Slag: Book Four in the Galaxy Pirates Alien Abduction Romance Series (Shifter)

by Alana Khan

  “Slag! I’m going to come!”

  My orgasm whips through me like a hurricane, hurtling from a tropical depression to a category five in a nanosecond. The spasms hit me from deep inside, rippling out until my toes curl and my fingers bite into his shoulders where I’m hanging on for dear life.

  Instead of slumping on top of him, I sit up, lean back, and continue to rub myself on him until I find release a second time. This one is a smaller echo of the first. Not exactly a Hall-of-Famer like the first one was, but satisfying nonetheless.

  Panting, sweating, and no longer able to move, I let my muscles go, fall next to him and tuck myself against his side. Pulling me close, he gives the top of my head a dozen close-lipped kisses and uses that deep, rumbly wordless murmur to tell me things that don’t translate.

  His cock is pulsing at my belly, but he’s too much of a gentlemale to ask for a second round.

  That steel cage I locked all my worry-thoughts into? It springs open like Pandora’s box. I realize I just played with fire—a male who could kill me in a minute with one hand still playing his flute.

  But it’s Slag. Who’s been nothing but a kind protector since I met him.

  “We’ve got to get you a new name, big guy. Is that what your parents named you? You deserve better.”

  I find his wrist in the darkness and press his hand onto his cock. “Go ahead, finish.”

  He only hesitates for a moment, then works himself hard and fast until he releases on my chest. After, he rubs his come on me while murmuring unintelligible sounds that I’m certain are high praise.

  As I fall asleep, I acknowledge that this is the oddest thing I’ve ever experienced. Yes, odder than flying in a spaceship or having a conversation with a psychopathic snake.

  Sharing pleasure with a giant green alien in the dark depths of a poisonous mine is definitely strange. What’s weirder though, is that I feel singularly connected to him. And even more odd? I have no regrets.

  The ground rumbles beneath us. This is bigger than the one I experienced in Ryone’s living room. Slag holds me tighter and kisses my temple, trying to reassure me.

  A minute later there’s another tremor, and a minute later another. Finally, the ground heaves and the quaking goes on for long seconds.

  Slag straddles me, his knees at my hips as he leans over me, his body protecting me as fragments of rock break loose and fall around us. I feel him bounce against me as huge pieces of stone must be pelting his back. He grunts in pain more than once.

  There are several after-tremors, then silence except for a few straggling rocks falling to the floor.

  Though my brain is foggy, I attempt to think, but try as I might I don’t know what to do.

  Slag waits a few more minutes, still hunched over me in an effort to keep falling rocks from landing on me. Finally, he stands, lifts me into his arms, and walks to the tunnel we entered from.

  Although it’s hard to believe, our little slice of heaven is equipped with an emergency illumination system. Dim lights flicker to life in the tunnel making the sight we’re greeted with even more depressing.

  After travelling no more than fifty feet toward the entrance, we’re met by a wall of fallen rock. This isn’t a large pile we can navigate over, it’s not even a blockage we might be able to pick our way out of. This appears thick and solid and impenetrable.

  Slag sets me down on a small pile of rock, points sternly—a clear warning I’m not to even think of standing to help, and gets to work.

  His strength is prodigious. I watch his ropey muscles slide under his green skin as he pulls and maneuvers some of the biggest rocks in the pile, but no matter how many he displaces, no light seeps through.

  Despite Slag’s pantomimed orders, I do rise from my spot. After walking to the cave-in, I press my ear to the rock, hoping to hear muffled shouts as the guards or perhaps our fellow slaves work to dig us out. Nothing.

  Slag shakes his head, making his meaning all the more clear when he adds a sad face to the message. He’s been with these people far longer than me; he knows what they’re made of. He absolutely knows no one is coming to help us.

  I have to give him credit, though. He lets me listen for ridiculously long minutes until I come to my own conclusion.

  “Okay, Slag. We’re on our own, huh?”

  He nods. After two days together, I still have no idea whether he understands all of what I say, but I know he comprehends my resignation.

  He approaches me and bends for me to climb on his back. I guess we’re going to crawl into our den and wait to die.

  He swerves into our little room for a moment, but that’s only to grab his pickaxe and secure his flute to his loincloth. He puts me down and urges me to drink. In spite of the lingering nausea, I’m able to drink my fill. Slag does the same, then hoists me onto his back once more. Carrying his axe, he forges down the corridor toward the blackness.

  The illumination from the dim emergency lights follows us for a surprisingly long way, but eventually we are alone in the dark. Sightless.

  Slag slows, testing every step with his rag-covered feet before he takes a full step. I’m scared and fatigued to the bone, but the adrenaline must have chased away my muzzy thinking, because I’m thinking clearly enough to catalog every possible way we could die.

