by Stella Sky
I shook my head, snapping out of it and grabbed the bag from her. “I'm packing up, and I'm gone. I'm going to the Vithohn camp. Tell Baxley... tell him I died in the raid! I don’t care.”
Rebecca leaned against the bed, pressing her calves against the pressboard wooden base and asked, “You think he'll fall for that bullshit?”
I shrugged. “Probably not.”
Rebecca twirled her fingers and said, “Then either we kill him or give him something more important to worry about than an escaped traitor.”
“I'm not killing Baxley, and I can't think of anything else more important for him to worry about if siding with the Vithohn or this war doesn’t faze him.”
Faith and Rebecca exchanged a look that I couldn’t read; excitement and resignation were melding into one glance. Then Evelyn said, “Then I'm coming with you.”
“Me too,” Rebecca added with a nod. “And we have five more who want to leave.”
“This isn't a game Rebecca,” I snapped. “Tessoul was... He's honest, and he's trouble's, but—”
“Bad boy scores again,” Evelyn snorted.
Thinking of Tessoul made my heart sink once more: a darkness rising in me that made me spin around and exclaim, “It's not a game!”
“I guess that's why this bullshit has no finish line, huh?” Rebecca said, her drawl coming out. “Sidney, we're not stupid. I've watched. I've been out there, with you, in fact. I'm ready.”
I shrugged. “It's not going to feel like love.”
“It is with Tessoul,” Evelyn corrected.
“He's genuine, with feelings, and if you go into this thinking you're going to manipulate them… You can’t come with me if you’re thinking like that. This has to be an alliance, completely,” I instructed.
“I mean, that was the plan, wasn't it?” Evelyn asked, her eyes blinking nervously now. “To use them?”
Lele flinched from the window and turned her profile to us. “That was Baxley's plan.”
“I don't care,” Evelyn reaffirmed, turning her back to me and revealing her backpack, already full and ready to go. “Whatever it takes. I'm team human race, baby.”
“You guys... Tessoul is gone. I'm a fugitive in my own camp. Why are you doing this?” I said with a crack in my voice.
“We want to start over,” Rebecca said.
What an amazing concept, I thought. To just start over, not only as a group, but as a race. As two races. We and the Vithohn could start over completely, get on better footing, and do what was best for both of us. We could share this world and right every wrong that’d been done to us both.
Except I would have to do it without Tessoul. The thought sent me into a full-blown panic; tears were swimming from my eyes as I erupted into a tortured sob.
“I don't want to start over,” I cried. “I want Tessoul.”
The girls look at each other sadly, unmoving. Finally, Lele walked over to me and set her hand on my back. Her perfectly shaped lips parted and I thought she might impart some comfort to me, but instead, she spouted, “Chances of success is sixty percent if you leave immediately. Statistics of survival outside of the camp unaccompanied are much worse.
“Like it or not, we're coming. Nine strong,” Rebecca said and slipped my backpack over my arms.
I sniffed and took a few steadying breaths, trying to get it together. “They are?”
“Tessoul made a heck of a case for himself when he was in our camp,” Evelyn said with a shrug.
“What about Baxley?”
Rebecca shrugged and walked to the door. She set her hand on the knob and turned back to me. “Let him have the… what… eight people left? They do things their way, and we take our own path.”
“Here,” Evelyn said shyly, scooping Ed from her backpack. “Use this. He'll lead you to the Vithohn like a beacon.”
I scooped Ed into my arms, and he looked up at me apologetically. I didn’t know whether to embrace him or get rid of him, though I couldn’t bring myself to kill him, I wondered what connection he really had to the Kilari. If they looked as they did in the spawning cave, why was he just a little blob? If they hatched from eggs, why was he sprung early? I swallowed and held him close.
Maybe I would keep him, for now. At least until he could lead us to the beacon.
Ed looked delighted to be in my company again, and I wonder what would have happened if he ended up in the spawning cave. Would he have transformed into one of the beasts or would he have tried to find a way to protect us?
I wished I had thought ahead and brought him in the first place. I felt his warm squishy texture in my arms and gave him a sweet pet, wondering why I didn’t believe Tessoul when he first told me about the war. About the Kilari.
I spent so much time thinking Tessoul was lying to me. It turned out I was the liar.
We wandered out of the camp, nine strong, and wandered into the wilderness. It took many days to find the way back to the Vithohn space station, but I was too numb to be terrified. We traveled easily through the forests; it was the same canopy where we had planted so many traps—where we had hidden supplies in case we were ever driven from our camp.
Now we were going back. Back to the Vithohn camp. We were greeted by Karen, who finally seemed the girl I once knew. Open and friendly, willing to help us. She brought us to the barracks and began grabbing supplies and tech from Jareth and the other reborn Vithohn.
Then she looked at me.
“I’ve been waiting for you,” she said with a wide smile.
“Yep, that’s me, the hero,” I said coolly, dropping my backpack to the ground with a hollow ‘thump.’
“I can’t believe out of everyone, it was you who believed me, Sid.”
