by Kate Rudolph
Escape from Ixilta
Kate Rudolph
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Escape from Ixilta © Kate Rudolph 2019.
Cover design by Kate Rudolph.
All rights reserved. No part of this story may be used, reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission of the copyright holder, except in the case of brief quotations embodied within critical reviews and articles.
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental.
Published by Kate Rudolph.
www.katerudolph.net
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Also by Kate Rudolph
About Kate Rudolph
Chapter One
AFTER SIX YEARS, HOMESICKNESS was little more than a dull throb for Andie Munster. She woke up every morning and could almost forget that she wasn’t in a dingy apartment in Atlanta. It wasn’t until she spotted the twin suns outside of her window that her new home, such as it was, intruded on her. As far as prisons went, the place wasn’t that bad. The tiny apartment she slept in was bug free and her food processor always had enough to satisfy her. The job she’d been assigned when she’d arrived wasn’t too taxing; all she did was supervise the short-range teleporter that transported goods from the ground to ships orbiting the planet. She wasn’t even tempted to box herself up and try and escape that way. At least, not most days.
The city of Ixilta hardly looked like it was run by a blood-soaked dictator, and except for when the guards showed up to collect her taxes or one of the supervisors dropped by and asked for a ‘favor’ Andie could pretend that she was just on an extended work study, that someday she’d be allowed to go home. After all, they didn’t call her a slave. It didn’t matter that pirates had kidnapped her and sold her in a lot of people to the Ixiltan Council. As soon as they’d removed the control collar from her neck the representative had welcomed her and her fellow newcomers as citizens of Ixilta. They were free to make their lives in the city, and so long as they caused no trouble, there would be no reason for them to ever be punished.
But they couldn’t leave. That question had brought on the first beating, and Andie had been lucky that she only had to witness it. She didn’t know what had happened to the young man who’d asked it, but after the guard laid him flat and kicked him until his blood stained the white tile floor, he’d been dragged away and the representative had asked if anyone had other questions.
They hadn’t.
And somehow since then, six years had passed. At first Andie had spent her days and nights dreaming of ways to escape, how to make it to the gates of the city and get past the guards there, how she could find a ship willing to take her back towards Earth, and how she could return triumphant, having suffered through an adventure and learned something from it. But she stumbled at every step. Getting towards the gate risked falling under the watch of the guards, and she didn’t want to draw suspicion to herself.
She didn’t know the first thing about finding a ship to take her home, and she knew just how bad it could turn out if the ship’s captain was untrustworthy or weak.
And finally, there was no one back on Earth to witness her triumphant return. Her parents had long since passed, she had no siblings, no cousins, no aunts or uncles, and she’d kept everyone back at work at arm’s length. No one back home was missing her, if they’d even realized that she was gone.
So over the years the need to escape had changed from a driving force to a weak pulse that occasionally pounded. And on the days where she felt the need to leave, she let herself stroll around town and witnessed what the guards did to those who seemed out of place. They rarely gave her any trouble nowadays, but their evil smiles sent a chill down her spine when she saw them catch sight of a new victim.
She hated Ixilta, but now it was her home and there wasn’t anything she could do about it.
Andie got ready for work, donning a boring gray outfit and covering her head in a dark cap. Ixilta was made up of dozens of alien races, so no one looked at her twice for being human, but the drab clothes helped her blend in, showed everyone around her that she belonged. Not that Ixilta got much in the way of visitors. Still, the work outfit made it clear that she wasn’t planning anything and looking the part was the most important tool for survival that Andie had learned since arriving.
She locked her apartment up behind her and took the elevator down the thirty stories to the ground floor. Outside was a riot of noise as street vendors hawked food, workers hustled towards their stations, and children shoved their way to school. It could have been any city on any planet, except for the castle that sat on a hill at one end of town and looked down on everyone, and the prison that sat at the other end, a silent promise that any transgression could get a person sent away behind thick walls, where the screams echoed through the city on especially quiet nights.
Andie shivered and looked away. Work was only a few blocks down the street and if she didn’t check in on time, her boss might worry. Or report her. She didn’t want either of those things to happen.
The day went by in a blur. Her co-workers and the robots they programmed for the especially heavy lifting came in and out of her station, placing their wares on the transporter. She stayed in constant contact with the receiving station in space above her, and when she was given the go, she pressed the big red button and sent the goods on their way.
By dinner time, the shipments had slowed to a crawl, and Andie spent several minutes finishing up her reports before the skin on the back of her neck tingled, warning her that she wasn’t alone. She looked up and practically jumped out of her chair. The man in the shipment room wasn’t one of her co-workers. They hadn’t received a new one in several weeks, and they had no need for more workers, not right now.
