Date: 2016-06-11 04:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Aliens; Science Fiction; Romance; Paranormal; Fantasy; Shapeshifters; Science Fiction Romance; Paranormal Romance; Humor; Erotica
Description: War rages between Earth and Mars, and an alien fleet from a distant star barrels toward our solar system. I’m laying low in the asteroid belt, as far from the war as I can get, but so is one of the aliens. And I’m the first to find him. Second to find him? Pirates. A whole lot of them. The alien kills every last one to protect me, and we barely escape before reinforcements arrive. Now my life is in the hands of this savage, purple-skinned killer. Not all of his skin is purple though, his...thing...is teal. And it’s nearly as big as the rest of him. His shoulders are as wide as Valles Marineris

Marauder Cygnus

Mating Wars

Aya Morningstar

Contents

Copyright

1.
Aura

2.
Cygnus

3.
Aura

4.
Cygnus

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Aura

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Cygnus

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Aura

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Cygnus

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Aura

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Cygnus

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Aura

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Cygnus

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Aura

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Cygnus

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Aura

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Cygnus

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Aura

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Cygnus

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Aura

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Cygnus

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Aura

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Cygnus

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Aura

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Cygnus

Epilogue

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About the Author

Copyright © 2016 by Aya Morningstar

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

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1 Aura

“Aura! Aura! Wake up! You’ve got to see this!”

It’s Seth, the Zephyr’s on-ship computer. Even though he’s just a floating voice with no physical presence, he sounds excited.

I wipe the sleep out of my eyes and unzip the big glorified potato bag that I sleep in. It keeps me strapped to the wall so that I don’t float around in zero-g.

I kick myself off the wall and float to the ladder. In zero-g there’s no up or down, so I just pull myself steadily along the ladder, which runs through the ship like a spinal cord, until I reach the pilot’s seat at the front end of the ship.

The Zephyr is small, but it’s my home. The ship is shaped like a small high-rise building with four main stories. Each story is its own room, and each room can function in zero-g or under the artificial gravity of acceleration.

We’re not accelerating now though, so I buckle myself into the pilot’s seat and see what Seth has got for me.

My augmented reality lenses flood my vision with the full Heads-Up Display. The HUD shows me where we are in the belt, and it indicates there is a small spherical object flashing green up ahead of us.

“See? See?” Seth says. “Let’s go grab it!”

“It looks like we’ve got everything pointed at it? Full juice?” I ask Seth, pulling up the power distribution chart.

“The sphere is made of some exotic material,” Seth says. “It’s reflecting our pings, so I’m diverting all of our instruments toward it, but we’re still barely getting a reading! Anything less and we won’t get a reading at all. I can’t tell what’s inside, but I bet it’s exciting if it’s trying so hard to hide from us!”

I sigh. “Okay, we’ll ping it like this for five minutes, but then we need to get our guard back up.”

If I keep everything pointed on the sphere, a pirate ship can be right on top of me before I even know it’s there. The sphere is small enough to just scoop onboard into the containment bay, but the “exotic material” worries me. It could be radioactive, or worse, a biological weapon. Best to figure out what it is before scooping it up.

Bio signatures start to pan across Aura’s vision. “Shit! It’s alive?”

“Looks like it,” Seth says. “But the pulse is...barely there.”

I have Seth run a full gamut of tests, and within minutes he rules out any radioactivity.

“Test for known pathogens,” I say, yawning.

“How can you yawn? This is probably the most interesting thing we’ve ever found,” Seth says.

A composite image of what is within the sphere starts to fill in across my HUD and on various screens within the cockpit.

“The lifeform looks human,” Seth says. “Almost. It’s slightly different, look at the ears—”

The five-minute timer I set starts beeping. “Five minutes is up. Reorient the instruments and scan for hostiles.”

“We’ll waste so much time re-pointing the instruments, Aura,” Seth says. “Two more minutes, please?”

“No,” I say. “Reorient, now.”

It takes two or three minutes for the instruments to reorient for a full 360-degree scan, and I look at the data Seth has gathered so far while I wait.

“This...guy...looks to be seven feet tall,” I say. “Is that right?”

“I don’t think it’s a human,” Seth says. “It’s probably genetically modified. Some kind of super soldier.”

I lick my lips. “Sounds valuable.”

I’ve been a scrapper for two years, and I’ve gone on dozens of runs. After paying for fuel, repairs, maintenance, food, and water, I barely break even on each run. I have very little to show for spending two whole years on the outskirts of civilization. I spend time between each run hawking my wares on Mars, but there’s no time in that harsh place for romance. Seth is the closest thing to a man in my life, and that’s only because I programmed his voice to sound like one.

My HUD shows all clear, and I let out a big sigh of relief. “We’ll hold like this for a few more minutes, just to be sure, then we can figure out what’s up with this sphere guy—”

A klaxon rings and my HUD flashes red.

“Pirates!” Seth says. “They’ll be on us in...um, minutes.”

“Give me a way out,” I say. I’m doing everything I can to keep calm, but acid is rising in my throat and my hands are trembling.

“No chance of evasion,” Seth says. “If we scoop the sphere, we can stop them from blowing us up.”

“Uh,” I say, “how do you figure? I know it’s a big loss to abandon it, but I’d rather be broke than dead. Let’s just full burn out of here, and hope they want the sphere more than they do us.”

“Aura,” Seth says. “If they realize it’s a super soldier, or something of high value, they’ll chase and kill us so we can’t tell anyone what we saw, and then they’ll go back and grab the sphere.”

Every second I waste is making things worse, and knowing that a torpedo could kill me at any moment has me racked with paralyzing fear.

“Aura?” Seth says.

“Scoop it!” I shout.

Gravity surges back on at 1g as the thrusters ignite. My stomach churns and my cheeks vibrate. The green outline of the sphere grows larger as we begin to approach it.

There’s nothing for me to do but pray as we accelerate toward the sphere, and when we close in to 200 meters, the Zephyr’s grappling net launches. I fire it from the side as we zoom past the sphere. If my aim is off, we’ll be out of range for another attempt.

The net blasts wide-open a few meters from the sphere and wraps tightly around it. I let out a relieved sigh.

Nothing happens for a while, but when the cable runs out of length, I feel a jerk as the Zephyr starts to drag the sphere along with it.

“Reel it in,” I say. “Continue full 1g burn.”

I unbuckle myself from the seat and climb the ladder. The Zephyr’s engines jut out the side of the ship, and when we accelerate at 1g, the acceleration makes it feel like I’m experiencing Earth’s gravity. It helps keep my bones and muscles strong for the five-day trips back and forth from Mars to the belt.

I climb the ladder as fast as I can; I want to see this “specimen” with my own eyes. If I’m going to die, I at least want to see the thing that is responsible for getting me killed.

Capping off the front—or top, depending on how you look at it—of the ship is the cargo bay. While I’m cramped into a tiny four rooms, the cargo bay is twice as tall and twice as wide as the rest of the ship. If my living quarters is the handle of the hammer, the cargo bay is the hammer itself. The Zephyr is a scrap ship, so it needs to be able to carry a lot of scrap.

The net is reeling the sphere in toward the cargo bay’s airlock. It will need to pass through the airlock before I can get my hands on it.

I sit down in the cargo bay and focus on my HUD while I wait for the sphere to finish getting reeled in.

Seth has mapped out the situation, and the pirates are burning faster than me—at 1.5g—and it’s only a matter of time before they catch up to us. It’s not just a small asshole pirate ship either, but it’s one of their capital ships. It can hold a handful of smaller craft and dozens of crew members.

“We can threaten to destroy the cargo,” I say, “or offer to sell it.”

“Hmm,” Seth says. “Selling it might work—just don’t expect a good price—but they might kill us anyway after they have what they want from us. We have no real leverage here, Aura.”

I can see the sphere through the window now. The airlock is open on the top end, and it’s only a few meters from entering. The airlock is above me, like an attic, and there’s a built-in hydraulic lift to lower cargo down while under acceleration.

Once the sphere is reeled fully inside, the airlock closes. I watch the gauges.

“Fully pressurized,” Seth says.

“Open it,” I say.

The hatch opens, and the lift starts to lower down into the main area of the cargo bay. As soon as it reaches eye-level, I walk toward it, looking for a window or a hatch. The lift touches the ground, and I walk around it, examining it from all sides. There’s nothing at all but smooth metal. It’s windowless and seemingly doorless.

“Should we cut it open?” I ask Seth.

“That could kill whatever’s inside,” Seth says.

I shake my head. “Hail the pirates, tell them we want to make a deal.”

“They’re...not accepting our hails,” Seth said. “Oh my, they just launched grappling hooks. You might want to hold onto something.”

I rush to the wall and hook myself in. Moments later the ship jerks. I feel my stomach churn as the g-forces fly back and forth between zero and 1g.

“Kill the engines,” I say. “We’re not getting away.”

The engines die, and the g-forces start to drop. The pirate ship must be initiating reverse burn, breaking us back to zero-g.

I unhook myself, push off the wall, and start punching the shit out of the sphere. The stupid valuable piece of shit is going to get me killed. What’s the point of it being valuable if I never even get to sell it?

It feels good to hit it, but each time I punch the sphere, the force from hitting it makes me float back away and I have to push off the wall to strike at it again.

When my knuckles start to hurt, I rest my palm on the sphere and say, “You got me killed, you know that?”

And then, in an instant, the sphere changes from fully opaque to transparent. The sphere becomes so transparent that I’d think it had disappeared, if not for the fact that my hand is still pressing onto its hard metal exterior.

What I see inside makes my heart race—and for all the wrong reasons. I blush profusely as I gaze onto the specimen floating before me, seemingly suspended in mid-air. It’s not quite a man, yet it’s bigger and more masculine than any human man I’ve ever seen. Its skin is purple, and the ears are on the top of its head rather than on the side. The ears are not quite pointy, but appear more rounded, like a bear’s ears. It has medium-length, dark black hair, which is human-looking save for the ears poking out from it.

From the neck down, it’s all a man’s body. And what a man! The shoulders are wider than Saturn’s rings, the chest is as big and imposing as Olympus Mons, and the eight-pack abs are perfectly sculpted—and glistening—like Earth’s glaciers.

I look further down its body, and now I really blush. The dick is almost human, but it’s so much bigger than anything I’ve ever seen, and it’s teal-colored. The whole body is purple, but the cock is teal.

“What the hell,” I say, almot forgetting that pirates are about to kill me.

“I think it’s an alien,” Seth says.

“You don’t say?”

2 Cygnus

“What are you doing, brother?” I hold my blade out to him.

“Cygnus,” he says. “You know what I’m doing.”

My brother, Aegus, has stolen supplies, and he’s loading them into a scouting pod.

Our Marauder fleet has already spent 20 years accelerating toward the humans’ home system of Sol, and we’re flying through the void at 80% of light speed. We’ve all woken up from hibernation long enough to turn our fleet around and run the engines in the other direction for another 20 years. Long enough to break and slow down our ships down enough to stop in Sol, rather than fly right through.

The engines are about to fire on, and all Marauders should be hibernating by now.

But not my brother Aegus.

“I know what you are doing,” I say, “but I don’t understand why.”

Aegus is up against the wall of the scouting pod, and I push the blade up against the skin of his neck.

“I believe breeding with the humans will bring about the Seraphic Form,” Aegus says.

My ears stand erect and I wiggle them in frustration. More religious bullshit.

“The Seraphic Form is like light speed,” I say. “We strive for it, but can never reach it.”

“But I believe we can,” Aegus says. “And if the humans are the end of our journey, we can’t invade them like normal. We have to treat them as equals—”

I slam my fist into the pod, and press the knife into his skin until I see a few small drops of blood trickly down his neck.

Aegus has pretended to be a model Marauder. He’s strong and fights nearly as well as I do. No one suspected him. No one but me.

“You fooled everyone,” I say. “Almost.”

“I’m going to take the pod,” Aegus says. “Separate from the main fleet, and continue on at 80% of lightspeed for several more years. I’ll reach Sol many years before the main fleet. I’ll prove that I’m right, and message the fleet before you arrive. You can do with the information as you please.”

I’m holding the blade perfectly steady, as any slip would slit my brother’s throat. Despite my steady hand, I’m anything but calm.

I narrow my eyes until they’re nothing but slits. One thrust of the knife and I can do what I’m supposed to. I can kill my own brother to ensure the survival of my race. We know the humans are advanced, and if they resist us, it will not be an easy victory for us to win. If Aegus arrives years ahead of the fleet, the humans will gain a tremendous edge.

I look into Aegus’s green eyes, and I see complete conviction. He truly believes in what he’s doing, which is more than I can say for myself. All that drives me is the need to mate. And to kill anything that gets in the way of that.

The bear DNA that has been spliced into us to allow for hibernation heightens our need to mate and protect those we care about. My brother included.

I pull the knife away, and I study the blood dripping off the blade. It’s our family’s blood, and I realize that if I kill my brother, I don’t deserve to mate.

“You truly believe?” I ask him, still examining the bloody knife.

“Trust me, Cygnus, Sol is the end of our race’s long journey.”

“Go!” I say. “I’ll follow you.”

Aegus hugs me, then jumps into the pod. “I knew you’d do the right thing. Take that pod,” Aegus says, tilting his head toward an adjacent pod. “I’ve loaded it with biofuel for you.”

“You knew I’d follow you?” I ask him.

“I prayed you would,” he says, before slamming his hatch closed.

As soon as his hatch is sealed, a robotic arm grabs hold of it and carries it toward the bay where it will launch out and continue on toward Sol.

“What the fuck am I doing?” I ask myself, still holding the bloodied knife.

And then three fellow Marauders float into the room behind me, their blades drawn.

Aegus sabotaged the security systems before his escape, and I only followed him because he’d been acting erraticly since we’d awoken from hibernation. I didn’t think anyone else had followed us, but I was wrong.

“Cygnus!” Zarek shouts.

Zarek is my friend—or he was, at least—and he’s with Tager and Gent.

“I’m going with my brother,” I say, holding up the knife. “Will you stop me?”

The marauder fleet only goes through a one-week period of zero-g. Just long enough for all the ships to turn around, check their engines, and initiate a braking burn. Most marauders neglect to train for zero-g combat. Not me. I live for combat, and wanting to be as deadly as possible in all situations means I’ve trained hard at zero-g.

An alarm wails across the room. “Two minutes until engine burn. Last call to hibernate.”

If I were a coward, I could jump into the pod and run, but the three of them might be able to blow up both my pod and Aegus’s pod before we got away.

Gent starts to turn around, and I see him pushing off Zarek. I realize he’s going to run. Tager and Zarek will fight me, while Gent makes sure someone blasts my brother’s pod into vapor.

No time to think.

I throw the blade.

In zero-g, there’s no need to arc it, and though Gent is over twenty Marauder lengths away, the blade flies straight and true.

I kick off the pod and fly toward them, floating just behind the blade, which jams right into Gent’s spine. He twitches violently for a few moments, and then falls dead still before zero-g causes his body to float away, lifeless.

Moments later, Zarek is right in front of me—or under me—it’s hard to tell in zero-g. Zarek is holding a blade, but not for long.

He slashes at me, but I shift to bear form in mid-flight. The extra mass slows me down just enough that Zarek misses, and I claw his arm off before he can recover from his missed attack.

I shift back to marauder form and grab Zarek’s dismembered arm by the bicep.

Tager is floating slowly toward me, his blade pointed straight at me. He expected a big fat bear for his target, but since I shifted back to marauder form, he’s caught off guard.

He readies his blade as we float toward each other, but Zarek’s arm gives me extra range. Zarek’s hand is clutching tight to the blade, and I swing the whole arm right at Tager.

“Shit!” he yells, realizing there’s no way for him to stop in mid-flight.

The blade jams through his skull, killing him instantly, and his death means I’m alone. And that my brother is safe.

“Thirty seconds until engine start,” the intercom says. “Final warning!”

I kick off Tager’s body, which propels me back toward the pod. I miss it by a Marauder’s length or so, and I have to use my arms to pull myself along the rail toward the pod. I quickly get in and seated, slam the door shut, and hit the release button.

The arm pulls my pod down toward the bay, blasts me out into the cold void of space, and just moments later, the artificial sun of the anti-matter drives flares in the distance.

The pod’s display flashes red with warnings, and I start to feed all of the biofuel that Aegus has packed for me into the shield generator.

“Shields active!” the computer says in a voice that is much too calm for the situation.

“Shit!” I shout. The shield is burning up way more biofuel than I thought. If I use up too much too soon, I won’t have enough reaction mass left to slow down—I could slingshot right through the Sol system.

I watch as the engines from the fleet get smaller and smaller, and finally I shout, “Kill the shields!”

“50% chance of survival, are you sure, Cygnus?”

“Yes, I’m fucking sure,” I say. “Now follow my brother.”

The pod is a small sphere, and I already feel cramped. I watch the engines shrink as my pod continues on at 80% of lightspeed, while the fleet looms behind me like a hundred suns.

“Cygnus, I recommend you hibernate now.”

“Wait,” I say. “I want to see it.”

I watch the hundreds of mini suns fade into the distance. It’s only after several hours, when they are just small dots, that I allow my inner bear to take over. I drift to sleep, into a years-long hibernation.

3 Aura

As soon as the alien starts breathing, the pod immediately takes on a solid form again, hiding the purple creature’s muscled body from me.

“Shit.”

All at once a hatch pops open on the side of the pod, and thick purple liquid starts spilling out. We’re in zero-g again, so the liquid just floats around in a translucent, oblong blob.

I pull myself along the pod and cautiously look into the hatch through the open door.

The alien is curled into a fetal position, and the pod’s computer is talking in a language I can’t understand.

His purple eyelids open, and he straightens his body so he’s sitting up to face me. His green eyes bore into me.

I try to force myself to look in his eyes, but I blush and look downward. It’s then I realize I’m just staring at his big teal cock, so I quickly redirect my line of vision back up again.

“Sorry!” I say, my cheeks blushing bright red.

“Human female,” the alien says, in a strange accent.

“How can you speak English?” I ask.

“I order you to take me to the red planet. The fourth from your star,” he says.

“Wow,” I say. “You just woke up and you’re already bossing me around?”

“I am Cygnus, warrior of the Marauder fleet,” he says, “Now that introductions are over, I order you to take me to the red planet.”

There’s a loud slam, and the ship shakes.

Cygnus kicks off the wall of the pod and flies out of the pod. His muscles are even more impressive in action. He’s still gloriously naked, and he doesn’t seem the least bit shy about it.

He floats through the Zephyr’s cargo bay, then catches the airlock’s handle to stop himself. He looks through the window of the airlock. We’re already inside the pirate’s containment bay, though they haven’t sealed us in yet.

“What’s this?” he asks, pointing out the window and into the inside of the pirate ship which has now swallowed us.

“I can’t take you to Mars,” I say. “We’re being captured by pirates who are very likely going to kill me. You’ll have to negotiate with them. And how exactly are introductions over? Did I tell you my name?”

He looks up at me and his ears twitch. “You are a childless human female. My race is coming here to interbreed with you and assimilate your offspring into our fleet. You’ll be assigned a true name once you bear one of our children. I don’t need—”

“Excuse me?” I say, kick myself off the side of the pod and fly toward him at the speed of a bullet.

I crash into the wall beside him, and then orient myself so it feels like we’re standing face to face.

“I’m Aura,” I say. “I don’t need to bear a child to have a name.”

His eyes look me up and down, and his ears pull back. He tilts his head a little, and then cracks a tiny hint of a smile. It looks almost like…a smirk?

I blush, and he tilts his head even more. “What’s wrong with your skin?”

“Nothing,” I mutter. “If you’re not going to call me by my name, at least shake my hand. If we’re going to die together, I don’t want to die with a stranger.”

I hold my hand out for him to shake. He takes hold of it, brings it to his face, and sniffs. I feel a tingle of excitement as his warm hand grasps me, but I pull back in fear.

His eyes widen, and I see movement out of the corner of my eye. I look down to see his big teal cock twitching and expanding.

“Jesus!” I shout, and swear my face must be on fire by this point.

“I’m excited by your scent,” he says. “You’re not even in heat...yet you’re wet?”

How the hell does he know I’m...shit! I am wet. He’s naked and towering in front of me, and his muscles are glistening from the liquid he was floating in. His own scent is masculine and overpowering, and now his big teal cock is growing longer and wider!

“Interesting,” he says,. “Perhaps I’ll keep you.”

“Keep me?” I shout.

“They’re hacking into the airlock,” Seth says. “Their computer is stronger than me. I can’t hold them off for long.”

“Are these good fighters?” Cygnus asks me.

“They’re pirates,” I respond. “They usually know how to fight. I have a gun down in my sleeping quarters. Do you know how to use a gun? Or should I keep it?”

He laughs. “A female with a gun? I’m one of the greatest warriors in our fleet, and I am master of any weapon.”

“Okay,” I say. “Follow me, and I’ll give you the gun.”

He jumps off the wall and disappears back into his pod.

“What are you doing?” I shout after him.

A few moments pass before he floats back out of the pod, holding a blood-soaked blade and a small black box.

“My equipment,” he says.

I look down at the equipment he’s holding in his hands, and then I look further down, at his….equipment. He’s still semi-hard, and I catch myself licking my lips.

“Would you like to hold it?” Cygnus asks.

My face burns hotter than the sun, and my eyes bulge.

“I...I….”

He holds out the box, and I let out a nervous giggle.

“Oh,” I say. “Sure.”

I take the box from him, and then he leaps off the wall and catches the ladder. “I will find the gun.”

He disappears up the ladder.

Just before I jump off the wall to follow Cygnus, gravity comes back, but in the wrong direction. Now that the Zephyr has been secured within the cargo bay of the pirates’ ship, they’re accelerating with us trapped inside. They seem to have mounted my ship within their cargo bay so that it’s positioned sideways, so that the side walls of our ship have become the ceiling and floor.

I stand back up and walk through the greenhouse of our ship. All the hydroponic equipment is hanging on the sides of the walls now, and I have to walk across what is usually the ceiling to get through. The ladder is still cutting through the ship as usual, except now it resembles jungle gym bars. I have to jump up to grab hold of it, and then move my arms swinging from bar to bar just to get from the greenhouse to my quarters.

When I reach my sleeping quarters, I see all my drawers are pulled open and Cygnus is holding up a pair of my lace panties.

He holds the panties up to his face and then sniffs.

“We’ve watched your broadcasts for decades,” he says. “It’s how I learned your language. But I never would have thought you’d have such an intoxicating scent. Do all human females smell like this?”

