Beauty sighed as he followed the big Warborne leader. T’Raal’s fire and vitriol were just because he cared. He knew that, but still…
Eric looked up from the comms console and eyed Sparky as the human crowded onto the bridge after Beauty.
“Well, we knew that. What did he do now? I told you that you should have taken me. This situation needed brains, not brawn. Neither of which Mr. Allen is blessed with anyway,” the scientist said as he eyed up Sparky’s frame.
Although as tall as Eric, he was significantly leaner, if the doctor was much softer. Beauty sighed at the human’s posturing. It was all bravado and they all knew it. Sparky was a killer through and through, and Eric… did a mean line in analysis.
“Hey, hey!” Sparky held his hands up in surrender. “For once, it ain’t me. Tall, dark, and growly here fucked up instead.”
Fin leaned back in his chair and whistled in surprise, running a hand through his hair. The movement revealed the tattoos on the shaved sides for a second. “Didn’t think he had it in him. What’d he do?”
“Fucking offered himself as a fighter again. He’s going back into the pits!” T’Raal growled and stalked the small gangway between the command chair and the pilot’s console. They were parked on one of the landing pads at the edge of the city, so it was inactive now, the chair turned around with Zero, their big cyborg pilot, lounging there. He started at T’Raal's words, a look of surprise washing over his dark features.
“But I thought that me—”
“You’re back!” a feminine voice called out from behind them, cutting the cyborg off. Beauty turned to find Marika in the doorway with Tal’s mate Lizzie crowding in behind her. The two women had become firm friends in the time since Marika had come on board.
Hope on her face, she emerged from the doorway, her gaze latched on to his face. For a moment her scent wrapped around him and he fought back the darkness.
She wasn’t the right one. Almost the right one, but not quite. And… if he made a move on her, Skinny would pound him into the deck plating. Which would be bad, on more than one level. That level of violence and pain… not even his iron control would keep the darkness inside.
“How did it go? Did you get her?” The little human female looked around the bridge as though he’d hidden her sister from her behind a console panel or something.
“Not exactly,” he said. “We saw her but couldn’t get to her. I’m going to have to go in and get her.”
She chuckled, the sound a little unsure as she looked around the bridge and then at the city visible through the front view screen. The guards were visible as they patrolled the stone parapets. “It’s a big place. Are there enough of us.”
He sighed, reaching up to shove his hair back. He needed to cut it; it was always getting into his eyes. “That’s not what I meant. I’m going to have—”
“He’s going back into the pits as a fighter,” T’Raal said bluntly. “Which means he’s going in alone and as a slave again. And we won’t be there for backup.”
“No… you can’t do that,” Marika gasped, hand flying to cover her mouth. “What if you get hurt? I couldn’t ask you to do that!”
For a moment he was stunned into silence. For the look of concern in her lovely eyes, to have a female look at him that way again, he’d move mountains. He wanted… no, he needed, a soft and delicate little female like Marika—someone who could gentle the rage and darkness within him. Soften his hard edges and remind him of all the good in the universe when he’d only ever seen hate and pain. Forget mountains. He’d destroy galaxies to have a female look at him like Marika just had.
Shaking his head, he smiled gently. “It’s the only way, my lady. Trust me. I’ll bring her back. I promise.”
6
They were herded out of the sanded arena with the threat of the cattle-prods. Nat eyed up the nearest guard as she tried to figure out a way to wrestle the prod from him but almost immediately gave it up as a lost cause. No way could she get the thing from him before the others descended on her, and she didn’t like the sickening way they sparked, the green and yellow crawling over the end of the vicious baton and warning her that it would hurt. A lot.
While she was prepared to put up with pain, had a high threshold, there was no point going through what promised to be agony without getting some kind of payoff for it.
“Where are they taking us?” Melissa whispered, crowding close to Nat, even though Nat had exactly the same amount of information about this place that she did. Which was precisely nothing. She cut a sharp glance sideways and then bit down her irritation. Melissa’s eyes were wide, her breathing short with terror. It was obvious she’d never been in anything like this kind of situation before, and she was on the edge of her ability to cope.
Nat… she assumed everyone was an asshole and life was out to screw her over, so this was just par for the course. Which meant that, yes, she actually did have more information about what was going on than Melissa. From the fact she could think clearly and she was observing everything, right down to the fact that she’d realized the arena was a fight ring before the redhead… all meant she knew more, and in a place like this, knowledge was power.
Unfortunately, she sighed and narrowed her eyes as they were herded down a dank, stone corridor, that also meant that to survive, she had to cut Melissa loose. In a place like this it was every man for him or herself. She ignored the odd feeling in her gut. It was survival of the fittest and she couldn’t afford a weakness like Melissa. And she’d discharged her debt for Melissa giving her water and caring for her while she was out of it on the shuttle by saving her life in the arena. Surely?
Cells lined each side of the corridor, big enough to hold twenty people… aliens. They were filled, the prisoners within hooting and leering at the group as they were herded past. She tried not to make eye contact since the raucous jeering was aimed at the women in the group. Rhythmic movement caught the corner of her eye and she made the mistake of looking. A large, well-built alien who almost looked human leaned against the wall by the bars of his cell. Her eyes widened. He was jacking off, right there in front of them. He grinned as she snapped her eyes forward. Instinct made her duck to the side and the alien behind her flinched as something hit him in the face. He snarled and bellowed something at the jacking-off guy. A threat or a challenge, she wasn’t sure what and didn’t care.
Her thoughts were cut off as they reached a large stone hall, the prisoners shuffling in a group onto the sandy floor in the middle. Braziers burned in brackets on the walls, actually burned, no technology here. It was like as soon as they’d stepped off the shuttle, they’d gone back in time a couple of thousand years.
If she closed her eyes and ignored the aliens around them, Nat could almost believe they were in Ancient Rome about to enter the gladiatorial arena. She ignored the fact that most slaves in the arena died. Horribly. She was not going to be one of them. She was the cage queen. That would… had to… count for something. Right?
The head lizard, obviously the guy in charge because he wore a little hat as well as a tac vest, snarled something she didn’t understand. The aliens around them obviously did because they started to shuffle into two groups as the lizard snarled.