by Tristan Vick
“She?” Danica asked.
Zallek turned his black and blue face away as if to say, I’ve said too much already.
With a merciless crunch, she stomped her boot down on his bare foot.
“Argh!” he cried.
Her hand reached out and clutched him vigorously by his hair. Jerking his head back, she leaned down to whisper into his ear. “Sorry, I may not have made myself clear earlier. We’re not stopping until I get a name.”
“Tell me, Dani, do you still have that cute little freckle on the inside of your left thigh? The one that greets you just before going down on—” Crack!
She elbowed him right across the bridge of his nose. His head was already back as far as it could go so the tension placed on his spine caused his head to rebound and whip forward. Leaning hunched over, blood gushed from his busted nose and mingled with the blood pouring from his mouth.
“You psycho bitch,” he grumbled, blood and saliva drizzling from his mouth as he spoke. “You broke my goddamn nose!”
She stomped down on his other foot and he yelped like a wounded dog.
“I don’t know if you’re just dense or really this stupid. But you still haven’t answered my question. Names. Or we go to round three.”
Zallek just laughed to himself. When Danica drew out a knife he stopped laughing and gulped. “W-what’s that for?”
“I’m going to cut off your balls now and feed them to you.”
“You’re joking, right?”
Danica smiled at him, leaned in, and said, “Sure.” Then, not wasting another second, she grabbed his waistline and sliced through his belt. Then, gripping tightly to his waistband, using the blade to sheer the fabric, she tore off the pants in one swift jerk and looked down at his man thong.
“Seriously?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. “Budgie-smugglers?”
A crude smile formed on his battered mouth. A smatter of sticky red stained his teeth, giving him a hideous look—like a wild beast that had just gorged itself on a kill. “You better get to cuttin’ sweetheart, because I have a huge set of balls and it’s gonna take you all day long.”
She ignored the lewd remark and clutched his underwear’s waistband and started cutting through it. He watched nervously as she removed his underwear too. His half-flaccid dick unfurled and flopped onto the chair between his legs.
They both looked down at it together, admiring how truly long it really was. Then, Danica gently scooped it up in her hand and slowly squeezed down on it. This elicited a pleasurable groan from his lips and leaning over she looked into his eyes and smiled.
“So, do you have a name for me or not?” she asked. She continued to squeeze his cock, which was growing firm in her hands, and ran the edge of the knife along his inner thigh as she moved the blade incrementally closer to his scrotum.
Just as the blade touched the tender part of his perineum, he yelped, “Fine! Yep. Got it!” Realizing she might actually go through with it, he glanced down at the blade between his legs and quickly began to spill everything he knew.
“Onelle Te’Legra Agnar,” he said in a distressed tone. “She and the Voice of H’aaztre have an agreement of sorts. She gets to have free rein on all trade during the occupation.”
“And what does The Voice get out of all this?”
“All of the intel she gathers from shipping manifestos goes back to her. If anything on the manifestos should look suspicious, she sends in boarding patrols to take a look and neutralize any possible threats.”
“Let’s see if I have this down correctly. You get to send your narcotics to all corners of the galaxy and get bonuses for ratting out your competitors who lose their licenses on one-time offenses? And the Voice collects all of the information to keep tabs on every little thing being traded, sold, and smuggled.”
“In a nutshell, yes.”
“So, naturally, you climbed into bed with her.”
“She’s a woman, isn’t she?”
“Ew, gross,” Danica said, making a sour face. “I didn’t mean literally, you Slurvian ass.”
Zallek shrugged as though bedding any random woman was a common occurrence with him. One he obviously wore as a badge of honor evidenced by the smug half grin he wore on his swollen lips.
“I think this concludes our little chat,” Danica said, dropping his cock back onto the chair.
She twirled the knife in her hand, raised it high, and then slammed it down with brutal force right between his legs. He jolted in fright and then sighed with relief when he realized it had only bit into the wooden chair. The blade barely missing his manhood, he sighed out in relief, happy to remain unscathed.
