Star Warrior: A SciFi Alien Romance (8 page)

“Holding me in a stasis cell this small, or whatever it is, completely immobilized is cruel. I thought you Livisk had more honor than that,” I said.

There was no point in going on about rules of war or anything silly like that. I understood from reading ancient military history that there’d been such rules when we fought against humans, but there was nothing formal about the war with the Livisk. It was a savage fight for survival, one that humanity had been winning for some time now. A fact that only served to make them that much more vicious in their attacks.

“I can assure you that we are not holding you in a stasis field out of any attempt to punish you,” the general said.

“And why should I believe this from an honorless dung worm such as yourself?”

Immediately all action in the room came to a halt. Every Livisk surrounding us turned and stared. No doubt wondering how their general would react to that insult. At least I was pretty sure it was an insult. I was sometimes foggy on the intricacies of their spoken language, and it was entirely possible I could’ve just called him a barber or a tree depending on the inflection of the word.

I was pretty sure that was right from the reaction I got, though. Not to mention that I spent quite a bit of time familiarizing myself with Livisk insults. Time that probably should’ve been spent learning their pictographic language, but in this moment as everyone stared wondering if I was about to be cut down all that work on insults seemed well worth it.

Only he didn’t react. He chuckled. Shook his head. He didn’t move forward and kill me instantly like I would’ve expected from a Livisk as high ranking as this one. Though something seemed odd about his rank paint this time around. As though it wasn’t quite as intricate as the last time we met.

Maybe I wasn’t the only one to come down a few pegs in the universe since our last meeting. Perhaps we were the architects of each other’s demises. That was a pleasant thought. About the only pleasant thought I had going for me considering how screwed up everything else was.

“I could release the field,” he said. “My medical personnel assure me that would be a very bad idea considering the extent of the injuries you sustained in the attack. I managed to rescue you before your ship was incapacitated.”

“Am I supposed to thank you for that? You are the reason the ship was incapacitated in the first place.”

“And you are the reason I was out there in the first place looking to reclaim my honor, human,” he snarled, some of the heat I expected from a Livisk general finally coming to his voice and face. I would’ve recoiled in fear from that snarl, only there was the whole incapacitated by strange alien technology thing I had going for myself. Made it kind of difficult to do much of anything.

Which was probably a good thing. I didn’t want to show weakness in front of the scary sexy space alien. That would be bad.

“Well I’m glad you were able to reclaim your honor. Must’ve been pretty difficult for you to get it up after I handed you your shiny blue ass in single combat,” I said.

Everyone in the room was still standing absolutely still after the first insult, but several of them stepped forward as though they were about to avenge their commander’s honor after that slight. I guess my Livisk was good enough to get that point across as well. Luckily for me, considering I was still very much completely incapacitated from the neck down, the general held up his hand to stop them. He also puffed up as he moved in close and I was glad for that weird field thing surrounding my body otherwise it would be pretty damn obvious the sort of reaction I was having to feeling him so close to me.

“I am General Jorav of the Livisk Ascendency, uncle to the emperor, husband of a slain wife, and I will not have you speak to me so in front of my men,” he growled.

“Get used to disappointment, tall blue and sparkly,” I said.

His eyes narrowed. “You confuse me. Was that supposed to be an insult or a description? I admit the way you use our language is imprecise at times.”

“Allow me to be more precise then,” I said. “It was certainly meant as an insult. Not a very good one, I admit, but you’re not exactly catching me at my best. You probably know that since you got your ass handed to you the last time you did catch me at my best.”

I figured that would be it. To be perfectly honest death would be preferable in many ways to what no doubt awaited me on the Livisk homeworld. I’d heard the stories of what they did to human women, and none of them were pretty. Again, it sort of went back to that whole total war thing we had going with them and the unfortunate evolutionary happenstance that made our two species sexually compatible. Something about a common spacefaring ancestor the eggheads were always going on about. Convergent evolution and blah blah blah. All I’d ever cared about was learning how to blow them up real good.

At least until I met this one. He chuckled and shook his head in a very human seeming gesture. He moved in so close that I could feel his hot breath against my cheek. It was about the only thing I could feel since all my senses had been taken away below the neck which was very annoying and sending all sorts of alarm bells ringing in my brain which was sure we’d been decapitated.

“Do you want me to let you free, human? You have spirit, I’ll admit that. Perhaps too much.”

“Please do,” I said. “We can have round three. See who comes out on top this time around.”

General Jorav held a hand up and made a quick gesture. A sciencey type who still looked more ripped than the most muscleheaded space marine only hesitated a moment before flicking a switch. The light covering my body winked out in an instant.

There was a moment while I hovered there enjoying the return of feeling to my body. I didn’t enjoy it for long before my body was hit with the most profound pain I think I’d ever endured. I cried out as I collapsed forward. I had no other choice. It seemed there was a reason why that strange light had been holding me up. My body was unable to support itself otherwise, and so I went crashing to the ground where I landed with a grunt as the wind was knocked out of me and pain flared up in parts of my body I didn’t even know could feel that bad.

I gritted my teeth and avoided crying out with that pain, though. I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction. He was the enemy. I’d bested him once, and I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of showing weakness even if I did want to curl up into the fetal position and cry. Not that I thought I could curl into the fetal position without potentially rebreaking several bones that seemed to be on the mend before the glowy stuff disappeared.