“Put that away!” I snap. “You can’t just go through a woman’s underwear drawer!”

“I see,” he says. “I will put it away then.”

He snatches the box out of my hand, touches my panties to the box, and they are somehow sucked inside it.

“I didn’t mean….” I start to say, but then realize we’ll both probably be dead before he can sniff them again anyway.

I shove past him toward the drawer containing the gun. It’s shifted so that it’s on the side of the wall now, and I have to reach up on my tippy toes and stick my ass out to reach it.

As I’m halfway toward reaching the gun, I realize I’m pressed up against Cygnus’ body. My ass is pushing into his muscular thigh, and his body heat is radiating over me like a warm blanket.

I hurriedly grab the gun and then snap myself back up in an effort to move away from him. Now I’m standing just inches away from him, and he’s smiling at me, sniffing away. His eyes narrow as he sniffs, and that frustrating grin comes back.

I back up, somewhat reluctantly, and wave my hands in front of his face in frustration. “You can’t just...just...sniff people like that!”

“But I enjoy your scent,” he says in a tone that seems to question why I think his actions should be taken as anything but a compliment. His eyes turn serious. “Wait, I hear the hatch opening. Intruders. Should I go kill them?”

“Yes,” Seth says. “Please kill all of the intruders, Mr. Cygnus.”

“If I kill them all,” Cygnus says, “can you take me to the red planet?”

“Yes,” Seth and I both reply in unison.

“Good,” he says. “Then you will see what a Marauder warrior can truly do. Perhaps after you see, you’ll allow me to smell you more closely.”

I grit my teeth, but if smelling me will help him to fight better…

“Yes,” I say. “If you truly impress me with your fighting skills, you can smell me all you want.”

The smile on his face is the widest I’ve seen since first meeting him. I notice his teeth are perfectly white and quite human-looking, and his ears stand up perfectly straight when he smiles.

As he cocks the gun, I realize I haven’t told him how to operate the weapon. Even though there are a number of safety switches, he disengages all of them without hesitation. It causes me to wonder where he learned how to use a gun.

“You stay here, human female,” he says. “I will fight for you.”

He jumps through the hole in the wall into the greenhouse, and moments later I see him leap again into the cargo bay.

I stand alone in my sleeping quarters for a minute, fuming. I told him my name, why can’t he just use it?

I hear gunfire, and then a man screams. Seconds later, I see a gun hit the ladder in front of me. It bounces off and clatters to the ground. It’s not my gun. Cygnus must have killed a pirate breaking into the airlock, and it’s his gun that had fallen down the ladder.

It’s then I notice the bloodied blade laying on the ground. There could be dozens of pirates, but my gun only has twenty bullets.

“Cygnus!” I shout through the ship. “You forgot your knife! I’m bringing it to you. You might need backup!”

“Do not shame me, human female!”

“All right,” I mutter to myself. “That’s the last straw. I’ll shame him, all right.”

I put the knife into my belt and race toward the cargo bay.

4 Cygnus

I laugh at the thought of the female fighting alongside me. I’ve killed two males already just as they entered the airlock, and they’ve left it open. I do not want to give them time to plan, so I lunge through the air and out of the female’s ship with my gun held up and ready to fire.

As I fly through the air, I see four pirates surrounding the airlock door. They’re close to me, but are unprepared for my advance.

I take reflexive shots, and before I even land, I’ve shot two of them dead.

The remaining two aim their weapons at me sluggishly, so I hit the ground and roll.

Firing again as I’m rolling, one of my bullets blows a hole in the third pirate’s face.

The fourth pirate gets one shot off, and I hear the bullet ping on the metal floor a full Marauder’s span from me. I break hard from my roll, raise the gun, and fire, hitting him right in the heart.

I begin to survey my surroundings even as the fourth pirate falls. The cargo hold we’ve been pulled into is enormous, and there are smaller bay doors all around me. The female’s ship seems to be secured in a corner of the bay. On the wall behind me is a ladder, which leads quite high up. I wasn’t able to see this ship from the outside, but judging by the direction of acceleration, I assume the cargo bay is on the bottom of the ship. The ladders will likely lead up toward the main parts of the ship, which will hold all the men that I must kill to convince the female to help me get to the red planet.

The female runs past me, grabs one of the fallen pirate’s guns, and holds it up as if she’s preparing to fight.

“Cygnus, it looks clear, but more are probably coming.” she says, moving back toward me, her gun still held up high.

Where did she learn to mock a male soldier’s movements so accurately?

Rage bubbles up from deep in my gut that she would shame me like this, but I suppress it—for now.

“Get back in the ship, female!” I shout to her.

I let my inner bear rise up, and my hearing becomes more acute.

I hear a hiss from one of the bay doors to my right. I spin toward it and raise the gun, and the moment it opens, I fire a bullet through the small gap. I hold the gun there, waiting. I hear my own heart beating, and the female’s, as well.

Suddenly, I hear another clatter to the left. It’s hundreds of meters away, but the bear’s hearing is impressive. I spin toward the source of the sound, and pop off a shot before I can even see the target.

My sight catches up to my hearing, and I see a man falling with his hands holding his gut.

“Wow,” the female says from behind me. “You certainly weren’t lying when you said you’re good with weapons. You hit them before I even knew they were coming.”

I hold the gun ready to shoot again. I listen, but it’s silent aside from the female’s heavy breathing behind me.

I feel a gentle warmth on my back. It’s the female’s hand, and her skin...it’s impossibly soft. Marauders have calloused hands, but the touch from this human female’s palm is softer than the finest fabrics of Sanftar.

“Cygnus,” she says. “Now that we’re in the hangar, I got Seth to scan the ship’s layout. I can take us to an access point.”

I turn back to face her and shout, “Give me the map, woman, and I will access the point!”

I furrow my brows at her, shake my ears, and frown deeply. Perhaps I can scare her back to safety.

Her face scrunches up in a perplexing formation. I can’t quite figure out what it means.

She stifles a laugh.

“First you shame debt me,” I say. “And now you insult me?”

“The map is on my HUD,” she says. “I have lenses grafted to my eyes that link to the ship’s computer. Do you know how I can get that map onto your eyeballs?” She glares at me, with a daring question in her eyes.

I shake my ears profusely, and then narrow my eyes at the infuriating female. “Tell me the way, and I will go there.”

“Okay,” she says. “I’ll do that, but on one condition.”

“Speak,” I say. I’m tired of arguing with her. She seems hell-bent on endangering herself and shaming me, as well.

“When you reach...the point...how will you access it? What’s the plan?”

I’ve learned their language from Sol broadcasts, but perhaps I’ve overestimated my own abilities.

“I will point my gun at it,” I say, shaking the gun. “And gain access...through brute force!”

“The access point is a computer, Cygnus. I have to get Seth in there, and he can open the hangar door. Only I can get Seth in there, you can’t interface with him. Do you understand?”

“You insult my intelligence,” I growl. “I understand perfectly.” I don’t understand what she means, but no human female can talk down to me.

I grab her by the wrist and begin to march her back to the airlock. She resists, but my strength is far greater than hers, which further proves my point: I’m in charge.

I get her back into the airlock, and she begins hitting my chest. My penis starts to twitch and, to my amazement, it begins to vibrate.

Impossible! A penis can only vibrate when in the presence of a true lifemate. This woman is just…just what? She’s just a human female, isn’t she?

I look at her more closely. Her facial features are—at best—a 2.5-point deviation from the ideal Seraphic Form, which all Marauders must venerate in their breeding partners.

“Freckles,” I say, studying her face. They are imperfect...but they draw me in, and I don’t know why. Perhaps it’s my inner bear corrupting the purity of my Marauder DNA.”

“What?” the female spouts, but she stops hitting me.

I notice, too, that she has shifted her gaze and she is now looking down at my engorged and vibrating penis.

I make another realization: her face reddens more when she is angry, and seeing her angry pleases me.

I smile.

5 Aura

“Freckles,” he says, completely out of nowhere.

“What?” I say. Why did I stop hitting him again? This insufferable bastard alien is….

Smiling. Again. Smiling at me.

My mouth drops open, and I look up at his obnoxiously charming smile and piercing green eyes.

“I was thinking,” he says, “that your eyes are several millimeters too far apart and your facial structure is too far deviated from the Seraphic Form. However, I was taken by your freckles...which should be a flaw. But on you...they are not.”

The blood rushes to my face flushing it in blind rage. Did he seriously just say my eyes were too many millimeters apart?

He turns his back to me and, without warning, he slams the airlock shut in my face.

I hear metal scraping, and when I try to turn the latch, I find it’s been jammed from the outside.

“Shit!” I yell, even if it’s only to myself. Trapped in my own damn ship.

Wait. Did he also just say that he...liked my freckles? And...his inner bear? Was he insane, or was he using the wrong words? He was speaking with a strange accent, and it was clear that Solarian was not his first language. In many dialects of Solarian, the slang term for ‘penis’ often references animals. Birds are popular, dragons, snakes...but bears? Maybe since his ears were bear-like, he called his dick his bear? But how would his dick force him to like my freckles?

I kick the hatch with my boot. “Seth! Help me open the door!”

“Deploying drones,” Seth says. “Please be patient.”

I point the gun up to the ceiling—no, the wall, which is now the ceiling—as if threatening to shoot Seth. “Don’t tell me to be patient! I’m pretty tired of men bossing me around.”

“I can be a woman,” Seth says, his voice turning completely feminine. “If you’d like.”

“I’d like you to unjam the door!” I say, shaking the gun at him.

I jiggle the handle. It clatters with each attempt, but nothing budges.

While I wait for Seth’s drones to do their work, the acceleration dies off, and I’m back in zero-g.

Finally, after what feels like hours, I hear a sliding sound, and when I try the hatch handle again, it opens right up.

“Our purple friend jammed a rifle through the handle,” Seth says. “Perhaps he is right, however, and it’s best for you to remain in the ship, if—”

“Not you too, Seth,” I say, floating through the hatch and into the pirates’ cargo bay.

“Sorry, Aura, whatever you think is best.”

As if in apology, a route draws itself across the map, and Seth starts explaining as I follow the route.

“This is the most likely way he’ll go because it’s the most straightforward and brutish approach” Seth says. “. I expect he’ll walk right past the access point, and I also expect there will be an army of pirates...here.” He points to a small hallway that flashes red on my map.

“Chokepoint,” I say. “Well, he seems well-versed in battle tactics, maybe he can figure it out. Good luck to him.”

I follow the map, and there’s a blood-splattered door open along Seth’s route. Seth was right, Cygnus went this way. I see a body floating through the hall, and I maneuver around it. When I reach the door to the access point, I find that it’s unlocked.

“Sloppy,” I say.

I run in and I find the access point. It’s a big black tower of computers covered with a variety of old-fashioned ports.

“Shit,” I say. “It’s ancient.”

“Sometimes obsolete equipment is the best security measure,” Seth says.

“That doesn’t help me,” I say.

“Check the dead pirate in the hallway,” Seth says.

I go cautiously back into the hallway and gently prod the floating body with my boot. It rotates slowly around, and when I see computer keys jangling on his belt, I carefully try to unhook them without touching the body itself.

I go back to the computer and try the first key. Seth tries to stop me, but it’s too late.

An alarm starts wailing the moment I insert the key..

“Okay,” I say. “So not that one.”

I try the keys, one after another. One brings up weapons systems, one brings up climate control, and finally, I find a key that controls the airlocks, hatches, and most importantly — the hangar doors.

I set the main hangar door to the unlocked position, and Seth confirms he can open it at any time. Then, for good measure, I unlock all the doors and airlocks, which gives Seth some serious control.

“Get back to the ship, Aura,” he says. “I don’t know how long it will remain unlocked. If their captain notices you’ve hacked in, he may be able to re-lock it.”

I nod, pull the keys out and keep them—just in case. When I get into the hall, I grasp hold of one of the handrails and prepare to propel myself into the main hangar and back toward the Zephyr. I hold tight to the handrail. The sweat on my palms feels cold against the metal.

“Aura!” Seth says. “Come on!”

“Cygnus!” I say, in what sounds to me like a panicked voice. “I can’t leave him here, can I?”

Seth makes a scoffing sound. “If you, human female, went to help him, you’d positively shame him! How dare you consider shaming him and making him lose so much face.”

I draw in a deep breath and hold it. I think it through carefully and realize that the best and smartest thing to do is turn tail and run before I die on a pirate ship. It’s the smartest thing to do...but it’s still shitty. I exhale, turn back around, and propel myself deeper down the hall, following Cygnus’ trail of floating pirate bodies.

“Aura…,” Seth whines, but I ignore him. He’s just a computer, and Cygnus is...insufferable? An asshole? Yes, he is those things, but he also saved my life. I try to imagine how long I’d have lasted holed up in the Zephyr with that one pistol and some scrapping drones to guard me while dozens of pirates flooded in to kill me. Cygnus saved me, and I couldn’t live with myself if I just abandoned him.

“This door will take you into the spine,” Seth says, stopping beside the door.

I open the door and see the spine. It’s lined with ladders and handrails. There are doors all along the spine. Having seen the ship from the outside, I know that all the doors will lead to spokes of rotating rooms. These rooms will be able to simulate gravity even when the ship isn’t under acceleration. Most of the ship will be comprised of rooms like this, and when the ship is accelerating, they can just kill the rotation.

Seth overlays directions onto my HUD. I follow them.

I kick off from one of the rungs and float down the spine until I hit the wall. I push off the wall and propel further and further down the spine, bouncing back and forth against the wall as I go. It takes me three or four minutes to get all the way down, as the ship is huge. At the end of the spine, I reach a computerized door.

“Can you open it?” I ask.

I know that the main command room is beyond this door. It’s at the front of the ship, and it’s where Cygnus would go.

“Opening on three,” Seth says. “3, 2, 1….”

The door opens, and I can’t believe what I see.

There are hundreds of dead and eviscerated bodies floating all over the command room, and floating orbs of blood float alongside the bodies.

The command room is the size of a hotel lobby, and there’s a bear floating through the air. Not just any bear, though. No. It’s a purple fucking bear, and its fur is blood-caked. It’s flying toward a man who is holding tightly to a handrail on the wall. The man has a knife, and he kicks off the wall to lunge toward the bear.

Just as he’s in range to slash at the bear with his knife, the bear transforms into Cygnus.

Cygnus grabs the man’s wrist, bends his arm back, and jams the knife deep into the man’s back. He kicks off the writhing body to propel himself through the air and toward the wall. He hits the wall and clasps one of the handrails with his free hand.

“Female!” he shouts to me. “You shouldn’t be here!”

“He’s still calling you female,” Seth says. “Do you regret going back for him yet?”

I roll my eyes, but my heart beats hard when I see Cygnus once again.

“I defeated all of them,” Cygnus says matter-of-factly. “There were only a few of them when I came in here, but dozens more flooded in. I killed every last one. Though I think their leader has fled.”

“Why do you say that?” I ask.

Cygnus is pulling his way down the handrails, getting closer and closer to me. I can’t help but stare at his big teal dick floating gloriously in zero-g. And his biceps bulge enticingly as he moves hand over hand across the walls.

“No one fought well enough,” Cygnus says. “No one was strong enough to merit being a captain of this ship.”

I laugh. “I think you’re going to find that humans are weaker than...whatever it is you are. You know that we also cannot transform into bears? When were you planning on mentioning that little detail?”

“I told you,” he says. “Before I shut the airlock in your face.”

His bear. Oh.

“Okay,” I say. “But I think you’ll need to explain it to me a tiny bit better than that when we have some time.”

“I’ve killed every last pirate,” Cygnus says. “I have fought back the shame debt you have brought onto me. You may now access the point.”

The shame I brought onto him? The nerve! I could have left his ass behind to pilot this big pirate ship on his own, which is probably impossible for such a brute to handle.

“In our culture, you can thank me for helping you,” I say. “It goes over a lot better than blaming me.”

“Thank you?” Cygnus says, finally pulling himself up so he’s positioned right next to me and by the open door to the spine. “Never has a woman put me so deep into shame debt! You’re lucky I’m powerful enough to have paid it back. No, I’ll not be thanking you. Now come!”

He grabs me by the waist, and before I can say a word, he jerks the ladder and whips us down into the spine.

Unlike my previous attempt to propel through where I hit the wall a dozen times, we glide through perfectly straight. When my surprise dies down, I realize that Cygnus is holding me tightly his body. His muscles are hard, and his body is warm against me. His muscular arm is wrapped tight and solid around my waist, which feels positively miniscule in his giant hands. And I can feel his dick pressed into my back. It’s hot and thick and big. And it’s...vibrating?

Before I can confirm that his teal alien cock is indeed vibrating, we hit the end of the spine.

The ship rumbles, and my stomach churns. We’re pulled down to the ground. The ship is accelerating again, which means we’ll have to climb all the way down to the Zephyr rather than just floating.

“Follow me, female,” he says. “Their captain must still live; he is controlling the ship.”

I follow him down the ladder. I can see the Zephyr way down on the ground. It looks like a small speck from this height.

Cygnus looks up at me as he climbs down. “My ammunition was depleted when I killed two dozen men,” he says. “Give me your gun.”

“Fine,” I sputter. “I get it, you’re just so amazing with a gun, and your bear claws, and whatever else you can get your hands on. Here!”

I tug on the shoulder strap and dangle the gun down toward him. He rips it out of my hand and straps it to his back before continuing down the ladder.

“When you ask for something,” I say, “and the person does it for you, you say ‘thank you.’ Maybe you can practice?”

“I asked for nothing,” he says nonchalantly. “I ordered, and you obeyed.”

“Regret it yet?” Seth asked in a smirking voice.

I roll my eyes and keep climbing down.

Cygnus reaches the ground. I wonder as I go down the last few rungs if he’s going to reach out his hand and help me down like a gentleman, or if—

Before I can finish my thought, he grabs me by my waist with both hands, tears me off the ladder, and then plops me down onto my feet. He looks me right in the eyes, wiggles his ears, and turns his back to me.

I look down at his perfectly sculpted purple ass, and I give up trying to figure out what the hell he is trying to do with me. I could almost swear he’s intentionally trying to piss me off, but that assumes a certain level of self-awareness or humor on Cygnus’ part. I’m convinced the man— or the alien—has no sense of humor.

“Ah,” Seth says. “Cygnus did not kill everyone, and he was right about the captain. Incoming.”

As we near the Zephyr, one of the bay doors begins to slide open.

Cygnus pulls the gun off his back and points it toward the door.

Just as I’m about to tell him what Seth said, he grabs me with one hand and tosses me over his shoulder.

“Hold on,” he says.

His arm is holding me tight to his body, but I swing myself around so that I’m clasping to him piggyback style. My legs wrap around his muscular back as he begins to run toward the Zephyr.

His left arm reaches back to hold me secure as his giant, seven-foot strides jostle me up and down. He continues holding the gun in his right hand pointing it toward the rising bay door.

I can barely see anything considering how much I’m bouncing up and down, but it looks like there’s some kind of robot standing in the bay. I can make out mechanical legs.

Cygnus fires a few shots, and I look up toward where we are going. I’m surprised that we are only about fifty meters from my ship. Cygnus runs fast.

Just as we’re close to the airlock, I hear bullets whizz past us. Cygnus opens fire.

When I look up, I see a giant robotic exoskeleton. In the center is a man holding a gun. He’s suspended by tangling hydraulics within the exoskeleton like a small insect caught in a spider’s web.

His gun flashes, and Cygnus runs faster.

I hear hot lead plinking on the metal floor below us, and bullets continue whizzing past us. I’m tucked with most of my body behind Cygnus, grasping his back, but I worry he might get hit.

He reaches the airlock, throws me inside, and slams it in my face. Again.

6 Cygnus

I throw the difficult female back into her ship, and shut the door. The primitive ammo is exhausted so I jam the gun into the handle once again to lock her inside..

One of the suited man’s bullets has hit me in the arm, so I take cover behind the female’s ship to assess the damage.

There’s an exit wound, so the bullet went cleanly through. I attempt to rotate my arm in a circle, slowly, to test for pain.

Explosive pain tears through my body when I raise my arm. I ignore the pain and press on, but the arm goes numb and falls limply to my side.

It’s my left arm that got hit. The most useless of the two. I should be able to beat any human with just one arm. The man’s robotic suit looks almost as primitive as the ballistic weapon.

Suddenly a number of robotic drones launch from the female’s ship, immediately opening fire on the man in the suit.

A speaker broadcasts a message from the ship in the female’s voice. “Don’t worry, Cygnus, the computer is controlling the drones. There’s no shame debt in that!”

An excuse! The woman controls the computer. This brings me shame debt indeed!

I throw the empty gun to the ground and remove one of the odd knife blades I took off a pirate’s body. It has a soft grip, made for weak and tiny hands. It’s awkward in my large hand, but I’ve yet to find a weapon or combat style I could not quickly master.

I rush forward, and my shame debt increases as I see the suited man firing at the female-controlled drones.

The suited man has cleared half the distance from the bay to the female’s ship, but I’m on him in seconds.

He tries to swing the gun toward me, but I grab the barrel and tear it from his hands.

“Cygnus!” the drones shout. It’s the computer’s voice. “Move aside, I have a clear shot!”

I take the suited man’s gun and throw it with my full power at the drone. It hits one of the drones in its whirring blades, and the drone crashes uselessly to the ground.

I spin back around and go in to gut-punch the pirate. I need to beat him bloody before I stab him if I’m to clear all my shame debt.

“Cygnus!” the one remaining drone shouts. “Move!”

I ignore it. If the female-controlled drone kills the pirate captain, I’ll have more debt than I could clear in a lifetime.

The exoskeleton squeezes my wrist. And I try to fight it.

It’s powered by a primitive system of tubes full of pressurized fluids, and though it’s not an advanced technology, it gives the man enough strength to be my equal.

I flex all the muscles in my body against the robotic arm, and the man inside starts laughing.

“You’re something!” he says. “I don’t know what the bloody fuck you are, but I know you’ll make me rich!”

He’s strapped into some kind of cage, and if I can just free my arm, I’ll be able to punch him. After I’ve punched him unconscious, stabbing him for the kill will end my shame.

My arm and the exoskeleton reach a draw, but then the other robotic arm reaches up and squeezes my waist.

It begins to pry me off, and with only one good arm and no purchase with my feet, there’s little I can do to fight back.

I can’t die while still so deeply shamed. I can’t die with my brother stuck on the red planet. And...I can’t leave the human female—Aura—alone.

