by LC Morgans
They travelled for hours, and while grisly, Junior had been amazingly calm throughout their trip, which had been a godsend. The trio later arrived at the lushest green forest Bella had ever seen and she couldn’t believe her eyes. She sucked in deep breaths of the humid, leafy air, and marveled at how wonderfully Minic had come through for her and Junior. He’d bought them to a home in the center of the vast forest, the house itself built inside the trunk of a huge, ancient tree.
When Bella finally saw it with her own eyes, his portrayals fell utterly short. She’d expected quaint and simple, small and homely, but this was far from it. They had a huge new home with every modern amenity on hand and a view to die for, as well as a secluded location where they could raise their son in peace. She was over the moon and beyond excited for their promised future together and, despite his anxiousness, so was Minic. Life would be good there, she was sure, but there was something she was missing. Bella needed a friend, someone she could rely on and connect with outside of her relationship with Minic. She needed Kyra and any other illegal migrants they found along the way to become her new family. They had to stay together and keep one another safe—like the rogues they’d inevitably become.
“Where did you say Thrayke and Kyra are living?” she asked and Minic’s face fell. He pointed out the window to the huge stretch of forest that was all Bella could see in any direction on the horizon.
“Around fifteen miles that way, but they aren’t there,” he told her. Bella’s heart sank. She begged him to explain why and Minic eventually began telling her the story of how Kyra had been kidnapped while aboard the ship. He also told Bella how she’d seemingly disappeared and that despite him and Thrayke searching every inch of that ship, she had remained lost. Her heart broke for them both and she couldn’t believe Minic hadn’t told her about their dilemma sooner.
“You have to do everything you can to help Thrayke,” she begged. “You don’t rest until she comes home safely, Minic. Do you hear me? We owe that poor woman.”
“I won’t give up, trust me.” Bella just hoped he meant it, because she knew that if it were her in that position, she would be absolutely terrified. Kyra could be anywhere and in the hands of anyone. Time was of the essence if they had any hope of finding her alive, but Bella couldn’t bring herself to even think what might be happening to her, or what fate could potentially come Kyra’s way once she too reached whatever destination she was heading to.
***
One year later…
Kyra picked at the thin cuffs around her wrists and ankles, regardless of her being well aware it was a pointless attempt at escape. She did it out of habit now, rather than with the mindset that she might actually be able to remove them, and hated that she couldn’t figure out a way to hack into the technology she would’ve once marveled at. Those days were long forgotten now though, and Kyra truly despised the mindless minion she’d been forced to become under Greegis’s ownership.
From what she could tell, the cuffs had to be either remotely controlled or wirelessly programmed—but only by Greegis himself. To ensure she always remained within certain parameters set out by him within the vast laboratory complex, the domineering scientist had the only monitoring device on his person at all times. Kyra supposed they were also trackers, and perhaps even transmitters. She was never free of him. She hadn’t been since the moment he’d bargained ownership of her from Rasmos and had slowly learned to accept being watched over constantly.
There were no chains connecting the cuffs, so Kyra’s movement wasn’t hindered, but she’d been forewarned early on that the technology inside could also render her temporarily paralyzed at a push of a button if he wanted. However, so far Greegis had simply used them to stop her from escaping and to summon her to his side whenever he wanted her. When she reached the limits of his chosen perimeter, it was like Kyra hit a wall and couldn’t push through it. Her body had ached for weeks after her first days at the facility. It hadn’t mattered to her that there was no evident weakness in the strange contraption Greegis used on all of his slaves, or at least a way around the thresholds he’d programmed into it. Kyra had needed to try, and try again. It was only when he tightened the parameters to an incredibly small space that she finally backed off, not that admitting defeat came easily for the once so headstrong young woman.
Like how the cuffs somehow controlled her movements, there was also another handy little setting her captor liked to utilize on far too regular an occasion. If a beep sounded from her right wrist, Kyra knew she had just seconds before her body was no longer her own. The cuffs were somehow connected to and in control of her nervous system and when Greegis commanded it, she would be forced to head directly to whatever location he’d programmed in without any delay.
Feeling exhausted and oddly numb, Kyra tried to clear her mind. She was going nowhere, and as much as she hated to admit it, she knew there was no point dwelling on the small details. Instead, she focused on the bigger picture and the here and now rather than fret or feel sorry for herself. They’d long since arrived on Thrakor, but she still had no idea where they were on the vast planet. She hadn’t seen any of the landscape for herself thanks to having been knocked out for the duration of their journey, and Greegis hadn’t been kind enough to give her a tour when he’d brought her to what she knew now was his private and secluded medical facility. He also hadn’t offered her any information on the geography of their planet so she couldn’t even hazard a guess as to which area they might be in based on the position of the stars or type of terrain. One thing she did know was that Thrakor was more than double the size of Earth, so his kind had plenty of room in which to hide their contraband.
