Kel D'Rek; His To Claim

by Theodora Taylor

  However, that worry and all others fade away when I find the human asleep in the first cage beyond the door.

  She is fully covered in Xalthurian clothing, but the sheer material does little to hide her body’s generous curves. My eyes greedily take in her large mammary glands, wide hips, and rounded jaw.

  Kaidorian females are built strong and muscular and only take on a slight amount of fat in the hips once in their lifetime to bear a baby. But this human has so much fat on her body, it appears soft. Like the pillow I often hump into to relieve myself on the long stretches between pleasure station visits.

  My cock strains as I unlock her cage and let myself in, pulsating so hard, I can tell it is preparing to release a claiming spray. Obviously, it will stop once I’m inside of her and it senses she is already pregnant. But now as I gaze upon the female whose body seems to have been truly crafted by her species’ creator for breeding, it quivers in anticipation. For she is even more exquisite than the many rumors I have heard about her kind.

  “Yea…” I whisper, pushing my pants down to my ankles. “Our emperor will be most pleased.”

  Almost as pleased as I am about to be…

  The human suddenly sits up, her fist drawing back, as if one as small as she could really hurt one as large as m—

  My mind nearly blacks with pain when the little female punches me in my cock. My cock of all places. Then darts out of the cage.

  I fall to the ground cupping my cock. I have never in all my life as both an raider and a warrior felt such pain. It takes me many, many long minutes to recover.

  But eventually I regain my ability to move. Then I stalk out of the cargo container after her.

  I will find that wretched human female, and when I do, I will make sure to deal her as much pain as she gave me.

  25

  Kira

  As I watch the tremendous horned monster aliens search the ship for me from my hiding place in one of the shuttle bay’s air ducts, I thank the moons for clocking way too much time in the colony ship’s viewing room while growing up.

  Old planet entertainments are full of women kneeing and punching males in the dick to defend themselves, but I still can’t believe that actually worked. Or the old hide in an airduct trick for that matter—which unlike the suite at the Xalthurian palace, this cargo ship actually has.

  However, old planet entertainments are pretty much all I have to be grateful for at the moment. I don’t know how long I’ll be able to hide in this air duct. And, not going to lie, watching the monster alien captain stomp around the ship, shouting about how he’ll let whoever finds me first have me for a full day after he’s done with me, doesn’t inspire much hope.

  Everyone seems to have joined the search, from the captain and other males dressed in leather uniforms to males with much smaller horns, wearing grey coveralls. I think they might be worker bees in charge of maintenance or something.

  They’re much smaller than the other Kaidorians, but they scare me the most. Instead of fruitlessly searching the same places over and over again like other members of the crew, five of the small horns keep gathering underneath my air duct to pitch hypotheses about where I might be. After agreeing to one plan of action, they fan out for a prescribed amount of time, then regather to pitch more ideas. That’s a little too clever for my hiding for dear life liking.

  I know I was right to be worried when one of the worker bees suggest getting newet heat signature machines and scanning the entire ship.

  “It will take much time to complete a scan with such small machines,” says one.

  “But we have no better idea, so we should try it,” says another.

  Pigeon shit!

  They’re right about it taking a long time. Hours and hours. But even that’s not enough time for me to come up with a viable plan.

  I’m right above a shuttle bay, but unfortunately, the captain’s first act of searching was to place bighorn guards all around the shuttles and flyers. Even if I could somehow get past one of the monstrous creatures, I’m not sure how to fly any of their spaceships…or even open the shuttle bay doors.

  My whole body is wound tight with terror, but I can’t for the life of me figure out how to get out of this mess.

  “The human female is unlikely to be in the shuttle bay with so many guards, but this is the only place we have not yet checked, so we might as well before gathering to discuss another plan,” I hear a voice say in the distance.

  Frustration burns through my body as I listen to them getting closer and closer, until I can full on see one of them, scanning the wall beneath me with a small device. I’m pretty sure this tech was originally made to locate the chittering rodents I keep hearing in the background of my hiding space.