I roar, and my animal strength rises up.

I surrender control, and I shift. The knife clatters to the ground, but my claws are longer and sharper.

My bear arm pushes against the exoskeleton, and the man inside laughs maniacally.

“So much fucking money!” he cackles. “I’ll never let you go!”

I hear the drone whirring behind me. It must be trying to angle for a clear shot, but I’ll not allow that.

The man stops laughing, and his face is red and dripping sweat. The cage that covers him like a web does not have a large enough opening for my head to get in and bite him, but if I can free my arm….

I see another drone—a wheeled one—race behind the exoskeleton.

In bear form, I’m not able to command the female to stand down her robots, but this wheeled drone looks like some kind of repair bot rather than a combat model.

The exoskeleton begins squeezing my arm. I’ve almost freed myself from its grasp, but now it’s just going to shatter my bones.

The bot wheels right up next to the exoskeleton, and a circular buzzsaw protrudes out of its side. The buzzsaw rubs up against one of the hoses on the exoskeleton’s arm. The hose breaks and fluid starts seeping everywhere.

I feel all the force against my arm drop, and I pull it free.

I roar so loudly that I see my spit cover the pirate’s face. And soon my arm has reached through the bars of the cage.

As I slash at him, the captain pulls something from a holster. Just as I feel my claws making contact against his skin, electricity surges through me, and everything fades to black.

7 Aura

I order the drone to cut the hydraulic hose, and the arm drops. Fuck Cygnus’ shame debt, if I let him fight with his masculine pride intact, he’ll die.

The moment the exoskeleton’s arm drops, Cygnus the bear’s—I still can’t believe he is able to transform into a bear—furry arm goes through the cage and claws the captain’s face.

I’m watching from the drones’ cameras, there’s still one in the air and one on the ground.

Cygnus slashes at the pirate, but suddenly he falls backward off the exoskeleton. He hits the ground, convulsing.

“Shit! Seth! What happened?”

“The pirate hit him with some kind of stun rod. High-voltage.”

I catch sight of the pirate’s face, covered in blood, but he’s laughing and waving the stun-rod in celebration.

The exoskeleton’s good arm reaches down and clasps Cygnus’ body, which is still breathing but no longer convulsing.

The pirate’s voice shouts out over a loudspeaker. “Here’s the deal. Let me keep this alien and you’re free to go. Normally you couldn’t trust such a deal, as I’d just hunt you down afterward...but seeing as my crew is all dead, I won’t be able to chase you down.”

“Take the deal,” Seth says.

“No,” I retort, panicked. “Cygnus fought to protect me, and I think I’m starting to understand shame debt. Imagine how much I’d have if I took this deal.”

“Aura,” Seth says. “There’s no such thing as shame debt. I can’t believe you’re seriously—”

“Seth!” I shriek. “Fire the grappling net and pull Cygnus back. Start diverting power to the mining laser.”

“The mining laser!” Seth says. “What the hell—”

“Don’t question me! Just do it!”

I pilot the flying drone to open fire onto the pirate captain. He jumps out of the exoskeleton and dives behind it for cover.

The grappling net launches, but misses Cygnus.

“Bring the repair drone around, get the net on him!”

Seth obeys, for once, without any banter.

I pilot the flying drone around the exoskeleton, and as there are barely any bullets left, I wait until I have a clear shot before firing.

The shot never comes, as the captain is able to move faster than the drone. He keeps the exoskeleton positioned between himself and the drone.

“Come closer!” he shouts, “You stupid bitch!”

I grit my teeth at him, but then realize he’s trying to taunt me into wasting the ammo I have left.

“Net is on Cygnus,” Seth says.

“Reel it in!” I shout.

The net begins to reel in, and I watch the captain grab a knife and run for the net.

I fire at him and see a bullet hit his leg, and then the drone runs out of ammo.

The captain collapses, but he’s still alive.

“Cygnus is on board,” Seth says.

The captain crawls and limps back to the exoskeleton, and then he climbs in.

He pilots it around toward the repair drone. He swings the leg into it, knocking it over. He stomps and crushes it before turning toward my ship.

“Shit!” I exclaim. “Open the hangar door!”

Seth obeys, and klaxons sound as the door begins to open.

The air rushes out of the hangar, and I apply just enough thrust to clear us of the hangar. I apply some micro-thrusts to re-orient the ship, and then I give a final thrust to propel the ship outside and down the pirate ship’s spine.

I watch the map as we move, and when we reach the reactor room, I shoot just enough reverse thrust to stop us.

“All right,” I say. “Give me mining laser control.”

A reticle appears in my vision, and I guide it with my mind.

I overlay the data from our internal scans and point the reticle right on the fat center of the pirate ship’s tokamak fusion reactor. I let loose with the mining laser, and it slowly bores through the thick hull.

“I need to kill him!”

It’s Cygnus’s voice, and he’s floating into the cockpit behind me.

“I don’t care about your shame debt right now, Cygnus,” I say, sounding irate but feeling immense relief at the sight of him.

He flicks his ears at me, and I shake my head.

“Fine!” I say. “Weapon master, take my seat. Point this mining laser at the reactor.”

I rip the harness straps off and push out of the chair. “Come on!”

Cygnus pulls himself into the chair and studies the screen.

“Give him manual control, Seth,” I order.

“But Aura—”

“Do it!” I say.

The control console lights up, and a joystick pops out.

“Use that to keep the mining laser on target,” I say, pointing to the stick.

Cygnus grins and adjusts the mining laser slightly, then directs it back on target.

I roll my eyes. In all likelihood, the pirate commander died when the air was sucked out of the hangar. The only reason I’m bothering to disable the reactor is in case some scouting ships return to the main ship. I don’t need another pirate declaring himself captain and coming after us.

But, if I can convince Cygnus that he delivered the killing blow, then all the better.

“Our primitive ships run on fusion power,” I say. “Once your laser cuts through the hull, it will start burning through the tokamak. It’s a big sphere that holds superheated plasma with powerful magnets. Once you poke a hole in that containment system, the reactor won’t be able to run. The ship will go dead.”

Cygnus looks back to face me and scowls. “It will shut off life support?”

“Yes,” I lie.

A ship of that size surely has backup systems and emergency life support. Killing the reactor will cripple its movement, but not shut off life support.

We watch the screen together, and we see air begin to seep through the hole.

“I’ve broken through the hull,” Cygnus says.

“Seth,” I say. “Zoom in.”

The screen zooms in, and we see the big tokamak itself. The laser is melting the metal exterior. I watch with my fingers crossed, and then watch as the laser cuts all the way through.

For a moment, the plasma from inside is a brilliant glow shining through the pinprick hole, but soon the magnetic field fails and the plasma starts shooting out. It melts the entire half of the tokamak, and then the vacuum sucks all the plasma out into space.

“The lights on the ship aren’t shutting down,” Cygnus says, turning to face me.

“It will take a few hours for all the power to die off,” I say. “You’ve killed every last member of their crew, you’ve killed their captain, and now you’ve single-handedly disabled the entire ship.”

“I still feel there is some shame debt,” he says.

“Okay,” I say. “Feel whatever you want, but it’s time for you to get out of the chair.”

“I should pilot the ship,” he says.

“Okay,” I respond. “Fine, tell Seth where you want to go.”

“Computer Seth,” Cygnus says. “Take us to the red planet.”

“Aura,” Seth says. “Are you—”

“Listen to Cygnus,” I say, cutting him off.

“Very well,” Seth responds. “I’m reorienting the ship and plotting a course, prepare for acceleration burn in two minutes.”

“Now come with me, please,” I say to Cygnus.

I decide to be excessively polite to him, hoping that it might—just possibly—rub off on him.

“Where are we going?” Cygnus asks.

“We’re going to go sit down in the kitchen, get something to eat, and you’re going to tell me everything.”

8 Cygnus

“Here,” the female says. “Put this on.”

I’m in her kitchen now, and we are accelerating toward the red planet. Toward my brother.

But this thing she’s thrown to me is some white piece of cloth.

“Put it on?” I ask, examining it.

“It’s a bathrobe,” she says. “It’s all I have that will fit you.”

“Why must I clothe myself?” I ask.

“Because,” she says, simply. “People don’t just walk around naked here. Don’t you ever wear clothes?”

“Of course,” I say, and I reach for the black supply box. “But only in combat.”

I open the box and the scent of her panties fills the room. I angle the box away from her so that she cannot see. I don’t want to anger her right now, but I also don’t want to give up her panties. It’s best if she can forget I’ve taken them.

I remove the bio-suit. It’s folded up into a small sphere, barely larger than the tip of my thumb. My scouting pod used up every last bit of biofuel to stop and orbit the asteroid belt. There’s not biofuel left to power the suit.

I hold the black sphere between my thumb and index finger and raise it up so that she can see.

“My bio-suit,” I say, showing her the black sphere. “I depleted it entirely to shield myself from the anti-matter exhaust of the invasion fleet.”

“Um,” she says. “That looks like a marble. I don’t think you can wear that, so put on the robe.”

I press the suit onto my shoulder, and it transforms into a needle, injects itself into my shoulder, and fuses to my body. A small black sphere protrudes out.

“Oh,” she says, her eyes widening. “That’s creepy.”

“I require food,” I say. “To feed the suit.”

“Put on the robe,” she says. “I’ll make us something.”

“You’re quite insistent on me wearing this robe,” I say. “Are you repulsed by the sight of my body? You should know that I’m a near match for the Phyrian Form. Barely outside the margin of error, does that not please you?”

Her face turns red at that statement, and I realize I must have angered her once again. I’ve enjoyed watching her be angry, and I enjoy it again now, but I need her to cook for me, so I open the robe and pull it on.

I wrap it around myself, and find it’s quite warm and soft. The sleeves squeeze my biceps, and after tying the belt around my middle, it covers most of my waist. Fortunately, it’s short enough that my penis is able to hang free and unrestricted.

The female looks down at my penis protruding from the robe, and she blushes red once again. Is there no pleasing this woman?

“The suit requires extra food,” I say. “So you must cook four kilograms of food with high protein content!”

Her mouth begins to open, but she stops herself from saying anything. She raises a finger at me, pointing. She’s incredibly angry.

“Please!” I shout.

Her mouth drops open and her hand falls to her side. She nods, and her face loses its angry color.

This word, “please”, is a powerful word, I realize. I’ll need to make liberal use of it when commanding this female.

“Can you eat our food?” she asks me.

“Yes,” I say. “Our race is highly adaptable.”

“So tell me about your race,” she says, as she begins pulling food out of a refrigeration device. “I assume you’re part of the big fleet heading toward us?”

“Yes,” I say. “We call ourselves Marauders. We travel from star system to star system, asserting our dominance.”

“I see,” she says. “You know that you started a war here?”

I scoff at that. “When the Marauder fleet arrives, your petty squabbles will end, and you will breed with us.”

“Breed...with you?” she says, stopping what she was doing and turning to look at me.

“Why did you stop cooking,” I ask. “Continue!”

I almost forget the command word, and I shout it to make sure she hears. “Please!”

It doesn’t work this time.

“So, there’s a whole fleet of guys like you, and you’re coming here specifically to...breed with us?” she stammers.

“Not just males,” I say. “All of our race is coming. Your males will find our females highly desirable. With each generation, they are reaching ever closer to the Seraphic Form.”

She glances down at my penis, which is hanging quite far below the robe, and I decide to risk angering her.

“I see you looking at my penis,” I say, “Though it seems to anger you. The jumpsuit you are wearing hides your breasts and femininity. But I can smell you, and you are quite desirable, even if far from ideal. Is it possible that you’d want to breed with me, given the chance?”

“Take off the robe!” she hisses, her face redder than my birth star.

I remove the robe at once, even though she failed to use the “please” command word.

I throw it to the ground, and I feel my penis twitch and grow.

“Pick it back up!” she says, looking away from me and raising her hands to cover her eyes.

I pick the robe back up and wonder if I’ll be using it in some form of sexual play.

“Put it back on,” she says. “But use it to cover your bottom half instead of your top.”

“Ah,” I say. “You are displeased with my penis. It seems that after I find my brother, I’ll need to find a female who can handle my vigor.”

I wrap the robe around my midsection, but I find it stifling and awkward to have my penis restricted and confined like this.

She shakes her head and turns her back to me. She cracks open some form of egg, one after another, into a pan. I count six of them. Then she throws some higher protein food into a pan.

The smell hits me instantly, and my stomach churns. The biosuit is already sapping my strength, and I’m ravenously hungry. It’s enough to make my penis go flaccid and to forget briefly about my growing need to breed.

“Why are you and your brother ahead of the fleet?” she asks.

“It was foolish of me,” I say. “I’ve been an ideal Marauder all my life, but my brother is a religious man...though he kept that secret from me. I have great shame debt for not having seen his deception.”

“I see,” she says. “Well, not really.”

“Our race dominates all. We’re built for it. But there’s a cost. Were I to breed with you—”

Her face burns crimson again when I say this, so I correct my speech. “Or a human female that were willing, our offspring would be unable to breed with other Marauders or other humans.”

“So...the end of the line?” she asks. “Sterile offspring?”

“Only if our offspring remained here,” I say. “But they wouldn’t, they’d be strong, and they’d form their own fleet to take mates in another system. And so it goes on. From our earliest recorded history, it’s always been this way.”

She takes the pan off the heating mechanism, and I eye it while licking my lips. The moment she lets go of the pan, I grab the handle.

I take thick handfuls of the odd yellow eggs and throw them into my mouth. I swallow them with minimal chewing, and then grab a handful of the meat. I chew the meat and savor it, as flavorful and fatty grease floods my tongue and nose, and the crispy texture of the meat is unlike anything I’ve ever experienced.

“Make more of this,” I command. “Please!”

Her face distorts, and I wonder if she’s going to cry or shout, but instead she laughs.

I must have broken her, because she continues laughing. I put a hand on her shoulder and shake at her gently, but she keeps laughing, and tears stream down her cheeks.

Is she happy or sad? I cannot tell.

Then I realize I’ve consumed all the food and she’s not eaten anything.

“You will allow me to cook more of this delicious food,” I say. “Please!”

“Okay,” she manages to get out through her crying and laughing fit. “Okay, okay, I’d love to see you trying to cook. Go ahead.”

She sits down and her laughing fit begins to subside. She wipes the tears from her face with her sleeve.

My memory is good, and I repeat exactly the steps she followed while cooking. She stands back up and watches me with intensity as I pour the salt crystals onto the egg and flip the meat strips over at just the right time.

“You’re good with weapons, and with cooking,” she says. “I have to admit, I’m surprised.”

That releases me of more shame debt, though I don’t tell her this. I worry she’ll humor me in the future, so I suppress my smile and do my best not to show her my satisfaction.

I hand her the pan of meat. She takes it from me, but puts it back down on the heating mechanism.

“We use plates,” she says. “Let me show you. And silverware. At least when we’re accelerating. It’s trickier in zero-g.”

She brings out an array of complicated and unnecessary tools, all which accomplish the same thing as using my hands to eat out of the pan.

“I will not use these,” I say, grabbing the remaining meat strips into my hand. The greasy and protein-rich fat covers my palms, and I lick the fat off after I’ve thrown all the meat into my mouth.

She sighs and rolls her eyes. “One thing at a time, I guess. ‘Please’ is a good place to start.”

9 Aura

Just as I’m about to ask him about his brother again, Seth interrupts.

“Aura, ummm, a Mr. Scorpio has sent you a message.”

“Who is Scorpio?” I ask. “Do we know a Scorpio…?”

“It’s the pirate captain,” Seth says.

Cygnus smashes his fists into the table, then jolts to his feet. “We destroyed his life support! If he lives, we must go back and kill him!”

I put a hand on his shoulder and squeeze, but then I realize how good his muscular arm feels in my hand, so I blush and pull away.

“Relax, Cygnus,” I say. “Let’s play the message first.”

I’m anything but relaxed, and I honestly am afraid to play the message. Watching Cygnus shovel food into his face like a barbarian and seeing how much he enjoyed it had hugely lightened my mood. I’d been just ready to believe that we’d escaped death by a hairsbreadth, but now death had a name, and it was Scorpio.

“Play it,” I say, my stomach churning.

Scorpio’s face flashes onto the screen. Four horrid gashes are torn across his face. They are still bloody and swollen, and one of his eyes is gone. He’s not bothered to put in a prosthetic or even cover it up with something. It’s just a big gaping hole edged by a sagging eyelid.

“Hello, lovelies,” he says. “I just wanted to give the scrap queen a chance to get herself out of this mess. This will be my final fucking offer, so I’d recommend you think it over real hard. Put the alien into an escape pod and shoot him straight back. We’ll scoop him up and let you go. I was gonna’ pay you the first time I offered, but this time your payment is me not fucking killing you real nice and slow. I know you’re going to Mars, and judging by your record, you ain’t got the money to take sanctuary on the habitats. So, if you don’t do the smart thing, me and my boys will see you on the surface, and we’ll get the alien either way. Only difference is you’ll die on that rusty shithole of a planet. Scorpio, out!”

The screen shuts off and Cygnus roars, slamming the bacon pan onto the table with a loud bang. “We should have found his body! I’ve failed to protect you!”

Protect...me? That’s what this is about?

“Cygnus, we—”

“Put me in the escape pod!” he commands angrily. “All I need is a blade. I’ll cut through all of his new crew. You will be free, and after I kill them all and clear my debt of greatest shame, I will find my way to Mars and rescue my brother. Are Martian women suitable mates?”

“You’re not going on an escape pod,” I say flatly. “Scorpio’s not going to make the same mistake again. He knows how strong and powerful you are.” I hope flattery convinces him not to go. “There’s simply no way you’ll be able to tear through his whole crew again.”

Cygnus raises the pan and looks ready to slam it down again, so I grab his wrist and disarm him of the pan.

Still holding his wrist, I look into his eyes, trying to convey the foolishness of his plan . “Please, can you trust me?”

He tilts his head and his ears pull back, flattening against his head. “For a female,” he says, “you’re formidable. It’s a pity you are not willing to breed with me, as our offspring would make excellent Marauders.”

I shake my head and suppress a smile. “Cygnus,” I say. “This is kind of like a plate and silverware situation. Do you know what ‘subtlety’ means?”

“It means being weak,” he says.

“No,” I say. “Not exactly.”

He squints at me and his ears twitch.

“It means,” I say, “not grabbing all the bacon off of a hot pan and shoveling it into your face. It means not asking a woman point-blank if she is attracted to your penis and wants to ‘breed’ with you. You’re not a bad guy, but if you want to attract a human mate, you’ll need to learn to be a little bit more subtle.”

“So,” he says, “it’s an issue of protocol?”

“Yes,” I say. “Something like that.”

“I see,” he says. “So even though I am drawn to your breasts, and even though I find your freckles intoxicating, I should not say it without subtlety?”

“Yes,” I say, with a grin. “Exactly.”

His ears perk up and he starts to grin. “And,” he says, “drawing this to further conclusions, if you, for instance, were attracted to my penis and wanted to breed with me. Protocol would require you not to say it so frankly.”

My face burns red. I turn around to hide my embarrassment, but say nothing.

Even when this cocky alien is trying to be subtle, he’s blunt as a battering ram.

“I need to know,” I say, changing the topic. “What side are you on?”

“What do you mean?” he asks.

“Your race is invading us,” I say, “and it’s already started a war between Earth and the Mars-Venus Coalition.”

“I see,” he says. “You’ve seen me fight, and do you really think this war will matter when my entire race is here?”

“Did you brother want to warn us?” I ask. “I owe you a lot for saving me, I really do, but I owe it to humanity to warn them of your race’s intentions.”

“I don’t think warning them will do much,” Cygnus says. “Humanity can prepare all they like, we’ll still dominate them.”

“So what did your brother think?” I ask.

Cygnus looks down and gets quiet.

“You said he was religious,” I add, prompting him to continue.

“He believes that humans are different. That interbreeding with you will create the true Seraphic Form.”

“What does that mean?” I ask.

“It means Aegus believes that we would no longer need to be Marauders. That our offspring would be fertile without needing to invade a new system.”

“Oh,” I say. “So he wanted to come here early and...prove it?”

“Yes,” Cygnus answers. “But his pod crash-landed on Mars. I was able to scan just before falling into the belt. He didn’t have enough power or life support left to wake from hibernation.”

“If we could prove to the incoming fleet that humans could create the—uh—Seraphic Form, would it stop the invasion?” I ask.

“No,” Cygnus says. “It would change it, however. It would likely split the invasion into two camps. One side would want to peacefully co-exist with you, the other would want to eradicate you.”

I feel my stomach knot up, but I risk asking the question heavy on my mind. “Which side would you take?”

“That depends,” Cygnus says. “Do all human females have such nice freckles?” He grins wide and then says, “That was a subtle answer, yes?”

“Yes,” I say, eyes wide. “Very subtle.”

I lick my lips, and I’m not surprised to realize I’m blushing.

* * *

The trip to Mars from the belt takes about five days. I quickly realize that there’s not enough food for the seven-foot tall alien and the weird parasite suit thing he has attached to his arm. He offers to hibernate to conserve supplies, and I reluctantly agree.

He still has a bad knife and bullet wound, and he says that hibernation will help it heal more quickly.

I’ve been alone on the Zephyr for years now, and after having Cygnus’ company, it’s hard to give it up. He goes into the greenhouse to hibernate, where the carbon dioxide he gives off during hibernation will help feed the plants.

During the trip, I occasionally go up to the greenhouse to “look at the plants.” They are all hydroponic and their care is automated, so there’s no real need for me to check on them. I know I’m fooling myself, because every time I say I’m going up there to look at the plants, it’s really so I can look at Cygnus instead.

He wants to breed with me. Jesus. I’ve had guys sleep with me before, but none have ever wanted to breed with me. It sounds so much more primal, but I find that something about it turns me on.

Cygnus took his robe off to hibernate, and I can see his big teal cock looming over me every time I visit the greenhouse. I try not to look at it, because if the situations were reversed, I’d be intensely creeped out at the thought of him staring between my legs while I sleep. So, I just glance at it occasionally out of the corner of my eye, as if it were the sun.

Scorpio doesn’t send me any more messages, and Seth and I focus most of our scans behind us, looking for any ships in pursuit. We find nothing.

All of my Martian contacts are on the surface. None of the snooty orbitals would dare lower themselves to the level of buying scrap and junk from the asteroid belt.

