by C F Rabbiosi
I so badly want to tell them who I am, that I’m half horrid alien. But I can’t yet. How can I admit that I’m one of them? One of the creatures that have haunted their nightmares since they were old enough to understand the truth? No. I shake my head at the thought. They can’t find out.
“Stop being dramatic,” says Scarlet as the males approach. “This is the best chance we have, and you’re throwing it away!” Jane cradles her head, and black-haired Alice hums under her breath.
“What?” Blond Alice retorts. “You think these things are going to care for you? That once you have a child for them, they will just let you go?” Visions of us being ripped from our medical beds and placed in chains to be impregnated steal my breath.
“She is pretty, that one with the poison tongue,” laughs one of the Koridons. They stand around us, partially-eaten meat hanging loosely from their grips and dripping blood into the dirt.
Arek closes the distance behind her, his sheer size creating the vision of a demonic creature creeping up on a helpless child. “Some of us do not wish to breed you at all!” He grasps her shoulder and flings her around. “Some of us would also rather die out than taint our perfect race with animal woman genes.” A painful groan slips from blond Alice’s mouth as her knees hit pebbles on the ground. He holds her face in his hand and her lips puff out from the force. “I will see that scornful tongue severed if you speak again in a way that offends me.” Tears spill down her cheeks and swirl around the Koridon’s fingers. “You would be truly blessed to have a mighty Koridon’s seed filling your unworthy crevice!” He rips her nightgown and full breasts pop out. “And you do not need a tongue for that, do you?”
3
Blond Alice hits her back, and we fight against the conjoining ropes that burn into our skin and jerk us with her. I look to Drakon, but the yell dies on the back of my tongue as he crosses his arms and appears every bit resolved to allow his subordinate to teach her a lesson. One we’ll all feel.
Arek snaps blond Alice’s knees apart, and her shriek shakes the forest. The girls turn their heads, but there’s no damn time for blushing.
“You can’t allow this,” I say to Drakon, my voice steady though my insides quiver. “Is this your plan for us? Is this how you wish your children to be brought into the world? By a hateful mother?” The fire in Arek’s eyes tells a story of rage and desire—so much so that he would rather make her hate him, too, than take her in love.
Blond Alice grunts, trying to close her legs, and strikes into the Koridon’s chest. “Get off me!” she growls. “I won’t do it, I’ll never let a fucking beast inside me!” A vein surfaces across her forehead, and her legs kick wildly. “Animal!” She spits in his face, and he backhands her. She staggers backward and hits the ground. Sliding her hands into the dirt, she wipes the muck down her breasts, then all over her face. “You want to stick your cock in me now?” She shoves her hands in the forest floor and smears it in her hair.
Arek studies her humorously, the sneer on his lips dissolving as she slaps more mud onto her skin. “Stop it. Stop.” He takes her wrists and forces her reluctant gaze to him. “It doesn’t help.” She licks the dirt off her lips, and a wicked smile graces her lips.
“Enough!” Drakon says, raising a hand.
He chooses to stop this now? All right, I guess he just wanted the violence. His weapon gleams at his side, and I think the second he falls asleep I’ll stab him in the face with it. I keep telling myself there’s a future for us with these aliens, but while Arek and even Brekter show signs of weakness for us, Drakon is cold as nuclear winter.
The fire crackles and flickers as Arek drags hesitant fingertips down blond Alice’s full lips. He touches the inside of her thigh and gazes upon the swell of her breasts, the taper of her hips. Koridon females are built for fighting, the delicateness of sexual beauty overwritten by muscle and hardness. Her hair is long and wavy, her eyes the liquid gold to their silver. Every woman is a different work of art. Arek hates the girl his gaze feasts upon as much as she hates him, but he can’t stop the pounding of his heart or the softening of his mouth as he touches her. We are slaves to our feelings, and these warrior males are no exception.
