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  He attacks the plant with a vicious fury, yanking the tendrils and vines from me. It is working. He is freeing me - but at a cost. For every piece of plant he pulls off me, another two wrap around him. His sharp body slices through some of them, but they keep finding places where he isn’t sharp or armored and I know he is being infected with the plant’s juices as well. His grunts and growls could be anger, pleasure, or pain. I don’t know. I don't think he knows either.

  Chapter Nine - Revenge

  Reaper

  One is gone.

  There aren’t many places to be gone on this ship, but there’s a hell of a lot of places to be gone on the husk of the planet beneath us. It also happens to be the least safe place for a human female in the universe. Only a complete moron would return One to the planet she barely managed to escape from alive in the first place. Unfortunately, I travel with a complete moron all the time thanks to the fact he was hatched with me.

  It is obvious that Tarkan has taken her. Likely already ravaged her. She is probably in the throes of forced lust, her energy reserves being depleted to dangerous levels by his endless desire. He has no right! I was going to wait for quite some time to mate with her again, until she had fully recovered from her ordeal on Earth.

  Perhaps it was wrong for me to take her. No. I know it was wrong for me to take her. I couldn’t help myself. Maybe I shouldn’t expect Tarkan to help himself either, but it’s one thing to give into mutual desire, and something completely else to steal her and take her back to the hellscape we rescued her from.

  Tarkan is foolish and aggressive, unable to function on his own. Scythkin know better than to separate from their nest mates. We are strong together. We function as a group. There is no such thing as a single Scythkin. There is only the clutch.

  Apparently, he has forgotten that. The lure of a fertile female is too much to ignore, one last chance at human pleasure. He is an idiot. When I find him, I will hurt him. If he has hurt her, accidentally or on purpose, I will truly hurt him.

  As I prepare a shuttle, I am cursing under my breath in every language I know, three hundred phrases for “stupid asshole” pouring from my fanged mouth. He has put the girl in danger. He has undermined the trust we have to have for one another. Finding him is not going to be easy. I doubt he returned to the same area of the planet where we found her. That would be too simple. He will have searched out some remote, overgrown location where he thinks I’ll have a harder time finding him.

  The planet is split into three environments. Water. Desert. Forest. We found her in a desert biome, so I’m picking forest. I’m also thinking he wouldn’t have travelled far. He would have headed for the closest forested area, probably with some ruins which will be difficult to scan effectively.

  I run a simulation while I’m preparing, and by the time I’m ready to depart, the computer has a likely destination to start looking.

  He didn’t just disobey me as captain, as humans might understand our relationship - as the girl will no doubt understand it. That is not how broodkin interact. He did worse. He turned away from our primal connection, broke the bond of our hatching in order to try to steal the female away. I do not yet know what I will do when I find them, but I know it will be painful for Tarkan in the extreme.

  It takes a matter of minutes to fall through the atmosphere, my shuttle hurtling at terminal velocity toward the ground, only barely avoiding collision with the Earth when I pull the nose up at the last possible moment and engage the afterburners to bring the shuttle down in dense forest.

  Before I leave the shuttle, I ensure that I am fully armed. I do not know how feral Tarkan has become. His desire to mate has overridden his basic instincts, so he could be a long way gone, a shadow of the honorable broodling he once was.

  My simulation was accurate. Within seconds of landing, the shuttle is picking up the signal from his craft, landed less than one Earth mile away. I make my way quickly to that craft, hoping he had the sense to stay there and use it as a base, but it is empty, and I can see a trail cutting through the dense undergrowth where he must have taken the human girl. His footprints are easily visible to the eye, making the tracking equipment I brought with me utterly redundant. I can see how he’s gone crashing between the trees, breaking through bushes with no regard for the environment he finds himself in, or any dangers that might lurk. We are powerful creatures, but we are not invulnerable. That is why we are born in broods, so we can lose a few of our numbers and not be overly weakened. Tarkan and I don’t have the luxury of being idiots - a fact he seems to have forgotten. There are no redundancies in our brood.

  “TARKAN!”

  I roar his name, my voice audible across a ten mile radius. He could hide from me, but he should know better. I have his trail, and I will follow it until I catch him. Stopping so as to be better able to hear him if he calls back, I listen to the silence of the forest. This place is full of life, but inexplicably still. I feel as though something is waiting for me out there.

  This planet used to be almost entirely civilized, but much has changed and it has returned to the wild state from which it came. That means wildlife, beasts with claws and teeth and a hunger which knows no sense other than sating itself. Tarkan could be in pieces by now, and the girl too. She would be an appetizer for some of the creatures that could roam this place.

  “TARKAN! YOU FOOL! ANSWER ME!”

  Silence again. I could believe that this jungle was lifeless, if not for the abundance of the plant growth which crowds me on all sides. I could almost swear that it is drawing closer to me with every breath I take, little leaves and tendrils reaching for me.

  Now I am growing paranoid. This is Tarkan’s fault. We don’t belong down here. We are not made of the stuff of this Earth and we can only bring harm to ourselves and to the life struggling to make it through to another generation.

