Instinct: A Dark Sci-Fi Romance

by Loki Renard

  “It feels like it’s about me!”

  “Everything is about you. You come from the stars, but you are no sun. The planets do not revolve around you. You will learn to live on this world, as our ancestors did. You will follow our customs. We will not be dictated to by a spoiled little girl from the stars.”

  With that, I cast the lash away and spank her bottom with my palm, big hand prints flashing bright pink over her welted skin. She believes this to be a harsh punishment, but this is nothing compared to what she deserves, and what the huntresses would do to her if left to their mercy.

  “Let me go! You asshole! You destroyed my shuttle! I hate you! I hate you!”

  She is learning nothing. She appreciates nothing. She does not understand what a miracle her survival is, how close she came to perishing at the hands of the huntresses, how her fall from the heavens could have cost her life. She wails and she whimpers and she complains though she is fed and protected. The simple goodness of her existence escapes her.

  Her body is on the ground, but her head is in the stars. All of her must come to accept this new reality. Spanking is a childish punishment, usually reserved for whelps, but it suits her well. She is like a child in this world, unaware of her place in it, expecting things to be as they were, unable to understand that they will never be the same.

  “Stop! Stop!” she cries out, giving me orders. I will not stop. I will win this battle of wills. I will tame this space girl and she will be mine.

  Her bottom turns pink and then bright red and still she has not stopped. Her fight is furious. I ease back. I do not wish to seriously harm her, and she is close to having had more than enough. Her tender body is not used to rough handling. Her bottom is hot to the touch, whipped and spanked to the shade of a rosy dawn, but the rebellion is still in her. I can feel it.

  I pull her up from my lap and stand her in front of me. I want to see her face. I want to know why she fights so furiously for this beast craft that spoke to her in such angry tones.

  “Why did you do it? Just tell me why!” She is crying in misery. “That was all I had left. They’re going to kill me!”

  “They?”

  “The people I come from.”

  “I won’t let anyone hurt you.”

  “You won’t be able to help me,” she says miserably, wiping tears from her eyes with the back of her hand. “They’re so much more advanced. They have machines that can... oh, I can’t even begin to describe what they can do. They make food from nothing. They let us speak at distances of lightyears. They will come and they will take me and there is nothing you can do to stop them.”

  “I buried their beast. I will bury any more that come,” I growl, flexing. She doesn’t trust my ability to protect her, but that is because she does not yet know me.

  “You should have left it alone. You should have left me alone,” she says, her lower lip quivering. “This is bad. This is very bad. I don’t know what they’re going to do, but I know they’re going to hurt me now. And maybe you too.”

  She is deeply afraid of the men from the stars, but we know a thing or two about the star people. The stories have been told since the old times, and they are the reason I knew to crush and to bury the beast she rode down on.

  “Your beast angered the huntresses, and brought danger to our tribe. It could bring down the wrath of the stars. So I broke its pieces apart. Now it will be no danger to anyone.”

  “There’s still danger,” she sniffs. “My ship is still up there, in orbit. My people will come for me when I don’t respond. And they will look for me down here. You having buried the shuttle won’t change anything. They will still look for me.”

  “But they won’t find you.”

  “They will though. They’ll find me.”

  “Will they?”

  “The computer will log my descent. It knows I took the shuttle down here. It may or may not have recorded the crash location...” She’s talking more to herself than to me, muttering words I don’t fully understand. Sometimes this girl from the stars speaks another language entirely.

  Then, something changes. It is as if a light goes on in her eyes.

  “They might not find me,” she murmurs to herself. Something like the beginnings of a rare smile begins to spread over her face. Since her arrival she has either worried, or pouted, or cried. I have not seen this bright expression before, joy lighting her stormy eyes. “Zion. They might not find me!”

  * * *

  Tselia

  The ship’s computer knew my trajectory, but after I went spinning out of control, the data would have been patchy at best. My ship might be able to tell the Patron’s men that I breached the atmosphere, but it might not be able to tell whether I burned up in it, crash-landed on the planet, or otherwise spun into space.

  I have been so consumed with the notion of needing to get back to my ship that I never stopped to think whether that was truly the best course of action. With Zion’s suggestion, even in my sore-bottomed state, I find my spirits rising.

  The idea of never being found brings with it the most profound sense of relief and freedom I have ever experienced. I thought I had to return to the ship. I thought I had to report back to the Patron, explain away the anomalies in the logs. I thought I had to spend the rest of my existence answering to a system that did not care for me at all—and suddenly it occurs to me that perhaps I do not. Maybe I can live down here. Maybe they won’t come for me. And maybe, even if they do come, they won’t find me. I am not sufficiently genetically distinct from these people to spot at a distance. If I change my hair and dress like them, I won’t be noticeable at all. And I know they won’t come down here. That is against the Patron’s precious protocol.

  “I am free!” I throw my arms in the air and let out a little squeal of excitement. “Zion. I am free!”