If I had a way to contact my sister, I would. She could tell her superiors on Earth, and they might believe her. But she’s lost to me because of the war, and the difficulty of getting a message through to her unmonitored.

Ending the war would mean I could talk to my sister again, make sure she’s safe. I’m in a serious bind, though, because the one way I could get everyone to believe me and potentially end the war, is giving up Cygnus.

That’s not something I’m willing to do, even though it seems like the logical choice. But I can’t. And I won’t.

Seth helps me run all the computer models and decision trees, and we agree our best bet is to keep Cygnus under wraps while looking for support from my surface contacts. The main issue is that I’ve come back from my belt run empty-handed—aside from Cygnus—and I’ll have to rely on favors and sympathy instead of bartering. The Martian surface is a harsh place, and there’s little sympathy to ever be found there.

10 Cygnus

I awake from hibernation to a cold ship. It’s cold for me, which means it must be even colder to the weak female.

I unstrap myself from the harnesses and realize that we’re in zero-g. Could it mean we’re already in orbit around the red planet?

I grab the ladder and pull myself forward toward the cockpit.

When I reach it, I find the female clasping a shiny metal blanket all around her body.

“Update me on our status,” I say. “PLEASE!” I add loudly, after a brief pause.

“Shh!” she says, holding a finger to her full lips. “We have to be quiet!” she whispers.

I look around and realize all the lights are off. The only illumination is coming from Sol itself through the windows. I look out and see the red surface of Mars, Sol over its horizon.

“We’re here!” I say, forgetting to whisper.

“Shh!” the female makes that same sound again, this time in an angry tone. “We’ve gone dark. I’ve shut almost everything down to minimize our chance of being detected.”

“Why?” I ask.

“Someone is looking for me,” she says. “For us.”

“Who?”

“It could be someone Scorpio contacted to intercept us. I don’t know, but I barely managed to shake them.”

I move closer to the woman and notice her jaw is trembling. The blanket too is shaking, as her whole body must be freezing.

“You’ll die,” I say.

“We’ll die, too, if I turn the heat back on,” she says. “They’ll detect us and capture or kill us before we can slip away to the surface.”

“Then we abandon ship and go to the surface,” I suggest. “Before you freeze.”

“As soon as the dropship starts its re-entry burn, we’ll get snagged. It’s like a signal flare. We just have to wait them out.”

“I see,” I say, crossing my arms. “I have additional heat, however.”

She narrows her eyes at me. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t feel very cold, but you do. Hibernation has helped me retain a great deal of energy,” I say, moving closer to her. I float right next to her in her pilot’s seat. I lick my lips as I admire the freckles on her cheek and nose…like constellations of stars.

“I’m fine, Cygnus,” she says. “It’s not the first time I’ve gone dark and froze my ass off.”

I smile and pull at the blanket covering her. It opens up and I float inside, wrapping it closed around us both.

I see her eyes widen in surprise. I wrap my arms around her body and press myself snuggly against her.

“Extra warmth,” I say. “You see?”

She looks angry for a brief moment, but then her face softens, and I feel her small hands clasp around my back.

“Jesus,” she says. “You really are warm.”

Finally, I can feel her soft breasts, though the feeling is dampened through the thick fabric of her jumpsuit.

“And you are soft, human,” I say.

“Cygnus,” she says. “Can you call me Aura, just this once? PLEASE!” I include the loud, gruff command as added encouragement.

She evoked the full force of the command word, and though I feel it wrong to use her childless name, her eyes look fierce and serious, and I find myself unable to object.

“Aura,” I say. “I see you.”

11 Aura

He sees me. What does that mean? At least he finally called me by name. It seems that using his awkward shouting of “please” did the trick.

His body is pressing against me and I no longer feel numb. As the feeling comes back to my limbs, I crave more of his warmth. I want to get closer to him.

His cock is semi-hard and pressing into my stomach, but I can’t see it through the blanket. It’s the closest we’ve been to each other, and I realize I don’t want him to let go of me.

“That was subtle,” I say.

“What was?” he asks.

“The way you got your naked ass under this blanket with me. It was a subtle trick. You’re a quick learner.”

“No trick, female—Aura—I needed to protect you from freezing.”

“So you don’t want to be naked and pressed up against me like this?” I ask coyly.

I feel a vibration on my stomach.

“My penis is vibrating,” Cygnus says. “It seems to think you are my mate.”

I slide my hand across his back, around his waist, and then I reach down to grab hold of his giant teal dick.

His eyes widen in surprise as I grip his cock firmly in my right hand and drag my fingers up and down its length, smiling to myself as it starts vibrating and hardening in my hand.

“I’ve reconsidered,” Cygnus says in a thick voice, his green eyes boring darkly into mine.

“Yes?” I say, returning his gaze while I continue rubbing my thumb rhythmically up and down his thick and gloriously warm shaft.

“I think your eyes are just the correct distance apart. It suits your personality.”

“And I think your cheekbones are at just the right height,” I say, laughing. “And I think your big cock is just perfect.”

“So why did you want me to cover it?” he asks.

“Subtlety,” I say slyly and wink.

“Remove your clothes, woman,” he says.

He’s already forgotten to call me Aura, but in this context, I don’t mind.

We work together to remove my clothes, and the blanket floats away, as well. I’m not cold at all anymore.

I reach down to take hold of his cock again, which I see is fully erect now and vibrating slightly in my hand.

“Can you control that?” I ask, referring to the vibration.

“No,” he says. “It will increase with my pleasure.”

“Oh,” I say. “That’s good.”

He grins. “For your pleasure.”

“Yes,” I say. “I picked up on that.”

He grabs my breasts and squeezes lightly. And though his calloused hand is big and powerful, he fondles me with a light touch.

“We are not a subtle race,” he says. “But in the battle of sex, we understand the value of a light touch.”

He gently caresses my nipple, and I start to moan. His other hand runs along my waist, then dips down and squeezes my ass.

I tighten the grip of his cock in my hand, and I notice its vibrations increasing.

He grins, and his ears go back. He pulls me into him.

Our lips meet, and immediately his tongue seizes control. His mouth is warm, and though all of him is so rock hard, his tongue and lips are soft. I apply gentle pressure to massage his tongue with my own. I’m still in disbelief that I’m making out with an alien, but it feels too good and too right to consider stopping.

We’re floating through the cockpit, our bodies and tongues entangled.

I continue stroking his hard cock in a methodical rhythm, and he squeezes my nipple and ass in response.

I stifle another moan and pull away from his mouth. Without missing a beat, he moves his mouth’s attention down my throat and begins kissing and licking my neck, and then my collarbone. Slowly and steadily his path reaches my breasts.

I bend back and stick my chest out. Cygnus takes this as the invitation it was meant to be and pulls my breast up to his mouth. He circles his tongue in rings around my pointed nipple, and then his teeth nibble on me.

A shock jolts through me, and I feel my pussy getting wetter and wetter with each nibble.

I jerk his dick faster, hoping he’ll grow impatient and spread my legs, but he seems fixated on my breasts. He squeezes one and rubs it, while he devotes his full mouth to the other. It feels incredible, but as my wetness pools, I get more and more impatient. I start grinding my hips into him.

“Cygnus,” I plead. “Please.”

“Please what?” he says, “Does that word mean anything without an accompanying order?”

“Please,” I say again, and his ears wiggle in a way that I can’t help but interpret as smug and self-satisfied.

“I thought you’d want subtlety,” he says, and then his hand reaches down between my legs.

His fingers run against my outer mound, and I spread my legs wider in response.

His cock is vibrating intensely now, and I squeeze hold of it rather than stroking. I need to focus on what Cygnus’s fingers are doing to me.

They’re running up and down along my lips, trailing through my soaking moisture. His fingers trace near my clit, but they circle around it rather than touching it directly.

As I squeeze his dick tighter, I feel my hand slipping off as its vibrating becomes stronger.

“Is that precum?” I ask.

“What is that?” he asks.

“Like...some cum comes out before—”

“You dare accuse me of such a failure?” he says, obviously embarrassed, and he twists my nipple as punishment.

“It’s lubricant,” he says, as I squirm and moan from his touch. “What else would it be?”

“Your cock is self-lubricating?” I ask, in surprise. “Seriously?”

He seems to be done talking, and he plunges one of his fingers a centimeter or two inside my channel to explore my inner walls and wetness.

“Please,” I plead again.

“You’ve ordered me around enough,” he says. “I’m in charge now.”

He floats around behind me and pushes us off my pilot’s chair, propelling us both toward the wall.

“Hold on to the handrail,” he says.

I obey.

I hold tight to it, and Cygnus presses up against me. His cock slides between my thighs, pressing up against my outer lips, but it doesn’t enter inside me. The vibrations haven’t stopped, and even though his dick isn’t touching my clit and hasn’t entered me yet, the overwhelming sensations and anticipation causes me to moan loudly.

“Shh,” his voice whispers softly behind me. “The pirates will hear you.”

His dick is coming in at me from behind, and his fingers reach back down, this time making contact with my clit. At first, it’s the gentlest pressure, but that’s all I need.

I bite my lower lip and try not to make too much noise, and my palm is sweaty on the handrail. To think I’d been shivering from the cold before Cygnus joined me in the cockpit.

He bucks his hips against me. His big, thick, vibrating teal cock is vibrating up and down all along my soaked outer lips, but the angle is bringing him just shy of my clit. His fingers make up for it, rubbing my sensitive nub with increasing pressure.

I hold fast to the handrail with one hand, but with my free hand I reach down to cup his balls. There are only two of them, just like with a human male, but they’re incredibly warm to the touch.

“Why are they so—” I moan, suddenly unable to finish my question.

“Big? Fertile?” he asks.

“No,” I say. “Warm.”

“The vibration generates a lot of heat,” he says.

Right. Of course it does. I’m not a Marauder, but if I were, I worry that my impatience toward Cygnus would have put me in shame debt. I badly want to feel that self-lubricating, vibrating miracle cock inside of me...but I don’t dare ask him to rush things along a third time.

I close my eyes and enjoy every last bit of what is happening to me. It’s all too much, and I can only focus on one or two things at once: his glistening abs pressing into my back, his soaked and vibrating cock grinding up against my pussy, my tit being squeezed and pinched in his other hand, or his finger caressing my clit.

As he rubs my clit just right, the dilemma begins to solve itself. From his finger on my nub, I feel intense waves of pleasure surging up through me. It heightens all my senses. I can feel with increasing intensity how my pussy oozes all over his cock, and how his hard and sweaty muscles slide against my skin while he bucks his hips. And when he puts my ear in his mouth to lick and suck the lobe, I feel that, too. It’s as if my rising orgasm has given me the focus to feel everything all at once, to feel it all, and to not have to sacrifice any aspect of the beautiful things that Cygnus is doing to me.

I feel his body slide down, and before I can realize what’s happening, the wetness and warmth of his tongue is licking up my pussy.

“Your scent is impressive, woman,” he says.

I try to stifle the moan, but it comes out anyway.

He flips around and floats under me. I see his green eyes look up and his ears become fully erect. He grabs hold of my waist and ass, and pulls himself tight against me. His tongue presses into my clit, causing me to begin bucking involuntarily against him. It’s not subtle, but I can’t be both patient and subtle.

As I squirm against him, he closes his lips and sucks gently at my throbbing clit. Each time I buck my hips, we move together in zero-g, but I grip tight to the handrail and we remain anchored to the wall.

His tongue slides farther down and then into me. I gasp in surprise, and then squeal, as his tongue starts sliding further into me than I’d thought possible.

“Cygnus,” I gasp. “What the hell?”

He can’t answer me, of course, with his tongue sliding several inches into me. It writhes within me, and I hear him moaning and sucking. His lips are still pressed wet against my clit, and when I move against him, the friction causes me to writhe beneath him.

His tongue finds my g-spot and swells against it. I’m moaning, but then the moan is cut off as my throat catches. My body tenses and I lose my grip on the handrail as my orgasm consumes me.

We start to float through the room as I come, but Cygnus doesn’t let go of me. He’s fully in control, just how I like it.

As we near the other wall, he kicks it and we start to spin. I keep my eyes closed as my orgasm continues rocking through me. I open my eyes briefly, but the room is literally spinning, and I use every last bit of self-control to stop myself from screaming wildly and giving away our location to the pirates.

I cup my breasts and press my nipples together between my fingers as his tongue slides in and out of me. His finger reaches to my clit and he starts to rub it. The orgasm from my g-spot is heightened from the pressure of his warm and slick finger against my clit.

We hit another wall, and he grabs the handrail. I buck and writhe wildly as warm blasts of ecstasy flood through me, nearly numbing my senses. My toes spread apart, and I force myself to reach down and grab hold of his shoulders. I dig my nails into his purple skin as my orgasm shakes me to my core, taking full control of my senses.

I feel my wetness surging like a river, his tongue lapping it all up, and my thighs close tight around his head. I see his ears twitching erect beneath me, and his eyes are closed. A cold shock explodes in my chest, and I gasp. It burns warm like a summer day on Earth. That warmth fills my chest and heart, and my heart beats in sync with my clit. The warmth rushes up to my head and down my spine. It fills me up entirely. Unable to find the strength to moan, I grunt and bite my lip.

Drool trails from the corner of my mouth and floats through the air.

Cygnus’ tongue pulls out of me and attacks my clit. I feel the swollen nub beating like a second heart beneath his beautiful tongue. I buck against him as my orgasm fades.

I start trembling. The orgasm is fading to a beautiful afterglow, but the cold creeps back upon me already. There’s very little heat left in the ship. Any warmth I feel is coming from Cygnus.

Before I can say anything, he slides back up against me and wraps his arms around me. I feel his cock pressed against my back, vibrating steadily. The warmth comes back into me thanks to his embrace, and I let out a low, satisfied hum.

I turn around to face him. My body is still pressed tightly against him, but now I can see his face. I smile at him and run my fingers along the hard planes of his face.

“I would breed with you, Aura,” he says.

“Aww,” I say. “You called me Aura again.”

He furrows his brow and his ears pull back. “You asked me which side of my fleet I’d side with: those who would side with my brother and seek the Seraphim Form, or those who would eradicate your species.”

I lick my lips as I watch him speak. I think I know what he’s going to say, and it’s tempting to interrupt him, but I hold my tongue. I want to hear it from his mouth.

“You see,” he says. “I told you that I saw you. And now I’ve tasted you….”

Okay, this isn’t what I thought he would say.

“And though I’ve not yet filled you with my seed,” he says, “I know you. I will protect you and your race.”

I reach down and squeeze his cock; it’s still vibrating.

“Aura,” he says. “You mustn’t!”

“Why not?” I ask.

“I’m trying to clear my mind. You’ve come already. You must recover. I’ll not spill my seed outside of you.”

“So…,” I say. “I know I’m contradicting the hell out of myself by being so blunt, but why don’t you cum inside me then?”

He tilts his head at me and his ears pull back. “You’ve already orgasmed. We’ll need to wait until your next cycle. It will be difficult to wait, but I have honed my patience to a sharp blade.”

“Cygnus,” I say. “How did you learn about human women?”

“By the time your radio waves reached us,” he says, “they were greatly degraded. We were able to piece together much of the audio, but precious little full video. I’ve learned more in my short time with you here than my whole race knows from decades of radio waves.”

“Okay,” I say. “So you know that a woman can come multiple times? Like, there’s no real limit.”

His eyes bulge wider than I’ve ever seen and his ears perk all the way up. “It can’t...it can’t be.”

“Yes, it is,” I say. “Why not?”

“My brother was right…,” he says to himself. “Of all the species we’ve bred with, never have we encountered a female species that could come more than once per cycle...it’s a true miracle. It’s the Seraphim!”

“Okay,” I say. “I don’t mean to interrupt your religious experience here, but can you please put that teal cock into my holy pussy?”

I turn around, grasp the handrail, and bend over.

I feel him grab me, and his vibrating dick slides up against me. His dick is soaked with lube, and my pussy is still wet from my last orgasm.

He slides back and forth a few times, and just as I start to feel impatient, his head enters me.

I gasp, it’s warmer than I could have imagined, and the vibration is incredible. I’d never used a vibrating dildo before, because it felt...robotic and impersonal. But having a flesh and blood cock attached to a god of a man—or alien in this case—what a world of difference!

His rod is too big and thick at first, but the wet lube fills me as he slides in and out. He doesn’t enter deep, as just the head is already stretching me wide.

But with each entry, he works his way deeper inside of me, and I feel my own wetness combine with his. He stretches me wider and plunges deeper into me. The vibration seems to be helping things along, as his dick feels constantly in motion even when he holds still.

He grabs my breasts and pinches my nipples, and when I start to moan, he presses his hand over my mouth, stifling my cries.

I scream into his hand, and he drives deep down into me, going several inches at once.

It’s good that his hand is big and tight against my mouth, because I scream without abandon into it as his big teal dick fills me all the way up. I feel his balls slap against my skin as he penetrates me to full depth.

“Will you scream again if I let go?” he whispers.

I nod with his hand still pressed against my mouth, so he doesn’t release me. He’s protecting me from the pirates by not letting me scream and moan. It seems ridiculous, but I have to appreciate how much he’s taking charge of the situation. He’s an efficient multitasker: he can fuck me raw and keep me safe.

The vibration is hitting my g-spot, and I feel my inner walls squeezing and writhing all along his cock. He starts to thrust, pulling almost all the way out before hammering back deep inside me. I scream into his hand again and again as he pounds me. He grunts with exertion, but still keeps his voice relatively low.

The loudest thing in the cockpit is the sound of our skin slapping together wet and sweaty, soaked in cum and alien dick-lube.

Cygnus reaches around my waist and fingers my clit as his dick slides in and out of me.

He presses his lips against my neck as he fucks me, and I can feel his hot breath on the back of my neck. His breathing quickens as he rams in and out of me, and my own breath condenses humidity against his hand. I moan into his palm.

He slaps his free hand hard against my ass, spanking me, and the intensity of the slap surprises me. The pain flares up across my ass, burning hot.

“If you don’t stop screaming,” he whispers into my ear, “I’ll hit you again.”

I scream louder into his hand, wanting him to hit me.

He slaps me hard in the same spot, and plunges his cock deep inside.

The stinging pain dances across my nerves, and my adrenaline surges in response. I’ve never been spanked before and I’m surprised at just how much I like it.

I scream louder and Cygnus laughs.

“I see you, Aura,” he says. “I’m trying to punish you, but you like it. You’ll not trick me.”

He adjusts his grip onto my waist, and he begins to pump me with animalistic intensity.

The juices from both of us are leaking out, and they float across the cockpit in zero-g. I hope our come won’t damage any of the instruments, but it’s a risk I’m willing to take.

I feel all the contours of his big veiny cock penetrating me relentlessly, and my breasts bounce back and forth in zero-g as I grip tight to the handrail. His sweaty and muscular abs slide across my back, and he moves the position of his hands to hook over my shoulders.

He speeds up his thrusting even more, the vibration increasing in intensity, as well. My pussy starts surging against him. It squeezes and writhes at a frantic pace. It seems to have taken on a mind of its own: it wants to milk Cygnus for all he’s worth and coax his hot alien seed to spill and fill me up.

“Holy Seraphim!” he blurts, as my pussy squeezes and holds him. “I have seen Her!”

He starts to grunt, and I see thick white cream floating out of me as he rams me hard. I begin to climax and it feels like an electric current that jolts through me.

He’s no longer holding my mouth shut, so I settle on releasing a wailing hum rather than screaming and moaning.

It feels as if every last endorphin in my body has been released, and my body trembles beneath Cygnus’ alien strength and power. I feel his cock begin to twitch within me.

“Yes!” he snorts. “Yes!”

His voice is louder than it’s been, even he’s not able to keep quiet now.

Drool escapes from my mouth as my fingers and toes twitch against the power of my climax, and I feel Cygnus’ thick and creamy cum pumping into my pussy.

His seed fills me entirely, and then I see it spilling out of me and floating across the cockpit. It’s teal-colored.

His cock vibrates with fury and twitches a half -dozen times; more teal cum floats across the cockpit in spheres and rivulets.

I laugh and giggle and cry simultaneously, and he continues orgasming. He comes much longer and more intensely than any human man, and he produces so much fucking cum that I worry we’ll spend hours cleaning it up.

His orgasm starts to die down, and I feel his cock’s vibrations finally subsiding. He holds himself still, his cock balls-deep inside me. We stay like that until the vibrations stop entirely.

“Cygnus,” I say quietly, feeling his cock softening within me. “That was...incredible.”

“Yes,” he says. “The way your insides clenched against me, and the overwhelming wetness...and to think you had just orgasmed! Minutes before!”

He pulls out of me and I turn back to face him. “How many times can you come? Just once per cycle?”

I know it’s a somewhat selfish question, but I need to know what I’m getting into. Even if he can only fuck me like that once per month—or however long one of his cycles lasts—it’s well worth the wait.

“What do you mean?” he asks.

“You said you’d never seen a woman who could come more than once per cycle, what about you?”

“I’m a man,” he says. “A dominant male.”

“Which means?” I prompt.

“I come when a female does,” he says. “Typically a dominant male can take any number of women and he can fill them all up one after another.”

I open my mouth, but no words come out. “You….” I start to say. “You want to take more women?”

He narrows his eyes at me. “No.... Don’t you understand?”

He cups my face in both of his hands and gazes at me with fierce intensity.

“No,” I say. “I don’t.”

“We’ve attained the Seraphic Form! It’s growing now within you, our child. Even the bear agrees with me, you’re my lifemate.”

12 Cygnus

I’ve forgotten about the pirates.

Aura. I can think only of Aura.

Still I must save my brother, if only to tell him how right he was. If only to help him find his own lifemate.

Aura is all that matters now.... Aura and the child growing inside her. I know how strong my seed is, and I don’t need any equipment to check that she is now pregnant. Our child will mean the end to my race’s nomadic lifestyle.

Or war, I realize. Not everyone will embrace the Seraphim. I must find my brother and work with the humans. I must secure a future for my child and lifemate.

“We’re clear now,” Seth’s voice says. “You better get in the shuttle while you still can.”

Aura floats over and grabs me. She’s jammed a number of supplies into a big bag, which she straps to her back. I’m ravenously hungry, especially after the divine exertion of procreation, and I already cooked and ate the last of the rations. Aura saved the last of the meat strips—the bacon—for me.

The bio-suit would have already been ready had I not lacked food or hibernated. It’s still immature, and I don’t know how much food will be available on the Martian surface.