  I start clambering through the undergrowth again, heading along the path he so carelessly made. Does it not occur to him that any animal could follow him? There is hunger in this jungle. I can feel it. The trees reach high into the air, the undergrowth hiding all manner of predators I am sure. I have never encountered an environment like this on any planet that didn’t hide at least one beast adept at shredding flesh from bone.

  A female scream makes me break into a run. One. It could only be her, and her desperate fear sets off a response in me which I cannot control. As I start to move more quickly I become more sure than ever that these damn plants are deliberately getting in the way. I could swear that the roots crossing the track are rising toward my feet, trying to trip me as I thunder toward the sound. If he is hurting her, I will soon be the only member of our brood left, because I will be more dangerous to him than anything

  She is not so far away I can’t hear her, but far enough away that it takes more than a minute or two to get to her, and in that time I feel my body swell to full combat mode, the musculature of my arms, legs and chest nearly doubling, the hard ridges of my back, forearms, neck and skull taking on their hard-plated form which is impenetrable to any flesh creature on any planet anywhere.

  I burst through the undergrowth in a full charge, my bulk making the earth shake, my roar of aggression causing birds to fly screaming from the foliage in a bright cacophony of wingbeats. There is more life here than we expected, but it knows how to hide and only shows itself when it must.

  I hear her scream again, but this time it is a cry of recognition. She has seen me and instead of fleeing from me as any sensible organism might, she runs to me and throws her arms around me, embracing me with a desperation which tells me that something has gone so wrong my presence is preferable to whatever she was running from.

  I have to hold her back so she doesn’t impale herself on a sharp protrusion of my natural armor, she is so eager to hide with me, babbling words I can’t understand. The message is clear though. Something terrible has happened. She is pointing in the direction she came from, pulling at my hand. She wants me to go there. To save Ta
rkan? Or to kill him for what he tried to do to her?

  What did he do to her? Did he hurt her? I don’t smell the scent of his seed. He obviously didn’t get that far before succumbing to whatever wild thing has attacked them.

  She is tugging at my arm, apparently eager to draw me back into the depths of the wilds. I would think she would want to escape, but apparently Tarkan has managed to endear himself to her even though he abducted her from the safety of the ship and took her somewhere where they were both attacked.

  Before going to his aid, I try to inspect her carefully to ensure that she hasn’t been harmed. She keeps wriggling furiously, impatient for me to follow, but I don’t see so much as a scratch on her body. He’s managed to keep her safe, I suppose that’s something, though I still intend to kill him if whatever is attacking him doesn’t manage to.

  I don’t want to take her with me into danger, but I also cannot leave her alone. I should return her to the ship, but if I do there’s a chance Tarkan will actually die. This is a stupid, dangerous, nasty situation to be in and it is his fault. I will kill him twice.

  “Stay close,” I say, knowing she doesn’t understand a word I’m saying, but thinking she can understand the gist of it. We truly do need to decode her language and phase it with ours, the inability to communicate is potentially more dangerous than whatever has Tarkan.

  She tugs at me again. I have to nudge her behind me, she keeps trying to get back ahead, trying to make me follow her instead of following after me. Another thing she doesn’t seem to understand is that she does not lead. She is the subordinate member of our little group, and she must do as she is told.

  It would help if Tarkan would follow the chain of command, but that will be a matter to address once I have killed him three times at least. Four, I think to myself as I grasp her wrist and tug her back again. Once more, she moves ahead of me and has to be pushed back. A third time she moves forward and this time I have to make my point more forcefully, swinging her up off the ground and whacking her naked cheeks with the flat of my palm.

  She squeals and I put her back behind me, pointing at her to let her know that she needs to behave. Her hands go back to her bottom, clutching her cheeks, pouting at me with her lips. She does not want to stay, even though she is clearly going to be in danger if she gets ahead. She is defying me, though in this moment, I am a towering beast full of rage and danger. That means she trusts me. If she did not, she would be cowering in fear. Instead there is a flash of rebellion in her gaze, and impatience. I’m not moving quick enough for her liking. She wants me at Tarkan’s side, defending him from whatever evil he bought on himself.

  He must have somehow made an impression on her in the short time they were alone. Or perhaps what I am seeing is one of the hallmarks of humanity, a desperate desire to ‘help’, even when the one in need of help is a bitter enemy. In the past we watched members of armies embroiled in bitter wars lay down arms to help a wounded enemy, only to begin the slaughter all over just a few days or even hours later. Perhaps this is merely one of the idiosyncrasies of the human condition playing out in front of me.

  I stop to think about that for a moment, which only serves to irritate the little human further. She is squeaking and squealing at me, stamping her feet and pointing in the direction she came running from.

  “Stop,” I tell her. “I will go when I decide to.”

  She winds up and kicks my shin, the underside of her toes meeting the hard armor of my leg. Her high pitched yelp brings me great amusement, as does the hopping dance she does clutching at her foot.

  Tarkan is capable of taking care of himself. More than capable. I do not for a second believe that he needs immediate help. May the human concept of god help any creature which has decided to antagonize him.