The corner of Drakon’s mouth lifts, and he brings his hands together with a hard clap. “Detach the girl from the others and put her on your horse, Arek. I wish to remove ourselves before we waste any more time.” I quickly pluck the rest of the meat from the ground and shove it in my mouth before standing in formation. The Koridons gather around to see us back in order, and Arek does as commanded. Blond Alice’s body hangs as though lifeless as he hoists her onto the seat and brings a leg over to settle himself behind her.
Mary-Shelly’s frown is deeper than the rest as she watches blonde Alice’s head lay back against Arek’s chest.
“Are you all right, Mary-Shelly?” I ask.
She snaps from her daze with a shudder. “No. I miss my husband.” She dips her head as we’re pulled along, and dread fills my heart. Arek had shown her attention earlier, and I wonder if she too had entertained passionate thoughts about him throughout the morning. It isn’t strange that such thoughts might intrude her mind. These males are the epitome of what women are attracted to by nature’s push. It isn’t just their towering forms with abounding muscle and strength; these males exude power, a dominance that exists without regard to logic. Each of them have similar coloration though their facial features vary, but I haven’t met one yet whose eyes didn’t sparkle with the shade of fiery passion.
* * *
The evening sun descends below the mountains and dims the vibrance of the wild growth of trees and brush around us. But with the evening comes a new beauty, one that touches the senses with a feeling of magic. It floats on the breeze and tickles my skin; it rushes into my lungs with every breath. We are confined to our village and don’t have endurance for long treads through overgrowth, but in some ways, I’d still rather be here, amongst vicious beings from another planet, than locked up again. But I’ve always been different and fearless with a sense of adventure the other girls lacked. Kassien once told me my dauntless spirit is proof of my Koridon roots.
Blond Alice stirs from sleep and blinks rapidly as she bounces against Arek’s lap. He holds her firmly with one arm, and when she twists around and sees his face, her eyes squeeze shut, pure disgust splashing her face.
My foot hits a stone and I stumble, helpless as the ground flies up toward me. Pain stabs through my belly as I brace against the fall. I roll onto my back, grabbing my stomach, and grit my teeth.
“Everyone halt!” comes Brekter’s voice like an echo through a barrel. He rushes over and places a hand on my shoulder. “Let me help you.”
A strange sensation seizes me like nothing I’ve ever felt before. My pelvic region pulses with shocks of pain. “Wait, no. Something’s wrong. I think the fall—”
He lifts my hands away, and I suck in through my teeth. “Get up. You are acting weak.”
“I’m not weak.” The lining inside my stomach still aches sharply, but I hit his hand away and stand up. His fingers outstretch toward me, and I smack them away again.
He smirks, and it’s irritating how he enjoys taunting me. I don’t know if I’m imagining things, but it seems like something is changing inside me already, although it hasn’t been long enough for me to feel a pregnancy yet.
His arms snake around my waist, and my nose presses into his chest. His heady scent sends a thrill through my blood and his leathers tighten at the crotch, pressing against the flutters in my belly. He groans, knowing the havoc he causes within me. “I will give you your tea tonight with nutrient X2. You need it more than ever now.”
“They should all begin taking it,” says Drakon. “It will course through their weak genetics and prepare them properly for carrying a Koridon child.” He turns his horse in a tight circle. “We rest for the night presently!”
My insides scream upon remembering the orange and violet flower that grows from seeds broug
ht from their planet. Since being given the nutrient I’ve needed all my life, I crave it, and like others who were born secretly of the otherworldly species, I would have died in my early twenties without it.
The males unload the deer and boar carcasses they had hunted throughout the day and build a fire. Our ropes are loosened as we sit around the flames and listen to the sound of nocturnal creatures scurrying and calling out under the flood of moonlight.
The meat and tea rejuvenate my spirit as we sit around the fire. All the girls have the same dead-tired stare as they chew, half in this world, half in the next. All of us strangers, floating through time and somehow thrown together. Sometimes I think some kind of higher power has set all this craziness in motion. Otherwise, if life is so rare and delicate, why do I get to be here now? Why has my existence been allowed through infinite space and time and gifted to me in this very short moment? It is another question I will put forth to Kassien if I ever see him again. We had such a short time together.