I follow Aura into the shuttle, which is barely large enough for the two of us. There are two chairs, and I’m too big for mine. My knees are pressed into the edge of the wall and I must bend my head down so I don’t hit the ceiling. I’m wearing the clothes Aura has made for me. My penis presses uncomfortably up against the pants. It’s a curious design, as the penis—which is meant to hang down along a male’s line of symmetry—is forced either to the left or right. It seems an arbitrary decision, but I put my penis to the left, as it feels slightly more comfortable in that position.

It’s not comfortable, however, when I become erect. The pants are not designed for that, and the erection presses uncomfortably against the cloth. Human males must have much smaller penises in order to wear pants all the time. All of the pirates I killed wore pants, even though there were no women around.

“Good luck, Aura...and Cygnus,” Seth says.

“I’m bringing you with me,” Aura says. “Upload into the dropship.”

“But how can I watch over the Zephyr?” Seth asks.

“I’m going to sell the Zephyr,” Aura says. “But not you.”

“Why are you selling the ship?” I ask.

“I have no money. Nothing of value. Mars is a harsh place, and even after selling the ship we’ll be lucky if that holds us over for even a few weeks.”

She looks sad. I can tell she is emotionally attached to the ship.

“I see,” I say. “Aura, I am adept at surviving in harsh environments. We will flourish there.”

She gives me an uneasy look, as if she doesn’t believe me.

“Did you believe me when I told you of my mastery with all weapons?”

“Uh,” she says. “No, not really.”

“Well believe me now,” I say. “You are safe with me. We will flourish here.”

She smiles and squeezes my hand.

“I’m in the shuttle now,” Seth says.

“Alright,” Aura says. “Let’s go.”

I feel a jerk and a brief thrust. The g-force increases for a few seconds, and then zero-g returns.

I squeeze Aura’s hand back and look through the window. I see nothing but blackness, but soon the shuttle begins to rumble as we hit the atmosphere. The rumbling intensifies, and Aura holds me tighter.

The heat dies down and we begin to glide.

A joystick deploys, and Aura uses it to control the shuttle throughout the descent.

I look out the window, but am surprised to see nothing but red and lifeless terrain. There are occasional algae blooms and patches of greenery, but it’s largely a red and cracked desert.

“Where are the cities?” I ask.

“Far and few between,” Aura says. “We’re landing outside of a city called Rust Bucket. It’s where I sell my scrap, and it’s where most of my contacts are.”

“Rust bucket,” I repeat. “Do they insult themselves?”

“No,” Aura says. “It’s built in a small crater, so it’s shaped like a shallow bucket. And it’s on Mars...so rust.”

“How do we know my brother landed near here?” I ask.

“We don’t, but all of my contacts are near Rust Bucket, so we have to start here. We’ll do everything we can to find your brother, but first we have to figure out how to survive here. It won’t be easy.... I’d expect Scorpio has put some kind of bounty on us, so even walking into the city together will be a huge risk.

The surface is close now, and Aura stops talking to focus. She has no window, but the lenses on her eyes are giving her a full view of the surface, or so she’s told me.

I watch through my tiny window as the ground comes up fast on us, and at the last moment she pulls a lever.

I hear a hiss of air, and suddenly the window is covered by something.

“Airbags,” she says. “They completely cover the shuttle, and we just kind of bump all over the place until we grind to a halt. Hold tight!”

I feel a slam, and my stomach churns. We are jostled violently, and I am jerked forward against my restraints. Soon the vibrations die down and we stop moving.

“Okay,” Aura says. “We didn’t die.”

“I thought you make this run regularly,” I ask her.

She undoes her harness and stands up. “I do, and every single time I’m in disbelief that I don’t die.”

“A harsh place indeed,” I shake my head.

She opens a panel and pulls out some masks.

“You have to put this on,” she says. “It’s warmer than it used to be on Mars, so as long as we bundle up, we won’t die from exposure, but there’s not enough oxygen in the atmosphere. If you lose your mask, if your hose gets cut, or if your tank goes dry...you’ll pass out in a few minutes, and you’ll be dead in ten.”

She looks me over, then says, “Well, that’s how it is for humans. But since you breathed the air on the ship just fine, I’m just assuming it’s similar for you.”

“We are more adaptable than you,” I tell her. “It’s possible I can do without the mask. I need very little oxygen.”

She forces it into my hands. “No, you need to wear this big jacket with a hood to cover your alien-looking ears and purple skin and the mask to cover your face. It’s bad enough that you’re seven-feet tall, but you’re going to need to do your best to look and act human. You think you can handle that?”

I nod. I realize that Scorpio—and many others—would kill to capture me. I must keep a low profile so as to not endanger my lifemate.

I put on the big jacket and affix the mask. The jacket compresses the bio-suit sphere, but it’s adaptable and spreads itself out along my arm. I can feel my stomach churning and tearing with hunger, but I will not complain. I will find a source of food for Aura and me. She’s shamed me enough already by providing me so many of her own rations.

She hands me a medium-sized blade. It’s only about the length of my hand, but it will do. “It’s the only weapon I have left.... I should have carried more than one gun.”

“It’s my fault,” I say. “It would have been wise to have taken more of the pirates’ weapons. But this blade will suffice.”

“Let’s go,” I say.

“Aren’t you going to put away the knife?”

“Why?” I ask. “We will look like weak targets.”

“Subtlety,” she says. “Most people on Mars will have guns. If you’re carrying a knife, they’ll assume you don’t have a gun, and they’ll try to shoot you.”

This woman—my lifemate—is wiser than I could have imagined. How can a female learn so much about the nature of combat and aggression?

“I will conceal the blade,” I say.

I tuck it into my jacket.

I open the jacket and put the blade into one of the pockets. It’s slow and awkward compared to my bio-suit, but I cannot argue with Aura’s logic.

The gravity on this planet is quite low, but I spent several cycles training on a planet with a similar gravity. I grin in anticipation.

“Ready?” Aura asks.

I nod, and the door opens.

Cold rushes in, but it’s much less frigid than I’d expected. Women must always feel cold.

I step outside first. In case there is some type of ambush, I must be ready to protect her.

I step outside and let my inner bear rise up, but I do not shift. I just need access to its heightened senses.

I hear everything around the shuttle. Every last piece of dust rustling across the rocks.

There’s a gale of wind, and red dust sweeps across me. I’ve been outside for only moments, and my clothes are already covered in dust.

My ears twitch, and far in the background I hear an electric droning, and men laughing.

Aura begins to step outside, but I push her back into the shuttle. “Someone is coming.”

I point to the hill. “Just on the other side of this hill. Stay inside, lock the door. I’ll handle this.”

“Wait,” she stalls. “Cygnus, I need to see who it is first. I have friends—okay, not quite friends— but acquaintances here. I’m guessing it’s going to be three guys on a buggy.”

“They ride on a bug?” I ask, astonished.

“A buggy,” she says. “It’s a thing with four wheels.”

My ears hone in on the sound, and I watch the hill. I grip the handle of the blade within my coat.

The buggy bumps lazily over the hilltop, and it begins descending the hill toward us.

When I turn around, Aura is already waving her arms.

I go to shove her back inside, but she says, “No, Cygnus, it’s Baxter. He’s cool.”

“All humans must feel cold here. Is Baxter even colder?”

“I mean he’s not going to kill us,” she says. “He’s an okay person.”

“I see.” I tuck my ears back and watch the buggy approach, but I do not let go of the knife.

The buggy stops just a few meters away from us, and just as Aura said, there are three men. They’re all wrapped up in thick jackets with big facemasks. The tallest of the three jumps off the buggy and pulls back his hood.

He has wild black and grey hair, and it’s caked with the red dust of the surface.

“Aura,” he shouts, his voice distorted by the face mask. “Who’s your friend? He’s...tall.”

“This is Garrett,” she says, looking at me. “Hired gun.”

The other two men jump off the buggy, and I pull the blade partially out of the pocket, readying myself to strike.

“That’s good,” Baxter says. “It’s getting rougher down here with the war heating up. A lot more piracy, and the orbitals don’t give a flying fuck what happens down here.”

“Did they ever?” Aura asks.

Baxter laughs and reaches his hand out to me.

“Shake it,” Aura hisses behind me.

I grab his hand, and we’re both wearing gloves, so it feels awkward. I squeeze lightly, and Baxter’s body doubles over.

“Shit! Okay, dude, I got it, you’ve got a strong grip.... Jesus!”

He flaps his hand and hops up and down. It seems I’ve damaged him.

“I am...Garrett,” I say. The name sounds strange on my tongue.

“Baxter,” he says. “And these two bums behind me are Sherlock and Gusto.”

“So,” Baxter says, turning to face Aura. “What you got for us, sweetie?”

I grab Baxter by his collar and pull him in. “What did you call her?”

“Ah! Shit!” Baxter says.

“You’ll not call her that! Please!” I shout into his face. The facemasks are all tinted, so we cannot see each other’s’ faces. The hood is still covering my ears.

“Sorry, sorry!” he cries.

I let go of him.

I hear Aura stifling laughter through her facemask. She seems to find humor in almost anything. It’s an admirable trait.

“Um, well,” she says. “I’ve got nothing for you, to be honest.”

“Nothing….” Baxter says. “I don’t run a charity, you know. You want me to guard the shuttle while you’re down in the Bucket, you’re going to need to give me something worth my time.”

“I had a new deal in mind,” Aura says. “You can take the whole shuttle, scrap it.”

“What are you hiring us to guard then?” Baxter asks.

“I have a hired gun,” Aura says. “But we have no gun.”

“The shuttle for a gun?” Baxter says, looking it up and down. “That’s fair.”

“Two guns,” Aura snaps back. “And some rations.”

“One gun,” Baxter says. “And I can throw in some jerky, I guess.”

I’m impressed by this exchange. Among my race, we would simply battle each other and the winner would take everything. This is...subtle. Each party can walk away alive and with something they need.

Baxter turns toward Sherlock and mumbles something. Sherlock walks back to the buggy and opens up a cargo hold on the back. He rummages through, sticking his head way down into the hold.

He pops back out with a weapon in his hand. It’s a small pistol, and it’s as red and rusted as the surface of the planet. There are a few flecks of black, which must have been the original color.

“Let’s see,” Sherlock says. “This is your classic Mark VI, a real collector’s item.” He grabs the top of the gun and pulls back. I hear a rough grating sound, like coarse grains of sand cracking, and the weapon half cocks, then jams. Sherlock ducks down and tries again, and the weapon grinds all the way back, and clicks.

“It’s only got three bullets,” Baxter says. “Like I said, it’s a collector’s item...the bullets are even more valuable than the gun! I can have Sherlock test fire it for you, but then you’d be down to two bullets.”

I take a long stride forward toward Baxter, and I reach into his inside jacket pocket. I feel cold, oiled metal, and I tear the item out of his jacket.

I draw the knife, pull Baxter’s body against my own, and raise the gun at Sherlock.

Gusto starts to slowly fumble into his jacket, but I shout at him.

“Do not try to draw your weapon. Please! Or I will kill him.” I press the knife flush against Baxter’s thick scarf, and then I pull it up to expose the skin. I settle the cold metal against his throat.

Gusto raises his hands into the air.

“Shit, Garrett, what are you doing?” Aura hisses behind me, but I ignore her.

Sherlock has the rusty Mark VI gun pointed at me.

“If you pull that trigger,” I shout over to Sherlock. “And the gun doesn’t work, I will kill all three of you. Do you want to risk that? Will you risk your lives on this gun functioning properly?”

“No!” Baxter shouts. “That thing ain’t gonna’ shoot! Drop it, Sherlock!’

Sherlock drops the rusted gun.

“We will take this weapon,” I say, shaking Baxter’s pistol in my hand. “It’s well maintained and seems reliable. It feels good in my hand. Do you agree to this trade?”

“Yes,” Baxter says. “Just let me go, man.”

I pull the knife away from his throat and shove him away from me. In the low Martian gravity, he looks like he’s falling over in slow motion, but he falls all the same.

“Good,” I say. “Enjoy the shuttle. Please!”

13 Aura

“I can’t believe you did that!” I say, shoving Cygnus.

He’s not quite shovable, however, and my attempt only bounces my own body back.

“Yes,” Cygnus says. “I quickly adapted to the human bartering system, and I made the most of it.”

“No,” I say. “You jumped the gun...literally! I could have talked him into a better deal, I just needed more time. You’re going to have to learn to compromise, and to trust me. We can’t just do everything the Marauder way all the time.”

“That was a compromise,” he says. “The Marauder way would have meant killing all three and taking everything. I showed great restraint and subtlety.”

I grit my teeth. This man is impossible.

We stop near the lip of the crater to eat. There’s only one entrance into Rust Bucket, and it’s clear on the other side of the crater. I’ve opted to avoid the road until the last possible moment. Highwaymen are rampant on the roads. They are tolerated because they ask for very little in return for safe passage, and I’m normally able to buy them off with a few grams of precious metals—or a half kilogram of bacon. Right now, though, we have nothing of value aside from the gun and the jerky. Sneaking around the edge of the crater is a bit riskier because, while the highwaymen are happy with high volume low value robbery, the raiders off the main roads will kill you and take everything. And if you have nothing, they’ll just kill you.

I give Cygnus all of the jerky, and he raises his mask and starts to cram stick after stick down his throat, but he stops after three or four pieces.

“Aura,” he says. “Though you do not have a biosuit feeding off of you, you must be hungry.”

“I could eat a couple,” I say.

I’m starving, but I’ve heard Cygnus’ stomach rumbling like an earthquake ever since we landed, and I need him at full alertness if we run across some raiders.

He puts half of the jerky—six sticks—into my hand. “Eat. Please.”

I try to hand him back a few of the sticks, but he looks away from me and devours his remaining portion.

I raise my mask and put a whole stick in my mouth, then re-seal the mask. I repeat this process until I’ve finished the jerky.

“Thanks,” I say. “I was really hungry.”

“You must sustain two lives,” he says.

“Cygnus,” I say. “We only had sex one time, there’s no guarantee I’m pregnant already….”

He scoffs. “You will see.”

“Tell me more about your sister,” he says, wrapping his arm around me.

We’ve been walking a long time, and the surrounding rocks mask us from any potential raiders.

“We’re both from Earth,” I say. “The surface though, not the orbitals.”

“Earth’s surface is also a harsh place?” he asks.

“Yeah,” I answer. “But different from Mars. Mars is cold and sparse; Earth is sweltering and crowded. Fiona, my sister, is two years older than me. She’s always looking out for me, and after our parents were killed in food riots, she took care of me.”

He nods. I know Cygnus is a younger sibling too, though I don’t really understand sibling dynamics in his race.

“She joined the military for the minimum five years,” I say. “As soon as she turned 17. She had most of her salary sent to me, and I used it to learn bartering. I got good at it, and I played it safe. I rarely took risky deals, and my profits were miniscule at first. After three years though, I was making real money on each deal, and I bought my own ship. The Zephyr.

“Your fleet started its breaking burn when Fiona was only a few months from getting out of the military, and war meant she was kept indefinitely in the military. Earth wanted to pool all of the solar system’s resources together to prepare to fight you. Mars and Venus wanted to welcome you. I had built up all my connections on Mars, since it’s closer to the belt. I had to pick a side. If I stuck with Earth, I’d be able to keep in contact with Fiona, but I’d go broke, and all the sacrifices she’d made for me would have been for nothing. Earth doesn’t tolerate scrappers.”

“Why did Mars and Venus want to welcome us?” Cygnus asks.

“Humans have only been terraforming Mars and Venus for a few centuries. Aside from the orbitals, Martians mostly live underground or in domed craters like Rust Bucket, while Venusians live in floating cities. I guess they have less to lose...if the invasion had gone as planned, which planet would you hit first?”

“Earth,” Cygnus says. “But also these orbitals. It sounds like the orbitals are the cream of society, so we’d be most interested in breeding with them.”

I shudder a bit at that. “So you’d rather have a glitzy orbital girl over me?”

“Of course not,” Cygnus says. “This is just how the marauder fleet will think. Mating with you has changed my thinking. They’ll still be set in the old thinking.”

“That’s sweet,” I say, smiling. I know he can’t see me through the tinted faceplate, so I press it against his. It’s surface shorthand for a kiss.

“I have to go pee,” I tell Cygnus. “Then we can work our way around the crater. We should reach the entrance in an hour or so.”

“I will escort you,” Cygnus says.

“No, you won’t. I will be just a few meters away.”

He huffs, but I convince him to let me have just a few moments of privacy. I appreciate his fierce and resolute protection, but watching me pee is taking it one step too far.

The worst thing about peeing on the Martian surface is how damned cold it is. The Martian air chills me to the bone as I pull down my pants, but my bladder thanks me as it finally relieves itself.

There’s a man-sized rock and about three meters separating me from Cygnus, but I know those bear ears can still hear me, which is annoying, but unavoidable.

As I pull my pants back up to shield me from the biting chill, I feel something snag my ankle.

I look down to see a robotic hand clasped on my ankle. The cable attached to it is still somewhat slack, but then it slides across the ground like a snake as it begins to tighten.

“Cygnus!” I shout. “Raiders!”

14 Cygnus

I’m already running when she shouts. “Cygnus!”

I shouldn't have let her out of my sight, but there’s no time for regrets now, only action.

I leap over the rock with my gun drawn. How did I fail to hear or smell someone so close to us?

As I clear the rock, I have my answer. There’s something clamped to Aura’s ankle, and hundreds of meters away is a band of men and a buggy. One of them is holding a long gun from which the cable is attached.

I draw the knife and rush toward the cable. It’s tightening and is going to drag my mate away if I don’t cut it in time.

I raise the knife. I’m only two steps away, but the cable tightens, and Aura slides across the surface. Away from me.

I dive toward her, and she reaches out to me. My fingers miss hers by mere centimeters. I watch in horror as she’s dragged away from me, down the lip of the crater and toward the four men. Four men who have only minutes left to live.

I raise the gun, and with the steadiest of hands, I make the micro-adjustments needed to hit a target from over 300 meters away. I fire.

Aura is halfway to them by now, but the bullet moves faster. I’ve accounted for Martian gravity— which means minimal drop-off as the bullet travels—and I see the man holding the harpoon gun drop the device and fall down.

As soon as he lets go of the gun, Aura stops sliding, and the gun instead pulls toward her.

I rush down the lip of the crater, toward my mate. I see muzzles flash from the remaining three men, and I dive feet first, sliding behind a rock.

I hit the rock, which breaks my sliding descent. I hear bullets biting into the other side of the rock, but I risk a brief look around.

Two of them are advancing toward Aura with guns raised, while one is jumping into the buggy. Aura is motionless on the ground.

I’ll return any injury they caused to her one-hundred fold!

I sight across the gun, which is pointing at the rock. I steady my breathing and leap out from behind the rock. I jump hard and travel far— further than they expect—as their reaction shots hit against the edge of the rock, but I’m several meters past it.

I fire three shots before I hit the ground. One shooter drops, and the other is hit in the leg.

I hit the ground, the surviving shooter’s muzzle flashes, and a bullet tears into my shoulder.

Both of my arms still work, but the gun shakes as I try to aim.

I fire wildly as I rush headlong toward the shooter. From the corner of my eye, I see the buggy begin to drive away. The coward will not stay and fight? How could he live with such shame debt?

The shots I take while running are inaccurate, but they force the shooter to hit the ground and roll to find cover behind a rock.

The moment he’s behind the rock, I shift.

The clothes and jacket tear apart as I grow to full size. The facemask’s straps break, and the mask falls to the ground, as does the oxygen tank.

When the shooter pops back out, I see his gun shake wildly. The last thing he expected to see was a 2,000 kilogram purple bear rushing towards him.

I’m almost on him, and I cut to the side just before he fires. He loses sight of me behind the rock.

Now he thinks I’m going to come around on his right side, so he’s likely holding the gun pointing toward the other side of the rock. He’ll unload as soon as he sees me, at point-blank range. It would be hard to miss from that vantage.

But I won’t come from the left or the right side.

I leap, and in Martian gravity, I might as well be flying.

I coast over the top of the rock, and just as expected, he’s tunnel-visioned and waiting at the edge of the rock.

I land on top of him, my claws severing all the tendons in his shoulders before he can aim the weapon up at me. My teeth find his throat, and I tear it open in one brutal bite.

Without bothering to look back, I run at full speed down to my mate.

I shift back to Marauder form, and I unclasp the robotic hand from her ankle.

“Aura!” I shout, putting a hand on her shoulder. I’m tempted to raise the mask—briefly—to check for injuries, but I decide against it. She needs all the oxygen she can get if she’s injured.

“Cygnus,” she says. “I’m fine. Stop the one on the buggy from getting away!”

She grabs the harpoon gun and throws it at me. I catch it and look up.

I’d forgotten about the one on the buggy, but quickly I understand. I’ve shown them what I can do, and if he escapes, he’ll tell others who will come for us. If I let him escape, I’m failing to protect my mate.

He’s only about 200 meters away. He must have stopped to gawk at my bear attack. That delay will cost him.

I raise the harpoon and notice there is a screen on it for sighting. When I put the harpoon on my shoulder and sight across it, the cable retracts all the way and suddenly there is a green flashing reticle. It locks onto the man; I pull the trigger.

I expect the projective to fly straight, but the hand adjusts itself as it flies. The buggy swerves wildly to try to dodge it, but the hand simply follows, the cable trailing behind. The harpoon beeps slowly at first, and then faster as the hand travels.

I hold the harpoon tight with both hands, and the beeping intensifies.

The beeping becomes a constant hum, and the targeting reticle flashes red.

I see the cable begin to tighten, and I press my foot against a rock to brace myself.

As the cable goes fully taut, I tug the harpoon and the man is jerked out of the buggy. He hits the ground, and the cable drags him across the dusty surface. I hold tight, and the cable does all the work. He’s coming quickly toward me, but I spare a moment to look down at Aura.

She’s sitting up now, and she nods at me.

I look back, and I notice the hand is grabbing the man by his head rather than his ankle. His facemask is still attached to his oxygen tank, but the tank is dragging across the ground.

When he’s about 100 meters away from me, the tank slams into a rock and a moment later, he’s engulfed in flames. I drop the harpoon, and it flies toward the burning mass.

“I wanted to kill him with my own hands,” I say.

Aura tugs at my arm. “Cygnus, we need to go. There may be more nearby.”

“We will take the buggy,” I say. “It’s faster, yes?”

She nods.

