Brute: A Dark Sci-Fi Romance Read online

  At the base of the shaft, there’s an emergency shelter room. It’s very well stocked, both with food and weaponry. Old weaponry, projectile based, but still effective enough. And there’s a lot of it.

  “Okay,” I breathe. “We’re safe.”

  Crash gives me a look. “We’re trapped underground like some kind of prey animal, with a Genari fleet above us. You think that’s safe?”

  “We’re safer than we were,” I correct myself. Being fired at repeatedly and having his ship heavily damaged seems to have put him in a bad mood.

  “Is there a way out of here?”

  “Yeah,” I say. “There’s three tunnels leading out of here. Those portals there.” I point toward a bank of exits, each one protected by a circular grille.

  “Where do they go?”

  It’s a good question, but I don’t know how to answer it. “Uhm…”

  “You don’t know.”

  “Well, I mean, they have to go somewhere else,” I say vaguely. “I think… hmm.”

  It’s been a while since I looked at the schematics. I don’t actually know where any of them go, but does it really matter? They all go away.

  Crash strides over to one of the portals and yanks the grate off. What lies beyond is a reinforced metal tunnel.

  “I am not going to fit through these.” He makes the statement flatly.

  He’s right. I can fit easily. His pet will too. But he… fuck. I just trapped him underground with at least a hundred tons of rubble above and no way out below.

  Fuck. Fuck. “Fuck!”

  I curse and kick at the nearest thing, an oversized family can of peaches.

  “Calm down,” he growls at me. “Swearing and screaming won’t do anything. We will find a way out.”

  I look at him. He’s not panicking, even though he should be. He’s the one who pointed out the problem of my little ‘escape plan’ and he’s the one worst affected by it.

  “Sit down.”

  He points to a bucket of dehydrated protein. It’s an order, and it’s one I follow because what’s the point of resisting him now. I haven’t effectively resisted him at any point since he showed up.

  Suddenly, there is silence. I sit. Farti bleats and butts at his legs and I look around. My eyes settle on the dark little hole that was exposed when Crash pulled the grate off.

  I could go out the grate. I could leave him alone here, in the dark, with dwindling surprise. I could take Farti with me, and just… forget about him. It’s a horrible, nasty little thought and it makes me sick to have it, even though it would mean saving myself in the process.

  Crash is moving around the room, taking an inventory of what’s here. He has shrunk back to his normal massive form and his eyes have dulled to a rich red rather than a blazing fire. I watch him, entranced by his body. He is such an incredible specimen. The way his muscles are structured is stunning.

  He pulls the top part of his suit down and it drapes around his waist, exposing the line of his torso. It’s built for pure power, rows of muscles leading down to the cock that is covered, but which I have felt desecrate my most intimate places.

  As I watch him, I feel myself aching between my thighs. He fucked my pussy and my ass. I am still exposed. Naked from stomach to thigh. His cum is still making me sticky. I forgot about it in my fear, but now it’s all I can think about. Sitting is not a comfortable proposition. My bottom aches inside and out.

  This is the most confusing, conflicting situation I have ever been in. I’ve done wrong, in lying and in bringing him here under false pretenses. He’s done wrong by fucking my brains out and beating me. The Genari have done wrong by being a pack of psychopaths, and now we’re all in a standoff. I don’t know if I’m Crash’s prisoner, or his… no. I’m definitely a prisoner.

  The bleating starts to settle, and I wish I had pants. There should be a change of clothes down here. Several really. I get up and start hunting too.

  “Sit down.”

  “I am looking for clothes…”

  “Sit. Down.”

  He repeats the order in no uncertain terms. I stop and stare at him.

  “I need to clean up. I need…”

  “You need to sit down, or you’re going to be sore.”

  Just like that, I fucking hate him again. But not enough to make a dash for the grate. Enough to sit back down on that bucket and stare daggers at him.

