“You knew, didn’t you?” I ask.
He grins at me. “I had some hunches. I didn’t think whatever field is being projected here to shut down technology could keep running for millennia...unless someone was still here to run it. And my father had some document. It wasn’t in any human language...he kept it secret. Even from me.”
Elise tugs on my arm. “What are you guys talking about?”
“The Atlanteans,” I say. “They are still alive...but they live underwater.”
“I knew it!” Kain says.
“Can they get a message to Earth before Sara arrives?” Elise asks.
“I don’t think so,” I say. “The only reason they showed themselves was to get me to agree to take down Harmony. They want to keep themselves secret from it...broadcasting a message to Harmony is the last thing they’d do. It would expose them.”
“The bomb is in orbit,” Kain says. “On one of our lander pods. I don’t know which one.”
“How do we get into orbit from here?” Elise asks.
“We could wait,” I say. “Until Sara lands.”
“It’s a risk,” Kain says. “Reinforcements are already en route from Darkstar and Earth.”
“Are all those ships one-way?” I ask.
Kain smiles. “No. Good thing you’ve got that bioglove.”
“Let’s go in now,” Elise says, “while they are still disoriented.”
“No,” Kain says. “We need to wait for the reinforcements to land. If we go in now, they will be able to spread out, or they may not land at all. Right now there are no ships that can take off again, but I know they are sending a handful. Old clunkers that don’t need any computers to make it back to orbit.”
“So we’ll make camp,” I say, “and watch for those ships coming in.”
“As soon as we attack,” Kain says, “they could just launch the bomb toward Earth. It can hit Earth in just over thirty-six hours.”
“Then we can’t risk attacking at all,” Elise says. “We have to –”
“If we don’t attack...if we just sit here,” I say, “Sara will attack without us. The same thing will happen when she shows up, but they’ll see her coming from even further away. At least our attack will come as a surprise.”
“As soon as we get something in orbit,” Kain says, “we can warn Harmony. She’s cunning enough to intercept the bomb before it’s in range.”
I sigh. Working with Harmony makes me feel queasy, even if it’s to save the whole planet and everyone on it.
“Let’s find a place to set up camp,” I say. “Preferably on the high ground.”
14 Elise
We go up into the mountains, and just when I think my feet are going to freeze off, we find a nice space with rocky ridges on all sides. There’s no cover from above, but it’s a necessary sacrifice, as we need to be able to see the drop pods and Darkstar ships breaking atmosphere when they arrive.
Ramses gets a fire going, but it’s lit only with the wispy twigs, and it gives off little heat.
“We could use another giant spider right now,” I say, holding my hands over the weak flames.
“Giant spider?” Kain asks.
“They seem to live around the ridges...camouflaged against rock,” Ramses says. “They don’t taste great, but the ichor is great for fueling fires.”
Kain nods. “I’ll go get one.” He hoists his rifle over his shoulder.
“Do you need help?” I ask, grabbing the submachine gun.
“No,” he says. “I like to hunt alone. Rest up.”
He walks through the narrow pass leading into our shelter, and disappears.
“You really think we should trust him?” Ramses asks.
“I guess we have to,” I say. “I can’t see what other motivation he’d have had….”
Ramses puts his hand on my waist, then moves it to my stomach. “They told you?”
“Yes,” I nod. “I can hardly believe it….”
“It’s a gift,” he says. “Among all the horrible things that are happening...this child is a gift.”
I feel my stomach jumping, full of butterflies. “We never talked about this,” I say, “It just kind of happened, and –”
“We didn’t need to talk about it,” Ramses says. “It happened for a reason.”
“We know the reason,” I say, “Harmony wanted to –”
“Fuck that,” Ramses says, shaking his head. “That’s not our reason. This happened because….”
He puts his hand on my face. It’s warm, and his eyes stare deeply into me.
“Because?” I ask.
