by PJ Schnyder
“Her scent is changing. Your girl is coming into heat.”
Oh hell, no.
Suddenly, her irritability made sense. Her tight skin, and fevers over the last week. She’d never had to deal with it in the past but she wondered how long Bharguest had known.
“Relax.” Bharguest chuckled. “There’s nothing more interesting than watching a man fight to kill what he wants to fuck.”
Chapter Thirteen
“Most men don’t want a big cat.” Rygard’s words came out choked.
That...would have been more than awkward. She might be her beast aspect in a lot of ways but the imagery Bharguest had called up sent awful shivers through her. No, no and no. Thank freaking goodness Rygard seemed to feel the same. Bharguest shrugged. “If the two of you are going to survive this place, she’s going to have to use every trick she’s got. Staying in one form is a death sentence for you both.”
Changing shape during a fight was risky. Hell, she couldn’t remember the last time she had. Once engaged, she usually committed to one form or the other until it was over.
You are your beast and you’re wasting more of your brain than any normal human is while you deny it.
Bharguest’s earlier words floated to the surface of her memory. Shaking her head, she twitched her tail in annoyance. She would chew on the thought for a while because the words tasted of truth.
“How will it affect her, going into a heat cycle?” Tracer watched her, not wary but curious. Next to him, Max sat relaxed and watchful. “Others reacting to her could be an advantage but is she going to be handicapped physically or mentally?”
All the males were looking at her by the end of the question. Annoyance burned hotter, turning to anger. She bared her teeth at them all.
Bharguest grinned. “I wouldn’t say it’ll be debilitating for her, but she might be more likely to give someone else a handicap. Say, a maiming or a few new holes in their hide.”
Kaitlyn resisted the urge to flex her claws.
Boots sounded in the hallway again. Two humanoids approached, different from the earlier guards. These were heavier and walked with more purpose, approaching fairly quickly.
Max’s head turned, big ears swiveling toward the sound. The dog’s hearing was as good as her own. Tracer stopped whatever question he’d been about to ask. Looked for whatever had his partner’s attention. Good handler.
“That was quick.” Bharguest sounded pleased. “I guess we’ll find out which of us gets to play first.”
Rygard rose to his feet, moving forward to stand at the force field. Kaitlyn hesitated a moment before joining him. Seemed like a bad idea to be out in the open but she wouldn’t leave him to stand alone.
These two humanoids were heavily armed. One aimed some sort of plasma rifle at the other occupants in their cave while his partner fixed a reptilian gaze on Rygard.
“The big man and the panther.” The slight hiss as the reptilian pronounced the ‘th’ sound tickled Kaitlyn’s ears. “All others stay back or be shot.”
Thank you, Captain Obvious.
Then again, looking at the strange aggression burning in the eyes of some of the other beings standing right at the force fields in other crevices, Kaitlyn wondered if it might not be so obvious after a prolonged period down here.
“Come.”
The force field deactivated. Rygard didn’t hesitate, but he didn’t move quickly either. He stepped forward because it was prudent to do so. He wasn’t particularly obedient. Kaitlyn remained at his side, allowing him to take the lead.
Part of her wanted to zone to one side, keep the two reptiles from flanking them, but that wasn’t the purpose of tonight’s situation. No, they had to play along for the time being.
The guards led them back through the corridors, taking a different route than Dev’s hologram had led them. It looked the same to the eye, but Kaitlyn’s nose told her more. Even with the aid of her enhanced senses, she had to pay careful attention to their path. Too many scents confused the trails, some of them astringent, and she was betting they kept the corridors clean for more than simple sanitary purposes. It’d be a challenge to find their way out when the time came.
They stepped onto a new set of lifts. Faint traces of blood streaked the floor and as they rose through the levels, the sound of cheering and shouts grew louder. When they stopped, and were told to step off the platform, they were still underground. Ventilation on this level was better, yet it stank of sweat and drink, excitement and violence. Everywhere, the tang of fear tainted the air. The only light fell in columns clustered ahead of them and Rygard slowed his pace in the reduced visibility.