  “You are mine,” he growls, reminding me of his possession, but I don’t listen. The very notion is coursing through my veins, making me mad with excitement. Oh, all the things I could do now that I am free! I will never follow rules again. I will make my own. I will wander this world, all of it. I will find a place of my very own.

  “Star girl...”

  “No,” I say. “Don’t call me that. Call me Tselia.”

  “Tselia,” he grunts. “Do not get excited. I am not done punishing you.”

  “But...” I stare at him. “But...”

  “You must learn to put your feelings aside and listen with respect. You must learn to hold your tongue, especially when you wish to yell. These are lessons our whelps learn.”

  She shakes her head in what seems to be disbelief. “At least you’re talking to me now.”

  “I don’t usually have to talk this much. Usually, women know their place.”

  His words make my rebellion flare in spite of the pain coursing through my flesh.

  “Well, I don’t. And I don’t even agree that I have a place. Maybe I’m tired of being bossed around. Maybe I don’t need another man telling me what’s right and what’s wrong. Maybe I’ll make my own damn mind up.”

  “What’s wrong is what’s going to make you hurt,” he grunts.

  “I already hurt.”

  His treatment has left my body and my pride both aching. I am exhausted from crying and yet this new possibility for life has given me enough energy to defy him.

  “You will hurt more if you do not do as I say.” Those blue eyes glint at me, and I know he means it.

  “I’ve hurt enough for one day.”

  “Good,” he says, pulling my naked, punished body to his. He holds me in that grasp that feels so incredibly good. I find myself sinking against him, nuzzling against his neck, drawing in the scent of him. I could stay like this for hours, relishing the skin to skin contact, the wonderful strangeness of being near another person, being able to touch the flesh of another human.

  Ten thousand years separates the strains of our DNA, and yet we are still so much the same. The color of my hair and eyes is different,
and no doubt there are other minor changes, but we are the same thing. In his arms, it is as if I have finally returned to the home I have been yearning for since my birth.

  We live disconnected lives under the Patron. We have conquered so much illness, we have staved off death. These people down here have not. They live and die as humans used to live and die, short spans punctuated with the miseries of existence.

  “I am taking you to my home,” he says. “You must live in the village, dress as the others do. You must become my mate and take my seed and grow my babies.”

  None of this is a request. It is all an order.

  “I want to explore this world. I want to go and see...”

  “You have explored enough, Tselia,” he rumbles. “You have fled all across the stars. Now it is time for you to make a home.”

  “How do you know I have ‘fled all across the stars’?”

  “The stories,” he says. “They tell of the star people. How they wander alone, looking for what they have lost.”

  “Well, that’s not what I was doing. I was on a reconnaissance mission.”

  “For what?”

  “For knowledge.”

  “Why?”

  He asks simple questions sometimes. It would be easy to dismiss those questions as stupid, but I notice that I am struggling to answer him. I had my missions. I carried them out. I gathered data and I assumed there was meaning in it because I was told there was—but in the end, why? I don’t know what we were looking for, and I don’t know what would have been done if we found it. It seems to me now that the Patron rules over the remnants of humanity with an iron fist. He hoards experience, turns worlds and cultures and species into a data stream devoid of any of the emotion that makes life worth existing.

  Even now, with my bottom welted and sore, my body pressed against Zion’s hard form, I am experiencing more than I ever did visiting dozens of worlds. I used to think that observing was the same as living. But it isn’t.

  “They sent you alone into the stars,” he says when I fail to answer him. “I will not send you anywhere alone. You will be with me. You will come to be with the tribe. You will learn to live as we do. And when your star people come, they will not see you anymore, because you will not be one of them anymore. You will be one of us. There’s just one thing I need from you.”

  “What?”

  “Tell me where you came from, star girl. Tell me how you fell.”

  I try to explain where I am from. I try to tell him how everything is so good and perfect and... totally fucking wrong. He listens, but I don’t know how much he understands. How can he? All he has ever known is this simple life, a world where he ruts the females of his choice, kills to eat, and dies in whatever way random chance decides for him.

  He listens to me though, and I talk. I talk and I talk until he knows everything, even though I know he can’t comprehend it. I’m using words he could never have heard before. It doesn’t matter. He listens until I have no more words.

  I have confessed all the secrets of the old world before he takes me by the hand and leads me to the new one.

  Chapter Seven

  Tselia

  This time we do not go up the mountain. Instead, we go toward the valley, where a village is nestled in the cleft between two rises. There are huts built along little ridges. Between them, small rivulets make their way down the rocky ground and flow into the river at the base where crops are planted in the rich valley soil.

  These people seem primitive to my eyes, but they know how to find solid foundations for homes, and how to cultivate foods.

  Curious eyes meet me, older men and women working the fields, tending small goat-like creatures. There are several men working on stone tools, and at least one who appears to be smelting metal, liquid hot rocks melting in a crucible. It is as if I am finding this civilization on the brink between stone and iron ages. They are making the same progress our ancestors did many thousands of years ago. That fills me with hope and melancholy. I hope their technical journey does not lead them to the same place it led us. I hope they never reach the point where they neuter themselves and slide into frozen stasis in an effort to escape the endless horror of a life disconnected from living.