But it wasn’t her knowledge of the staff roster that let Andie know that this man was out of place. It was the black uniform he wore, ripped in places where identification numbers and stun suppressors might once have been. Everyone knew the look of Ixiltan prison uniforms, and the bright purple alien standing in the shipping station was wearing one.
She wanted to duck out of sight, to hide until he was gone. Even knowing how dangerous the man could be, Andie didn’t reach for the communicator on the dash to call for security. For all she knew, they might decide that she was working in conjunction with the escapee and throw her in a cell, never to be seen again. She couldn’t risk it. No, she just had to stay away from him until he went on his way. She was safe behind thick, las and fireproof glass. He couldn’t get to her.
Too late, Andie realized she hadn’t locked the door to her station when she came back from lunch. The alien stared at her, his bright blue eyes freezing her in place, and when he started towards her, she tried to dart for the door before he could get it. Their hands landed on their handles at the exact same moment and all of her strength was ba
rely enough to keep the door from opening. The escapee had too good of a grip and the door was open wide enough to stick a finger through. She couldn’t lock it, couldn’t do anything but hold on with all of her might and hope that he couldn’t get the leverage to pull her out. She was wedged into place, doing her best to keep the door closed and keep the alien out.
But centimeter by centimeter, he pushed, and despite her best efforts, Andie couldn’t stop it. Once he had a hand in, she knew it was over, but that didn’t stop her from trying. Sweat beaded on her forehead and her muscles ached, but she couldn’t give up. The prison did something to the people sent there, even the innocent ones, and if anyone ever saw them again, they were monsters, bent on destruction and pain. Torture, rape, murder—he could do anything to her if he got through the door, and there was no one coming to help.
With a final heave, the door burst open. Andie shrank back as if she could make herself small enough that the escapee wouldn’t be able to see her. But even in her drab gray clothing, she stood out against all the machinery. The alien growled at her, sending a shiver of fear down her spine, making goosebumps jump on her arms. This was it, the end. She’d survived six years on the planet without making waves, she’d mostly stopped dreaming of a better life, she’d thought she was doing okay, and now it was all going to end because she was in the path of a rampaging prison escapee.
She forced her eyes open. If this was her death, she was going to meet it head-on. It was all she could do. But the escapee wasn’t advancing on her. He wasn’t paying any attention to her at all, his whole focus turned to the teleporter control station in front of him.
Andie eyed the gap beside the alien and wondered if she could make a run for it while he was distracted. There was less than a meter between him and the door. All he had to do was reach out an arm and he’d have her, but would he care when he seemed to be completely ignoring her existence? She didn’t know.
She swallowed hard and rolled on the balls of her feet, trying to psych herself into moving. But six years on the planet had dulled so many of her resistance instincts. She’d learned that on Ixilta it was better to go along with whatever was commanded. Resistance only ended in suffering or death. Often both.
Still, she had a shot and this place hadn’t completely defeated her. But before she could move, the alien held up a hand and pointed at her.
“Don’t.”
Andie froze. And though it was insane, her first thought was that he had a pleasant voice, one that she’d love to hear under other circumstances. But power trembled in his fingers and she was sure if she challenged him, he’d react. And while she might be able to outrun him, she definitely wouldn’t win a fight.
“Wh-what do you want?” She managed not to stutter most of the question out, but the words were barely loud enough to be heard over the teleporter’s machinery. If she couldn’t run, maybe she could make him go away. He didn’t seem like he was going to start punching—he wanted something, so she had to give it to him before everything went wrong.
The alien took a deep breath and kept staring at the control panel. “How do you reprogram the coordinates?” he asked. He should have sounded gruff, out of control, like some beast who’d been treated to the worst Ixilta had to offer. Instead, he might have sounded more at home on a university campus or in a business meeting.
And Andie’s heart plummeted at his question. “You can’t,” she told him, trying to keep her voice from shaking. “It’s a fixed machine. Only works from here to our facility in orbit.”
The escapee’s hands curled into fists and she flinched, sure that now he was going to come at her. But he still wasn’t looking at her. “Where in orbit?” he asked after a moment.
She could put him on the transporter and lie to him, get him out of here and save herself. But the price for that was too heavy. “It goes to a receptor outside of the space station. No life support, and it’s not continuously monitored. You’d be dead really quick if you tried to get off the planet this way.”
But the alien didn’t seem content to take no for an answer. “Fix it,” he commanded. “I will give you the coordinates.”
Andie knew she should just lie to him, punch some buttons and tell him it was done. He’d been in prison, and from what she could see he had the scars to prove he’d lived a hard life. Sending him to the other end of the transporter would be an act of self-defense. And maybe someone else could live with themselves if they did that. But not her. She couldn’t cut someone down just to save herself, not like this. Maybe in the heat of battle, but not during a calm conversation.