“Because we’re meant for each other,” he says. “I know it’s only been a few days...but I feel it.”
I nod. I feel it too. “It’s been a long-ass few days,” I say, laughing.
“We can tell our kid,” Ramses says, “that we had Chicago hotdogs on our first date, and an Atlantis giant spider on our second.”
“Ew,” I say. “Eating the spider counts as a date?”
“At least the giant spider wasn’t covered in hot pepper,” Ramses says.
“I thought you were tough and could handle it?” I say, raising an eyebrow.
He grunts and crosses his arms. “Maybe I didn’t like it. Not because it was too hot, but just because I didn’t like the taste.”
I scoff at him. “Whatever.”
He kisses me, and I grab hold of him in response. I dig my nails into the back of his jacket, and he throws it off onto the ground.
I pull off his shirt, and he reaches for mine.
“It’s too cold,” I say.
My nipples are pointing out like swords, and the fire is barely doing anything.
“You won’t feel cold when I’m done with you,” Ramses says.
He pulls me up to my feet, pushes me against the rocky wall, and starts pulling my clothes off layer by layer.
When I’m totally naked and shivering, he pushes his own naked body up against me, and it’s hot like a furnace.
And his cock is hard as a rock, and impossibly warm.
I moan in pleasure, and he presses his cock between my legs, then rubs it back and forth against my outer lips. I’m already wet, but as his cock massages my clit and pussy lips, I drip wet on his big teal rod.
His cock starts to vibrate, and he adjusts himself until he’s rubbing slowly back and forth along my clit.
His hands run up and down my body as his vibrating member massages my nub of nerves. He cups my breasts and rubs them until they are so warm that I forget entirely we are in a frozen wasteland. He squeezes and tweaks my nipples.
“One advantage of the cold,” he whispers into my ear.
“Don’t tease me,” I moan.
“I will tease you as much as I like,” he says. “Though I know you like it, too.”
I give up arguing. His cock slides back and forth, dripping with my juices, and my clit is throbbing and swollen against his veiny dick.
Ramses kisses along my neck and up my chin, and he bites and nibbles along my ear. His tongue runs gently along my earlobe, and I can feel his hot breath on my skin.
“Elise,” he whispers into my ear, and I nearly melt just from the sound of his voice and from the way he says my name.
I try to say something back, but I just moan as he licks and bites me.
I reach down and run my hand up and down his shaft. I cup his balls and play with them, and he moans into my ear.
“You like that?” I ask.
“Mmm-hmm.”
“I’ll take that as a yes,” I say.
He spins me around, pushing me until my breasts press against the rock.
He slides his steely rod up against my clit, but then he presses his arm onto my back and bends me forward. My hands are flat against the rocky wall, and my back is nearly parallel to the ground.
I look back at him, and he’s staring down at my ass, his soaking wet cock in his hand.
He pushes his dick into me, sinking it into my wet pussy
.
I gasp and look forward again, gripping the rock with my fingers. He slides deep into me, and I’m so gushing wet that he readily goes in steadily and deeply despite his enormous girth.
Every part of my body feels warm now, except for my hands against the cold rock. But I’m so hot everywhere else that this one point of coldness comes as a relief, a contrast to the burning hot furnace that is Ramses’s rock-hard body.
As his vibrating cock sinks deep into my wet pussy, he fills me up from the inside with his incredible warmth. There’s no need for a blanket when you have a red-hot Seraphim buried inside you.
Ramses grips my hips and starts to pump me for all he’s worth. I scream out as he thrusts in and out of me.
He pushes me forward until my body is up against the rock, but I keep my ass stuck out so that he can keep fucking me raw. He reaches around and fingers my clit as he drives into me.
“I want to see you,” I say.
He slides his cock out, and I look down and see it covered white in my juices.
He turns me around and pulls me up onto him. I wrap my legs around him and dig my heels into his back. He presses my back against the rocky wall and fucks me hard from the new angle.