  The little rat-like animals I heard as I worked today could swarm and devour us. There could be a huge monster farther back in the recesses of the mine. Hell, I’m on another planet where psychopathic snakes walk upright; monsters aren’t farfetched. My protector could make one misstep and hurtle us into a huge crevasse, or maybe we just walk until we get to the end of the line and die of starvation.

  For maybe the first time since I met him, I think of Slag as a person—not an enemy or possible rapist, not even my silent protector. I think of the fact that somewhere in that quiet male is a sentient being who not only must be feeling some of the same terror as me, but who also carries responsibility for my safety as an added burden.

  I snuggle closer grabbing my elbows where they hang across his chest, dip my lips to his ear, and talk.

  “You’re a good male, Slag. I think you can understand some of what I say. I hope you can. I’d be reduced to a sad puddle screaming in the dark if you weren’t here with me. I know you haven’t had the best life, but you have me now. I’m your friend.”

  He reaches up with a huge hand and pets my forearm—just once. His calloused palm skims across my skin soft as a whisper. He had to have understood me, at least a little.

  We walk for hours. I don’t know how long, it’s impossible to tell. We’ve had to traverse several rockfalls, but there was always a way over and we kept walking. Well, Slag kept walking. I just hung on.

  I began humming. It’s something my mom taught me to do when I got scared in the middle of the night. When Slag started humming along, it gave me permission to sing.

  I went through the whole rotation of every camping song I ever learned starting with “Row Your Boat Ashore,” and ending with “Baby Bumblebee.” As soon as I hit the end of my repertoire, I started over. Once I caught my companion’s deep rumble as he vocalized with me in his wordless manner. As soon as I commented on it, though, he stopped singing even though I praised him.

  He’s stumbled several times now. I’m certain he must have walked all night. Finally, I manhandle my way off his back, pulling my arms from his grip.

  “You need rest, my friend.”

  I can’t see him at all, but sense his resistance, so I grab his hand and pull him with me as I lie down. I don’t have to argue too strongly, he’s got to be dead on his feet. He sits with his back to the wall and pulls me across his lap, then he tucks my head against his chest and rests his chin on top. As soon as he wraps his arms securely around me, we both fall asleep.

  ~.~

  When I wake, I know instinctively that Slag is already awake. As soon as he feels me stir, he gets to his feet, pulls me onto his back, and works his way farther into the mine. />
  We’re not actually going to find a way out of here. I think we both know that by now.

  I don’t know how it took me so long to realize it, but since green speckles glow and we haven’t seen any glowing since the cave-in, we’re out of the irradiated zone. Maybe that’s why my thoughts are a bit sharper and I’m less fatigued, and I’m starving.

  Slag just keeps up his pace as he carefully puts each foot down, making certain we don’t tumble into any crevasses.

  “Slag!” I say excitedly as I practically pound on his bald head. “Look!”

  I see light. He does, too, because he’s moving faster now. Once you’ve been in the dark as long as we have, even the smallest amount of light can almost burn your retinas. It certainly illuminates the darkness, because we get to the source in record time without any stumbles.

  It’s a small crevice in the ceiling, maybe ten or fifteen feet in the air. The crack is no more than ten inches long and two inches across at its widest point.

  He just looks up and shakes his head.

  “We can do this!” I tell him excitedly.

  I slide off his back and bring rocks that litter the floor all over the cave, trying to build it up enough to walk out of here. Slag helps, but it’s obvious from the start that the pile never gets taller, the rocks just tumble to the edges of the area. It would take days and days to make this work. That’s time we don’t have.

  He’s what, close to seven feet tall? I’m over five. Plus, we still have the axe.

  “You’re going to put me on your shoulders. I’ll work at the crevice until I can wiggle through it.”

  Actually, I think it will work. My big friend can do anything; I know he’ll get me through. My jubilation disappears, though, when I try to imagine the rest of the plan—getting him out. Once I’m outside, I’ll never be able to pull him up.

  He knows it. He knew it before it dawned on me, but he nods his head in excitement and stands directly under the slim sliver of sunlight and fresh air.

  He hoists me to sit on his shoulders, then holds my knees to steady me as I stand. After a while, my legs quiver with exertion as I chip at the hole with the axe. Whenever he senses my arms are too tired to continue, he helps me down and has me sit on the ground.

  At first, when his strong fingers moved to massage my aching thigh muscles, I batted his hands away. Soon, though, I stopped arguing as I laid down and let him ease my quaking muscles to get ready for the next round.

  The effort strains my shoulders and arms as well as my thighs, but every time we take a break I see more daylight peeking through the ceiling.

  Our efforts go on for hours, but finally, I think the hole is big enough for me to shimmy through.

  While I’ve worked, the room has been filled with the sound of my grunting efforts. Now, though, it’s silent as I imagine we’re both contemplating the fact that I’ll be escaping and leaving him to rot underground.

  “I’ll find a way to get you out,” I tell him with more conviction than I feel.