“There isn’t a way to reprogram it,” Andie insisted. “I’m just as trapped as you are, why would they put me in charge of something I could use to send myself home?”
The prisoner studied her for long moments, his blue eyes observing her like she was some kind of specimen. It was unnerving the way he looked at her, and she wanted to shrink back, to hide from him. But she wasn’t going to do that. She squared her shoulders and stood tall. Whatever was about to happen, she would keep her pride.
Finally, the alien nodded as if he’d come to a decision. “You’re coming with me.”
Chapter Two
ANDIE WASN’T GOING to let that be the end of the argument. The alien seemed satisfied that she could not use the teleporter to get him off the planet, but when she told him she wasn’t going with him, he grabbed her wrist and pulled her away from her station. They were out the door and ducking through shadowed alleys before her mind could catch up to what had happened. She’d been kidnapped by an alien escapee from prison and if the guards found her they were sure to think that she was working with him. She was screwed.
“Please, just let me go.” She was not above begging, not if that got her freedom. “I’m of no help to you. I’ll only slow you down. Please, I won’t tell the guards I saw you.” She winced as the last sentence escaped her mouth. Maybe it wasn’t wise to remind her captor that she could stand as a witness against him.
They moved swiftly, but Andie had no idea where they were going. She wanted to ask, but she didn’t want to know, not if knowing would encourage the alien to keep her with him. The suns hung low in the sky and soon it would be getting dark. She was far away from her apartment and already would be cutting it close. She couldn’t get caught out after curfew, the consequences were too high. She had to get the alien to let her go before they passed the point of no return.
“I will get you out of the city,” said the alien. He scanned their surroundings, looking less like a prisoner and more like a soldier with every minute that passed. “You’ll no longer be trapped.”
A whisper of temptation snaked through her. Out of the city? On her way home? No, it was too good to be true. “Does that mean you’re just going to kill me once I’ve served my purpose?” There were other options, some she’d already lived through, but Andie didn’t want to spend too long dwelling on that.
Her question stopped the alien in his tracks and his head snapped around, bright blue eyes meeting hers. “What? No!” He sounded truly horrified.
Had she judged him wrong? Perhaps he was one of the many innocents who ended up in the city jail. “What were you in prison for?”
“Murder.” He said it matter-of-factly, daring her to react.
Andie crossed her arms. “You aren’t helping your case here, buddy.” Murder? She shouldn’t help a murderer escape the city, no matter the horrors the prison had to offer. It was a terrible place, but some of the inmates did belong there.
“Xandr.”
“Huh?” What was he talking about now? Andie’s mind spun, and a part of her was convinced that she was still back at work, perhaps having fallen asleep at the end of her shift.
The alien was patient with her. “My name is Xandr, not Buddy.”
“Oh.” That made more sense. Of course he had a name.
“Your name is O?” he asked.
What? “No.”
“No?” Now he looked confused.
What the hell was going on? Maybe the city was starting some sort of prank show to broadcast to anyone with an entertainment system. That would make more sense than being kidnapped by a murderous escaped prisoner named Xandr who had eyes as blue as the summer sky.
Andie tamped down that thought. She wasn’t about to allow herself to admire her kidnapper's eyes, or his physique, or the sensual sound of his voice. Oh crap.
“My name is Andie,” she spoke mostly to override her own train of thought. “Why do you need me anyway?” The teleportation station was a good distance from the prison. If he had made it that far on his own, she had no idea why he would need someone like her to make it any further. She was just a normal person, someone living the life she was forced to live in the city. She had no special skills, and if she knew how to escape the city she would’ve surely done it already.
“The guards will not question your presence,” Xandr explained. “There are a few things I need that would make walking through the city much simpler, things I could not procure without hurting someone.”
“So a murderer cares about hurting people?” Yeah, right. Why would she believe that? Then again, other than grabbing her wrist a little tightly and possibly leaving a few bruises, Xandr hadn’t done anything to hurt her. Sure, he had intimidated her, had tried to force her to do the impossible to get them off the planet, but he had done nothing more than loom to get her on his side. What did that say about her? Was she so easily cowed? Or was she being led by those sky-blue eyes and the voice that made her shiver?
God dammit. She could not afford to be attracted to a man who had kidnapped her. Even she couldn’t be that stupid.
Andie was so caught up in her own thoughts that she almost missed the flash of pain that flitted across Xandr’s face. “Some people need to be killed,” Xandr said menacingly. “But most should not be harmed.”
Could she believe that? There were a lot of monsters in the city, a lot of people that made it a terrible place to live. And if someone did away with them, maybe life wouldn’t be so miserable.