We lock eyes with each other, and he leans in and kisses me. His tongue slides into me, and his warm lips press against mine. At the same time his cock slides in and out of me, and his rock-hard body and bulging muscles press against me. My tits press into his chest, and I dig my nails into his chiseled back.
It’s like riding a bull – not that I’ve ever done that – but I imagine it’s a similar feeling: I’m clinging onto this powerful force of nature, and it’s all I can do but hold on and not let him completely overpower me. But if I lose the struggle and he does overpower me...it will be an amazing orgasm rather than being bucked off and tossed onto the ground.
I bite his lip as his cock fills me up and my pussy tightens all along his dick.
“So tight…,” he mumbles, never stopping his rhythmic thrusts.
My pussy tightens and pulses around him, and he starts to fuck me harder and faster. I can feel his balls slap against me with each thrust, and I squeeze my legs tighter around his studly body.
When I begin to come, he goes so hard and fast that the sound of our wet slaps fill the entire enclosure – that and my loud cries and euphoric moans.
I feel his cock start to pulse inside of me as incredible warmth overtakes me, and then even more warmth begins to fill me up. Each time his cock pulses, I feel thick wetness filling me up inside.
When he stops thrusting, his cock twitches a few more times, and I feel his seed spilling and leaking out of me.
“I guess if you weren’t really pregnant before,” he says, panting, “you are now.”
I laugh, and he lowers me down. We collapse together against the wall, and he takes my hand in his.
Sweat is dripping down my forehead, and I wipe it off with my free hand. “I’m burning up.”
“I told you,” he says.
“What?”
“That you wouldn’t feel cold when I was done with you.”
I grin at him, and he twitches his ears at me.
“We should probably get dressed, though,” I say.
He looks down at me and lets out a satisfied breath. “Why?”
“Because we will get cold,” I say. “The fire is nearly dead.”
I grab my clothes and start to dress, but Ramses just stands naked and watches me. His eyes probe me up and down, and he licks his lips as I clasp my bra.
When I’m fully dressed, I throw his clothes back to him. “Come on, you need to keep warm. We don’t know if Kain will even be able to find any food.”
I hear footsteps from the path, and Kain’s shadow casts across the entrance. And then I see Kain himself, holding chunks of giant spider roped all along his back.
He throws the pieces of spider down on the ground. “Who’s hungry?”
15 Ramses
“So,” Kain says, “I spotted it moving against the rocks, even though I was at least half a kilometer away...I still saw it despite its camouflage.”
I yawn. Loudly.
Kain holds up his hands like he’s aiming a gun. “I sighted across my rifle, and the wind was blowing hard, but I am one with this gun. I adjusted for the wind and distance, and boom! The bullet went straight to its nerve center...I took it out before it felt anything.”
“So you laid down and pulled a trigger?” I ask. “Impressive.”
Kain thumps his chest and raises his chin. “Listen here, Seraph. I provided for you and your woman while you laid down cozy by the fire. You owe me great shame debt! Or are you too human to recognize Marauder culture?”
“How do you think I killed the spider when we first arrived?” I ask. “I was soaking wet and naked in the cold...armed with nothing but a rock –”
“You had an overclocked stun rod,” Elise says, “But you were to stubborn to use it.”
Kain laughs.
I raise a finger. “Even better...I had a weapon that would have given me an easy kill – not as easy as a cowardly sniper rifle – but easy all the same. But I chose not to use it! I needed to save it for the real enemies.”
“But you never managed to hit me with it,” Kain says. “So your woman is right. You were stubborn and foolish. You risked your life to kill the spider with a rock, even when you had a perfectly good weapon at your disposal. This is nothing to brag about.”
And then, above our heads, we see three bright lights streaking across the sky.
“Reinforcements are here,” Kain says. “It’s time.”
The three lights streak by fast, but then a much larger light lumbers through the air.