The new and improved facility Kyra had been confined to struck her as similar to the one she’d been to on Earth where she had been given the serum that’d given her strength, healing power, and an elongated life ahead of her. At first, that treatment had been a wonderful gift, but then lots of things had gone wrong and now there wasn’t a single thing for her to look forward to. Kyra’s life on Thrakor was nothing like she and Thrayke had planned when he’d set about giving her hopes of a new start on his home planet. As a human, she always knew she’d be the lowest in society, but that hadn’t mattered. Thrayke was the one Thrakorian who’d never treated her as below him and she loved him for it with all her heart. He’d made her a solemn vow to keep her safe, which he’d broken by not finding her, but Kyra blamed herself for him not having been able to keep those promises. If only she’d been stronger and had been able to fight off Rasmos when he’d come for her…
She picked at the cuffs again in a bid to stop her thoughts dragging her down and stared off into the empty blackness of her room. It was nothing more than a bed, one set of drawers, and four plain walls, but at least it was a place of her own. She felt safe in her little space, regardless of its sparseness.
Kyra was glad that Greegis hadn’t created awful memories here to make her hate the place, not yet anyway. Surprisingly, he’d never beaten or tortured her the same way Chief Rasmos had when he’d kidnapped her and forced her into servitude. Instead, Greegis had seemed captivated by what he’d been asked to create in his laboratory years before. He had so far treated her like a living piece of art he’d molded with his own hands, all while testing her body’s new strengths and abilities via his numerous experiments to assess her endurance via both training and pain.
No one seemed to have a clue what he was doing here at his private facility. Not even her friends she’d thought would search every inch of their world for her. Greegis had won. He’d gotten away with capturing her and had even been promoted to the rank of Paladin by King Thrakor upon his return, or so she remembered hearing. Greegis had been hailed for his work with the human DNA serums that were reportedly already being prepared for Thrakorian testing, rather than being taken away like the lying scumbag he truly was. The facility had been a gift to him from their leader, and since their arrival, he’d been working day and night to provide encoura
ging results to his sovereign. That much Kyra did know. She hadn’t seen the results for herself because as far as she could tell he’d told one more lie. They hadn’t begun Thrakorian testing, nor did they even seem close to it, but Kyra knew Greegis had to be busy because there were days when she hardly saw him. Those were the best ones.
Greegis didn’t share much with her, but Kyra knew from some of her overheard conversations that he’d managed to isolate the correct malignant cells within their test subjects and had used them to create an adapted serum like she and the other human candidates’ had already been given. This new and improved treatment was reportedly aimed at providing the Thrakorian’s with whatever it was they lacked after advancing way beyond their human cousins. Earth had been saved from catastrophe temporarily by the Thrakorian’s advanced engineering and now its survivors had to finally know they hadn’t done it for simply research into a species distantly related to their own. The real agenda was a cure for the Ehrad disease that was plaguing them, but right now, Kyra could think of nothing other than her own misery, rather than worry about theirs. She hung her head as she thought back to the last days aboard the ship that’d brought them to their planet, and how she’d been stolen from Thrayke’s quarters regardless of his high standing in Kronus’s Kings Guard Service.
Greegis had sedated her and had then evidently sneaked her onto the cargo ship of humans bound for his new facility. Rasmos had seemingly fooled all those around him into believing he too was an upstanding member of their society, when she knew he was far from it. While he was working as Kronus’s right-hand-man, he was also in the business of kidnapping, breaking, and forcing human men and women to become slaves he then traded with other despicable Thraks like pets. Kyra had since learned how after the transaction was complete, their new purchase was for the Thrak in question to use and abuse in whatever way they pleased—no returns, and no refunds.
Thrayke had trusted Rasmos, as had the only other Thrakorian she now yearned to see again, Kronus. After years of crushing on him in secret following his tender treatment of her as a child, Kyra had eventually found herself under his gaze again once she’d made it into the Intelligence Division’s Gentry. That moment in the sun had been wonderful, but also torturous. While she’d chosen to walk away and be with Thrayke, she still grieved for the time spent with Kronus, and the person she’d become while under his care. He was her friend and she missed him tremendously.
Thrayke, on the other hand, was someone she couldn’t bear to think about for too long, or else she would crumble and wail like a woman possessed. Her once mute voice had returned, and at times she cursed it for giving away her pain. Kyra wanted nothing more than to remain defiant, strong-willed, and silent when confronted by her unyielding new master, but her throat had miraculously healed. Her voice often betrayed her resolve whenever Greegis inflicted his chosen pain and then watched in awe as she healed in record speed. He might not beat or abuse her, but he sure seemed to take great pleasure from watching his serum work its magic on her once so fragile body. The way he’d treated her made Kyra hate being in the facility under the frightening Thrakorian’s ownership. What few humans she’d encountered were either loyal doctors or nurses in Greegis’s employ, or slaves working in his household like her. They too wore the same cuffs as she had around her wrists and ankles while they tended to their master, and they were in no position to offer her help or a way in which she might get a message to the outside world.
Kyra felt lost, and in more ways than because of having left the life she once had behind. Huge parts of her memory and intellect were suddenly beginning to elude her. It’d only started happening recently, but for some reason her rationale and even aspects of her personality often felt just out of reach. Whenever she tried to come up with a plan to escape, Kyra couldn’t seem to access the strategic part of her mind. There were also times when she wanted to answer Greegis back or refuse to play along with his games of cat and mouse, but she’d suddenly find her mind blank. She would’ve wondered if it was because Rasmos had beaten the fight out of her when he’d kidnapped her, but that was an entire year ago now and these changes had only just begun to take effect.