  “I need to get cleaned up. If I don’t, I’m going to get gross and I’m going to start smelling and I’ll probably get a rash, and then…”

  “Alright,” he snaps. “I’ll clean you up.”

  He grabs me up off the bucket and he puts my legs over his shoulders. I am suspended in his great grip, my head dangling toward the floor. His big hands hold my thighs in place, pull my sex to his mouth.

  I don’t know what to expect, but I feel his tongue rasping all the way from the back of my bottom, all the way over my pussy lips, taking away the residue of my well fucked rear and my dripping cunt.

  He is cleaning me like a mother cat might clean her kitten. He is pinning and holding me in place, and he’s not leaving a drop of his or my essence in his wake. The only problem is that every time his tongue passes over my clit, I feel a tremor of arousal run through me.

  The more he licks me with that hot, rasping tongue, the wetter I get. Upside down and helpless, I begin mewling pathetically, thrusting my hips against his lips and tongue.

  It’s so sudden. It always is with him. He doesn’t give warnings. He doesn’t warm me up. When he wants me, he grabs me and then I am his, consumed in whichever way he desires.

  The blood is rushing to my head as the pleasure spirals down my spine. Held in his impressive grip, I am helpless to his desire, and my own. He laps my cunt until I come, once, and then he keeps going, the roughened tip of his tongue toying with my clit, swirling around the hot little bud.

  My stomach muscles ache as I convulse with pleasure. He is punishing me. He is rubbing my clit to a raw peak and there is nothing I can do to stop him, because he is big and I am small.

  I wanted to be clean, but he has made me filthy. He has taken my understanding of sexuality and he has twisted it into something so perverse I put my hands to my head and I let out screams of ecstasy, contorting and writhing in his grasp until finally he shows me mercy and lays me down on the ground.

  Crash stands over me, wipes the back of his hand over his mouth. I lie there, push my hands between my legs. I am gleaming and slick and my poor clit throbs with the repeated climaxes he has forced on me.

  “Please,” I whimper. “Let me get dressed.”

  “You’re not going to cover your cunt. I want you open to me. I want your pussy bare.”

  “Did you come all this way for pussy?” My voice is weak and timorous, but I don’t understand why he is so intent on making me feel… like this. Every bit of energy I had left was consumed in those vengeful orgasms, and now I am bereft of any kind of defense as I lie there at his feet.

  “I came all this way because of you,” he says, his eyes flaring with lustful desire. “You lured me here, Pyxel. And you buried me far beneath the ground with you. Every step of the way, you’ve made it impossible for me to ignore you. So yes, I want you. I want every bit of you. I will have you in every way I can, as often as I can.”

  “But the chip…”

  “The chip isn’t enough anymore,” he says. “It’s worth a lot. But it’s not worth being buried underground. So I’m not just taking it anymore. I’m taking you too.”

  My stomach clenches. I sit up and stare at him. He’s putting into words what I’ve been afraid of since the beginning. He was never, ever going to let me go. The moment he laid eyes on me, I was going to be his. And we’ve both acted like it was inevitable, even while we pretended it was about this chip wrapped around my wrist.

  “Get up,” he says when I have nothing else to say. “We’re going to eat and drink and we’re going to work on a way out of here without exposing ourselves
to the Genari.”

  He takes charge so easily and so calmly. If it were me, finding myself basically buried alive, I would be clawing at the walls, but he doesn’t seem bothered. That iron discipline he has applied to me over and over seems strong within him too.

  I could fight him on this. I could tell him that the chip was for sale, not me. I could yell and scream and assert myself, and it wouldn’t do a damn thing, because we’re both stuck here and I can’t stop him from taking me if he wants to. Even if I wanted to, I don’t think I would. He makes me feel things I’ve never felt before. He makes my body sing and my senses soar.

  Living alone has been the best and safest way to survive. But it has been lonely. There are men out here who would force themselves on any woman they found. Several have tried it on me at various times, but their grunting lust never made me feel like Crash does.