Oh, Kassien. A ghostly presence still lingers around my wrists from his fevered grasp and my heart still feels the constriction of his touch as well, no matter how ridiculous it must seem to everyone else. Within days of being with him, he intoxicated me with the desperation pulsing from beneath his skin, always reaching, but always starving from fear of hurting me. Tales from the old leather-bound books unearthed from the wreckage spin round and round my thoughts. I used to marvel at why ladies of England with titles and wealth would give up everything to be paupers for love, and why Romeo would drink a vial of poison to lay by Juliet’s side for all eternity without it. I fantasized about such a thing to live for, to die for, and felt it grip my soul, but nothing could have prepared me for this. Love fucking hurts. Especially when one is loved by the enemy.
“My only love sprung from my only hate,” says Scarlet with a laugh alive in her eyes. “I know you’re thinking about your prince.” Since we were children she has known my thoughts, and I love her for it. The flames flicker over her face, magnifying her defiant beauty.
My fingers dig into the dirt. “Do you believe this union between Koridon and human could be like that story?”
She leans back to bask in a magnificent sky of stars. “Where we die at the end and everyone’s crying?” She nods. “Yeah.”
“Yeah.” I look down at my feet and listen to the murmur of Koridons talking amongst themselves, and the tearing of animal flesh with their teeth.
“Are you truly in love with their prince?” Scarlet asks.
“Yes.”
“Do you think—” she nods toward one of the males who meets her attention with piercing gems. “The one that beds me will love me too?” Her first time experiencing sex was born from pain and absolute terror, so perhaps she has nothing left to fear.
“Under his desperate possessiveness you’ll be unable to breathe and yet wish for it with all your heart when his crushing ceases.”
“Will it hurt?” she asks, touching the inside of her thigh where an old scar surely reopens.
I refuse to let the thought of Brekter’s ridiculous girth shoving inside my unwilling body shadow my expression. Their size in that area does not slide in with ease, and without proper excitement, it’s excruciating. Conversely, being filled with such a male’s cock in the midst of pure love is ecstasy. “It was the most amazing thing I’d ever felt, Scarlet. But after what was done to us by Alexander, I was terrified.” It is a mystery how something so beautiful can be twisted into something so wretched, just as a pleasant dream can turn to bloody terror upon the sudden veil of a nightmare.
Jane nudges me with her shoulder. “I’ve been thinking about what you said earlier. About what giving our bodies to these beings could mean for the future of our families. I am with you.”
Blond Alice tosses a piece of bone into the fire. “Fools.”
“Perhaps,” I say, “but you haven’t seen what I have. You haven’t bathed in such—”
“And I never will.” She gathers a pillow of leaves and crashes onto her side.
“And so we beat on,” Glenda’s voice cuts through the tension. “Boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”
“The Great Gatsby,” I say warmly, the familiar quote warming my insides. “I cannot fix on the hour, the spot, nor the words that laid the foundation,” I recite with little trills of excitement dancing through my veins. “It was too long ago.”
Scarlet, Mary-Shelly and Glenda say the last line with me: “I was in the middle before I knew I had begun!”
Jane stands up and bows playfully. “Why, that was your very own Jane Austen who said that!”
Glenda kneels before Scarlett and takes her hand. “I’ve loved you more than I’ve ever loved any woman, and I’ve waited for you longer than any other woman.”
Scarlett throws the back of her hand to her forehead. “If I said I was madly in love with you I’d be lying, Rhett!” She whips her hair back in exaggerated O’Hara fashion, and we burst into laughter. The males across from us cease their conversating with identical looks of annoyance and mild fascination. They utilize our books to enhance their survival but not the silly ones meant only for entertainment, according to Brekter. But these old classics are all we had to escape our small lives, and they taught us to dream. Reciting the words from those worn pages creates a familiar space that I’m welcoming whole-heartedly right now.