  Despite those rodents, I slide myself as far back as I can, without making a bunch of noise. But that’s only a mere scoot.

  Soon I hear a growl of exclamation from down below, followed by a sharp beep. “Captain, I think I have—”

  Boom! Suddenly the entire ship pitches, like in an episode of the ancient old planet entertainments about humans exploring space along with several other species. (Obviously those sci-fi idealists had never met any real aliens.)

  “We’re under attack! We’re under attack!” a bunch of Kaidorians growl. And the overhead sound system lights up with the captain’s voice yelling for everyone to return to their stations.

  The guards abandon their posts and the worker bee directly below me gives up his search, running off for parts unknown. I hear another deep boom soon after they leave, and the ship pitches again, before righting itself. But then another even louder boom sounds and the ship suddenly jerks to a stop.

  In the next moment the overhead system lights up with a computerized voice calmly rattling off a list of all the things that are now either not working or about to give out.

  The list is super long, and I soon realize I have a big decision to make. Keep hiding or try to get to a flyer while everyone’s not looking?

  Flyer, I decide. I don’t have any idea how to pilot one or open the shuttle bay doors, but it’s a better alternative than staying in this vent like a sitting duck…whatever that means.

  D’Rek was kind of right about the human language being baffling, I admit to myself, as I push the air duct open and scoot out before dropping down to the floor. But then I freeze as soon as my feet hit the ground.

  Those shuttle bay doors I’d been so worried about, they’re now opening. And those Kaidorians who just left to fight some unknown enemy? They’re now streaming back into the shuttle bay—with the captain I dick punched leading the way!

  I scramble to hide behind the nearest small flyer as the captain shouts, “Get as many warriors as you can into the escape shuttle! Haido, Kayto, Maern, with me. Grab a fighter craft and fire on the enemy ships. We need to give the escape shuttle enough time to engage the faster than light drive!”

  It’s a good plan for sure. And I’m thinking about doing some get on out of here my own self. But then the captain suddenly appears on the same side of the small flyer I’m crouching behind.

  So…apparently this much smaller ship is one of those fighter crafts he mentioned grabbing. Ugh. You learn something too late, like, every day.

  We both freeze. Him staring at me. Me still crouching as I try to figure out what the hell to do.

  “Look. the enemy’s coming right this way!” Then I point to my left to emphasize my statement.

  Again, I cannot believe this works. But having seen not even one old planet entertainment, the Captain actually takes the bait and looks in the direction I’m pointing. Giving me just enough leeway to dart past him.

  The Kaidorians are in the middle of retreating. If I can get far enough away to make myself not worth chasing, maybe he’ll let me go.

  The sound of pounding footsteps soon put that notion to rest. Kaidorians aren’t nearly as fast as the Xalthurians, but the captain makes up the difference in speed with his size.

  I’m ru
nning as fast as I can, but it only takes a few moments for a meaty hand to vice around my arm.

  He spins me around just in time for me to see the escape shuttle lift. And he wraps one hand around my neck while it launches out of the bay.

  “This is all your fault,” he growls, squeezing his enormous hand around my throat. “If you were not a pregnant female, I would snap your neck!”

  Well, yay, that he didn’t just snap my neck, I guess, but I can barely breathe. I scratch at his constricting hand, trying to break free. However, the uselessness of my pitiful human finger nails turns out to be another thing D’Rek was right about.

  “New Plan,” the captain growls, glaring down at me as he pushes the button on his chest. “I have captured the human female. We will use her to keep the enemy from firing on our ship. Open a comm and tell the Xalthurians that we have the human female and will—”

  He doesn’t finish that sentence, and he never will. A ray blasts into the side of his head, vaporizing it in an instant, horns and all.

  His hand falls away from my neck and I yelp as he tips over, his headless body crashing to the ground.

  What is happening?