Kain points up. “That’s the ship we need. It has an ion pulse engine for reaching the upper atmosphere, then we just hope there’s enough fuel left in it to reach orbital velocity….”
“Solid plan,” I say. “I owe you great shame debt for cooking up such a sure-fire strategy.”
“Can you guys stop arguing?” I ask. “Or do you want to pull your dicks out and measure them?”
“I’m a full Marauder,” Kain says, “Of course mine is –”
“Rhetorical question,” Elise says.
I laugh, but I narrow my eyes at Kain. We’ll have to measure them later – I’ll show him that my Marauder genes are dominant where it counts.
Elise picks up the submachine gun. “Ramses, let’s skip the shit where you say it’s too dangerous for me to go with you. I’m going, and –”
“I don’t object,” I say, grinning.
“What?” Elise says. “Don’t you want to protect me, and the baby, and –”
“You’re safest right by my side,” I say. “If I leave you here, they could come for you.”
Kain hoists his rifle over his shoulder. “Cocky fuck.”
I raise my bioglove up and squeeze my fist. “You ever used a biosuit?”
“I’ve seen them used,” Kain says. “We had to break most of them down into antimatter...only the highest ranking Darkstar Marauders can use them.”
“Guess you’re not high-ranking enough?” I say.
“I am,” Kain says, “but I’m so good with this rifle that I chose not to waste one. Let a weaker fighter use it as a crutch.”
Kain looks down at my glove and grins.
I scoff. I don’t need the glove, but I’d be a fool not to use it. “How many biosuits are there in the camp?”
“One,” Kain says. “My father’s.”
“Well,” I say, “if he chases us out of orbit, we’ll have to watch out for it.”
Kain shakes his head. “I don’t know how, but it must have been something in the book he’s reading. The day after we set up camp, his suit was suddenly activated. When I asked him about it, he just glared at me.”
“Shit,” Elise says. “So we have a bioglove up against a full biosuit?”
“Yeah,” I say, “But we’ve got a full Ramses up
against a little Grius.”
As we are walking through the narrow mountain passes toward the Darkstar camp, we see at least twenty more drop pods race across the sky.
“Shit,” Elise says.
“Don’t worry,” I say. “We can take them.”
“Is there like, a limit to your ego?” Elise asks. “I mean, at what number do you start to be realistic? There are at least forty of them in that camp now by my count, and there are three of us. Maybe the bioglove is worth twenty? Maybe Kain with that rifle and the element of surprise is worth ten –”
“Wait, woman –” Kain starts to say, but Elise cuts him off.
“But what about Grius’s biosuit? It’s a suit, not just a glove. You are good, Ramses, I admit it. You’ve pulled through every time...but can we please let the dick-waving down for just a moment and make a real plan here?”
Kain and I narrow our eyes at each other, and then at Elise.
I sigh. “It shame debts me to admit this, Kain, but I think Elise is right.”
Kain nods, but doesn’t speak. The bastard can’t even verbally admit he was being an asshole.
“Grius’s biosuit doesn’t cover his head,” Elise says. “The teal thing he was wearing was the biosuit, right?”
“Sounds like it,” I say. “But even if Kain can make the shot –”
“No,” Kain says.
“What?” I say. “You’re bragging so much about how good a shot you are, and now it’s just ‘no?’”
“Two no’s,” Kain says. “The first: now that I have betrayed my father, he will in fact keep his biosuit set to active defense. The suit will deflect or absorb my shot.”
“What’s the second one?” I ask.
“I will not kill my own father. The shame debt is too great.”
“What about the shame debt of destroying an entire planet?” Elise asks.
“I am helping you two, and I’ll kill anyone else. Just not my father.”
“Fine,” I say. “I can pick him off then – with a plasma beam. It might even damage him through the armor.”
“Wait,” Elise says. “Kain, you said the bullet won’t hurt him if you shoot him?”
Marauder Ramses Page 11