As they drew closer, it became clear that each pool of light was a cage. In some, matches were already going on, combatants performing for the cheering crowd watching from above and in others, the fighters waited in the shadows outside the cage walls for their turn. She and Rygard were led to one cage, herded into a small holding pen attached the side of the octagon. On the other side, she could make out a big humanoid shape and another animal.
Badger was suddenly there, handing Rygard his weapons through a small slot. Wordless, Rygard shrugged into his gear, clipping the harness across his chest and waist. His hands passed swiftly over the various sheaths and Kaitlyn took a visual inventory. All blades, no firearms, the configuration was as much for her as for him. At least two of the blades were attached to the back of his harness where he wasn’t likely to reach for them.
The fight would be well-matched, as far as the organizers were concerned.
An announcer’s voice projected over the shouts of the crowds. Kaitlyn didn’t bother to absorb the words. No doubt most of the onlookers had their own personal translators in ear buds or headsets. Instead, she studied the walls of the octagon. Thick strands of plasteel, woven to look like a net, stretched across the frame of the cage, allowing onlookers to see while the combatants were effectively contained. She couldn’t even slip a paw through any of the holes. And unlike netting made of cord or rope, these walls wouldn’t give on impact. Considering the felid’s earlier warning, she decided it’d be a bad idea to be caught up against the honeycomb patterned walls.
Glancing up into the light, fists pumped beyond the glare. She could make out the same netted pattern, confirming the cage fully enclosed, overhead too. She wouldn’t be able to leap up out of the cage if necessary. At least the onlookers couldn’t throw anything too harmful down on their heads. Liquids were a different story.
She’d borrow one worry at a time.
The gates to the holding pens opened simultaneously, and the guards used shock rods to prod them from their niches into the main cage.
Growling, Kaitlyn stalked to one side, truly annoyed and glad to have avoided the rods. Such a shock, right before a fight, could have caused seized muscles she didn’t care to overcome.
Rygard had stepped forward, sizing up the other humanoid. The other man, if she wanted to call him one, was huge. Towering over Rygard by close to two feet, the opponent was at least as wide and wearing dented armor across his chest and shoulders.
Circling the cage opposite her, the beast of the pair let out a hiss.
The good news? It was focused on her and not Rygard.
That was the bad news too.
The thing had to outweigh her by almost a hundred pounds. A triangular head swung to and fro as its tongue flicked out to taste the air. Tiny eyes peered across the way, blinking in the garish light shining down on them. Each of its four feet ended in wicked hooked claws, non—retractable from the way they clicked on the hard floor. As it dropped its jaw to hiss at her again, she caught sight of a solid row of nasty curved teeth, made to rip and tear.
Damned biggest lizard she had ever seen and she wondered briefly if someone had nabbed one from old Terra and tinkered with genetics to make the monst
er. She vaguely remembered images from her student days, something called a Komodo Dragon.
Obviously a predator, the thing was built low to the ground with powerful legs and a thick tail. She was going to have a hard time rendering the thing harmless. Likely, there’d be no halfway about it. She’d have to kill it or it’d try its hardest to kill her and her man.
The big humanoid let out a cry, a strangled sound of aggression no natural beast would make. It lunged at Rygard and her partner side stepped the first attack.
She didn’t have much time to watch because the Komodo Dragon charged. It came at her in a dark blur and she too dodged to one side, barely avoiding the struggling males. It lashed out with a powerful tail, knocking the feet out from under Rygard and his opponent as Kaitlyn barely hopped over.
Frustration twisted inside her. She wouldn’t be able to put this thing on its back quickly. She moved around the cage as it hissed at her again, bobbing its head in jerking movements. It was too fast and it didn’t care about its humanoid as much as she cared about Rygard. It whipped its tail around, heedless of the battling humanoids. If their fight brought them too close, damned thing might turn and take a chunk out of one of them.
