Chapter 12

AVA

I only see Koza once during the two-day trip.

I spend most of the first day in my room, bored and melancholy, aside from the half hour I spend yelling at my shower until I figure out how to use it. Part of me wants to mope for the rest of the voyage, but eventually, hunger drives me out into the wider ship.

I catch the masculine scent of the general hanging faintly in the air as I step into the dining room, and I wonder if he’s making an effort to avoid me, which only adds to my embarrassment.

I manage to get the machine in the wall to produce an uninspiring, oatmeal-like sludge. As far as I can tell, there is no further variety on offer. It tastes like cardboard, and I’m thankful that it’s thick enough I only need a few bites to ease my hunger.

As I’m poking unenthusiastically at the lukewarm remnants, I hear voices in the adjoining corridor.

“…from a Multic rebel, seized by High Command forces at the auction,” comes Zynett’s voice.

I can’t tell if Koza’s low rumble is disapproval or menace. “Where did…,” he starts, then trails into silence.

I look up just as the dining room door slides open, framing the general. He’s frowning sharply enough that the hair on the back of my neck stands up. But I don’t manage to say anything before he nods. “Good,” he says stiffly. “Make sure someone takes his position.”

Then he turns away, and the door closes. I don’t know what to make of anything that just happened and try to figure out what to do with my dirty plate.

I don’t see him again until the end of the voyage. Toward the end of the second day, as I lie on my bed staring at the ceiling, I feel the ship decelerate. My stomach lurches like it does when a plane starts to descend for landing.

Moments later, a robotic voice sounds out through the room, instructing all passengers to prepare for landing.

I roll off the bed and into the chair in the corner of the room, deploying the safety straps with the touch of a button. Zynett had showed me shortly into our first day on board, the one time I actually spoke to either man after our initial departure.

“Ava?”

My fingers slip as I’m clipping the last buckle together as Koza’s deep voice addresses me over the intercom.

“Are you secured for landing?”

“Y-yes! All good here,” I stutter out.

My heart thumps loudly in my chest at the sound of his deep rolling voice saying my name in that unique way of his. My cheeks flame in embarrassment at my unintentional reaction.

~Get it together, Ava, you’re acting like a twelve-year-old with her first crush.~

I press my palms together between my thighs, my leg jiggling nervously as the flight becomes slightly jerky like we hit some turbulence.

Finally, a final loud whoosh precedes the thump of the ship landing on a hard surface below.

As soon as the ding of the computer begins to announce our arrival, I’m stripping off the harness and practically running out of the room, eager to get off the ship and see a new alien world.

As I fling myself around a corner, I crash into a very solid barrier. Firm hands catch my shoulders and keep me from falling flat on my ass. A deep rumble of a laugh has butterflies swirling in my gut.

“Easy there, little one,” Koza tells me with a grin. His hands linger on my shoulders, his thumbs moving over my skin in the lightest of strokes.

His touch is distracting, and I close my eyes briefly, instinctively inhaling as his scent envelops me.

My traitorous vagina remembers the last time he was this close to me, with his hand deep inside her, and pulses wantonly in response.

~Way to play it cool, girl.~

He suddenly tenses and drops his hand, taking a step back.

Embarrassment floods me at the obvious rejection, and I duck around his large body, set on continuing down the hall.

“Sorry, just excited to see a new place,” I explain as I walk away from him and his annoyingly appealing smell.

I feel him following just behind me, and I can’t put any distance between us unless I literally run away from him.

“There is something I need to go over with you before we exit the ship, Ava, which is why I was coming to speak with you,” comes his voice from behind me.

I stop walking too suddenly, since my awkwardness apparently knows no bounds, but his reflexes are better than mine and he avoids bumping into me.

He doesn’t wait for me to turn around, launching right into it.

“I had three new units assigned to me while I was away, so I would prefer if you do not wander around the barracks or common areas. If you must, it will be while in my presence, or that of another trusted soldier I will assign to the task.”

My embarrassment is quickly erased by a flare of nerves, and I slowly turn to face him.

“Your men are that dangerous?” I ask him in a voice that sounds small and scared to my own ears.

His brow furrows in obvious concern at my tone, and his hand lifts slightly like he wants to comfort me, before he clenches it into a tight fist and drops it back to his side.

“Those who are used to my ways and leadership would not dare to harm you, but I do not know these new men. I am simply being cautious. It will not be forever, Ava. They will learn quickly what I expect.”

“All right, I trust you,” I agree, giving him a small smile. I don’t have much of a choice, but he’s also done enough that I do feel safe with him.

He clears his throat and gestures me forward, resuming his position a step behind me as we cover the short distance to the exit of the ship where Zynett already waits.