  I should hate him, but the situation is so complex that hating him is akin to hating myself, because he’s right. I did draw him here. I set him up in the hopes of scamming him. I’ve cost him a lot. I might even have cost him his life.

  “Let me make the food,” I say, getting to my feet.

  Cooking gives me something to do. And I am hungry too. I haven’t eaten all damn day basically, and I am guessing Crash has no idea how to prepare the supplies that are down here.

  He nods and I set to work. Most of the stuff is dehydrated, just needs a little water to return it to a semblance of what it once was. And some heat, to mimic what it could be if it was real.

  I pass a plate to Crash, and put a bowl down in front of Farti, who picks it up and sniffs it before hopping up on Crash’s lap and shoving his face into it. It’s adorable, the way he does that, and the way Crash lets him. Those two are really close. I’ve never had a pet like that before. I used to leave a little food out for feral kittens, but they never got tame. There’s too much wild in the world now.

  “What?” Crash catches my glance and makes it a question.

  “You let your pet eat with you? That’s sweet.”

  The little animal bleats and makes a rumbling sound that might be a growl.

  “Farti isn’t a pet,” he says. “He’s my colleague.”

  Uh huh. Sure. The way that little guy snuggles up to him screams pet. I guess Crash doesn’t like acknowledging that he’s soft enough to have a pet. He wants me to think he’s this big merciless brute of a creature. But the way Farti cuddles with him tells another story.

  I take a few bites, but rehydrated food is disgusting, and I’m not really that hungry. The room is dark, lit with low energy emergency lights. We’re cast in twilight and will be until we get out of here. As I chew on the gritty dried lumps that are supposed to be potato, I try to think of a way to get Crash through the escape. Short of chopping him up, I can’t see a way. He’s just too damn big.

  “They almost killed us,” I mumble. “The Genari.”

  “Yes,” Crash agrees. Farti gives a little bleat.

  “Why are they doing this? How can you be smart enough to have invisibility cloaking, but too stupid not to destroy the thing you’re looking for?”

  “The Genari steal all their tech. And they take slaves to maintain it,” Crash explains. “They are warriors. They grow so fast and breed so plentifully they can produce an army within five years. They don’t care how many fall in battle. Their queens are producing fresh eggs daily.”

  “Eggs?”

  He gives me a look, as if I am being deliberately silly. I have no idea what he is talking about, but I am curious. I shrug a little and give him a quizzical stare.

  “Genari females are rare,” he explains. “When one is born, she is destined to be a queen. She will grow ten times the size of the warriors, and she will be impregnated repeatedly by multiple males.”

  “So she’s getting…” I make an in and out gesture with my fingers. “All day?”

  “It’s not sex like creatures as you and I have it. It’s more… an insertion.”

  “An insertion?”

  “The queen has several openings that can be used. A male will approach and push his genitals into one of them. When he has fully penetrated her, the crevice closes and his man parts are… removed.”

  “Removed?” I repeat the word, finding it difficult to understand what he’s saying.

  “They stay with her.”

  “She takes his dick and balls?”

  “Yes. And then she absorbs them, gestates, and gives birth to up to a hundred eggs per day. Each of those eggs becomes a Genari warrior.”

  “No. Fucking. Way. That’s gross.”

  “It is the way their life form replicates.”

  “That sounds like an insect thing. Or a fish thing. Or maybe both.”

  “It’s a life thing,” Crash says. “Everything has to replicate.”

  “Does it?”

  “Hm?”

  “Does everything have to replicate?”

  “To be a species, yes.” He raises a brow as his eyes smolder. “You are not asking me how reproduction functions, are you, Pyxel?”

  “No,” I blush, even though I feel far past the point of blushing where he is concerned. I don’t know what I’m asking. I have been here for so long without a mate. But today he mated me. It won’t lead to anything though. How could it? His seed puts me into orgasmic full body shock and nearly chokes the life out of me. It makes me think. My mother. Her loss. My father. His disappointment.