Not something her man could survive.
The cage didn’t give them enough room to properly maneuver. She’d have to get in close range in order to draw blood, before it got tired chasing her. Fear shivered across her pelt and she shook it off. No time. No doubt.
Kill it.
She lashed her own tail, deliberately mirroring its body language. The thing hissed again, dropping its tiny head low and hunching its heavy shoulders. Dropping her own head she bared her teeth and hissed back.
Come get me.
Sure enough, it charged her again, a dark streak across the width of the cage.
Shouts and screams of the watching crowd rose in a crescendo as she waited, waited to the last possible second before leaping straight up into the air and rotating one hundred and eighty degrees to land on the thing’s back. Latching in with her front claws she bit deep into the tough leather just behind its skull. Holding on for dear life, she raked it as best she could with her hind claws, leaning all of her weight forward over its head.
As she’d expected, the thing thrashed side to side trying to turn and take a bite out of her. As long as she kept her hind quarters mobile, it couldn’t catch her. Her front paws were gouging into its shoulders from the strain of carrying all of her weight and the muscles of her back stretched cruelly as it whipped her to and fro.
The pounds of pressure she could apply with her jaw gave her a firm hold on its neck. She bit deeper despite the foul taste of its hide. It reared up on the cage wall, slamming them both down on the hard surface with a massive jolt, dislodging her claws. Still she bit deeper, sinking one front set of claws then another back into its shoulders as she regained her hold. She blinked her eyes, struggling to clear her vision as the crowd around them pounded a beat into the ceiling.
Its sides were slick with blood now and it began smacking sideways into the hard plasteel net of the octagon. Each impact was punctuated by cheers.
Their struggle had carried them around the octagon. Every blow jarred her entire body, flung her hindquarters into the wall. Still she hung on, even though her jaw felt ready to dislocate. At the edge of her peripheral vision, she could see the males struggling at the other side of the cage. Rygard still lived.
Finally, Kaitlyn’s teeth hit the solid resistance of bone. She’d found the damn thing’s spine. The lizard hissed again, a desperate note in the fierce sound. It picked up speed, trying to dislodge her against the wall. She needed to end it before the monster succeeded.
Finding the rhythm of its panicked thrashing, she waited for it to throw itself into the side of the cage. As it lunged to the side, she threw all of her body weight in the other direction, wrenching its neck in her jaws.
A sickening snap could be heard despite the cries of the crowd, and the Komodo Dragon lay still.
Triumph washed through her and she stood with both front paws planted on her kill. Staring up into the bright lights she bared her teeth at the wildly gesticulating shadows and roared her defiance.
She turned her attention to Rygard’s fight as it raged on the other side of the cage. Her partner held his own, barely, but he’d lost control of the center of the ring. Had to, while she’d been grappling with her prey. His opponent had him with his back to the cage wall, defending more than landing any telling strikes.
Rygard was a stand up striker and if the bigger male overwhelmed him and took the fight to the ground, her partner would be in trouble. Luckily, the other humanoid looked to be a stand up brawler too.
She’d been willing to let Rygard find his own way to a win, but his opponent had gotten through his guard, landing a hammer fisted blow to the side of his head. Taking advantage of Rygard’s disorientation, the big humanoid wrapped both arms around her lover’s upper body and hoisted him in a bear hug, trapping his arms against his sides.
Rygard tried for a head butt, bucking and searching to find some weak point to win his way free. He attempted hammer blows to his opponent’s torso while hooking his feet on the inside of the male’s knees to break his stance. As the air was slowly being crushed out of him, Kaitlyn darted into the fray and landed on the big male’s shoulders.
Armor protected the back of his neck and shoulders. Her claws could only find purchase to hold and not to gouge flesh. The big male stumbled backward a few steps with the weight of her on his back, still, he refused to let Rygard go.