We get into the buggy, and Aura checks the storage compartment. It’s full of weapons and food, and I devour several kilograms of rations immediately. It’s more cured meat, but it has some type of heat built into it. I find this odd, but the burning sensation somehow enhances the taste. Aura eats some as I drive the buggy, and we stop at each of the raiders’ corpses, throwing the equipment we retrieve from their bodies into the cargo container.

We finally retrieve my gun as well, which has a few bullets left.

“Get yourself covered again,” Aura says, smiling down at my penis. “Not that I don’t like admiring it.”

I remove the clothes from the largest of the raiders and manage to put them on, but they are a tight fit. The boots don’t fit, so I cut the toes off. My purple toes poke through the ends, so I wrap them in extra cloth.

“You look like a raider now,” she says. “A bad one...who doesn’t get much loot.”

“Will this be a problem?” I ask.

“No,” she says. “Getting attacked was certainly scary, but it worked out for us. We actually have a lot to trade with now. If that hadn’t happened, I honestly didn’t know what we were going to do when we got into the city.”

I nod in satisfaction. Just as I promised myself, I provided for her on this planet.

“We will flourish here,” I say, leaning back in my chair and chewing into another stick of jerky. “And you now have no need to sell your beloved Zephyr.”

15 Aura

As we approach the road, I turn to Cygnus.

“Let me do the talking here.”

“But—”

“Please,” I say. “I’ve done this dozens of times. I know what I’m doing.”

“I can intimidate them,” Cygnus says. “And—”

I cut him off. “Cygnus! You’ve saved me so many times.... I owe you great shame debt. Please let me repay you.”

He laughs loudly, from deep within his belly. “How can my lifemate be shamed when I protect her? It makes no sense!”

“Please, Cygnus,” I say. “Just keep quiet at the gate.”

He crosses his arms and leans back in his seat.

We drive onto the road and turn toward the gate. A small portion of the crater was blasted away to make a narrow tunnel through the crater. The gate is guarded, and beggars and troublemakers are turned away. Well, troublemakers are let in if they offer a big enough bribe, but beggars are never allowed entry.

I stop the buggy at the gate, and two men with rifles slowly walk toward us. I tap Cygnus’ shoulder and point up to the big guard towers. I whisper to him, “There are more guys with guns in those towers.”

“Yes,” he says. “Shall I get the sniper rifle from the cargo—”

“No!” I snap. “I’m pointing them out to you so that you don’t try to fight your way through this. Okay?”

He crosses his arms again, an annoyed look painted across his face.

I want to punch or slap him, but I know that will hurt me more than it hurts him.

“You got papers?” one of the men asks. He doesn’t point his gun at us, but he grips it tighter when he sees Cygnus.

I know this guard. It’s Tobias; he’s easily bribed.

“I’m back from a scrapping run,” I say. “I have a lot of high value goods to trade.”

“Please!” Cygnus says.

I elbow him.

“You look like raiders to me,” Tobias says. “What you think, Yannick, these look like raiders to you?”

Tobias clearly doesn’t remember me, or he’s pretending not to so he can milk out a better bribe.

Yannick leans into Cygnus. He pushes his facemask nearly into Cygnus’s. My heart pounds and my stomach churns. I worry Cygnus will snap his neck or do something incredibly stupid, but instead he reaches out his hand.

“Hello,” he says. “I am Garrett.”

They both start laughing.

Yannick backs away. “All right, you two look like trouble to me. Especially you, Garrett.”

“Yeah,” Tobias says. “Sorry, you’ll have to go back where you came from.”

I see Cygnus tense, but I put a hand on his arm and squeeze, willing him to be calm.

“Sir,” I say. “Maybe you can have a look through our cargo hold? Help yourself to something valuable? As a sign of goodwill?”

“Hmm,” he says. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”

He gestures toward Yannick, and the two of them pop the cargo hold open and start digging through it.

Yannick whistles through his facemask. “A lot of guns here for a scrapper. You find a weapons cache out in the belt? A lot of these are covered in Martian regolith too...real fucking odd that Martian soil would find its way to the belt.”

The two of them each grab a gun, and Yannick takes a full pack of jerky.

“I think we can let you two in if you promise not to make trouble,” Tobias says.

“Deal,” I say.

Yannick moves toward the gate controls, and just before he hits the switch, Cygnus speaks.

“No.”

Yannick pauses, and leaves the gate shut.

I draw in a breath, and do everything I can to suppress the flaring anger and panic I feel rising in my gut at Cygnus’s insufferable stubbornness.

“What’s that? Garrett doesn’t think we made a fair deal?” Yannick asks.

“No,” Cygnus says again, and he gets out of the buggy.

He takes one step toward them, and they raise their guns.

He takes another step.

“Stand down, raider!”

Cygnus stops. “Give back the meat.”

“What?” Yannick says, looking over at his friend.

“He just wants the jerky, man.”

“Fuck that,” Yannick says. “We made the deal already.”

“No,” Cygnus says. “This is the new deal. I keep the meat.”

Cygnus takes another step forward, and the two of them step back. I realize that despite the guard tower and the guns—and the fact that Cygnus is completely unarmed—the guards are scared of him.

“Just give him the jerky, dude!”

Yannick reaches into his jacket and throws the jerky pack onto the ground.

Cygnus reaches down, tears the package open, and throws a piece at Yannick. “Enjoy. Please!”

As soon as the gate shuts behind us, I punch Cygnus in the ribs as hard as I can. It hurts my hand, but I don’t care, and I punch him again and again.

He finally stops driving and looks over at me. “Is this foreplay? We can find a place in the city to mate again, if you wish. I would not be against this idea.”

“You big dumb idiot!” I try to gut-punch him, but his abs are like steel even through the coat.

“I was practicing my human bartering skills,” he says.

“What?”

“To get good at something, you must practice. I noticed that to strike a good deal, you must not show weakness. I want to master this skill.”

I’m still red-faced with anger, and I’m breathing so hard that my mask is fogging up. But I stop hitting him. “So you weren’t just risking everything for a pack of jerky?”

“Hmmm,” he says. “I did want the jerky.”

“If you really want to learn to barter,” I say, “you need to learn risk and reward management. Do you know what that means?”

“It means if I take a big risk, I will be rewarded. Like when I warmed you with my naked body, and then we mated.”

I blush just thinking about that, and I feel pissed off again when I realize he’s arguing against me successfully without even trying to.

“No,” I say. “How much do you think the jerky is worth compared to the two guns?”

“The guns have more trading value,” he answers. “But I was very hungry, so the jerky had greater immediate value.”

I sigh. “Okay, but think like...an hour ahead. We have a box full of more guns, which are worth much more than a pack of jerky. So why take such a big risk for the jerky?”

He crosses his arms. “You really think I am so short-sighted?”

“Yes,” I answer immediately.

“I told you we would thrive here. We will have to deal with these guards again in the future, and they now know we drive a hard bargain. They will not push us around or laugh at us again. They will fear the name Garrett.”

I laugh, and the anger seeps out of me. Cygnus does a lot of dumb things, but he always seems to at least have some kind of logic driving his actions.

16 Cygnus

I enjoy the jerky meat as Aura drives. It tastes even better knowing that I shame debted the guard to obtain it.

We clear the tunnel that goes through the wall, and the crater opens up into a fairly large city. The top of the crater is covered by some type of dome.

Aura pulls off her mask, but tells me to keep mine on. “Rust Bucket’s CO2 scrubbers have been known to fail; some paranoid people keep their masks on. You’re one of them.”

The buildings look haphazardly placed and organized. They are all quite tall, but each story is sometimes a different color from the one below it and made of a different material, as well. There are a lot of people in dusty clothes swarming through the streets.

I see some other buggies, but pedestrians clog the streets, and Aura has to stop constantly as people walk right in front of us.

“Run them down if they disrespect us,” I say.

She looks at me and rolls her eyes. I know what that look means now, so I hold my tongue.

We reach one of the taller buildings that I can see, and Aura stops the buggy right on the side of the street.

“All right,” she says. “The cargo container is too heavy to take in, so you’ll need to guard it—”

I reach down and unlatch the cargo container. I grab the handles with both hands and I lift it effortlessly into the air. I rest it on top of my head, still holding the handles.

“Okay….” she says. “I guess you’re stronger than I thought. Let’s bring it all inside then.”

I follow her into the building through a large glass door. There’s a large room full of tables surrounded by dirty and dusty people. The smell of mansweat is thick, which I find quite distasteful. I smell other human females, as well, but having bound myself to my lifemate, I pay no mind to them and their scents.

“Put that down here,” she says. “And sit on it.”

I put the container down and sit atop it.

“I’m going to go find some of my contacts,” she says. “I’ll bring them here to barter with us.”

“No,” I say. “I let you leave to pee and you were captured. I will not risk that again.”

She sighs, and I lift the container up again.

“You’re going to have to carry that up a bunch of stairs,” she says. “But, come on.”

We enter a stairwell, and the cargo container is almost too large for the winding corners. It hits the wall each time I turn, but mostly because I’m distracted by Aura’s butt. I look up at it—right in front of my face—as we climb the stairs, and I feel my penis harden and swell as her femininity distracts me.

We reach the top of the stairs, which brings us into a smaller lobby.

“You need a room?” an older female grunts at us.

“Ummm,” Aura hesitates. “I was looking for Jarek, actually.”

“Jarek,” she says. “He’s out right now. Should be back tonight.”

“How much is a room?” I ask. My cock is still hard, and it sounds like we need to wait for Jarek anyway.

“This place is overpriced,” Aura whispers to me. “We can get a better deal—”

I toss the cargo container down onto the floor and stride over to the counter. I lean into the counter and face the older woman. The tinted glass obscures my face, but she looks up at me.

“Woman,” I say. “Do you like jerky?”

* * *

“I got us a real deal,” I say.

“No,” Aura says. “You didn’t. She pretended to lower the price. She just stroked your male ego, and you fell for it.”

“At least we have a room now,” I say, smiling. I drop the cargo crate onto the ground, then slide it into the corner.

I sit down on the crate and pull off the mask and jacket. I’m still sweating, so I begin to remove the rest of the clothes.

“What are you doing?” Aura asks.

“It’s hot,” I say. “I’ve been confined in these clothes and mask for too long.”

I tug the pants down, and my penis—which is partially hard—bobs up and down.

I wiggle my ears at Aura, then say, “You must be hot as well.”

She peels her jacket off and throws it onto the floor, then collapses onto the bed. “I’m exhausted, that’s what I am.”

Though she says she’s exhausted, I see her looking over at me, her eyes wandering across my body. And I smell her feminine scent filling the room.

I walk to the side of the bed, and rather than falling down beside her, I simply stand and look down at her.

Her eyes lock onto my dick, and I see her tongue run across her soft lips.

“Come here,” she says.

She reaches out and grasps my erect penis. She squeezes and tugs me gently toward her.

“We’ve never done it in gravity,” she says, her voice husky.

My ears perk up, and I nod. I’m standing flush against the bed now, and my penis begins to lubricate itself as she squeezes and strokes it from base to head.

“Would it shame debt you,” she says, “if I get on top?”

“A woman...on top?” I ask, truly confused. “How can I dominate you this way?”

“If you make me come,” she says. “Then you are dominating me.”

“Hmm, that is true. It shouldn’t matter what position we are in, so long as I bring you to orgasm.”

She nods and smiles wide. “Exactly. So get on the bed.”

She grips my waist and tugs me toward her. She’s not strong enough to move me at all, but I humor her and move onto the bed. I sit up on the bed, but she shoves me down until I’m lying flat on my back. I lay like that, but my hard cock is anything but flat. It’s standing up hard and straight, and it’s beginning to vibrate.

I watch Aura as she gets on her knees and pulls off her shirt. Her breasts bounce impressively. I stare at them, captivated. I begin to appreciate clothes in a new light. Humans wear clothes all the time, and only remove them in front of others when prepared to mate. Aura wanted me to cover my penis even though she enjoys looking at it. Now that I see her naked breasts again after they were hidden so long, they captivate me in a way that wouldn’t have been possible had they been free all along.

“I understand now why you wanted me to hide my penis from you, Aura. I see you.”

She’s tugging at her pants now, and she falls onto her back to tear them off.

“Don’t hide your penis now, Cygnus,” she says, sitting back up.

She crawls across the bed toward me, and grabs my penis by the shaft. She moves her face close to it, then says, “Cygnus’s penis, I see you, and you’ve bred with me, though I’ve not yet tasted you.”

Before I can react, she is licking the tip of my penis, and I grunt as she engulfs the head and sucks.

She spits it back out and looks down at me, startled. “Cygnus, what the hell?”

“The taste doesn’t suit you?” I ask.

“No,” she says dreamily. “No...it tastes...incredible. Like nothing I’ve ever experienced.”

I had worried she might not enjoy the taste of me, but now my fear is laid to rest.

“How in the hell can your dick taste this good?” she asks.

“How do human males taste?” I ask.

“Not like this,” she snorts. “I could suck this teal cock all day...my God.”

“So you will suck it all day, and will not ride me?” I ask.

She squeezes me and giggles. “It’s a figure of speech. I don’t mean it literally when I say “all day”. So you really want me to ride you, huh?”

“I must admit,” I say. “I’m quite curious.”

“Patience,” she said with a grin.

She dives down on my dick and swallows it once again. It’s too big for her mouth, but she makes a valiant effort to take in as much of it as she can. She gets part of it in, and she sucks hard. Her saliva drips down my cock, and I watch as it runs down along the bulging veins. The sound of her sucking on me is incredible, and she drinks greedily of my juices.

I grab her and pull her atop me. She moans onto my cock as I bring my mouth up against her spread legs. I inhale the scent of her, and then I press my tongue against her outer lips. She may think I taste good, but it must be impossible that I taste better than she does. Her scent and taste is divine, and I greedily suck her juices as I run my tongue all along her swelling clit.

I hear her moan with my swollen member stuffing her mouth, and when I look down I can see myself inside her, which is a wonderful sight. Her breasts are hanging down in front of me, and I reach up and grab a firm hold of them. I tweak her nipples with my fingers, and when I realize my hands are dry, I touch my shaft to lubricate them.

I squeeze her nipples with my soaked fingers, next running my thumb and forefinger back and forth along her pointed buds. She moans louder with my cock in her mouth, and I start to laugh as I lick her to become wetter and wetter.

We continue like this for quite some time, but before she comes like this, she pulls away and slides down my stomach. The juices from her wet pussy coat my body, and I smile wide at the sight and feel of it.

She turns to face me, and raises her hips above me.

“I’m going to ride you now, Cygnus.”

Her words cause my dick to vibrate faster. She clasps the vibrating rod between her hands so she can press it to her clit, then she moans.

She’s having fun with my cock, but I’m still not inside her. I resolved to dominate her even while underneath her, and I will not break that promise.

I grab her and pull her down. My dick slides into her, parting her lips, which grab a tight hold of my head.

She gasps as I penetrate her, and I reach up and press my finger into her clit. I press her less gently than before, and she cries out.

But stimulating her clit has made her drip thick white juices down across my cock, and her body sinks down lower atop me. I watch myself disappear into her wet hole, and I grip her delicate waist firmly.

She moves her body up and down as she bounces atop me, and each time she sinks down onto me, I plunge deeper into her. When she rises back up, I see my penis soaked in her creamy fluids, which are hot and wet against my skin.

Aura lowers herself all the way down onto me, until the wonderful fullness of her perfect butt presses against my thighs. She’s sweating now, and with that her fragrance intensifies.

I vibrate deep inside her, and she rests on top of me, my cock fully embedded to the hilt inside her.

“I will protect you, Aura,” I say. “Always.”

“I know,” she says running her hand across my face, looking down at me. There’s moisture in her eyes, though I cannot understand why she would cry now.

“I’m sorry I punched you in the ribs,” she says. She’s difficult to understand, as her voice is heavy and breathy. My cock is having a strong effect on her.

“You were trying to hurt me?” I ask. “I thought you just wanted to get my attention.”

“I was mad!” she says, and she bucks her hips against me.

I feel her soaking wet and warm insides slide against my skin. My cock throbs and buzzes deep inside her. I flex my manhood, and it swells larger within her. She grips me tight with her hot pussy, and I watch as our combined juices flow down and pool on my groin.

The sight and feel of everything sets off a fire inside me, and I grip her hips and thrust madly from beneath her. I watch as my teal cock pounds and drills into the soft white of her skin. I’m so big that when I pull out, I can see part of her inner wall stretch out and cover my throbbing shaft.

She bucks her hips against me as I thrust, and the glorious feeling of power intensifies. I watch her breasts bounce and jiggle above me. I grab ahold of them as I thrust into her.

It feels as if we are locked in battle, and though she is pinning me down—though her thighs are squeezing my waist and she is on top of me—I am the one in control.

I rub my fingers against her soaking and swollen clit to assert true dominance, and she squeals and moans in response. I have full control of her. She bounces harder and faster, but the frenzied movement and animalistic longing has been brought about by my cock inside of her. It’s all because I’ve protected her and made her mine. It’s because I’ve filled her with my seed and impregnated her. I’ve made her my lifemate, and her pleasure is my duty and my privilege.

She falls down on me and slides back and forth wildly. I’m balls-deep inside of her, and vibrating with full intensity. Aura bucks her hips back and forth, grinding herself furiously against me.

Her insides constrict and pulse along my cock. She’s trying to milk me, but I’ll not come until she does.

And then her breathing intensifies, and she starts to wail and heave. She is coming now, and since I’ve already proven to her that I can dominate her from below, I jump up—and with my cock still deep inside her—throw her over onto her back.

Her legs wrap around me and squeeze, and still her pussy pulses and throbs, smothering me.

I thrust my hips as fast as I can, and my jackhammer of a cock slides hot and wet in and out of her. Cum is dripping down my balls and staining the bed, and as I fuck her faster, more creamy come spills out of her. I can feel my balls slapping into her thick cream with each powerful thrust.

“Cygnus! Cygnus! I’m coming so fucking hard! Aghh—”

And as she squeezes me with renewed intensity, I give myself permission to join her as she goes over the edge.

The icy vein blasts up my body from my balls, and then it burns hot inside me. My heart throbs, and my adrenal glands let loose.

I grunt, but am drowned out by Aura’s shrieking moans and gasping breaths.

My balls seize up, and they release my seed into my thick and sticky fluid. I feel the thick teal cum begin to surge through my long and engorged shaft, and the cum blasts deep into her womb.

With the release, I feel a burning longing for her. I swear to myself that I will protect her above all else, that I will never allow harm to come to her. I will die protecting her.

Thick streams of cum pump into her, over and over. I’m sure she’s already pregnant, but it feels too good to stop coming.

I continue thrusting, though she’s now filled with a thick and creamy pool of teal cum, and each time I penetrate her, cum blasts out of her wet hole, and it drips thick all over the bed and trails down her legs.

I thrust and thrust, and I come and come, until finally she hits my back forcefully with her fist. “Cygnus, I can’t...take any more…it’s too much!”

I will the flow of cum to stop, and my cock’s vibrations begin to die down as my hard shaft softens.

I pull out of her, teal cum and clumps of her white juices coating me. I stare down in astonishment. It’s a holy sight.

She’s breathing heavy, and I fall down to lay beside her.

“You turned the bed into a pool of cum...my God, Cygnus.”

“Yes,” I say. “There’s truly a religious glow to what we just did.”

She laughs and wraps her arms around me, nuzzling her cheek up against me.

Her warmth joins the inner well-being that engulfs me. I will keep this woman—my lifemate—safe against anything and everything. We will have many more nights like this, and our offspring will embody the Seraphim. I realize how lucky I am: born a warrior able to protect and provide for my mate, but the first of my kind with a reason to settle down and raise a family. My children will be the first of our kind who do not need to prepare to invade a new star system. They will bring in a new age.

17 Aura

Cygnus is beholding me as if I was some kind of miracle. His lips are parted, and his ears are pulled back. His green eyes gently probe me up and down. His fingers run across my body, and the lightest touch sends warm shockwaves through me as I bask together with him in the afterglow.

I’m about to ask him what he’s thinking, when there’s a loud knock at the door.

“Who is it?” I shout.

“There’s not much time,” a man’s voice replies. “Let me in.”

Cygnus rolls off the bed and grabs a pistol from the cargo container. He cocks the gun and raises it to the door.

“Cygnus,” the voice says. “Aegus sent me.”

I see his eyes widen, but still I worry it could be a trap.

“He knows my brother’s name,” Cygnus says. “They may have captured him.”

I grab my clothes and dress quickly, then grab another pistol. I hastily throw the blanket over all the teal cum.

The person at the door knocks again, then says, “I’m unarmed, but Scorpio has put a bounty on you. The woman you’re with...her picture is posted all over the city.”

That statement sets Cygnus in motion. He opens the door, and before I can even see who it is, Cygnus grabs him by his scarf and drags him inside.

He slams the door closed behind him, then throws the man up against the wall. Cygnus pushes his face up against the man and growls. “Who. Are. You?”

“My name is Jin!” he shouts out all in one rushed syllable. “Jin! I follow your brother! The Prophet!”

Cygnus pulls him back and then slams him hard into the wall. “My brother isn’t a prophet!”

“Okay,” Jin says. “He doesn’t like the word, no, but we call him that.... We obey him.”

“And what did he tell you to do?”

“He told me to get you out of the city before someone kills you….”

Jin looks over at me, tilts his head toward me, and adds, “And her.”

“This is my lifemate!’ Cygnus shouts. “I protect her!’

“Cygnus,” I say, putting a hand on his shoulder. “Let him go so he can talk. He knows where your brother is.”

Cygnus loosens his grip, but does not let go. “So he claims. If they found my brother’s pod and captured him, they could use the exact same story.”

“There’s nothing I can say to convince you,” Jin says. “Any code word could be interrogated or brought out through deep scan.”

“So why should I trust you?” Cygnus asks.

“Because….” Jin says, “If we captured your brother and broke him, then I wouldn’t know him as I do. He’s strong...and his convictions are fierce. But he never gets angry at a friend, and when everyone else has lost hope...he still can laugh.”

Cygnus lets go of Jin. His nostrils flare, and his ears twitch. He begins to pace the room.

“Tell me about the bounty,” I say.

Jin faces me. He has dark black hair and expressive, deep brown eyes. “This pirate you two ran across. He tried to get Mars-Venus to make a good deal to bring you in alive. They didn’t believe him, thought he was pulling their chain.”

“So if they don’t believe him,” I say, “then why would he waste so many resources to pursue us?”

“Earth believes him,” Jin says. “They want this war with the Marauders to happen. They want to kill the two of you, to silence the truth.”