“What did you do to me?” I hissed, still trying not to let the pain show and not doing a very good job of it. I was down on my knees focusing everything I could on not falling over.

Jorav got down on his knees as well. He looked at me with a fire in his eyes. “I’m afraid we did nothing to you. Though you might wish to have a word with the people who designed your command center to blow up at the first hint of an attack.”

I had to give him that. Great minds think alike and all that.

“You were injured rather extensively in our battle, and that field was the only thing keeping you from feeling that pain. I’m perfectly willing to put you back, as well. All you have to do is admit that you’ve been bested, human.”

I looked up at him, a fire raging within me. Like hell would I tell him he’d bested me!

8: Strength

Jorav:

I stood. It felt right to get up close and personal with this strange human with the warrior spirit when I was enjoying besting her, but now that I’d told her exactly what I expected of her I wanted to be towering over her when she made her surrender.

Only she didn’t do anything of the sort. This strange broken creature that had dominated my mind for the better part of the time between our last meeting and now looked up at me and her eyes blazed with a warrior’s fire that surprised me. That made me take a step back before I realized that I’d just retreated from the human in front of everyone in the medical bay. I stayed planted where I was.

There wasn’t any chance that she could actually harm me. This was just a human with no power armor, after all. Besides, more than anything I found myself drawn to her. I was just surprised at the strength of her spirit. I felt a stirring between my legs. More than anything I wanted to take her as well as accept her defeat, but of course that was impossible in her current state.

“I will never surrender to you,” she said.

And then something even more impossible happened. She straightened herself out and started to stand. I resisted the sudden desire to put a hand out and stop her. To prevent her from harming herself. I wouldn’t extend that discourtesy to any of my warriors, and I realized with a start that I was already thinking of her more as a warrior than a weak human. Strange, that.

“Impossible,” one of the medical technicians breathed from behind me.

It did seem impossible. The exomedical team that worked on her assured me that there were so many bones broken in her body that the only way she would survive was putting her in stasis and allowing her to bathe in the healing light of our repair units. It was already incredible enough that she’d woken while in that unit and started trying to move around, necessitating them calling me down here. The medical bays weren’t supposed to work like that, but then again it was rare that they were used on humans for anything other than experimentation.

The human commander, I still didn’t know her name, managed to get to her feet. She was a little wobbly on those feet, but she didn’t cry out in pain like I would have expected. Even one of my warriors would have had difficulty not crying out if they were as badly damaged.

“I will not surrender to you,” she said. “Never.”

I could only admire her fighting spirit as she took a lurching step forward. It was the fighting spirit I’d tried to instill in my men, with varying results. I felt the urge to help her. Especially when her next step had her stumbling forward directly into my arms. I was left with a choice to catch her or let her fall to the ground and cause even more damage, and I didn’t want her to be harmed even further. I was already so impressed with this human that I very much wanted to get to know her better when she was better.

I’d had my men gather any wounded humans we could find, aside from a couple in good health who were left behind to carry the story of what we’d done to their ship on this day. Usually we didn’t take that many prisoners, but I didn’t want the warriors to think it odd that I wanted this human in particular as a prisoner. I didn’t want them to think I had some motive other than the raid.

She felt odd in my arms. So light. These humans were so delicate when they weren’t in that accursed power armor. I looked down at her and she actually smiled at me. It was wrong, but that was a smile that went right to the core of my being. It ignited parts of me that had been dormant since the day my wife was torn from me. Torn by this very woman, though ultimately it was just the fortunes of war.

I couldn’t blame her for doing her job and besting me at it.

That smile was odd, though. She’d never done anything but stare at me with grim determination. Why a smile now? Did she enjoy being in my arms as much as I enjoyed having her in my arms? It seemed the impossible fancy of an old warrior, but I had no doubt she could feel the hardness pressing against her stomach. I wasn’t embarrassed by it. It was my response to her. That was all.

“Why do you smile, human? You’ve been defeated.”

She whispered something I could barely hear. I leaned in closer and heard her just as the men in the medical bay realized what she’d done and sounded the alarm. It was already too late.

“I have your sword,” she said, that smile going even wider.

My eyes went wide right along with her. I looked down and realized the mistake I’d made when it was too late. Once more it seemed the human had bested me. She now had two out of three. Her hand gripped the sword still at my side from the raid on her ship. It seemed her arm on that side worked perfectly well. I wonder if she planned that as well as she planned that stumble that was meant to look like an accident.

She was too close. She rammed the sword home in my side and it took every ounce of my training to not bellow in pain. We locked eyes with one another and stared, her smile now turned to a rictus. I held a hand up as several medical personnel finally realized they also had weapons training and had pointed their blasters at us. I held my hand up to stop them as much because I was worried their lack of experience with those weapons would result in them hitting me as I was worried they might harm her.

“We’re two out of three, sparkly,” she whispered.

“You didn’t hit anything vital, human,” I whispered back.

“I know,” she growled. “Just a little something to remember me by after you have me killed by your goons here.”

And with that she ripped the blade out. This time I did let out a raging scream of pain. That hurt. I’d been fighting humans so long, gotten so used to their strange energy weapons that did no harm more often than not, that feeling a blade being pulled out of me was a strange old feeling. It made me realize I was growing soft. That I’d allowed her to stick me with my own weapon was testament enough to that.

“Magnificent,” I said. “Your warrior spirit is magnificent.”