  That question gets answered in the next moment, when a small fighter craft with the Xalthurian insignia enters the shuttle bay and sets down.

  My heart leaps into my throat when none other than my giant blue alien jumps out, carrying a huge gun in one hand. I recognize the weapon as the same kind the Xalthurian soldiers use to keep human men from entering the ship during the Breeding Ceremonies. Depending on the level of the male’s aggression it shoots beams of photon energy that do everything from temporarily electrocute to kill. I have heard some of the males with twenty-one-year-old girlfriends complain about them.

  “D’Rek!” I cry out, waving my arms.

  He turns in my direction at the sound of my voice, and thanks to my now better than 20/20 vision, I can clearly make out every detail on his face—including the way it hardens when he spots me.

  My heart sinks with the realization that he’s not nearly as happy to see me as I am him. I step around the fallen captain’s body, wanting to shout out that this has all been a set up, that I didn’t run away, didn’t break the vow I’d made to him.

  But before I can, the sound of three Kaidorian fighter crafts lifting up fills the air. D’Rek raises his gun and starts aiming precise photon shots at the escaping Kaidorians. One of the jets manages to clear the bay, but the other two go spinning with screeching whirs, before crashing to the ground.

  D’Rek runs over to the closest jet, and rips open the door. Before I even have time to wonder if he’s going to try to help the hurt pilot, he aims the gun. With two cold squeezes of his hand, that Kaidorian’s life comes to an end, just like his captain’s.

  I don’t even wonder about good intentions when D’Rek stalks over to the second ship.

  But apparently the other Kaidorian warrior decided not to waste any time trying to recover from the crash. He pops out of his sideways ship with his own gun raised, dark and even larger than D’Rrek’s.

  “D’Rek, watch out!” I yell.

  But as it turns out, D’Rek doesn’t need any warnings from me. Without so much as breaking his pace, he raises his gun and pumps another precise shot.

  The Kaidorian lets out a sharp yelp when half of his gun arm, melts away just like the Captain’s head. But that pained noise soon comes to an end when another shot from D’Rek’s photon gun vaporizes his head.

  Wow…so apparently, there was an even more severe setting on the Xalthurian guns than we humans knew about.

  D’Rek raises the gun again, scanning for any more enemy warriors.

  But it’s only us left in the shuttle bay.

  Only us.

  And I don’t care if he’s pissed at me. I run to him. Run to him and don’t stop until I’m climbing up his hard, blue body and wrapping everything around him. My arms, my legs, my entire heart.

  “I didn’t run away. I was kidnapped,” I tell him, holding on to him fierce and tight. “Please believe me.”

  A moment of hesitation and then I feel his strong arms circle around me.

  “I know,” he answers, burying his head in my neck. “And, k’vani, even if you had run away, I would have chased after you. You and this babe are my hearts, my only reasons for living. There is no trade agreement or station restriction that could have kept me from coming after you. N’Ure and N’Maryah vastly underestimated the extent of my resolve to get you back.”

  They truly had.

  Many hours later, when we’re returning to Xalthuria in a fighter craft flown by another pilot, D’Rek tells me the full story.

  How he’d come to realize that I hadn’t written the note. “You never would have addressed me as ‘my Kel’ or apologized if you took leave of me.” How he’d interrogated both my former attendants until one of them confessed to reporting on me to N’Maryah’s attendant. How hard it had been for him to actually pretend to want N’Maryah, in order to get her to start up her flyer.

  One of his personal guards had managed to figure out that one of the N’ bloodline’s flyers had gone off planet.

  However, they couldn’t track it or find N’Maryah. Pretending to actually desire N’Maryah as his mate had been an odious endeavor, but having no choice, D’Rek had done just that. As soon as his guard contacted him with the location of the flyer, just on the outskirts of their galaxy line, D’Rek had put together a small squadron and come racing after me.

  He had saved me, and less than two days after my kidnapping, he carried me back into his rooms and gently placed me underneath the sheets.