“What about my brother?” Cygnus asks, clutching the pistol to his side. “Why is nobody after him?”

“He keeps hidden,” Jin says. “A few of us found him a couple of years ago. He told us everything, and we realized what would happen if anyone knew. He’s been slowly recruiting surface dwellers...people know of him here, but only as ‘the Prophet.’ Few people know he’s an alien.”

“Shit,” I say. “I’ve heard people talking about him when I came here on scrapping runs. I thought it was just some religious mumbo jumbo.... I had no idea it was Cygnus’s brother all along!”

“That’s how we want to keep it,” Jin says. “But Cygnus here is throwing a big fat teal wrench into things.”

He winks at me, and I blush.

“My brother is recruiting warriors?” Cygnus asks.

“Yes,” Jin says. “We have a few years left to grow. We need to convince enough people of the truth...that we can peacefully exist and breed the Seraphim.”

Cygnus grabs Jin and presses him into the wall once again. “How do you know about the Seraphim?”

“Aegus’s found a mate,” Jin says, grinning. “The first Seraphim, your niece, has already been born.”

Cygnus lets go of Jin and puts his hand over his mouth.

“I guess we won’t be the first,” I say. “No shame in being second.”

Cygnus grabs hold of me and hugs me tight. “You see! It’s true! We can save my brother and your sister, we can stop the war! There’s still time!”

“All right,” Jin says. “Sorry to break this up, but if I found you, the pirates and bounty hunters can, too. We need to get out of Rust Bucket as fast as possible.

Jin points to the black bulge on Cygnus’ shoulder. “Is your bio-suit fed?”

Cygnus bites his lip. “It was fully drained, almost dead. It’s not quite ready...but we have this.”

Cygnus pulls open the cargo container and reveals the weapons.

Jin whistles. “Good. Take all you can carry in your coats, but we need to ditch the box.”

“We have a buggy,” Aura says.

“That’s how I tracked you in the first place. It’s hot, and we can’t use it. I’ve got my own buggy hidden on the lip outside, but we need to get through the gate to reach it.”

Cygnus grins. “I know the guards.”

18 Cygnus

I cram as much food down my throat as I can, and I pack the rest into my jacket and pants pockets. We shove as many weapons and water canteens as possible into Aura’s backpack, and I shoulder the weight. It would be too heavy for Aura or Jin to carry, but it’s a mere inconvenience for me.

We sneak out a back entrance. We all move fully hooded and masked, which I realize as I see the bare faces of most of the people in the city, looks quite suspicious.

Jin tells us the bounty has only now hit the networks. It’s one of the biggest bounties in recent memory, so word of mouth will travel fast. Bounty hunters will pay simply for information, and so everyone, from street vendor to street urchin, is dangerous.

Everyone is looking for a tall man with a small woman, but since Jin has joined us, we’re moderately less conspicuous as a group of three.

I keep my hand on my gun as I move through the city. I make sure Aura stays within arms’ reach of me. They don’t want her alive. They want to kill her. If I hear even a hint of danger, I need to be ready to take a bullet for her.

Without the buggy, it takes a long time to pass through the city.

We avoid the main road as long as we can, but when we’re a few blocks away from the tunnel which leads to the gate, Jin leads us through a crowded alley packed with food stalls.

There’s fresh food cooking in stalls located up and down the street, and I’ve eaten nothing but dried and cured meat for days. I feel my mouth water as the smell of dozens of exotic and alien dishes hits my nose at once.

“Perhaps we can buy some fresh food,” I whisper to Aura.

She looks up at me and shakes her head. I can’t see through the tinted faceplate, but I’m certain she’s rolling her eyes at me.

The alley becomes so crowded that Jin has to shove his way through. I move in front of him and shove harder, as my size and strength allow me to clear a path more effectively.

“Cygnus,” Jin says. “Stay back, you’re drawing too much attention.”

I shove a man hard before Jin finishes speaking, and I see him whispering and pointing at us as we continue on.

“Ah,” I say. “I owe you shame.”

“Forget it,” Jin says. “Just move faster, this is bad.”

We make it to the main road, and a man on a buggy does a double take. I prepare to draw my gun.

The man jumps off the buggy and pops open the cargo hold. Jin joins him—he seems to know him—and together they remove some rusty engine parts, tossing them on the side of the street.

“Aura,” Jin says. “Get in.”

“No,” I say, putting myself between them. “I protect her.”

“She’ll be safer inside,” Jin says. “At least until we clear the gate….”

I consider it briefly. “You know this man?” I ask Jin.

“This is Trang, he follows the prophet,” Jin says. “I told him we’d need help getting through the gate….”

I grab Aura and lift her into the cargo hold, and then slam it shut. Her voice is calling out in protest, but when the door shuts, her voice is silenced.

Jin and I hop onto the buggy with Trang driving.

I’m worried Aura will be foolish and try to break out of the cargo hold, but she remains hidden.

“We’d have shoved you in there,” Trang says to me, accelerating toward the tunnel, “but you wouldn’t fit. Can you like...slouch down? Try to look smaller?”

I’ve never slouched down once in my life, and I tilt my head at him to show my confusion.

He lets his shoulders sag and drops his head. He looks suddenly like an old, weak man. It will be shameful for me to take on such a pose, but to protect Aura, I must.

I imitate Trang, and he shakes his head.

“You still look huge, but it’s better than nothing, I guess.”

We’re now three men rather than a man and a woman. I hope this will serve as sufficient deception.

I feel some shame debt toward Aura. I shoved her into the cargo hold without explaining myself. It’s something I’d have done to her before she was my lifemate. I will explain myself to her later, after she is safe.

We enter the tunnel, and the guards approach us, raising their guns.

“Hold up, hold up,” they say. “I need to know what you were doing in the city. I don’t remember seeing you guys come in together.”

Jin speaks before I am able.

“Remember me? I came in to hire a bodyguard.”

It’s Yannick. He gets closer. “Didn’t you say you were getting your sister, too? Where is she?”

“She eloped,” Jin says. “I was too late.” He frowns in an attempt to look sad.

“Tough luck,” Yannick says.

He steps up closer to me, and I try to slouch down even more. I avoid his gaze.

Tobias taps Yannick on the shoulder, who holds a screen out to him. They both look at it together, then glance up at me.

“Hey!” Yannick says. “Jerky man!”

I try to slouch more, but I grip tight to my gun, as I know the likelihood of getting through without the gun is decreasing by the second.

“Take off your mask, big guy,” Yannick says, staring at me more closely.

I rise to my full height and leap off the buggy. My feet crash to the ground just in front of Yannick. Tobias takes a step back.

I press my faceplate up against Yannick’s, and I speak in a low growl. “If you call it in now, I’ll shoot you dead right through my coat. Understand?”

Yannick nods, but Tobias reaches into his jacket.

“Tell him,” I say, tapping my faceplate against Yannick’s.

“Tobias,” Yannick says. “Wait, he’ll kill us.”

Tobias stops moving, but his hand remains in his coat.

“You’re not just walking away,” Yannick says. “The bounty is too juicy.”

“Give me twenty minutes,” I say. “Then call it in. You’ll still get paid the same.”

“Five minutes,” Yannick says.

“Twenty!” I shout back. “And a pack of jerky.”

“Take the deal!” Tobias shouts to Yannick. “Just let him through!”

I tap my faceplate against Yannick’s, harder this time. “If you call it in even a minute earlier than agreed upon, I will find out. I will come back here, and I will kill you. I will make it slow, and you will die a painful death as you watch me pull out each of your entrails—one by one—through your soft stomach. If you doubt I am capable of this, ask yourself why the bounty is so high. Am I clear?”

“Yes, fucking go!” Yannick says.

I jump back on the buggy, and Tobias pulls open the gate.

As soon as we clear the gate, Trang swerves off the main road and starts racing along the lip of the crater.

“That was fucking crazy!” Trang says. “Holy shit! Now I know why they call you guys Marauders!”

I pop open the cargo hold and retrieve my lifemate.

She seems angry, however, and punches me with both hands.

I laugh. “Aura, the guards knew I drove a hard bargain, and they respected and feared me. I was right. It’s just as I told you.”

“Okay,” Aura says. “But you still owe me great shame debt for stuffing me into the trunk like a sack of potatoes!”

“We will relieve this tension, lifemate,” I say. “When we again find a private moment.”

She makes a frustrated grunting sound, and hits me one last time. I smile.

19 Aura

The nerve! Does he really think I’m going to have sex with him after pulling a stunt like that?

Just when I thought that the insufferable alien had learned his lesson, he shoved me into a cargo hold. It’s much worse than when he locked me in the airlock. At least that was on my own ship, and it was well lit, and there was enough space that I didn’t have to curl up into a fetal position.

I’m back on the buggy now, and the cold Martian air is biting into me as we bump up and down along the lip of the crater. I’m in the backseat with Jin, and Cygnus is trying his best to slouch down in the front seat. He looks like Olympus Mons trying to pass as Mount Everest.

He turns back to speak to us. “Jin, please trade places with me. I will sit beside my lifemate.”

Jin nods, and jumps into the front, and Cygnus takes his old place beside me. He looks at me, but I can’t see through his faceplate. Does he know I’m mad at him, or is he oblivious? Which is worse?

I nod to him, and he reaches into his coat. He removes a few sticks of jerky and holds them out to me.

I take one and lift my facemask just long enough to eat it.

Cygnus takes five sticks and munches them down before I can even finish one.

He puts an arm around me when he finishes eating, and I lean into him. It’s hard to stay mad at him. I know he’s just trying to protect me, and if we keep at it the way we are, I really will be pregnant with his child before long if I’m not already.

“Sorry you didn’t get to sample any of the food in the city,” I say to him. “If we can stop the war, things will cool down and we’ll be able to try it.”

“Of all human things,” Cygnus says, “you are my favorite, Aura. Human food, however, is my second favorite. I look forward to this.”

* * *

We switch to the hidden buggy and part ways with Trang, who continues back onto the road alone.

Cygnus falls asleep sitting up, so I move to the front with Jin and let Cygnus sprawl out along the back bench to get some real rest.

Jin drives along in what feels like a random direction. There are no roads or tire tracks, and it feels as if he’s simply driving us into oblivion. I keep waiting for him to stop and tell us that we’re lost, but every time I ask him, he says we are on track.

I finally give up worrying and try to catch some shuteye myself.

I wake up to find the buggy slowing down by a heap of rocks.

“We’re here,” Jin says.

He jumps off the buggy and hits Cygnus on the shoulder.

Cygnus jolts upright and removes the gun from his coat. He points the gun at him, but then remembers who he is and lowers the weapon.

“The entrance to our base is through these rocks,” Jin says. “I didn’t want to risk sending even an encrypted message, so no one knows yet that Aegus’s brother is here. They’re going to be pretty excited, so brace yourselves.”

He pulls out a small device, presses a button, and a rust-colored tarp explodes outward. Cygnus grabs the other end, and the two of them put the tarp over the buggy, and ruffle it around until it looks somewhat like the natural surroundings.

“It’s mostly to throw off the satellites and habitats, but now with pirates coming into orbit soon, it will do double duty.”

“Is my brother seen as a criminal by the habitats?” Cygnus asks.

“No,” Jin says. “He’s been smart. He doesn’t have us attack anyone, raid anything...he just slowly recruits people, and most outsiders think the Prophet isn’t even real. The only real indication he’s real is when people suddenly disappear to go join us here.”

It sounds great: being tucked away safe underground with friends and keeping a low-profile. I wish we could do that so that I could have some quiet time together with Cygnus.

“He’s smart,” Cygnus says, “but no coward. We will need to take action soon, and that may mean revealing ourselves.”

Jin nods.

“Do we?” I ask. “What if we just lay low? They have a bounty out on Cygnus and me, but if no one sees us for over a year, surely interest will die down.”

“No,” Jin says. “They want to kill him to silence him. If he disappears and our message grows and gets louder, they’ll know he’s involved. We were getting ready to ramp up, and Cygnus’s arrival only gives us more reason to do so. The Marauder fleet is only ten years away now. We have little time.”

I sigh. It was a tempting thought, to live a quiet life in hiding, but if I’m really going to have children with this alien, I need to think about giving them a real future. Cygnus is in a unique position to stop an invasion and a war, and I need to help him achieve that.

Jin pulls back another rusty tarp, and there in front of us is a metal airlock door. He slams it with his fist in staggered rhythm, and a few moments later the hatch wheel starts to turn.

The hatch pops open, and a woman in a long coat and facemask nods to Jin.

We step down a few stairs onto a clearing with another hatch, and Jin shuts the outside hatch.

Jin jumps down the steps, then leans in close to the woman. “We have a visitor, and everyone will want to see him. Have everyone gather in the dining hall. I’m bringing him in for introductions.”

Cygnus nods to the woman. He throws back his hood, and his purple ears perk up. Then he pulls off his facemask.

The woman jumps back in surprise, and takes her mask off as well.

She has dark features and short-cropped hair, and her dark-brown eyes are wide. “It’s...it’s not the Prophet!”

“I’m his brother, Cygnus.”

Cygnus reaches a hand out, but rather than shaking his hand, the woman falls to her knees and bows her head.

“Mira,” Jin says. “It’s fine; stand up.”

Jin looks back at me and whispers, “She’s one of the more religious ones.”

She stands slowly, but keeps her head bowed. It seems as if she’s afraid to make eye contact with Cygnus.

“Welcome...brother of the Prophet,” she says.

20 Cygnus

We’re standing in the kitchen, and all of my brother’s followers are gathered just beyond the door, waiting to see me. To hear me speak.

I decide that I will just introduce myself and Aura. I don’t know what Aegus has planned, and I don’t think it wise to risk contradicting him. My first concern is protecting Aura, and if I upset these people, I can’t risk that they throw us out onto the surface of the red planet.

“All right,” Jin says, coming back into the kitchen. “They’re ready to see you.”

I take Aura by the hand and walk through the door into the large dining hall.

There are over one hundred people gathered around, and at least half of them fall immediately to their knees. They bow to me like Mira did. I can’t imagine that Aegus would have encouraged this kind of behavior, but if he thought it necessary to exploit the humans’ religious nature to help prevent the war...then maybe he would have resorted to this.

“Please stand,” I say. “I am Cygnus.”

They all look to each other, and I can hear them saying my name, whispering it across the room.

“Cygnus…Cygnus...Cygnus…,” they chant.

Odd indeed. Before I found my lifemate, I might have basked in such worship, but now I live only to please her and our future children.

“I am a simple warrior,” I shout, cutting them off. “Whatever my brother has taught you holds true. I come here to support him, but I bring with me my lifemate. And she is pregnant with my child!”

I shove her forward. “This is Aura. Welcome her. Please!”

They all start cheering and clapping, but Aura looks up at me with a bright red face. This is not the shame debt color of red, but rather the color of anger. I think hard, but cannot understand why she would be angry with me.

“Aura...Aura...Aura…,” they whisper in another chant.

“The introduction is over now,” I say. “I look forward to meeting the rest of you one by one. I also kindly ask that you be aware of my increased caloric needs as my bio-suit grows. Aura also will require extra food as she is eating for two. Please!”

I nod my head and pull Aura away with me. I want to go back to find Jin, but we are soon surrounded by people.

“What will you name the child?” a woman asks. “Do you have any cousins on the fleet? Do you think they’d like me?”

I’m tempted to shove everyone out of the way. To clear a path like I did back in the city, but those were strangers. These people are meant to be our friends, so I know I need to be less aggressive. Shoving will not do.

I grab the woman, lift her up, and place her down behind me. “Come, Aura.”

I whisk her through the door of the kitchen, and the kitchen door acts as a chokepoint, which Jin thankfully blocks off for us. He puts his back to the door and faces us.

“Okay,” he says. “Good job, I guess. Aegus had the same awkward and terse style when we first woke him from hibernation. You probably reminded everyone of that, which can play in our favor. Was that intentional?”

I feel very confused, and I tilt my head and waggle my ears.

“No,” Aura says. “He’s naturally abrasive and terse and awkward.”

I look at Aura, a perplexed frown on my face. Now I’m even more confused, but Aura won’t look at me, so I look to Jin for clarification.

“Aegus’s travelling to Earth,” Jin says. “He left me in charge of the Mars operation.”

“I trust his decision,” I say. “You seem to be a good leader. I ask for no special treatment aside from the extra rations for our child.”

“Cygnus,” Jin says. “I can’t be leader now. Not with you here.”

“I don’t understand,” I say.

Aura scoffs and rolls her eyes.

“Did you see how they reacted to you? If I make a tough decision, or have to do something unpopular, they will go to you.”

“If I’m to lead,” I say, “it will be because I’ve earned it. Not because of my brother’s actions. I refuse. The Marauders do not have royal bloodlines.”

“It’s not your brother,” Jin says. “It’s your race.”

“Oh, that’s a whole lot better,” Aura says sarcastically.

“The whole point of this,” Jin says, “and the thing they all believe in, is peaceful co-existence with your race. Humans have been alone in the universe for our whole history. We’ve lived alone on one planet for tens of thousands of years, and only in the past few hundred years have we expanded to three planets—four if you count the moon—but we’ve still been just one lonely race. And no matter how far we expand, we’d still feel alone.”

“As soon as we fired our drives to break, you knew you weren’t alone,” I say. “It’s not logical to place greater importance onto me when there is a fleet of millions coming toward you.”

Aura cuts in. “Look, Cygnus. When those drives turned on, we were terrified. Thrilled, yes, but terrified. We had no idea why you were coming for us. We knew you were more advanced than us, that’s it. It’s why there’s a war between Earth and Mars-Venus. So seeing you here, in the flesh, with your goofy bear ears and awkward request for extra food, you put a face on the invasion. They know it’s not all bad now.”

“And you feel the same?” I ask her.

She grabs my hand, and I feel huge relief that she no longer seems angry with me. “I know you’re all good. But you’re the second one they’ve ever seen. If you don’t show that you’re strong, they may think your brother is a fluke. You need to live up to their expectations. You need to lead.”

If Aura wants me to lead, I will lead.

“I understand,” I say. “Jin, you will show me what is needed to lead.”

* * *

Leading humans is difficult. They are weaker and more fragile than Marauders, and much more needy. The humans have not discovered how to synthesize nutrients or convert antimatter to digestible calories, which means a huge quantity of labor and manpower is dedicated to farming.

“The intake fan is busted,” Jin tells me. “So the dome’s not going to get enough CO_2 if we don’t fix it.”

I squint at him, and then at Aura. She shrugs.

“Well,” I say, “put a hole in the dome to let CO_2 in.”

“Then the plants will freeze,” Aura says.

“Yeah,” Jin says. “Or we’ll use up half the power by keeping it heated with a leak.” He rolls his eyes.

“A small hole,” I say.

“Cygnus,” Aura says, hitting me. “Jin isn’t asking you for advice on farming, he’s trying to tell you that we need to authorize a trade.”

Jin smiles and nods.

“You’re lucky that Aura can advise me as I lead,” I say, “or we would all starve and perish.”

Jin laughs.

“You realize,” I say, “that if we were to simply raid some travelers, we wouldn’t need to farm a surplus. In ten minutes, I raided a whole field’s worth of weapons.”

“Cygnus,” Aura explains patiently, “then we risk becoming a target. And the pirates who want you dead are swarming all over the surface. Be smart.”

I’ve been in charge for one week now. They’ve tried to contact Aegus to let him know I’m here, but he’s gone dark, and it’s impossible to get a message to him.

There’s a loud pounding at the door, and Aura opens it.

Mira rushes in, then falls to the ground to bow at my feet. It feels less uncomfortable to me now when people bow to me. I work hard to rule, and it shows they respect me.

“Great Brother Cygnus,” she says. “The pirates have taken Rust Bucket.”

I stand up. I try to recall how many operatives we have in the city, and their names.

“Trang’s crew is there,” I say. “Eight of them?”

“Yeah,” Jin says. “They’re good, they can probably get out before—”

“No,” Mira interrupts, in a panicked voice. “They were captured.”

“Trang won’t give us up,” Jin says.

“We’ll send a rescue team,” I say. “I’ll lead it.”

They give me uneasy looks, and Aura grabs my hand. “I’ll go with you,” she says. “Trang helped me, and I owe—”

“You will stay safe here.” I say. “Great Brother Cygnus has spoken!”

I say that to anger her, and it works. If she’s angry, she’ll be less likely to make a sound argument for joining me.

“We’re getting a message,” someone shouts, running into the room to join us. “It’s for Great Brother Cygnus.”

We pull up a screen, and it’s filled by Scorpio’s scarred face. He’s taken to wearing an eyepatch.

“Hey, you purple fuck,” he snarls.

“Is this live?” I ask, when Scorpio stops speaking.

“Damn right it is!” Scorpio says. “I’ve got you by your teal balls now. What are you going to do?”

I wait for him to continue. I’m aware of this type of tactic. He wants to make me angry so that I will argue less effectively.

“Nothing to say?” he asks. “Well, actions speak louder than words, huh? I’ve got your trading crew here. They’re not gonna’ have a fun time with me. The whole city is going to have a bad time, in fact. Unless you turn yourself over to me.”

“I thought you wanted to kill me,” I say.

“Yeah, that was my first thought. But then I realized I’m already rich, and even though the bounty on you and your girl is quite fat, there’s something I want more.”

I wiggle my ears, waiting for him to get on with it.

“I want to be able to transform into a fucking bear! My scientists think they can figure it out if they get you on the operating table. Give yourself up, and I’ll spare your girl.”

“I don’t like this deal,” I say. “I can keep my mate safe. Take your threats elsewhere.”

I turn off the screen.

“Jin,” I bark. “We will assemble a small team to rescue Trang’s crew. We’ll get in and out fast. We’ll need a second team to set up some kind of diversion outside. I will create the diversion, you will infiltrate the city.”

We begin planning. But an hour later, we receive a new message. It’s not live this time, it’s pre-recorded.

It shows Trang and his whole crew on what appears to be the top of a mountain. They are without masks, and handcuffed. The camera pans down, and I realize they’re on the top of the crater, outside the dome.

Scorpio pulls off his facemask long enough to smile, and then signals with his hand.

Several pirates shove Trang and each member of the crew. The camera points down, and I watch each one of our friends roll down the steep incline. Some die on rocks, others are badly hurt, and even those who survive the fall will eventually die from the lack of oxygen.

“Every hour,” Scorpio says, “ten more people are going down the crater. Get your purple ass over here if you want to stop it.”

