Broken Angel: The Complete Collection: A Dark Omegaverse Romance

by Penelope Woods

  She has a plan. A better plan that Vash or any of the others could come up with.

  “I want you,” she whispers.

  His foul breath hangs between their lips. Cassian tries to tug his hand away from hers, but she grips him tighter.

  “I will take you now,” he says.

  “No,” she whispers, looking back at the copies. “Not with them watching.”

  “They mean nothing to me,” he says, reaching for his weapon to prove it.

  Rae stops him. “You wish to spread them throughout the world. Do you not?”

  “When the coding is correctly synthesized, we can have the family we deserve,” he says.

  Glancing down at his small, drooping shaft, the truth about him hits her.

  He can’t breed. That’s why he made them. He must have lost his abilities decades ago.

  “Take me back to your quarters. Have your way with me,“ she says. “I want you to knot inside me.”

  Forcing the web of his palm against her throat, he squeezes. “I have yet to decide what to do with you,” he admits. “But I can assure you, it will be worse than what they did to you in that house.”

  He turns his head and lets out a horrid shriek. Rae pretends to struggle away, but before Rae can run, he knocks her head with the butt of his pistol. The heat of pain spreads throughout the back of her head.

  Conceding to the repeated blows, she falls into the depths of his darkness.

  One last time.

  Chapter Twenty

  As days seem to slip out from underneath Vash, he prepares for his oncoming death.

  His mouth is so dry he can’t even swallow. The whites of his eyes are a tapestry of yellow.

  “Then there will come seven years of hunger and famine, and all the great abundance of the previous years will be forgotten in the land. Starvation will exhaust the land,” he whispers.

  The sound of silence runs in his head like a grinding nail against a chalkboard, rhythm, angry and relentless.

  “The fear of the end. It washes over everything. Face the fire.”

  Vash opens his eyes to a sliver of light. Blinking through the pain of his narrowing pupils, he reaches for the bars on the door. On some days, they feed and water his throat, but the light never graces the windows of his prison cell.

  “I have lost my mind,” he admits.

  But he hasn’t. The door has been propped open by a thin nail. He graces the edges with the flat of his finger, too frightened to take it into his hand lest it be another vision.

  The image of Rae seems to flash against the light. She is always there.

  He loves her.

  Glancing down, he feels the radiant flow of chemicals circulate through him. “Fuck…”

  He has been hooked and plugged into various tubes that ran into his cephalic vein. A set of vials of pain medication sits on a small, metal desk near to his cot.

  Attached to the wall is an emergency flare kit and fire extinguisher.

  Pulling against the thin needle, he feels the rising tug of pain beneath the skin. Groaning through the discomfort, he rips the barb and cups his hand over the wound.

  Dizziness suspends his movements. Stumbling against the table, he reaches above and grabs the flair gun, laughing to himself at how terrible of a weapon it would make.

  Falling toward the door, he pulls it open and falls onto the concrete outside. A blinding, searing light freezes over him like the breath of life. He chokes as tears fall from his eyes.

  Even if this is for nothing, he has to see what fate has prepared him.

  More lights switch on around him, painting a trail down the long hallway. Taking the bait, he crawls until he reaches a door.

  Weakly, he stands and forces his body against the knob. He rocks his wrist and opens the door.

  The room is massive like a commercial greenhouse. Black and gleaming pods house endless rows of omegas. Rae…

  Yes, in every one of them, a part of Rae is visible.

  The room is quiet and still, cold and desolate. But there is a certain comfort in seeing the omegas rest in peace. Real peace. Not even death can provide that.

  Step by step, he walks into the center of the room, where a console sits flashing the Ouroboros. With a slower rhythm than glacial ice, he lowers against the console and laughs. Inward, his hands tighten and shake.

  Turning into a manic beast, he screams.

  Then, a voice springs from nowhere. It is a woman’s voice, elderly and familiar.

  “Welcome home, Vash.”

