossomed into something more.
“Prepare,” Axar growled, right after a violent howl blended with the sound of the crashing waves. The sound was unnatural and it chilled my bones.
Somehow, I knew that the creatures had finally picked up our scent. As if to confirm my suspicious, the silhouettes of the hunched beasts started appearing on the crest of the tallest dune in front of us.
There were still ten of them, not to mention their leader—larger and more vicious than the rest of them, it looked like something that had crawled straight out of hell.
With the sea to our back, this time there would be no escaping or clever strategizing. This time we’d have to face our enemies head-on and beat them at their own game.
With one command, Axar told Zuvo and Tarnan to close ranks around me and the three men pushed me back and stepped forward, offering their bodies as a protective wall.
Not wanting to act as a helpless maid, I grabbed my crossbow and armed it with three bolts. Going down on one knee, I closed one eye and took aim.
The beasts started rushing down the dune so fast that they covered the distance between us in only a couple of seconds, but I was ready for them. Squeezing the trigger tight, I sent three bolts flying through the air and hit one of them right away. It tumbled down to the ground, not a drop of blood in sight, but the others simply vaulted over the body and kept on advancing.
“Hold,” Axar shouted, and the three of them braced themselves for the inevitable impact.
The largest creature held back as the pack surrounded us, and its malicious eyes seemed to shine as it took us all in. Its eyes looked as if they were devoid of sentience, but I could feel a kind of malevolent intelligence lurking behind its pale gaze.
Zuvo parried the first beast’s strike with a quick blow from his pole, and then all hell broke loose. Snarling, the creatures started jumping toward the guys, their sharp teeth ready to inflict mortal wounds. I did what I could, loosening bolt after bolt and killing two of the beasts.
Even though they were superior in numbers, they were no match for the guy’s teamwork. Delivering crushing blow after crushing blow, it only took them one minute to dispatch the whole pack, their corpses littering the sand around us in a circle.
Still, the leader still watched us from a safe distance, and even though its pack had been destroyed it didn’t look as if it was going to give up.
Padding across the sand carefully, it circled us with careful and deliberate movements, looking for an opening. It jumped toward Axar without warning, but Zuvo moved in and sliced it across the belly with a quick movement.
Jumping back with a snarl, it tried to move in for the kill once more, but this time I was ready: I fired three more bolts, and somehow managed to hit it across the back.
It didn’t look as if that was enough to slow it down. It only made it angrier.
Charging headfirst, it tackled Zuvo to the ground and the two of them rolled around the sand while the beast’s jaw snapped incessantly.
Gritting my teeth, I reloaded my cross bolt and delivered three more bolts to its body. Adding to it, Tarnan and Axar struck it with their weapons, and only then did the creature collapse.
Pushing the corpse off of him, Zuvo went to his feet and wiped the sweat off his brow with the back of his hand. None of us said anything for a long while, the constant sound of the waves the only soundtrack to the scene. We sat on the sand as we tried to catch our breath, relaxi
ng for the first time in hours.
This planet was a dangerous one, and it seemed like every damn creature roaming the surface wanted us dead.
Still, after somehow managing to fight back a horde of murderous creatures, we deserved to take a breather. And more than just take a breather, I still needed to process what Zuvo had told me back in the station.
Still reeling from everything that had happened, I closed my eyes for an instant and sighed heavily. I only opened them back up when I felt a hand resting on top of mine. Looking to the side, I found Zuvo glancing at me, a loving expression on his face. For a man as quiet and sullen as he used to be, that was quite a thing.
Except it wasn’t just Zuvo looking at me like that.
Axar and Tarnan were doing it too.
When they told me I was family, they weren’t kidding.
They looked at me with a sense of adoration from the first time they laid eyes on me, and I felt that adoration every time they used my body. But that sense of adoration was slowly turning into something else.
Something deeper and stronger.
I knew because I felt the same thing.
Turning to me, Axar whispered something that sounded similar to what Zuvo had told me before. I couldn’t quite understand the words, but the meaning was clear.
And when Tarnan did the same, stroking my face with his long fingers, I found a smile spreading across my lips while a single word took over my thoughts.
Love.
What I felt toward them was love.
It was crazy, and I knew it. I was stranded on a faraway planet filled to the brim with things that wanted us dead, and yet I had found the time to fall in love with the strangest three men I had ever met.
When I signed up for the experiment, I never thought things would go down like this.
I had contemplated death, pain and a multitude of bad things, but I never believed love would be the among the things I was meant to experience.
“I really don’t know how to explain it,” I started, allowing my gaze to go from one man to the other. “But I’m in love with you. With all of you.” To make it more obvious, I laid the palm of my open hand on my heart and smiled at them.
“Love,” Zuvo repeated, the word sounding foreign as it came out of his mouth. Reaching for me, he laid his hand on my chest and felt my heartbeat.
“Love,” Axar said then, doing the same thing as Zuvo. When Tarnan repeated the same word, that goofy smile of his dancing on his lips, they all had their hands on my chest, feeling the gentle rise and fall of my chest.
“Yes,” I whispered softly, my heart happily beating. “It’s love.”
The words felt just right as I said it, but I was eager to break through the communication barrier between us. I needed to understand them, just as much as I needed them to understand me. But that was impossible...or was it?
Jumping to my feet, I placed both hands on my hips and stared down at the dead creatures.
Even though their exterior seemed to be almost organic, their insides were a mess of wires and metal, technology their beating heart.
Now that we weren’t running scared, and I’d had a chance to look at the discarded, broken tech at the stations, I recognized some of the pieces and chips.