Desperately, Kaitlyn yowled. Her lover was turning red in the face and his fierce eyes were beginning to lose focus.
She darted her gaze from his face to his harness, the combat knife strapped over his shoulder.
No way to reach it with her mouth. No way to grasp the handle with her claws.
Only one other choice remained.
Pain and agony screamed through her in a burning moment as her claws turned to hands. Her spine shortened and curved, and her toes scrabbled for purchase against the big male’s armor without the aid of claws.
Gritting her teeth against the protest of every muscle, she reached over her opponent’s shoulder and yanked the combat knife free of Rygard’s harness. Swift and with all the strength she could muster, she brought it around and inward, finding the gap under their opponent’s arm. Stabbing once, twice, the thing screamed and dropped Rygard, reaching back for her with its good arm as blood streamed down from the deep gashes under its other.
She dropped off its back before it could grab hold and toss her, crouching naked in the center of the octagon. Fear chilled her skin as she tried to hide her vulnerability. Quickly, she reversed the combat knife in her right hand and prepared to take the oncoming attack.
But Rygard wasn’t out of the fight. From where he’d fallen, he’d recovered and took the big male’s feet out from under him with a powerful leg sweep. When it hit the ground, Rygard grabbed its bad arm, and caught it in a solid arm bar using all his strength to bend it beyond natural range of motion until something gave with a sickening pop.
The humanoid screamed.
Yanking another combat knife free of his harness, Rygard buried it to the hilt in the side of the thing’s neck.
The horrible scream cut off in a gurgling sputter as blood fountained from a major artery.
Kaitlyn watched, ready, as the life left the big male. After the first fountain of blood, the crimson spurted out in time with its failing heart, waning and weakening.
Flat eyes stared at them and a thick tongue lolled out of its mouth.
It might have started out human, but whatever it had been mutated into had been cold blooded and as reptilian as the Komodo Dragon-like thing she’d killed.
Rygard stood, his own knife at the ready, and sidestepped toward
her until the both of them stood back to back in the center of the ring. If another battle was about to start, they were ready for it.
Chapter Fourteen
“This is definitely posing an issue.”
Dev’s voice came across the communication node still nestled in Kaitlyn’s ear lobe. Rygard knelt next to where she crouched in the back of the cave, leaning close to listen. Her proximity always drew him, heated his blood. Something about her at this moment, fresh from their time in the cage set him on fire. One by one, he extended his fingers, stretching open his hand before closing it into a tight fist again. Repeating the motions with his other hand, he found himself steady enough to listen back in on Dev’s commentary.
“Part of the reason we sent you in panther form was to avoid the issues inherent with sending a female into what basically amounts to a prison.” A tapping noise began to punctuate Dev’s words. Rygard remembered seeing the captain tap his comm when he was thinking. “I’ve had to turn down several offers from interested buyers.”
“That’s a lot of bodies to hide on this rock.” Her shoulders were relaxed, hands loose and face serene, but Rygard saw the way the German Shepherd Dog was watching her. Alert.
Dev chuckled. “For the time being, we think you’re safe from idiots because I’ve said I’m saving you for possible mating.”
Kaitlyn snorted, or blew a raspberry. “Max is fully loaded. And the rest of our boys are intact. But most of those males? Gotta be shooting blanks.”
Rygard swallowed the bark of laughter and ignored the odd flutter in his stomach. None of his soldiers ever used banter the way Kaitlyn did with her captain. Must be a merc thing.
Dev’s voice took on a bored tone. “I’ve also said I won’t pay damages for any males stupid enough to attempt forcing themselves on you. There’s a lot of agreement amongst the bigger sponsors that your value lies in both your fighting prowess and your viability as a breeder so they’ve made it clear they’d be displeased to see you damaged outside the fighting cages. Your potential value has gone up significantly and they’ve raised all of you several rankings in the brackets because of it.”