  Vash whips around, but he sees no one. Walking through the rows of life-suspended omegas, he searches for the sound. “Where am I?”

  A hideous laugh. “I never gave you access to the cryo chambers.”

  Vash pauses and sinks against the floor, exhaustion overwhelming his muscles.

  “You are weak,” the voice says.

  Vash peers against the stark white light that glows above him and the clones. “Who speaks?”

  “It is the nakedness of the land that you have come to see,” she says.

  Vash gasps. “You’re right. I am weak. If you wish to kill me, do it without the riddles.”

  The voice continues to thread its taunting tone through his ears. “You have been on quite a journey.”

  Vash gives a sigh of relief. “Wasn’t my journey. I can see that now.”

  “Yes, and soon enough, she will be back to her home.”

  “And my pack?” Vash asks. “Will they be treated with as much grace?”

  There is another light giggle followed by the rushed sound of oxygen filling aged lungs. Vash wishes he could see the woman behind the voice, but every word rustles in a different corner of the room.

  “They brought you to me. Their services are no longer needed,” she says.

  In turn, Vash lets out his own desperate laughter. “Every path I took led to my demise. Was it you who left me the serum?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?” he asks.

  “Cassian behaves rashly. You would have died if I didn’t help you,” she says.

  “I don’t understand.”

  As soon as he turns, the wall spins, revealing a woman in an enormous bed. A breathing mask houses her sagging face.

  She stares at him, hollow and impure. Vash stumbles forward, but he stops himself from getting too close.

  “Are you a…”

  “A copy?” she asks. “No.”

  Carefully, he walks to the foot of her bed, and she lifts her weathered hand, taking his with a trembling smile.

  He knows that smile…

  Collapsing onto the side of her bed, he breathes. “Mother,” he whispers.

  “So, you do remember.”

  “I remember,” he says.

  Suddenly, it comes back to him, the dream he has been having for decades.

  He was just a boy. His father told him to run to the stables to fetch his mother, the most beautiful woman in the world. When he arrived, he knew something was wrong. A set of armored vehicles sat idle, and a man in weighted, golden boots opened the door.

  Motionless, he watched as the alpha extracted his cock. “Watch and learn boy,” he hissed.

  More alphas followed. They held his mother and took her, one by one. Her eyes pierced right through Vash, numb and robotic. Broken like a bird.

  Vash always thought they had killed his mother. Growing up, he learned to respect the alphas who took her, casting aside the brutal memories of their hands grasping her bucking legs. Their laughter tickled his eardrums, invaded his manhood. Their actions taught him it was better to take than be taken.

  “I have always been your mother,” she says.

  Vash closes his eyes and bites through the urge to cry. “The man in gold-plated armor. He became my father.”

  She’d given birth to his child, Cassian. That meant that they were still related. And if they were brothers bound by blood, that made Rae his… niece.

  The room spins around him. “Oh, God,” he
hisses. “What have you done?”

  The cold oxygen vapor forms around her plastic mask. Inhaling a deep breath, she wheezes and widens her eyes. “Don’t worry. Their knots were unsuccessful.”

  “I watched them all take you,” Vash growls.

  “They can’t perform. And neither could I. After you, the Lord made me barren.”

  Vash hammers his fist against the center console, denting in the plastic housing of the computer screen. “How did you give birth to Cassian? Tell Me.”

  Impenetrable rage heats his body. His hands clamp around her frail skin, and she forces herself to answer, even as the tears slip onto the cup of her oxygen mask.

  “They tried,” she says. “He locked me away. Every morning, an unfamiliar alpha woke me with detached tapering. He’d sit and watch, thumbing around his grotesque cock. After the knot bruised into me, he would take me. In a way, I think I became an enigma for him to rely on. Your father found Cassian in a village of trash. You are not bound by blood.”

  “He is the bastard? Not me?”

  His mother nods and lets out a whimper of weakness. He can’t imagine what she has gone through, but that was a lifetime ago. Now, she lies in a bed of roses.