  Luckily, I’ve kept my tennis shoes on since my abduction. I take them off, tie them together, and hang them around my neck. I stand not on his shoulders but with one foot on top of his head and one foot in the palm of his hand as he balances me while I reach trying to get a grip on the soil above ground.

  After many false starts, my fingers gain purchase on the dry sandy dirt above the cavern.

  “I’m almost there, Slag.”

  Once I have a sturdy hold, I say, “Now.”

  He lifts me higher, with one foot in each of his palms. Even though he’s the strongest male I’ve ever known, he’s trembling from the effort, but he keeps his movement to a minimum while I try to hoist myself up.

  I’ve never had much upper body strength and my muscles are totally spent from using the pickaxe for hours over my head. I have to rely mostly on my strong friend to push me up until my elbows are through the hole and can hold my weight while I catch my breath.

  I’m still only halfway through the opening when I feel the top of a pickaxe under the sole of my foot. I quickly slide my other foot onto it and through monumental effort he pushes me up and ultimately through the hole.

  I lay on my stomach, panting, my dehydrated body shaking with fatigue. I observe the lay of the land. The blowing red sands are whipping across the landscape, but it’s not gusting as hard as when I walked from Ryone’s mansion to the mouth of the mine.

  Slag and I just walked miles through the darkness—I don’t see the mansion in the distance. I think we’re safe, at least for the time being.

  How am I going to get Slag out?

  Even though I’m still panting with effort, I force myself to my knees and ultimately to my feet as I visually inspect the landscape. It’s barren here except for a pile of large rocks I can see in the distance. The punishing wind relentlessly whipping pounds of sand couldn’t be easy on local flora.

  After a minute, I head back to the hole I escaped from. Getting down on my knees, I put my face in the opening and feel my chest tighten when I see Slag’s expectant green face and shining green eyes looking up, quietly waiting for me.

  “I don’t see predators. I think I’m safe. I’ll look for a way to get you out.”

  He grunts angrily, shaking his head vigorously. I know what he’s telling me—find shelter, forget about me.

  “You won’t get rid of me that easily,” I tell him in my perkiest voice, then leave in search of a miracle.

  A few moments later I return, arms full of rocks. I build a little cairn so I can find this spot again, then leave.

  Minutes turn into hours as I wander looking for something, anything, in the barren landscape. Finally, I see what looks like the entrance to a mine. I hide behind a boulder for what I estimate to be about an hour, waiting to see who’s working the mine, but as dark approaches, I feel confident it’s deserted and slip inside.

  It’s quickly apparent this isn’t a mine, but an abandoned living space—a small cave. There’s a pile of dried leaves against a wall that someone must have slept on. There’s no evidence of predators, and night is upon me. I’ll have to hole up here and resume my search for a way to rescue Slag tomorrow.

  Fear nudges the edges of my thoughts, reminding me of all the ways the deck is stacked against me. No food, no water, an inhospitable environment, and no big new friend to help me.

  No matter how scared I am, at least I’m above ground. I think of poor Slag, waiting in the fetid depths of the cave, looking up from time to time and losing hope that the human female whose life he saved will ever come back for him.

  “I’ll get you out of there, Slag,” I vow.

  Slag

  Alone.

  Chapter Three

  KJ

  I search for food in the little living space, but no one’s been here for a long time. They’ve left nothing edible behind.

  I settle into the little pile of old leaves with nothing to keep me company but the incessant howling of the wind.

  I must have fallen asleep, but I’m awakened by a funny noise. Actually, it’s not a noise, but the lack of noise. For several blissful seconds, the whistling has stopped.

  “Silence,” I say into the darkness, then realize it’s not silence at all. Do I hear water?

  With just the dim glimmer from the moon, I rise to look around the little cave. I definitely hear moving water. The space is so small, I don’t understand how I missed it, but in the back, hiding in the shadows is a small hole where the floor meets the wall. When I stick my hand inside, I can feel the humidity.

  “Dear God. I’ve found water.”

  I lick my cracked lips. I haven’t had even a sip of water in a day. I want to explore so badly I can barely contain the urge, but I force myself back into my bed of dried leaves to wait until the first rays of morning light.

  Moments later, I can’t contain my need to explore. I hurry to the hole and find the courage to stick my head in.

  In the gloom, I see lights shining. It�
�s not green salt. If anything, the glow is tinged with yellow, not green.

  I squat like this for a long time, weighing and measuring my choices. Something’s humid in there. Without water, I’m going to die in a matter of days. This planet is so inhospitable, I didn’t see much brush. Just a few wispy trees, ground cover, and a couple of little rabbit-like animals. That and the relentless wind.

  If I’m going to survive, I need water, and I’ve found it. No matter what animals or aliens may lurk in this hidden space, I have to explore.

  I gather my dwindling courage and crawl through the hole on my hands and knees and look around. I’m in a huge cavern. I can see how large it is because the walls are splattered with splotches of color. The formations look like ragged spots of lichen back on Earth.