I shrugged, not feeling very proud of myself or the things that I’d done for my people. All I had done, up to this point, was separate us from our camp, our commodore, and our safe homes.
That’s what it felt like anyway.
“I’m proud of you,” she said, as though she were reading my mind. “We’re going to make this work.”
“I know we will,” I said evenly and then relented to a small smile before running up and hugging her, crying into her shoulder like I would have done to my father when he was alive.
“Sidney,” she said with a small laugh. “I’ve been waiting for you to come back so I could show you something.”
I cocked a brow, and she led me down the corridors of the space station and down to the barracks. I wondered if she was going to give me hell for stealing from Jareth’s weapon armory, but instead, she led me down a familiar hall until we reached Tessoul’s door.
I looked at her with pained eyes, guilty for my part in the fall of the Vithohn. But my heart raced as she gave two brief knocks on his door before stepping in.
My feet were right behind her, watching as she opened the way to Tessoul’s bedroom to reveal him there, alive.
“Tessoul!” I yelled without thinking, running to him and falling onto his bed where he lay in a heap of sobs.
I tried to speak, but my tears were too powerful; the blanket of emotion was making it too difficult to think.
“Hey, you,” he said, wincing as I brushed against his wounds.
“Araxis found him,” Karen said quickly. “Sensed him: the pull. He’s a little beat up but, these guys are pretty strong.”
“The Kilari,” I managed to squeak out.
“We already know,” Karen said with a sweet laugh. “We’ll talk all about that, but for now, go be with your man.”
With that, Karen excused herself from us, and I set my hands on either side of Tessoul’s face. I couldn’t believe he was here.
His tan skin was a mess of cuts and bandages, but I traced my hand along the familiar green line that came down his forehead with familiarity.
“I’m so sorry,” I cried, my lip shaking and trembling even as he set his thumb against it.
“For what?” he laughed, wiping my tears away and drawing me into a beautiful kiss. “You di
d what you were told, for once,” he teased.
“I thought you were dead,” I bellowed.
“But I’m not,” he said and brushed his hand through my hair, pulling me down onto his chest. I embraced the warmth of him and knew from this moment on, I would never doubt him again.
“Thank goodness because… we have a lot to do,” I said with a bashful laugh. “Right?”
He nodded. “You got it.”
“I love you,” I said, breathing slower now. Happy to be back in the presence of the only real safety I had ever known.
A wry smirk tickled its way up his lips and with a wink in his tone he said, “It’s about time.
EPILOGUE
Tessoul
In the months that followed, Sidney and I had made a family together with another clan of humans far south. We’d taken a handful of women with us and returned to my base covertly to gather Karen, Tiffany, and their mates, along with a handful of other Vithohn who supported our cause.
Together, we would start a new family.
We’d agreed on scouting the land, going from human camp to human camp, scouting out wild Vithohn and those predisposed to listen to gather treaties of help: a warning of the war to come.
The current pack of humans we had taken up with were bunkered down in an abandoned hospital. It made for the perfect base: medical supplies, food, clean beds. It was perfect for us.
For now, at least.
“What do you think, champ?” Sidney said, bathed in sweat as she moved the hair from her forehead and smiled at me.
She was lying in a hospital bed, weak and impish and bursting with laughter.
I looked over at Stephania, our resident nurse, and she held a small newborn in her arms, murmuring with cries and a fresh take on the world.
I looked down at the child, holding it up in my hands and into the light. It looked just like her: imp nose and freckled cheeks and a mane of red curls. With my smooth skin and a small tentacle down her back.
My eyes brimmed with tears and I held back my emotion, partly so I could enjoy the moment with Sidney and partly because I knew she would make fun of me if I did.
Our mission was to set up a treaty system, readying our forces before the real Kilari invasion began. We had spent a year already going from town to town securing our allies.
I felt uneasy, the pull strong and growing more powerful every day, but I knew that Sidney could make everything better. She was my perfect other. My perfect partner.
So perhaps we would spend the next couple years on the move; fighting for our cause, but until then, I thought, there was no reason not to stop and have a family on the way.
“She’s perfect,” I said and kissed Sidney on her forehead, lifting our child up to her and showing her what we’d made together in love. “And so are you.”
Extra Value
I hope you have enjoyed Rax! To provide as much value as I can to you my lovely readers, I have partnered with my really good friend Maia Starr who is also a passionate Sci Fi Alien Romance author. If you love big sexy dreamy Aliens/Weredragons then you will absolutely LOVE her stuff. I have also some of my own books as a bonus to introduce you to other worlds and series that I have going on. Enjoy !!
With Love,
Stella Sky
Keecha-Raither Warriors
(Raither Warriors)
By Stella Sky
Chapter 1
Dr. Alice Tanner
“Oh my god, Alice, you always do this!”
I cringed at the sound of Lauren’s voice behind me and turned around.
“I thought I did it right this time,” I sighed.
“You know, for a scientist, you’re just too bad at numbers. You know we have to have everything absolutely perfect! We won’t get paid for our research if it turns out we’re messing it up!”