And these were working.
Or, had been until they tried to take out my guys.
Maybe, just maybe, it was enough to fix up my translator.
It was a long shot, but I had to try.
Without explaining to them what I was doing, I started heading back toward the station. They called after me, but I just looked back at them over my shoulder and waved at them to follow me.
They did it eagerly after exchanging a curious glance, and the four of us climbed up the dunes once more.
Once we were back on the station, I got to work immediately. Using whatever abandoned tech I could put my hands on, and salvaging some broken pieces from the dead beasts, I set about trying to improve the accuracy of the translator.
We’d gotten by tolerably well since finding it, but I was fed up of having to guess the occasional word – I needed to be able to talk to these men for hours at a time.
I had to know everything about them, to share my life with them as they shared theirs with me.
This needed to work.
Axar
At last we had a spare moment to catch our breath.
After the whirlwind of being thrown into battle, our lives at stake, it had been just as shocking to have then exchanged words of love to one another. It had been difficult for me to make out as Delia had declared those emotions, her body heaving from the coursing adrenaline of fighting.
But as she’d said it, its sound awkward to my ears, I found that I’d instantly grasped its meaning; it held the same meaning that our word did, the word that Zuvo had used to share his feelings with us and Delia herself.
We were in love.
I was in love. But oh how I longed to be able to speak those words to her and her to me without us frowning, stuttering and having to guess at deeper meanings.
As I watched Delia from the corner of my eyes, I noticed that she was scavenging around in some rubble that had fallen from one of the masters’ machines.
It looked dead to me, but she had decided otherwise as she continued to scramble and pull, trying to sandwich bits together and flip switches. I wasn’t sure if the battle had unsettled her or if it was because we’d all said we loved one another, but whatever it was, it had her on edge and eager to keep busy. Truthfully, I couldn’t blame her, my hands already felt twitchy at not having something to do.
Leaving her to fiddle about, I ambled my way over to Zuvo, Tarnan and he in deep discussion about, what I presumed, was Delia.
When I got close enough to hear properly, I had my suspicions confirmed; Zuvo was a little unsettled at how it still felt awkward between us all. We’d shared these words, but what they meant was still held back and in check by a contrast in language; he balled up his hands into fists and smashed at a nearby wall, the plaster crumbling and falling in large chunks.
I shot a sideways glance at Delia, but she was too engrossed in her toiling to take much notice. She’d heard the commotion, but she knew we weren’t in any danger. I rested my hand on Zuvo’s shoulder and gave it a squeeze. He turned to look at me, his eyes lost in a world of meaning, yet a world that I instantly felt a part of because I too was going through the same turmoil. Neither of us even needed to ask Tarnan if he was in the same boat as us, it was etched all over his face that he was also.
“I’ve got it!” Delia rejoiced.
All three of us yanked our heads to stare at her, our expressions one of utter disbelief yet again – had we just understood more of her native tongue? Without much thought, I automatically called out to her.
“Delia…? What did you do? How did you do it?”
“Axar? Oh, oh my God, I- I can really understand what you’re saying!” She ran over and flung herself into my arms, my muscles scooping her up and into a big hug. Zuvo and Tarnan looked in shock at one another before coming into the hug as well.
We’d all been struggling to communicate for so long, so to actually be able to hear what she was saying, to know her true words, it was beyond wonderful. It was remarkable, as was she.
“I’ve got some repairs to make, as it’s only half working right now, but I know I can fix it,” She rambled, some of her words not translating into ours, leaving us having to furrow our brows once more.
It was annoying that the gadget she held wasn’t translating perfectly, but at least we could grasp the main points of what she was saying, as she could with us. “It’s, it’s wonderful, isn’t it?”
“You have no idea.” I chortled, shaking my head in disbelief still. Having waited so long for what had seemed like the impossible, to have that revealed to be possible had me reeling.
I’d reeled from so many other encounters, most of them being when I was screwing Delia or fighting, but this one was differe
nt. My world had shifted.
Knowing that repairs still needed to be made, after that initial buzz of excitement, we held off from having lengthy conversations with one another; we still talked away, but only regarding words and topics we both mutually understood.
We waited patiently until Delia’s face lit up again.
“Do you understand me more easily now?” she asked.
“I do,” Zuvo said, his face beaming.
“I do as well,” I replied.
“Oh. My. God.” she said. “I love you!”
I knew Zuvo wanted to talk with her about it, but I noted that now he knew he had the right words to use, he suddenly seemed withdrawn and nervous.
Declaring your feelings when someone knew exactly what they meant and how powerful the connection was hardly the same as saying a word and hoping another got its general meaning.
Still, not wanting him to lose his chance, I tapped him on the elbow, encouraging him to be brave like me. He rolled his eyes skyward when I puffed out my chest and told him to stout and true.
“Delia,” He began, his eyes never truly meeting hers, although I could tell that he wanted to. “I know I spoke of love before… but I want you to know how, how much you mean to me…”
His voice trailed off when he finally held her gaze with his, her eyes brimming with salty tears ready to pour from her eyes at any moment. It took her awhile to compose herself enough to speak, but when she did, there was a stammer in her voice as emotions broke through.
“Believe me, I know how you feel - how you all feel - you’re my family, and I’m deeply in love with each one of you.”
At this Zuvo smiled, as did Tarnan and myself, my grin the biggest of all.
It was funny in a cruel sort of way, how all four of us had been saying the same things to one another all along, but that we hadn’t been aware of that until just now.
It felt like another twisted game this planet had played out, using us as guinea pigs; even though I tried to keep this moment light and joyous, I felt angry.