Danica fetched a nearby towel and wiped Zallek’s blood off her hands. She had gotten what she needed out of him and was ready to retire for the evening.
“Wait,” Zallek called out to her as she turned toward the exit. He looked down at the blade wedged between his legs, the sharp edge pointed toward him. “You’re not just going to leave me here like this?”
Danica didn’t reply. She left him there to contemplate his life choices, slowly turning away again and continuing on her way. She had better things to do than waste any more time on his sorry ass.
But she couldn’t say that seeing him didn’t stir up old feelings. With everything that had happened, the loss of her child, Jegra having fallen into a coma, every single damn day was a fight to just not use again.
Consequently, she turned all her pent-up frustration back onto the person who had been the bane of her existence. Sure, it wasn’t Zallek who’d forced her to use in the first place—that was on her. But everything after that was a deliberate attempt to manipulate and abuse her. And for that, he deserved whatever was coming to him.
“What do you intend to do with him?” a familiar voice asked as she neared the end of the corridor. She looked over to find Raphine leaning against a large marble pillar looking over at her with inquisitive, teal eyes.
“I’m going to let him sweat it out for a few days. Then lock him up and throw away the key. The best thing for me to do is try and move on.”
“We could use him, you know?”
Danica raised an eyebrow. She wasn’t in the mood to talk shop, but Raphine never had a bad idea, so she was willing to hear her out. “Oh, yeah?”
“I was thinking we could put our own agents into his drug shipping operation and then gain intel on those gaining intel on us. Kind of a double sleeper agent, spy on spy situation.”
“Sounds promising. But I’m washing my hands of Zallek’s bullshit. This time for good. So you’ll be overseeing this one on your own.”
Raphine nodded and then sauntered over to Danica. She reached up and brushed Danica’s hair out of her eyes and gently tucked it behind her right ear. Danica reached up and stopped her hand.
“Raph, sorry, I can’t. I mean, what happened between us was...unexpected and...I do care about you. It’s just...Jegra’s back now and I can’t...you know.”
“I know,” Raphine said, doing her best to mask her heart wrenching pain as Danica rejected her. “It wasn’t meant to last. It was foolish of me to fall for my teacher anyway.”
“Someday you’ll find the person right for you,” Danica said, bringing Raphine’s hand to her lips. She kissed the top of Raphine’s knuckles and smiled up at her. “I promise.”
When Raphine smiled back, Danica turned up the stairwell and disappeared into the main palace.
Raphine waited for her to be out of earshot before she broke down sobbing. Wiping tears from her eyes, she turned down a side hallway and raced out a hidden back entrance and into the courtyard. When she stepped out into the crisp, evening desert air, she took a deep breath and looked up at the stars.
Somewhere up there, right now, Jegra was meeting with her people—the last survivors of planet Earth—now galactic refugees. They had a long, hard road ahead of them and Raphine knew she’d need to have the palace ready to receive them when they returned.
In the distance
, new apartments were being built just at the edge of the city. The fifteen story-tall buildings were designed specifically for housing the human survivors.
“Raphine,” a voice called out from over her shoulder.
She turned to find Danica standing there, eyes brimming with tears. “I may have been premature in how deep my feelings run for you.”
Raphine laughed and then gulped, feeling equal parts anger for being jerked around and joy for Danica returning to her and admitting how cold and cruel she’d been.
Danica ran to her and threw her arms around her neck. Their lips met and they shared a satisfying kiss.
“Are you sure this is what you want?” Raphine asked.
“No,” Danica replied. “But whatever it is we have,” she pointed at her own heart, “it’s worth holding onto. Don’t you think?”
“What about your engagement? Don’t you still want to marry Jegra?”
Danica looked away as though she were embarrassed. “Honestly, she seems different to me somehow. Maybe it’s just me. So much has happened. And, not knowing if she’d ever wake from her endless sleep, I’d been mentally preparing myself for the fact that I’d need to move on. And the thing between us just sort of happened. And now...now, I just don’t know.”