  Her throne expands across the back end of the room, and he imagines her staring at the clones during lonely nights. Her trauma frightens him because it means seeing the darkness inside his own head.

  “Oh, Mother. What have they done to you?” Vash asks, tears running down his face.

  He can’t face what she has done to get him here. “You gave her those memories. You made Rae believe your experience happened to her.”

  “I added some minor embellishments,” she says.

  “And Cassian—you made him do your bidding.”

  “I deserve another chance at fertility,” she rasps. “She is my only hope.”

  A trickle of fear runs up his neck. Vash lets go of her hand. She is no longer the mother he once knew. He sees her for what she really is.

  Cold and calculating. Evil.

  “What happened to you?” Vash asks. “You used to be so…”

  Before Vash can finish his sentence, she lowers the sheets for him to see the wounds. She reveals her lower half, a mess of wiring and plastic casing that holds her together.

  The puckered flesh trails up to her navel, scarred with what looks to be from the edges of a surgical saw.

  Vash jumps in horror.

  His mother’s smile twists. “They used me up, darling. Carved me like a pumpkin.”

  Swallowing, Vash feels a sudden sense of urgency consume him. Her eyes met his, carrying the same broken look she did when they took her.

  She did not bring him here for a family reunion. She came here to end the family and secure a different finale before she could leave this forsaken planet.

  The doors bolt, and the computer flashes a red-and-black warning. The sawed and harsh tone of the alarm systems drown him in panic.

  “Let me go, Mother,” he says. “Let me go, and I’ll destroy the breed of alphas that did this to you.”

  “My boy,” she whispers. “My sweet, sweet boy. The war has been lost. There is nowhere to run.”

  “Mother.” His voice rises with urgency. “Please. Open the doors.”

  “You have given a mother everything she has asked for.”

  “Mother, don’t do this,” he warns.

  A glare of devastation overtakes her. “All of those nights alone, I waited for you to come,” she says with sudden command. “I waited, and the only one who came to me was your inbred brother, freak, the abhorrent beast of my most tender sickness.”

  Vash runs to the center console, sending it crashing to the floor. One by one, the lights popped and spark into darkness. The fire sprinklers open their ports and drench the room.

  “Mother, we will drown,” he screams.

  He tries the door next, but it is impossible to move the handle.

  Taking an extinguisher in his hand, he pounds against the rusted metal. Over and over, he watches as the metal dents. It does not move.

  He slinks forward and allows the water to pour over his eyes. Focusing on the sound of his heartbeat, he lets out a cry of misery.

  In the middle of the chaos, he turns and looks at the sleeping faces of the copies. Vash lives a life of pain and discouragement. But if he gives up, it will mean never seeing Rae again. Without a centered pack, their children would likely experience the proper end of the world.

  “Nothing will ever be the same again, will it?” he whispers to himself.

  Suddenly, the individual copies open their eyes. The green and earthy colors of Rae’s iris glow around him. She isn’t a commodity to him anymore. She is an equal, and all he wishes for is to get back to her again.

  “Entropy lacks God’s mercy,” his mother says. “The universe was born to eat itself.”

  The front of the pods open. The cold mist of the tanks that circle around the women’s cheek and jawbones dissipates into the air.

  “It is better to kill the whores than extend the timeline. Now, they can all die,” his mother hisses.

  Vash runs to clutch the first copy that falls out of her tank. As she tumbles into his arms, she gasps for air through frenetic shivers.

  She even smells like Rae.

  “You can’t do this,” he screams.

  Even Vash knows how senseless he sounds. The world has fallen from the edge of uncertainty. Everyone knows what happens at the end. Fire. Brimstone. Skeletal judges riding steel horses fueled by the blood of the lost.

  They live out the apocalypse every single day.

  His mother shrieks. “Ask of me, and I will surely give the nations as your inheritance, and the very ends of the earth as your possession. You shall break them with a rod of iron. You shall shatter them like earthenware.”