  Zion holds my hand firmly, both to reassure me, I think, and to stop me from getting away. I am very much under his control. Part of me resents that, but a greater part thrills to it in some way. In this world, I am not alone.

  “My house is at the ridge,” he says, pointing up to a construction that sits upon a ridge overlooking the village. It is the place of a lookout, and as we climb our way up to it, I find myself awed by the beauty. The blue hues of the grass are exquisite, and the wood and mud brick construction of the homes gives me a yearning feeling of nostalgia for that which I have never experienced before. The wood they use is a dark ashy gray. The bricks of mud seem to turn white in the sun, so there is great contrast between brick and wood, and the silvery thatch that adorns the roof.

  Already I am seeing more signs of advancement than I suspected. I thought they were all nothing more than animals or grunting cave dwellers, but they are making progress.

  It is simple construction, and the place itself is no more than a hut, but it has a charm that draws me in. I have the old animal instincts still inside me, the desire to burrow in and lay claim to a little patch of the world. My ship used to be that place, now that life is abandoned thousands of miles above the planet’s surface.

  In an instant, my impression of these people being advanced is shattered. Behind us, there is a sudden whooping and screaming. I turn with a cry of fright, only to be grabbed by Zion and pulled hard back against his body, his big arm protecting me.

  There are women confronting us. Six of them. Bare breasted and skirt wearing. The women do not dress any differently than the men do here—but they paint differently. They are smeared with black paint across their eyes, running down their breasts and bellies in angular markings. They are the most fearsome creatures I have seen on this planet, much more frightening than they were the first time I saw them. The first time, they seemed like a random gaggle of females. Now they present as a hunting party, complete with bows and spears, weapons against which I have no protection in my naked state.

  “She shouldn’t be here, Zion!” The leader of the women confronts us. She is tall and beautiful, powerfully built.

  “Tyna. Stop. We talked about this.”

  “We did not talk about you bringing her here. Parading her before our noses. Showing her bare skin to all.”

  I am confused. This woman speaks with utter hatred for me. I can feel it emanating from her. She doesn’t know me. How can she possibly feel this way? She has come to kill me; that I know.

  “She will be dressed soon enough.” He holds up the clothing he took from me. “This would not do. She needs to look as we do.”

  “She will never look as we do. She is too small. She has no tits. No ass.”

  I begin to grow angry. I have never been insulted for my appearance, and I do not enjoy the experience. These women are beautiful, and I am different, but Zion seems to think I am desirable. I feel their hostility and scorn, and I do not know how to take it. This is not part of my experience. I feel my lower lip quivering as my heart races.

  “Oh, and now she’s going to cry?” The lady laughs. “This is what you chose, Zion? A weak little scrap of star flesh? She’s cursed. She will bring misfortune and death.”

  “Tyna, go this instant, or that spear will be wrapped around you,” Zion growls.

  She smirks and laughs and turns on her heel, taking her group of hunters with her. They respect Zion. They obey him. But they hate me.

  “They don’t want me here.”

  “What they want doesn’t matter,” he says bluntly. “Come inside.”

  He opens the door for me, a heavy wood plank, and ushers me into the house. It is simple. There is a bed with animal furs cast across it, a fire at one side of the single room, and little else. There a
re a few baskets and pots that presumably contain clothes and food and such, for the most part I am impressed with how little he needs. The Patron has a palace with over a thousand rooms, each one of them filled with the art of centuries, but Zion’s single room seems to hold more goodness in it.

  “This is where you live?” The question is a stupid one. Of course this is where he lives. This place is just like Zion. Simple, strong, built for purpose with no extra adornment.

  “This is where we live,” he says. “You will sew your skirt today.”

  “What?”

  “Rite of passage and moment of marriage,” he says. “You will sew a skin from an animal I have slain and you will wear it from now until you perish. The skin you fashion will become part of you. It will take your shape. And you will care for it as you care for yourself.”

  “I don’t know how to sew.”

  “I will help you.”

  He draws me over to the bed, a raised platform of wood made comfortable by the passing of many beasts, their furs embracing me as he makes me lie down.

  “This will be our marriage bed. This is where you will bear our babes.”

  This is a great deal to take in. I feel some gratitude to Zion for trying to save me, but I have no desire to become a married tribal woman. I want to disappear into the wilds of this world. I want to be free.

  As much as I am attracted to him, there is little in this village to interest me, and the females here are so hostile I fear for my life if they are to find me on my own without him. Perhaps he knows that. That is why he tolerates them. They are another link in the chain that binds me to him.

  “This is happening too fast.”

  I try to sit up. He pushes me back down with one hand, while the other goes to his waist and removes his pelt. His cock is erect with lust, I see the great flesh rod throbbing with desire and I know what he means to do. He is going to take me again. He is going to wrap my body around his cock and he is going to make me forget everything I am and everything I desire. I am going to lose myself in him.