  I slept like a summertime log that night, relieved to have escaped the fire. However, I quickly discover that D’Rek didn’t sleep nearly as peacefully when I woke up to the sight of him staring down at me. His eyes are hollow and starved, even though I’m right there.

  “N’Ure still hasn’t been found. They think N’Maryah must have somehow gotten a message to him when her ship was seized by my soldiers, and that he most likely escaped. His flyer is missing, and the homing signal has been disabled, so we cannot track it by normal means.”

  My shoulders sink with disappointment when I hear this news. After finding all those Xalthurian prisoners on board the Kaidorian ship, I was more than a little afraid that N’Maryah’s reference to her father’s experiments was more than aggressive marketing. There was a good chance N’Ure really did have a lab filled with human females somewhere. Human females he’d impregnated with both Kaidorian and Xalthurian babies against their will.

  But I tamp down my own disappointment to say, “We’ll find him, D’Rek. We will.”

  D’Rek goes quiet for a few moments. Then his ridges start vibrating as he says, “If I had arrived even a few moments later, he could have killed you. You and the babe.”

  “He wouldn’t have,” I assure him. “He might have taken me hostage, but—”

  I stop when D’Rek sits up in bed, every muscle in his body tight with rage. “You damaged his pride and ruined his larger mission. He would have hurt you before returning you to me. No matter the price I paid, and I would have paid any price.”

  Yes, D’Rek would have paid any price, done anything it took to get me back. I know that now in a way I didn’t when I was trapped in that air duct. That fact warms my heart but brings me no solace as I watch his ridges quiver with what could have happened rage.

  I sit up beside him and take his large clawed hand in both of mine. “Baby, you showed up right on time. Let’s be grateful, not angry.”

  “Yes, you are safe and back in my arms. As well as the babe. That is all that matters,” he says, looking away.

  His words are agreeable enough, but I can tell his ridges are still vibrating even though I can’t see them.

  I reach a hand out to his blue cheek and turn his head back to face me, so that he can look into my eyes as I tell him, “Baby, I love you and you love me. And now we’re here together and safe.
No matter what happens today or tomorrow, that’s all that matters now.”

  I place a tender kiss on his vibrating ridges to seal in my words.

  D’Rek’s ridges instantly stop their anxious vibration, but not because of my soft words. I find that out when a new presence suddenly joins our conversation. Tall and thick and tenting the sheet.

  “Oh wow…” I say.

  “K’vani, please forgive me,” D’Rek answers with an embarrassed grimace.

  As it turns out, those forehead ridges of his are an erogenous zone.

  “You learn something new every day,” I say with a laugh, after D’Rek explains.

  But D’Rek still looks stricken. “I am aware you have been through a horrific ordeal, and that we have much on our agenda for today. Give me a moment in the facilities and I will make it comply.”

  D’Rek is right. We’ve got a lot to deal with this day. The sentencing of N’Maryah, along with figuring out how to handle a possible war with the Kaidorians after we thwarted the emperor’s kidnapping plot.

  There’s also our wedding and the Kel’s first diplomatic trip to New Terrhan to plan. Not to mention deciding what to do with all the Xalthurian prisoners of war we found aboard that Kaidorian ship.

  Xalthuria doesn’t have anything approaching a mental health care system or protocol. But most of those formerly proud warriors have been reduced to near comatose zombies, save for sudden and unpredictable bursts of violence and mad ramblings spoken in the Kaidorian’s bark and growl language.

  They cannot be released back to their families in their current condition, and we’ll basically have to build a mental health care system from scratch to help them.

  There’re also the many female rights items I want to get on the agenda for both humans and the Xalthurians. Messed up as N’Maryah’s actions were, I can easily see why she might fear Xalthurian females being completely shunted out of their own society just because they can no longer bear children.

  So yeah, our to-do list has just gotten crazy long.

  In many ways our lives were way simpler when he was just my alien overlord and I was just his to breed. In fact, it’s doubtful our being together will ever be that simple again.