  One decides to stop pleading with me and instead dashes off at a fast limp through the trees and bushes, forcing me to give chase. She’s faster than I gave her credit for, as agile as a gazelle. I am at risk of losing her trail, except for the fact that the faster she moves the more she sheds that perfect female scent, her sweat forming a trail which I follow even when I can’t see her skin flashing through the dappled undergrowth. The chase lasts less than sixty seconds and terminates in a clearing, where I see one of the most amusing sights I have beheld in a very long time. Tarkan is in trouble, but he is not doing battle with a tribe of feral humans, or being torn apart by wicked earth animal. He has been caught… by a daisy.

  One is next to me making panicked jabbering noises. She seems wildly concerned, but I don’t see any reason to panic. Tarkan is bound up by the plant-beast, that much is obvious. It has tendrils wrapped around his limbs, avoiding the sharp ridges of his Scythkin form with an alacrity I have to admire.

  “Get this thing off me!” Tarkan demands the moment he sees me, as if he wasn’t in the process of stealing the last human alive from me.

  “I don’t know,” I say, my hands going to my hips. “I don’t know if you deserve to be rescued.”

  “You're not rescuing me. You're just getting a plant off me.”

  “Well, if I’m not rescuing you, then I guess you can handle this yourself.”

  He lets out a snarl which makes the binding leaves vibrate. This is the most satisfying outcome I can think of to the entire debacle, but I am not going to let Tarkan off this easily. What he tried to do was underhand, dangerous, nasty, and utterly dishonorable.

  “What is this, anyway…”

  “It’s a plant that tries to fuck you, apparently” he growls. “Get it off me.”

  The plant seems as confused by him as he is by it. I can see the suckers trying to attach to an unarmored part of him, but they are not having much in the way of luck. As soon as I realize that not only is he not in any immediate danger, but that he is being fondled by a plant, untamed mirth overcomes me.

  “Of all the stupid things you have done, this has to be the most stupid of all,” I snort, my breath coming in short gasps as laughter escapes me over and over until I am doubled in two, hands on my knees, wheezing at the sight of the fearsome Scythkin Tarkan overpowered by a mutated sex crazed daisy.

  “Reaper! Cut the vines! Let me free!”

  I am not going to do that. Not right away, anyway. He deserves to experience the consequences of his actions at least once. I have saved him far too many times, and far too quickly in the past. That’s why he thinks he is bulletproof - and maybe he is, but he’s not plant proof.

  I feel a soft touch on my arm. One points to the plant, and then to her own body. I checked her when I found her for the scent of Tarkan’s ravishment. I didn’t think to observe any other signs. What I first thought were welts from running through trees and stumbling over rocks and such I now understand are marks from the same plant which holds Tarkan prisoner. I realize something else, too. She is thoroughly aroused, a sticky glue like substance running down her thighs.

  She reaches for me with that look in her eyes which always marks human desire, the hooded gaze with dilated pupils. She opens her mouth, but no words escape, only a small mewl of desperation.

  Finally I understand what she’s been trying to communicate to me. She needs to be fucked. She’s not sweating, she’s slick with desire. Her pussy is pink and puffy and not from use, but from the need to be used.

  As I stand there, One paws at me, making soft mewling sounds of desire. Her eyes are locked on mine with that incredible need and my own desire surges in response.

  I pick her up, retracting the sharp splines and ridges so she can wrap her legs around my waist and position her wet little cunt right over my…

  “Reaper!”

  Tarkan shouts my name, but I am not listening. The only sounds that matter are the soft little moans she’s making as I push inside her, claiming her hole for a second time, making her mine in the way she has to be.

  Tarkan

  When I get free of this plant, I am going to murder Reaper. Not once, but twice he has defiled the human, filled her with his seed. No
matter what happens, he always seems to win, and the prize could not be more sweet, her soft body wrapped around his, her pussy gripping his rod with desperation. She wants him, even though he looks like evil incarnate to her human gaze. His horns, his sharp fangs, his claws, his razor ridges, they don’t matter because her cunt is being filled and that is all that matters to the little human fuck doll. She’s a slave to her biology, first taken by the plant and now giving herself to the first male with a hard cock for her.

  It should be me inside her, sampling the rippling delights of her inner walls. I can see how desperately she is gripping him, she doesn’t want him to pull out, even though he can’t fuck her without leaving her cunt at least a little. She is a greedy, hungry, bad little human, and when I have my chance at her, I will make her cry out my name in between begging for mercy and pleading for more.

  But right now I can do none of that. I am restrained by the same infernal plant I rescued the girl from and now her eyes are rolling back in her head for Reaper, not me.

  He fucks her standing up, and then on the ground, her back on the dirt, her legs spread wide, her breasts bouncing with every thrust of his cock. He is so much larger than her. He makes her fragile female form seem so small and delicate, but she takes everything he has to give and howls for more, her legs trembling with orgasm after orgasm.

  Finally she is sated and his mating appendage slips from her swollen sex. He leaves her lying there on the ground and staggers over to me, pulling a fire knife from his belt and finally cutting the suckers off my body. Apparently he has discovered its weakness. The plant reacts to the fire with animal alacrity, withdrawing from my limbs with a swiftness and then folding in on itself, pushing back beneath the ground until only a small shoot is left visible above ground.