  The omega in his arms gasps, tapping against his chest. She cannot breathe. Lowering his lips, he provides air, but it isn’t enough.

  Her body begins pumping, flopping like a thirsty fish. And, somehow, he feels for the copy.

  “I need to raise them. I alone can give them happiness,” she says.

  He feels dizzy from the drugs. Opening his mouth, he tongues at the falling water. “Mother, I’m your son,” he gasps.

  “I will gift my child with death, and all the warring factions will know that I am she who searches the kidneys and hearts. I will give unto every one of you according to your works.”

  “Mother…”

  Vash feels his legs give out from underneath him. Dropping to the floor, he sways with fatigue.

  She is going to kill him.

  But maybe the world is better off without him.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  A woman stands over Killian. It’s not just any woman.

  It’s Rae.

  “Vitals read normal. No sign of Vash in the pack, but he couldn’t have gone too far,” she says.

  “The ground sweep will find him,” a soldier declares.

  “You’re alive,” Killian exclaims.

  He rocks his wrist against the set of metal handcuffs, skin now irritated from hours of trying.

  A row of omegas stand in leather paramilitary wear. To the side, alphas sit like obedient beasts, wearing black blindfolds and spiked choker collars in strict obedience.

  The building itself is a small warehouse with some spare medical equipment and weapons.

  The omega who appears to be Rae steps forward to analyze Killian. After shining a light into his eyes, she butts the rifle against his cheekbone, sending him hollering to the floor.

  Lucas watches, numb to it all.

  “I stitched your wounds. Where is she?” Rae asks.

  “Your guess is as good as ours,” Lucas says.

  Again, she raises the butt of her rifle, and Lucas braced for the shattering impact that does not come.

  “Where is Vash?” she asks.

  Killian grunts and wipes the blood from the raised wound. “He left. Went to the barr
acks, but he’s MIA.”

  “Off to find Mother,” she whispers.

  “Who?” Killian says.

  Rae turns and flags four men forward. “Keep them alive. I don’t know what to do with them yet,” she says.

  She walks through a set of red curtains.

  “Hey, don’t you fucking leave,” Lucas screams.

  The blindfolded men snicker.

  “Great,” Killian sighs. “We’re stuck with these freaks now.”

  “Maybe they’ll let us live,” Lucas says.

  “Who’s the omega?” Killian asks them.

  Silence.

  “He will stretch over it the line of desolation and the plumb line of emptiness,” Lucas whispers.

  “What did you just say?” Killian asks.

  Lucas shakes his head and inches his arms back into a more comfortable position. Slumping to the floor, he sways to his side. “Her eyes were blue. Rae’s are hazel.”

  Killian exhales, unable to think.

  Hours pass until “Rae” steps out of her tent. Face strained with thought, she motions for the alpha soldiers to step away. She pulls up a chair and sits down.

  “We are the Kali, the last men and women willing to fight for the Republic. We’ve initiated the second sequence of three. Very soon, every major city will forego their supremacy. Dagon was the first, and so far, we’ve taken three coastal ports.”

  “You will lose this fight,” Lucas says. “Cassian wields far too much might.”

  “Cassian has restrained himself for the omega,” she says. “He did not anticipate me.”

  “The omega. You mean, you,” Killian mutters.

  She locks her lips together. Clicking her tongue against the roof of her mouth, she pauses.

  After a few seconds of silence, she tosses him a key. “Rae is my twin sister. My name is Ruby. We were separated at birth.”

  Lucas unlocks his wrists and allows the imprinted skin some air. Killian does the same.

  They stare at her with the same dumb confusion as before.

  “I was born defective,” she says.

  Rae’s sister stands and walks to the alphas, unafraid. Her leather body harness reflects against the pale light. “If I were to explain, you wouldn’t be able to follow. Even now, seeing an omega leading a pack of alphas. It doesn’t compute, does it?”