There was no denying, she and Greegis had fought aplenty, but he’d never laid his hands on her for the fun of it like Rasmos had. For Greegis, it was more about the sick satisfaction he got watching her body heal before his eyes than the way it felt to inflict the pain in the first place. She figured her lapses in memory had to be a new form of treatment he’d concocted, or Kyra wondered if perhaps it was something to do with the cuff she was still fiddling with. After all, they were capable of overriding her brain’s commands to her nervous system, so maybe they could also dull her reactions and mental capabilities at the same time? She definitely felt slower and less able to think for herself or form much of an opinion than she had before. Something had to be causing the changes.
There’d been many hardships along Kyra’s path to Thrakor, but she’d never struggled with her mind before. She hoped there was something else to blame for her diminished brain function and survival instincts, rather than the alternative and her mind was simply shutting down of its own accord. To give in to a mindless existence now would certainly make her feel as if she’d failed, and yet she often felt like she was slowly losing her will to fight any longer anyway. No matter her determination or strength, she had lost in the end.
Kyra stared into the darkness in a daze. She was exhausted and felt her mind succumb even more to its odd numbness.
“Where are you, Thrayke, and why haven’t you rescued me yet?” she whispered into the shadows and she let a single tear fall down her cheek when a pang of pain shot through her head, as though in response to her forbidden thoughts and desires.
The clock to the side of her bed then began buzzing loudly and the sound pulled her from her sad daze. Kyra immediately reached over to turn it off, but hadn’t needed the wakeup anyway. Sleep was a rare occurrence these days, mostly because she forced herself to stay awake, or only doze through the night in small amounts brought on by sheer exhaustion. Her dreams had always been vivid, however lately her violent nightmares soon had her thrashing awake once deep sleep descended. It wasn’t worth letting herself sleep, so she’d decided she would rather not sleep at all.
“Paladin Greegis would like you to join him for breakfast,” a robotic sounding woman’s voice chimed through an intercom on the wall and Kyra climbed to her feet. It was the same routine every morning and she didn’t know why she was summoned every day in the same way, but guessed it was just another way of him asserting his control over her. “You’re to be ready in twenty minutes,” came the second message, as always.
Kyra was in and out of the shower in less than five and she wrapped a huge fluffy towel around her thin body, tucking it under the armpit to secure it in place. She then wiped the steam from her mirror and stared at the reflection looking back at her. It was hard to believe she was even looking at herself. Kyra always expected to see a pale, gaunt, sad looking creature there, but every time she was greeted by the sight of a vibrant, healthy looking young woman with full red lips and rosy cheeks. Someone seemingly radiating with vitality. Her dark eyes sparkled as though she’d slept soundly and her skin looked sun-kissed despite her not having been outside under their warm sun even once since arriving on Thrakor. Like every morning, Kyra cursed Greegis and his serum for having made her this way. But, that wasn’t the worst part. Like always, she closed her eyes when she removed the towel she’d wrapped around her head like a turban. This was the sight she truly hated and yet she still couldn’t remember how or when it’d happened.
Instead of her straight, dark brown bobbed hair, Kyra now had bright golden waves that cascaded around her shoulders and down her back. A year before while still aboard the ship travelling from Earth, Kyra had given her hair a trim so it was above her shoulders and it’d been that way when Greegis had drugged her and put her into stasis for the final hours aboard, followed by the jour
ney to his new facility.
When she’d awoken two days later, her entire body had felt alien. He’d mentioned something about having made improvements so that she was more to his liking, but at the time she’d been too scared and disoriented to question him about it. It wasn’t as if Greegis was an approachable sort of Thrak, and even when she had plucked up the courage to ask how and why he’d given her more treatment, he’d refused to answer. When Kyra had first seen her reflection in the mirror she’d thought the blonde hair was an illusion, or at least a dye job that’d soon wash out, but no. Even her eyebrows and lashes had changed to match the shade, and she’d quickly figured Greegis was fonder of blondes.
Her new master had evidently used his knowledge of the human genetic makeup to not only create serums such as the one she’d been given before to add years to her life and ensure she stayed healthy, but he’d developed them even more in the years since she’d first undergone his treatment. Greegis, it seemed, had administered an upgrade while Kyra was in her forced sleep. He had altered her in ways she hadn’t understood at first. Ones she hadn’t wanted or had a choice in. Not only was her hair now forever changed, but he’d also removed all of the scars from her body, making her skin absolutely flawless. The scars from the rose bush were her reminder of Invasion Day, regardless of their unsightliness, and she missed them. Gone too was the scar on her neck from where she’d taken a bullet for Kronus. All that remained was a faint sliver of silver no one but her seemed to see. He’d even taken away the cross-shaped scar on her cheek, and while she was saddened by the reminder it gave her to her old flame, Kyra still wished she had something of the old her to cling onto.