“It’s not even just about payment,” Mary reminded Lauren. “If we get the facts wrong, it could impact everybody negatively if the Committee takes us at our word and publishes the findings. Who knows how much harm misinformation could cause in the long run?”
I could feel a lump forming in my throat. Ever since I had joined the Elite Research Team that had been hand-chosen by the President of the United States and his team for homeland security, I had felt completely out of place. Sure, I had always been the top of my class and excelled at every single project I had undertaken in the scientific realm, but the fact was that, under pressure, I had a tendency to shut down. I had never handled certain types of pressure well; specifically, social pressures. I was great with facts and numbers…not so great with emotions and feelings and friends. And for some reason, I had really hoped that the other women in my group would like me.
“I’m sorry, you guys. I don’t know what happened. I must have had my mind somewhere else…”
The truth was that I knew exactly what had been on my mind. The day before, I had been working with Jaya, who was probably single-handedly the smartest human being on Earth. I knew I was intelligent, but she was on a completely different level: one that was nearly clairvoyant. It was eerie how quickly her mind worked at times—as if it weren’t even of her own accord or will. She just knew things.
I had been intimidated, of course, as it was easy to intimidate me around other human beings, specifically the ones I was hoping to make friends with. who wouldn’t want to be friends with the smartest human on the planet, right? Well…that may have been a little bit easier if I hadn’t stood up and accidentally knocked over the beaker she had been glued to for the past six hours. It crashed to the floor, and she had given me the harshest look I had ever been on the receiving end of.
I hadn’t been able to focus on anything after that, and the calculations I had done throughout the rest of the day had apparently suffered. Tremendously. Just as they always did when I was feeling stressed out.
“Maybe you just shouldn’t be doing mathematical calculations,” Mary said diplomatically, pushing the glasses on top of her head and revealing her gentle brown eyes. “I wouldn’t mind doing the work.”
“I can do math just fine,” I sighed. “But when I’m stressed out I do better out in the field. I need to work with my hands.”
“Well our work can’t be dependent upon how you feel, Alice,” Lauren scoffed. “What we do here is far more important than that. Feelings are biological. It’s all in your brain, not in your heart. Either get it together, or I’m going to tell the group leader to send a letter to the president asking him to reconsider your position here.”
Hot tears began to spring into my eyes, but I turned away before anybody could see them. I took a deep, wavering breath and then turned back to face Lauren, determined not to show anybody how I truly felt.
“I understand. I will do better from now on. I’ll just work in the field and let Mary do the calculations.”
“That suits me,” Mary said, walking over to the table where I was working and glancing down at my notes. “You can fill me in on what you’re working on. I was outside studying plant samples. Perhaps we can trade tasks for now. Once you are feeling better, you can try calculations again.”
It was the closest thing to compassion that any of the others had shown me since I arrived. The truth was that all of us were the types of people who were more comfortable in our own skin and in an isolated room full of books. We were the loners of the world, and although we could socialize just fine, we felt more fulfilled pursuing our intellectual interests.
“Thanks, Mary,” I said, sighing inwardly. “It would be nice to get outside for a while.”
Mary nodded at me. “Sometimes plants understand us better.”
I gave her a small half-smile, confused and touched by the small act of kindness, and then headed outside, feeling better for the first time since the beaker incident.
***
“You guys, come here! This is insane!” I shouted, getting up from where I had been perched in the dirt and scrambling inside the lab. “There’s a plant outside that I can’t ide
ntify! It looks like it may be extraterrestrial in origin!”
Everybody’s eyes widened, and the group of women drew a collective breath. This was exactly what the Committee had been waiting for. We had been looking for alien life on Earth for decades now, rarely finding any, but coveting the life we did find. Our job was to uncover the source of these plants and their impact on native Earth life. Rather than considering the plants that were alien in origin as an invasive species, for the most part, the Committee observed that alien plant life actually contributed to Earth’s ecosystem and provided much-needed nutrients to the soil that made it easier for plant life to thrive.
It was a discovery that was still very much new, and the research on it was limited. That was why the team had been chosen. There were roughly 30 women on the Elite Research Team, and each of us had an incredible aptitude for science and mathematics. We had nicknamed ourselves the Golds, after the Fibonacci sequence. The Golden Ratio was something we all found mesmerizing and beautiful, no matter what our chosen field happened to be, and were curious what that ratio might be like in other worlds.
Unfortunately, despite being brilliant scientists, we were still women, and because of difficulties in the women were refused a chance to go on missions in space to explore alien planets. Far too many incidents had happened before we had fully understood the high demand for females throughout the galaxies, and many women had been abducted and sold for their ability to reproduce. Since then, the government had officially banned women traveling into space. It posed too much risk both to the human women themselves and to national security. Women who were captured and tortured were more likely to give away secrets about humanity that could prove ultimately fatal should it come down to confrontation.
Soon, all the women in the lab that day were following me outside. I held up my hand, so they would know to stop before they trampled the poor little flower bud, and then cautiously stepped forward.