“Maybe you both just need some time,” Raphine said. “She only just came out of a coma to find the nightmare she had dreamed about for over a year was, in fact, a reality. That’s not an easy thing to wake up to.”
“No, but it’s the reality we must all face,” Danica replied.
“Like I said,” Raphine reiterated, “just give her time before you make any lasting decisions. Who knows? She may bounce back to her old self and everything will be right again, you two will marry each other, and live happily ever after.”
“And if not?”
“If not, then you’ll still have me.” Raphine cupped her hands around Dani’s face then leaned in and touched her forehead to Dani’s. They smiled, kissed briefly, and then returned to the glowing lights of the palace, hand in hand.
ABOUT FIFTEEN HUNDRED meters away from Arena Palace, a light breeze blew across the landscape, kicking up kernels of loose sand that rolled passed a medium sized rock perched on the crest of a sand dune.
Without warning, the rock sprouted legs and scuttled around like a crab. It moved into position and then focused its three, green-glowing night-vision eyes onto its target.
The telescopic eyes zoomed in on the two women entering the palace. After they disappeared inside, it zoomed back out again, widening its panoramic view. As a couple of palace guards rounded the corner, it automatically honed in on their positions and began tracking them. Each individual guard was flagged with a tracking number as the sand-crab gained intel.
Three dunes over, sitting cross-legged at the base of a rather large mound was a woman wearing full desert tactical gear, a VR headset, and the best equipment that a freelancer could buy. On her visor, she watched through the nigh-vision eyes of the robotic sand-crab perched on the crest of the dune.
In the silence of the desert night, the comm crackled in the woman’s earpiece and a gruff voice came on the radio. “Sand Viper, report.”
“The ex-vice admiral and the green-skin returned to the palace. Security seems to be minimal with the empress off world.”
“Do you have a fix on the target?”
“Affirmative. The target is being held in a secondary basement. Likely a holding cell.”
The robotic sand spider’s eye flickered and changed to red then transmitted its infrared thermal imaging back to its viewer.
“What’s the security detail like guarding the cell?” the voice in her ear asked.
“Nothing that appears on thermal imaging. But that doesn’t mean there aren’t bots guarding the prisoner.”
There was a short pause before the voice came back over the comm. “Sand Viper, your mission objective has changed. Ghost recon is now an official rescue op. Your mission is to infiltrate the palace undetected, secure the asset, and get out again.”
“And if there’s unforeseen trouble?”
“You have permission to terminate any and all obstacles that get in your way. Sand Viper, I needn’t remind you of the delicate nature of this op. I don’t want any mistakes. Do I make myself clear?”
“Crystal,” she replied in a calculating voice.
She cut her link and then slowly reached up and slipped off the VR headset. Pulling out her earpiece, she unwound it from her ear, letting it dangle from the cord. The insinuation that she’d ever make a mistake on a live op was insulting and she resented the accusation. Letting out a vexed sigh, she reminded herself that, although her current employer was a complete ass, she’d be sure to add a surcharge for putting up with his condescending bullshit.
Like most Bre’lal, she was extremely beautiful, even as she sported a shaved head. Slowly rising to her feet, she put on sunglasses with mirrored lenses that gave her an added mystique and then walked over to her ATV, parked a short distance away.
The Jeep-styled ATV was equipped with oversized sand tires that resembled giant tractor tires. The vehicle didn’t have any doors, even as it appeared to be armored, and she tossed the VR headset into the open duffle bag on the backseat before leaning in and fetching the high-powered plasma rifle off the back windshield.
After breaking down the gun and folding it in half, she swung it across her back and it clamped down onto the magnetic harness with a resounding clank.
The desert camo and tactical gear she wore helped her blend into the surroundings well enough, but she opened up a carbon fiber suitcase in the rear cargo bed of the ATV and pulled out a hooded cloak. She slipped the cloak on over her head and body armor then pinched a touch sensitive patch on the collar.