The door opens, and I squint as the sunlight hits my face.

We have landed in a large outdoor area, on what appears to be a dull expanse of paved asphalt.

As I follow the two men down the exit ramp and out of the ship, however, I realize it is a natural surface of hard-packed soil. The soil is just a dark bluish black.

We are in the very center of a giant, round courtyard of sorts, with building faces visible in a circle some distance away. They are made of a smooth, white stone which is a sharp contrast to the dark ground they rise from.

Spindly tree trunks, with bright-yellow leaves the size of large dinner plates, are growing on the outer edge of the circle. They are evenly spaced like a pretty, living hedge between the vast expanse of bare soil and the buildings beyond the trees.

The general’s army stands at attention in the area between the ship and the building directly in front of us. They are grouped into what must be individual units of about one hundred men each and are evenly lined up into formation with a space between each group. The units face each other with an aisle left open for the general to pass through.

They all carry swords and wear simple leather armor, but the soldiers are a vast variety of aliens, all different shapes and colors of skin and bodies. I recognize several of the species as those that made up the shoppers who gawked at me at the market, and shudder at the memory.

As we reach the closest grouping, General Koza stops. So, I stop, several feet behind him. I resist the urge to squirm. There are just… For some reason, I hadn’t expected quite so many, which in hindsight is pretty stupid.

An army is pretty self-explanatory.

The general says a few words to the crowd, but my heart is pounding so loudly in my ears I can’t make them out. I jump in surprise as he finishes, and the men give a loud cry, saluting their leader in perfect unison.

The mood lightens significantly after that. I move closer to Koza and Zynett as the precise lines of soldiers dissolve into a mass of bodies pressing toward us, eager to greet their general.

He speaks briefly to several of them, obviously on very friendly terms, but I’m pleased we are moving closer to the building at a brisk pace.

The closer we get to the building, though, the less familiar the men seem to be with the general, giving him only respectful nods as we pass. Koza is clearly eager to get inside, his pace increasing, and the distance between us has grown as I struggle to match his longer stride.

“Look at the general’s new plaything,” an alien in the crowd snarls out suddenly and harshly to my left. He has fins where his ears should be, and his mouth gapes open like a catfish. His skin is scaly and somewhere between gray and tan.

He pushes another man aside as he looks me up and down, and his large, webbed hand reaches out to grip my breast over the fabric of my tunic. He twists the swell of my skin under his palm painfully and gives a mocking laugh. “Have you ever seen such a creature?”

I barely let out a sharp gasp of pain before Koza is whirling back toward me in a blur of speed. With a bright flash of metal, Koza removes the grip of the alien’s hand by severing it at the wrist.

It hits the floor with a sickening squelch as the general pulls me behind him in a fluid motion.

I grip the strap of his leather harness where it crosses over his back. I take deep breaths to calm myself, pressing my forehead against the back of my hands as he growls at the soldiers staring at us.

“She is not to be touched.”

“Aye, General!” the suddenly serious crowd says sharply in unison, and I am glad to hear they don’t sound angry. They sound abashed, and I peek around the general’s large form to take in the man who touched me.

He grips his wrist in an attempt to stop the flow of blood, his eyes downcast and his shoulders slumped with shame. His blood is purple. Like, vivid-neon purple, and it stains the dark soil where it lands in a steady splatter.

“Your name, soldier?” the general asks the bleeding man in a frosty tone.

“Grafft, sir!” the man replies immediately, standing at attention even as blood drips steadily through his fingers gripped around the grisly wound. Blood continues to soak into the dirt below.

“As you are new here, Grafft, I will allow you to keep your hand. Report to medical, while there is still time for you to regain full function of your fingers,” the general says dismissively. He turns his back to the bleeding man and motions me to continue toward the door of the building that waits mere yards away.

~Keep the hand?~ I think stupidly.

~Oh, right. Advanced alien technology and all that.~ They look so ruthless, it’s hard for me to remember. At least the man won’t be permanently down a limb on my account. That certainly wouldn’t win me any brownie points with his people.

I’m frozen in place as Grafft bends down and retrieves his hand from the ground. He cradles it to his chest and stumbles away, presumably toward the medical services.

“Ava,” Koza prompts me, his gentle voice a stark contrast to the cold and uncaring tone he just used with Grafft.

I jerk my head to meet his eyes, and I know my own must be wild and wide with shock. He takes my arm gently, urging me to walk with him toward the building.

I put one foot in front of the other numbly, thankfully managing not to stumble over my feet. We pass through the door, and only when I hear it click closed behind me do I let out a shuddering breath.