21 Aura

I’m having intense morning sickness every day now. Cygnus and I have been going at it every night, but there’s no doubt I’m pregnant. I didn’t think morning sickness would come so soon, but there’s no guidebook for alien pregnancies. .

It took Jin, and a lot of the best fighters, to convince Cygnus we needed more than an hour to plan. In the end, it took five hours, which cost fifty lives.

But the plan is in place, and it’s dangerous.

An alarm sounds, signaling that phase one has begun: evacuation.

We have a few operatives on the habitats, and they kill the satellite uplinks. The satellites will probably only stay down for a few minutes, but it will be long enough for us to scatter. Every person in the base pours out of the underground bases and off the farms as fast as they can. We all carry as much as we can. Some carry packs laden with food, while others carry half a dozen guns.

I carry food and Cygnus carries guns.

We reach the surface and begin to scatter. All one hundred of us spread out over the surrounding two kilometers, and then we move toward Rust Bucket.

There are not enough buggies for everyone to ride, so the buggies form an outer perimeter that moves slowly enough so that everyone evacuating on foot can keep up.

Cygnus insists we stay in the middle and on foot. He doesn’t want me to be in danger, but as soon as the satellites come back on, an orbital bunker buster missile will most likely blow apart our base. So he has no choice but to bring me with him. The safest place for me and our baby is right at his side.

The orbital missiles will have a harder time hitting us while we’re on the move, and scattered out as we are, it would take dozens of missiles. We simply hope the pirates in orbit won’t have that kind of firepower.

As we roll across the rough terrain toward Rust Bucket, we attract attention. The wrong kind.

Raiders appear from all directions. Their buggies kick up dust as they close in on us.

They flank us—there must be at least three hundred of them—and we are forced to stop our forward progression.

Cygnus starts ordering our snipers to set-up, but a lone raider begins walking toward us with a white cloth held high on a stick.

“That means he wants to talk,” I tell Cygnus.

“People are dying while we sit here and talk!” he grunts.

Our people bring the raider into the center of our group, and he reaches out a hand to Cygnus.

Cygnus refuses to shake. “What do you want?”

“We want to help you with whatever you got going. There ain’t nothing to raid when Rust Bucket is shut down. So we can negotiate a way to—”

“Fine!” Cygnus barks. “Move out of our way and join us. We free the city now, not later. Now move aside! Please!”

He gets back on the buggy and orders us to start moving forward.

We continue on, and the raiders fall in with us. We’ve gone from a small circle of people to a wide wave, roaring across the Martian surface to free the city.

As we near the crater, I see two streaming objects in the dim, salmon-colored sky.

Cygnus grabs hold of me and shields me with his body.

From the edge of my vision, I see an explosion; moments later I hear it.

The far end of our wave is struck, and twenty-some raiders are instantly obliterated. Dozens more are thrown through the air like ragdolls.

The second missile hits the other end of the wave, and more raiders are blown apart.

We’re lucky that none of our own people are killed. We continue on, though some stay behind to tend to their wounded comrades. We watch the sky apprehensively, but either the pirates only had two orbital missiles, or they decided they weren’t inflicting enough damage to be cost-effective.

We form a semi-circle around the crater. Cygnus drives our buggy up to the road and points it straight at the gate. The watchtowers are manned now, not with guards, but pirates. They open fire, and raiders begin to fall.

Cygnus shields me with his body once again, and dozens of raiders open fire on the tower. The snipers dive down and take cover. Before they can even poke their heads back up, I see a stream of smoke and flames race from one of the raider groups. A rocket. It slams into the sniper tower and explodes. The wall crumbles open, and I see one of the snipers falling and screaming.

Cygnus is still holding tight to me, and he pulls my hair back. The contrast of this tender gesture amongst so much chaos and death touches me somewhere deep inside, and I feel my eyes begin to water. I try to fight back the tears, as I don’t want Cygnus to think I’m weak or to worry about me.

“Let me go in with you,” I plead. He’s refused me this request dozens of times, but I feel it’s worth one last try. “I have more contacts inside than anyone.... I’ll be critical to phase three—”

“You’re critical here,” he says, and points at my stomach. “This is the future. Our future.”

He looks back over his shoulder at the burning sniper tower, the towering gate, and the mountainous lip of the crater.

“It’s a siege in there. My race has evolved to thrive in that kind of hell. You not only have no race memories of such conditions, but you’re a female—”

“Human female again? Did I lose my name?” Cygnus can be so damn frustrating.

“You are, Aura,” he says. “I know what this word means. It means you project your presence and strength, so there is no need for you to be inside the walls. Your aura radiates through—”

“It’s just a name,” I say, grabbing hold of his arms. “You can’t read so deeply into a name, that’s an awful and illogical argument to keep me back here.”

“Human female then,” he says, waggling his ears.

Just before I smack him, he grabs hold of me. He dips me down, pulls up my facemask, and kisses me deeply. I feel his tongue in my mouth, and my heart races and aches for him. It’s foolish to go with him, but it’s even worse to let him go in alone. What would have happened back on Scorpio’s ship if I had stayed locked away, if I’d not gone back after him?

He embraces me, holding tightly to my lower back, and I drink in his lips and tongue and warmth. I nibble on his lips—if I bite him he won’t be able to pull away, and he won’t ever leave me—and I wrap my arms tightly around him so he can’t pull away from me.

Something explodes far in the distance, and gunfire erupts across the surface. We ignore it, lost in each other.

I start to feel lightheaded, and not just from the kiss. I’m not getting enough oxygen. I pull away from him, reluctantly, and re-affix my mask.

“I see you, Aura,” he says. “And I will see you again.”

He turns away from me, and phase two begins. It’s the part I don’t believe will work because it relies on Cygnus’s bio-suit actually doing something. Everyone else has seen Aegus’s suit in action, and they show little doubt, but it all sounds too farfetched to me. Ever since Cygnus first showed me his bio-suit, it has remained latched onto his shoulder. I’ve never actually seen it do anything other than make him eat like a barbarian. It’s consumed hundreds of thousands of calories over the past week and done nothing to show for it.

Cygnus throws off his coat, revealing a bare purple chest. Everyone turns toward him, and the raiders especially seem fixated. They’ve never seen an alien before, and they likely had no idea one was leading this attack.

Then he drops his pants, and I see some of the women looking down with lust blazing hot in their eyes. I ball up my fists and elbow the woman nearest me, giving her a sharp look.

“I’m sorry,” she says. “He’s chosen you as his lifemate, I just didn’t know that the Great Brother Cygnus was so...great.”

I elbow her again.

Cygnus stands fully naked and purple, his height towering above everything, and everyone in front of him begins clearing a path. After a minute or two, the road in front of him is completely empty. It’s now a straight shot to the gate.

The followers pull me back, saying it’s not safe for me to be too close.

As they’re pulling me further away from my mate, I see him touch the black sphere on his shoulder. The bio-suit seems to transform to liquid, and it flows out across him like a black pool. It shimmers in the dim Martian sunlight, covering his entire arm. It passes his shoulder, covers his chest, and then accelerates out across him. After a few seconds—to my great relief—it’s covered his dick, and then continues flowing down to cover his legs and feet.

It leaves his head unmasked, and it ripples like a pond on a windy day. It begins to glow and harden, and finally it changes color. To teal.

I roll my eyes at that, as there’s only one reason I can think of that he chose teal for his fancy suit.

The suit has covered his hands as well, and he raises them both up, pointing them toward the gate.

“Infiltration teams, get ready!” he shouts, his hands pointed toward the gate.

The gate is about two kilometers away, and I’m still incredibly skeptical that the suit is going to—

His hands glow purple. The glow intensifies, and even through my tinted mask I can barely look at his hands. I raise my hands to shield my eyes, but his hands begin to fade back to teal.

Nothing happens. It didn’t work? Our whole plan relied on this working, and if it doesn’t happen, we’ll be sitting outside this gate with a bunch of buggies and guns and no way in. We’ll—

All at once, a purple beam blasts out of his hands. It swells as it shoots through the air toward the gate. Within seconds, the beam slams into the gate, and that’s when I realize it’s not a beam of light, but plasma, or something resembling plasma. The purple material sloshes against the gate for a moment, and the beam expands. The gate crashes down, and the purple beam floods through the tunnel.

Cygnus keeps his hands held high as the beam completely fills the tunnel.

Buggies are racing down just off the road, steering clear of the beam, but moving in toward the lip of the crater.

As the beam begins to fade away, I make a reckless decision, one that will make Cygnus very angry.

22 Cygnus

When the hunger begins to gnaw at me, I scale back the flow of plasma. I need to leave something for the suit—and for myself—after I’m in the city.

The beam dies off, and I lower my hands. I see a clear hole through the tunnel and light at the end. Anyone who was in the tunnel would have died instantly. They’d have manned the tunnel with pirates rather than civilians, so I feel no guilt. With the beam gone, the buggies swerve immediately onto the road. Dozens of dust clouds merge together to form one red mass, which blocks my view of the tunnel.

I jump onto my own buggy and look around to find Aura, but there’s too many people running around and red dust everywhere. I saw my followers pulling her back to a safe distance, and I trust them now to keep her safe outside the city while we attack.

Jin jumps onto the buggy with me, and two of our best fighters load up onto the backseat. Jin drives the buggy down the road, and I have the bio-suit form a helmet to shield me from the dust.

I switch my vision to an infrared/UV composite, so I’m able to see through the dust cloud into the tunnel.

I zoom in as we approach and see gunfire flashing out from the end of the tunnel. Something explodes, and one of our buggies flips over. The pirates are fighting back, but with each second that passes, another buggy clears the tunnel and races into the city proper.

A minute or two later our own buggy passes the melted remnants of the gate. The tunnel is less dusty, so I switch back to normal vision and drop my helmet. There are some bloodied bodies lining the tunnel. I recognize the faces, and I make a note to mourn their loss after the battle has ended.

We clear the tunnel, and I see chaos everywhere throughout the city.

There are muzzle flashes lighting up along the upper stories of high rises, and our own fighters are pinned down against smaller buildings, taking potshots. Buggies are racing down the street, and gunners are letting loose with gunfire and rockets toward high-rises.

There are civilians screaming and running to get out of the way of the fighting, and buggies are flipped and burning everywhere.

I see one such civilian, she falls as she runs, and then I see a small child crying next to a pile of rubble.

I tap Jin on the shoulder and point, and Jin swerves our buggy toward them.

As we approach, I see a man with a rifle in ragged clothes pop out from the corner of a building and take aim at the woman.

I jump out of the buggy while it’s still in motion, and roll across the ground. I stand to my full height in front of the woman, just as the man fires.

I feel the bullets slam against my chest, but the bio-suit diffuses the impact of the first handful. One penetrates through, however, and I feel its sharp bite as it shatters one of my ribs.

Ignoring the pain, I raise my hand and blast a concentrated beam. The man has ducked back around the corner, so I just drag the beam into the corner. It melts off the edge of the building, and I see the beam cut into the shooter’s stomach. I drop the beam and see a hole cut clean through him as he crumbles to the ground.

Jin is moving toward me, and I quickly pick up the woman and inspect her for injuries.

“I didn’t get hit,” she cries. “But my daughter!” She points back toward the crying child, and suddenly I feel as if my heart has stopped beating. I see something that fills me with terror and rage.

Aura.

She’s running toward the pile of rubble and the child. I race toward her at full speed, raising my hands and scanning all angles. Aura is running completely exposed and with no cover, and there are dozens of buildings and hundreds of windows with an open shot on her.

I see a gun appear in one such window, steadied by a hand poised on the windowsill. Before I even see a face, I flood the window with plasma.

Aura picks up the child and cradles her. Seconds later I’m on her.

I scoop her and the child both up into my arms, turn around, and run back toward Jin and the buggy.

Jin has ducked down and taken cover behind a building just outside the tunnel.

I place Aura and the child down with Jin and the child’s mother.

“Aura,” I say. “Foolish human female! How did you—”

“I stuffed myself in the buggy’s cargo hold,” she says. “At least this time I was in there by choice.”

“Jin,” I say, ignoring her. “Take her back outside; see that she does nothing foolish again.”

Jin nods. “Sorry, Aura, Let’s get you—”

There’s an explosion behind us, and I feel the heat from it warm my face. I pull Aura in front of me and shield her. Moments later chunks of rubble slam into my back.

Jin has fallen down with the woman and child, and we manage to keep all of them safe.

I turn to face the source of the explosion, and see that the tunnel has collapsed.

My stomach groans, but I point my hands at the rubble and fire plasma.

The beam that comes out is barely wider than a flagpole. Though it melts only small holes in the rubble, more and more rubble falls down and covers the holes.

“Guess you need to eat more,” Jin says. “We’re all stuck in here.”

I look at Aura, and she’s smiling.

“Insufferable woman!” I roar. “Risking the future for your own ego!”

“Ego?” Aura says, eyes widening. “Great Brother Cygnus is calling me out on my ego? You purple bastard, I’ll —”

I grab her, pull up her facemask, and kiss her. It’s a brief kiss, but I try to channel all of my love for her into it. When I pull away and look at her face, I know I’ve succeeded.

23 Aura

Jin meets back with us. “I got the mom and kid into a building that seems safe. No pirates there, only some of our people. If we find more civilians out and about, we can bring them back there.”

“Good,” Aura says. “Now follow me.”

I lead us to Old Shuang’s. It’s a shop that gives me fair prices for scrap, and Old Shuang is the Rust Bucket civilian I trust most. The pirates have pulled back and holed up in the tallest buildings near the center of the city. They’ve taken a lot of hostages with them, and the tunnel was blown out before all of our people and raiders got through.

It’s a deadlock now, and we worry that trying to force our way into the buildings would mean more dead hostages — not to mention how many people we’d lose attacking an entrenched position.

Cygnus has taken a regular rifle, and he tells me his bio-suit is all but done. It will take a lot more sticks of jerky and servings of bacon and eggs to power it back up again.

We make slow progress, and Cygnus is hyper-protective of me. We can’t move away from one piece of cover until he’s 100% sure it’s clear, and then he shields me with his big, teal-armored body while we run from cover point to cover point.

When we finally reach Old Shuang’s, the door is locked. Cygnus kicks the door in, and he and Jin secure the first few rooms while I wait.

“Old Shuang!” I shout out. “Are you here?”

“Aura!” he shouts, “Get out of here, it’s—”

HIs voice cuts out.

Cygnus and Jin move toward the location of his voice. We’re surrounded by shelves of equipment, though judging by the appearance of the room, a lot of it has been looted.

Old Shuang had called out from the back room, so the three of us head in that direction.

“Wait here,” Cygnus says. “Something is wrong. I can feel it.”

Jin nods, and the two of them disappear into the storeroom.

I wait nervously outside. I comb the room for useful weapons or equipment, but it’s mostly just junk. Anything useful has been looted.

A quick burst of gunfire erupts from the back room, and I start to run toward it. I worry Cygnus has been ambushed.

Something hard grabs my waist, and I’m lifted off the floor in mid-stride.

“I knew setting up in a shithole like this would get the scrap queen to come to me.”

It’s Scorpio’s voice.

I squirm in his arms, and I try to hit him in the balls with my foot, but I have no leverage. He drags me toward the door.

Cygnus roars out from the backroom, and he raises the gun toward us.

Scorpio pulls me up in front of him and crouches low behind me.

“You really wanna’ risk that, Ziggy?” Scorpio says, laughing.

Jin points his gun as well, but he’s shaking and covered in blood.

Scorpio used Old Shuang as a decoy, and I was dumb enough to fall for it. It’s bad enough I got myself captured, but I got a good man killed as well. Maybe Cygnus really would have been better off without me?

“So you want to turn into a bear?” Cygnus asks. “And then you’ll let her go?”

Four more pirates flood inside the room. They raise their guns, and now Cygnus and Jin are completely outgunned.

“I wanted to turn into a bear, yeah,” Scorpio says. “But that was before I saw you shoot that purple shite out of your hands. Now I want that suit.”

24 Cygnus

I call the suit away. It fades to black and shimmers, and it quickly peels itself off my body. It tries to roll into a sphere, but the suit clings to my bullet wound. It’s dug itself deep into me to disinfect the wound and pull out the bullet, and since it’s in the middle of its work, it refuses to finish pulling away completely.

“Come on!” Scorpio yells, pressing his gun up against Aura’s chin.

I will kill this man. Not only does my shame debt require it, but justice demands it.

I grab the suit with both hands, just centimeters from the wound. I tear at it, and it rips out. The bullet pops out of the wound. Covered in teal blood, it drops to the floor and trails drops of blood behind it as it rolls. More blood begins to ooze out of the gaping wound. I cover it with my hand to stem the bleeding.

The suit rolls up into a tight sphere, and I throw it underhand across the floor.

It rolls toward Scorpio, and the moment I see his eyes glance down at it, I shift to bear form and lunge at him.

The suit swarms around Scorpio as I’m mid-lunge, and it hardens itself against my claws.

I feel my claws break as I hit the suit with full force, and then gunfire breaks out.

Aura is down on the ground, crawling toward the open door. The shooters are unloading onto the counter, and Jin has dived behind it.

Scorpio was shielded from my swipe, but the force of impact sends him rolling back into the wall.

While the shooters unload on Jin, I raise both claws and swipe, killing two of them instantly.

With their blood still hot and wet under my broken claws, the other two drop their guns and try to escape.

I jump on top of one of the pirates and maul him. Jin pops up and shoots the other one between the eyes, killing him instantly.

Scorpio—still fully bio-suited—is crawling away from me, toward Jin.

Jin unloads his gun into Scorpio, but the suit absorbs the few remaining bullets in his magazine.

Aura comes back inside and throws a gun down beside me.

I shift back to Marauder form and grab the weapon.

Scorpio fires a plasma beam into the counter, and Jin rolls away as the counter melts apart.

I begin to empty the gun into Scorpio’s back, and the bullets knock him flat on his face. I know that each bullet the suit absorbs will use up some of Scorpio’s energy, and the suit will grow hungrier.

Scorpio cackles wildly, then throws a hot beam right at me.

The gun melts in my hands, and I barely have time to dodge it and grab Aura.

Scorpio moves toward me with both hands raised, and Jin charges him with the butt of his rifle.

He slams the back of the gun into Scorpio’s head, but the suit hardens. The attack does nothing.

Scorpio grabs Jin and flings him into the air. The suit gives Scorpio enough strength that Jin flies into the wall so hard that it cracks and crumbles. He hits the ground, but doesn’t get back up.

Scorpio turns back toward me and laughs. “Just you and me now. I reckon we have a fair fight now that I’ve got this—”

I jump into him, shifting back into bear form in mid-air.

The mass of my bear form is enough to throw Scorpio to the ground, but when I see his open palm point at me, I shift back to Marauder form to turn myself a smaller target. When I dodge, I see Aura fall to the ground.

“Get out!” I shout to her. “Please!”

“I’m not gonna’ hurt her,” Scorpio says. He smiles a wicked grin. “I’m just gonna’ kill her.”

He points his hand at her, and I dive in front.

The plasma burns as it hits me. I feel my skin melt away, but just before it obliterates my inner organs, Scorpio’s eyes bulge, and he falls backward.

The beam cuts up my shoulder, and it hits the roof, tearing through it. The beam cuts off, and Scorpio falls flat on his back.

“Fuck,” Scorpio says. “I’m fucking starving!”

My chest and shoulder are both a burned and bloody mess, but the beam shot at least cauterized the bullet wound. I can barely move through the pain, but I see Aura safe behind me. Scorpio is flailing on the ground grunting and wailing.

He points his hand at me as I approach, but nothing happens.

Aura comes up behind me and clutches my arm. “What’s wrong with him?”

“He wanted the bio-suit,” I say. “And he got it. But human metabolism isn’t efficient enough, so it’s eating him alive.”

Scorpio clutches at his stomach, and he looks up at me with his one bloodshot eye. Tears are streaming down his face, and snot is filling his beard. “You fucking…b….”

His voice falls to a moan, and he writhes on the ground for a few more moments before falling still.

Aura runs behind the counter to check on Jin. “He’s alive.”

I nod. Jin is strong, and so is Aura. My human female. The mother of my future child. I see her. And now I will win this battle, and every battle to come.

Epilogue

Cygnus and I watch our daughter Sara play on the farm. She’s only two years old, but being half-Marauder and half-human—Seraph—means she can clear a whole stock of corn in Martian gravity.

Our farms are domed and outside now rather than underground. The orbitals have not accepted us yet, but they are not openly hostile.

Sara laughs and giggles, her voice unobstructed by a facemask. Another gift from her father’s genes.

Her ears are more elf-like than bear-like—a mix between human and Marauder.

Her skin is more a pale violet than purple, and in the pale Martian sunlight, her skin sometimes looks almost human.

“Sara,” I shout, “Come back, you’re getting too far away.”

She giggles louder, and jumps further away.

“She’s as stubborn as her father,” Cygnus says.

Great Brother Cygnus. Much to my dismay, the name has stuck.

But I’m Aura, the Great Mother. That name has stuck as well, and together Cygnus and I rule most of the cities along the south pole. Hundreds join our cause every day, but the equator and everything North of it is hostile to our cause.

“Have you heard from Aegus?” I ask. “Seriously, Sara, get back here!”

“No,” Cygnus says. “We have to trust he’s made it. I’ll go get her.”

Trust. I’d received one short message from my sister. At least I know she’s still alive, but I have to trust her to take care of herself.

Cygnus leaps off the hill and rushes down toward the rows of corn. He’s much faster than his daughter, and after a minute or so he’s snatched her out of the air. He slings her over his shoulder, and she pounds on his broad shoulders as he carries her back toward me.

Just as he begins to climb the hill again, he stops suddenly. He hushes Sara and looks off in the distance. My eyesight isn’t as good as Cygnus’s, but I think I see a figure disappear behind a far-off hill.

“Was that Uncle Aegus?” Sara asks as Cygnus climbs the hill.

“It might have been,” Cygnus says. “But let’s get you both inside now.”

Cygnus nods to me and smiles. He puts his hand on the small of my back, and we climb the hill back toward our home.

“I see you, Cygnus,” I whisper.

Sara pouts at me and clicks her ears.

“And you too, sweetie.”

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Also by Aya Morningstar

SHIFT Squad Series

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About the Author

Aya Morningstar lives in Denver. She writes with a hot cup of Earl Grey and her loyal were corgi by her side. She writes both paranormal and sci-fi romance.

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- @ayamorningstar

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