All of a sudden, her visage wavered like a heat mirage glistening on the desert. Parts of her image faded then reappeared, while others reappeared only to disappear again. Finally, she disappeared from sight altogether as the invisibility cloak fully activated.
Invisible to the naked eye, she ascended to the top of the dune and looked out across the two klicks of sand which sat between her and the palace lights that glimmered in the distance like the lamps of a desert caravan.
Although the Bre’lal people didn’t have a military to call their own, many Bre’lal were conscripted into the Dagon military as grunts. In fact, most of the Bre’lal men and a large majority of the women made up the backbone of the Dagon Imperial Guard. As it turned out, Dagon people were perfectly fine sending others into harm’s way to do their dirty work for them.
The IPG were trained in space, desert, and amphibious combat, but once their tours were complete, job prospects were rather limited. Which is why retired Imperial Guard made excellent private contractors.
Of course, you could always opt to re-up your enlistment, but for Gaewen Feradorn, private gigs paid too well to pass up.
Besides, she’d served her mandatory time and then some, having done two additional tours on the front lines of Dakroth’s endless war with the Nyctans. That had been enough for her.
For Gaewen, as a Bre’lal woman, it was either take on private contract work or go for sex work on some island resort, playing the part of a bikini-clad goddess desperate to appease her guest’s every fantasy. She’d be lying if she said killing wasn’t more arousing than sex. Because...it most definitely was. In fact, getting her hands dirty was the fun part.
She didn’t know if that made her a sociopath, or whatever, but she knew that it made her extremely good at her job.
Gaewen focused her mind on her new mission objective and began shuffling down the side of the dune. As her boots left lengthy skid marks behind her, she pulled her hood up and vanished into her surroundings like a ghost.
13
Hot white bolts of radiant plasma pelted the Nephilim ship. Hundreds of automated gun batteries honed in on the arrival of the enemy vessel and spat streaming hot javelins of energy at the mammoth cruiser that linge
red in low orbit.
The flagship of the Nephilim armada was unlike anything Dakroth had ever seen. Its architecture was organic, its design didn’t seem functional, but somehow it operated capably, and it shared more in common with the CSEs than any battleship he’d ever seen. He couldn’t even make out where its cannons were, as the entire ship seemed to glow with a coating of the same skin as the space squids.
Perhaps more daunting, however, was that this glowing armor seemed to absorb the blasts from the plasma canons they’d set up around the basecamp. The skin of the enemy vessel briefly flared to hot white wherever a plasma bolt hit it, then it absorbed the energy and cooled back to its usual, soft yellow glow.
Unable to damage the massive cruiser that lurked over them like a domineering golden Kraken, Grendok turned to Dakroth, a grim look stamped upon his face. “We might as well be throwing pebbles and wooden spears at it,” he groused in his usual gruff voice, “for all the good it would do.”
“How do you want to play this?” Callestra asked, throwing her hands up on her hips. She shifted her posture, tilting her hips in the other direction and tossed her hair across her shoulder as she waited for his reply.
Dakroth rubbed his chin as he mulled over their options. Then he turned to Grendok and Callestra, who watched him with anticipation as he cleared his throat.
“Order a ceasefire. It’s best if I meet with H’aaztre myself. While I’m keeping him distracted, you have your team get those explosives ready.”
“Sounds like a plan,” the satyr said. He turned to Callestra and taking her blue hand in his he kissed it. “It’s been a pleasure my dear. You keep him safe.”
“Always,” she answered.
The satyr bowed and then turned and skipped off toward the rows of batteries calling out orders to cease fire. Groups of mystified faces stared back at him as he went. Even though the orders didn’t make sense, they obeyed the satyr’s commands and the thousands of plasma needles lighting up the evening sky fell silent.
Callestra turned back to face Dakroth and squinted at him long and hard. When he was deep in thought like this it was hard to read him. “What are you planning?”