  Now I’m sitting here in the darkness with the alien I tried to trick, and his little pet, and I’m wondering why I bothered with any of this. Maybe it’s time to give in. He won’t give me the money. And the Genari won’t just kill me. They will destroy everything my ancestors worked to preserve.

  I can feel an era coming to an end. This end has been coming for a long time. It ended with my father. I’ve been playing at preservation, but all I’ve really done is run through limited resources. This deal with the chip was a gamble. And it’s one I’ve lost.

  “They will keep sending troops, won’t they?”

  “I don’t know,” Crash says. “They want the chip, but they will only expend so many resources to get it. They’ve lost three men so far. We have to make them lose more. We have to make it cost more to the get the chip than it does to give up.”

  “I should go up. Give them the chip. Get them to leave. And then I can get someone to come back for you. We can dig a tunnel down. We can get you out.”

  “No.”

  His refusal is flat and final. “I want the chip. And I don’t trust them not to kill you up there.”

  Farti starts bleating. He really does seem to understand what’s going on sometimes. It’s pretty impressive. But I’m more surprised that Crash is refusing his only chance at rescue.

  “I mean, you could try to dig your way out of here, but even with your strength…” I trail off.

  “Don’t worry about me,” he says, just as Farti jumps down and starts bleating and grunting and ranting and carrying on.

  * * *

  Crash

  “She’s screwed us! Send her up there with some trash from here. Make them think that’s the chip.”

  Farti is scared and angry. He’s also losing money, which I think bothers him more than any of the rest of it. An attacking army worries him significantly less than the fact that we can’t get the chip out of here to sell it. Our buyer was going to pay us ten times what Pyxel was asking for the chip herself. We could have retired on this single trade.

  “We have her. We have the chip. Don’t worry,” I reassure him, in his tongue, not hers. There are some things she doesn’t need to hear, and the fact she thinks he’s still just a pet is sweet.

  “Don’t worry? We’re basically dead!”

  “I’ll keep you safe.”

  His fur bristles. He lets out a little bleat. “Safe? I haven’t been safe since we got here. I hate Earth. The whole thing is made of shit.”

  “We knew it was a risk, coming here.”

  He grumb
les, but he knows it’s true. The reason he has me by his side is because I deal with the dangers. Like this. Truth be told. I’m in my element here. And it’s because none of us are exactly on the right side of good.

  She got greedy. We got greedy. And the Genari are more than greedy, they’re ravenous.

  Pyxel’s concern for me is sweet, but misplaced. I can get out of here by myself. It won’t be fast, but I can do it. I won’t need to though. We’re not all that far below ground, and I’ve been in worse situations than this one. This is a nice little bunker. We have protection from the bulk of the Genari force, and when they inevitably tunnel in, I’ll slaughter them one by one and I’ll have my escape. It’s only a matter of time.

  In the meantime, I have some time to spend. I intend to spend it teaching this girl what it means to be mine. She has eaten, and that is good. She needs her strength. Both for what she’s been through, and for what is coming. I estimate there’s about ten hours before Genari troops start pouring in through a hole somewhere. That’s ten hours to fuck her into submission and make sure she knows she’s mine.

  I will have to be careful. I can fuck her, but I can’t come inside her. I am a danger to her, a potentially lethal one.

  It would be safer to keep my cock away from her. But I won’t deny myself the pleasure I get from being inside her. Instead, I’ll deny orgasm. Hers and mine. I want her broken to my will by the time we get out of here. I want her to follow after me as obediently as Farti follows anyone with money.

  “You’re going to make me watch you mate her again, aren’t you,” Farti complains. “What am I supposed to do?”

  “Sit in the corner and meditate on how obscenely wealthy you’re going to be very, very soon.”

  He grumbles, but he trusts me. We have been through a lot together, he and I. And this is far from the worst place we’ve been imprisoned, or far from the most dangerous foe we have ever faced.

  “Were you two having an actual conversation? Because it kind of looked like it.”