“This is just like the full moon celebration, isn’t it?” says black-haired Alice who sways under the stars, her arms wrapped around her chest. Her foot accidently nudges blond Alice, who lets out a loud sigh that ruffles the leaves.
“What is this you do?” Kraetorr asks, sitting with elbows rested against his thighs, a piece of meat hanging from the side of his mouth.
The moment of happiness fades, and it seems none of us knows what to say. His harsh voice is an intrusion, and I don’t want to share my humanity with him.
Glenda says, “We were just pretending to be the characters we were named after, is all.” She wrings her hands. “Well, except me, I was playing Rhett from Gone with the Wind—”
“You play games?” asks Kraetorr, his confusion almost laughable.
“Don’t you?” She smiles softly and so bravely at the frightening beast that nearly ravished her blindly this morning.
Arek storms over to us and rips Glenda down to her place beside Scarlet. “Of course we do not play games! Not even our children are allowed to.”
“What children?” blond Alice adds under her breath.
Another coarse voice chimes in. “Silly women.” The Koridon was sure to say it in our tongue so we wouldn’t miss it. “They sit on the edge of death and play make-believe as though it will help them survive.” He laughs and throws a half-eaten, greasy boar leg at our feet.
“Survival is not all that matters!” Mary-Shelly directs her voice toward Arek. He stands a mountain over her. “Why do you even wish to survive without joy?”
“Joy is beating something down into submission.” He leans into her face, and an aqua-touched dark strand falls over his eyes. I purse my lips, feeling the sting of his utter beauty. “It is conquering,” he hisses.
“Then I feel sorry for you,” she says, her lips flush with his. They tremble slightly, and I sense Arek’s impulse to tear away from her. The intimacy of the near kiss, which he has likely never known before, sends bolts of heat into his loins; I can almost taste it, desire thick in the air. I wonder if he has any knowledge of the slick warmth a woman’s body creates, or if he has ever felt one buckling from the pleasure of his knot as he fills her to bursting. Their laws used to forbid coupling with humans, but that didn’t stop some of them. Arek’s aggression toward blond Alice during lunch today could mean either he really does think us a lower species, or he’s been with one before and hates himself for it.
Drakon makes an abrupt noise, and it sobers Arek into backing away. “Would you perhaps pretend to be someone else from your books? Perhaps… Adolph Hitler?”
The girls cringe at the name, and even blond Alice, who has held her position of ignoring the scene, turns over.
“Of course not,” Sybil says. “We would never take pleasure in such a dark character.”
“And who have you been named for?” he asks her.
“The tortured love of Dorian Gray, sir.” Sybil curtsies.
“Ah.” He has no idea what she speaks of. “Hear this. You and your terrible species are no longer allowed to bask in any of your human heritage. I will not have it tainting our children.” My one joy in this world, reading about faraway places and adventures that will never be… he would take that from us and forbid us to pass it on?
Blond Alice sits up. “Why do you hate us so much?”
I could give her a list but instead try to instill some understanding in her and the other girls. “Because before the war, they came to us for help.” I cut Drakon’s snide remark off, whatever it was going to be. “Kassien’s mate, the one I was to replace, told me the truth about our past. True, the Koridons are a violent and warrior-bred race, but that isn’t why they came to Earth. After defending their beloved home for three billion years, it betrayed them, becoming a hostile wasteland as their sun imploded. They were forced to reach out to the nearest life-giving planet in the Milky Way galaxy, and the shape they were left in didn’t warrant a fight. Our world leaders offered them help at first, then unleashed nuclear weapons on their ships all at once.”
“Which is the reason most of you died,” says Drakon. “Our reactors are powered by what your scientists were just discovering and call element 115.” His hands mimic a great blast. “You dridnaks destroyed your own planet.”
“They did that! The people of the past. Not us,” I remind him. “And I’m sure your hands aren’t clean of blood. How many planets have your people destroyed?”
Brekter steps through a cloud of black smoke that billows in the wind. “Well, now. I think you meant to say our. How many planets have our people destroyed.”
