Fallen: A Sci-Fi Alien Romance (Rogue Alien Warriors Book 4), page 20
Eventually my eyes get accustomed to the darkness, and it’s not as dark as initially it seemed. There’s light coming from somewhere, I just can’t tell where.
Tentatively I feel out for Myk. I don’t believe for an instant that the thoughtbond, something we both fought for, has gone. I close my eyes and imagine him.
When I open them again, a young Gryn female stands in front of me. She’s wearing a simple shift dress and her wings are almost white, in contrast to Myk’s dark reddish feathers.
“Lyra? Is that you?”
The female nods. If she was human, I’d say she was no more than twelve years old.
“Where’s Myk? He’s not…” I swallow hard. Lyra is dead, so I’m seeing her ghost or something, I have to be, that’s the only explanation, but all I can think about is Myk.
I don’t want to see his sister if it means he’s in trouble.
She smiles at me and shakes her head. I’m flooded with a sense of being whole, of being home.
“Is this what a fated mate is?” I ask the apparition.
She nods, slowly.
“And it’s Myk?” She continues to nod, her smile full of mirth at my idiotic confusion that Myk and I could not be anything other than fated for each other.
Fate is never wrong. He will come for you.
The words are all around me and yet they are only in my head.
“I know he will come for me. I believe in him.”
The light surrounding the beautiful Gryn dies away, and a huge, huge shadow fills my vision. It’s so vast I can’t even take all of it in.
“My eregri?” The voice is strong and familiar. My heart leaps to my throat, and I roll over, attempting to get to my feet, even though my battered body isn’t particularly keen on participating in this new exercise.
“Myk!” He picks me up gently, holding me to him like the most precious object on Ustokos.
“Are you okay?” He murmurs into my hair. “I thought I’d lost you.”
“I’m not that easy to get rid of, as you well know.” I press myself against his chest, reveling in his warmth and spicy scent with the hint of metal. “What happened?”
“Kyt’s vrexing weapon happened.” He growls as he strokes my hair gently.
“You did it? You activated it?” I can’t keep the hint of awe and terror from my voice, which reaches a very high pitch. “Proto?”
“I believe the weapon did what it was supposed to do. I need to get you out of here, my eregri. It’s not safe. We’ve no way of knowing how the destruction of the electronics is going to affect the structure and,” he pauses, listening, “I have concerns it may collapse.”
“But,” I hesitate, “Proto? It’s a living thing. The pulse won’t have killed it. It might not have stopped it, not completely” My voice trembles.
“I know.” Myk says darkly. “I need to find it. Alive or dead.” He growls and the thoughtbond flows with violence.
“Hey,” I wrap my arms around him and push back with all my love. “Is everything okay?”
The violence increases, the edges tinged with something else. I pull away from him and somewhere behind us, a light from a fire flickers. Myk is streaked with black, his dark eyes rimmed with it. One wing is covered in blood.
“What happened?” I hiss, reaching to touch his wing while he holds it stiffly.
“I will be fine. I heal quickly, my wing will be back to full strength in no time.”
I don’t believe him, not for one second. The thoughtbond doesn’t lie. His wing is causing him great pain, and he is worried.
“Then I don’t care. If you’re staying to finish Proto, I’m staying too.” I hold up a hand as he begins to speak. “I know I’m just a weak human female, but I’m not leaving you. Not now, not in the future. We do this together or not at all.”
Myk takes my hand and presses his lips to my fingers.
“I wouldn’t want it any other way.”
In the mottled lighting, he smiles. I think my heart just left my body and joined with his.
MYK
I’ve done some significant damage to my wing, not that I could hide the fact from my eregri, not since the vrexing thoughtbond decided to show up. She knows exactly what’s wrong. I can’t fly, not until my superior healing gets on with it. Which means we’ll be walking out of this base. If that’s even possible.
With her small, warm hand in mine, I feel safe. It’s as if Emma is my home and I’ve never felt more at home. We pick our way through the debris of the base.
“Kyt’s weapon really did a number on this place.” Emma says as we climb around two disabled joykills, their laser whips no longer glowing, and their cackles silenced.
Everywhere we look there are small glowing fires which burn with green or blue flames depending on what is causing them. The light is strange, and the way it flickers over my mate’s face is beautiful, ethereal.
“Do you think it did the same to the other bases?” She asks.
“I don’t know if there will be the same level of destruction, although I’m sure Kyt would have desired it.” I reply. “But he hoped it would end all of Proto’s bots, either through the pulse itself or by default when Proto shut down.”
“So as long as those things…” Emma gives an involuntary shudder, “those worm/snake things are alive, then there’s a risk it could reactivate.”
I was so concentrated on finally being able to face down the creatures that destroyed my home, my planet and my life, I didn’t consider what would happen if they were not hunted down like the prey they are.
“I wouldn’t want to bet on their destruction unless I do it myself.” I rasp, gripping the pommel of my sword for reassurance, even as a spike of pain runs through my wing. “Not for revenge, but for survival. Our survival.”
I run my hand around Emma’s waist and draw her to me, enclosing us in my functioning wing, I cut out everything but her. Her scent, her proximity, all of her. She makes me strong, and she makes me who I am. I nuzzle at her lips, wanting to taste her, to remind myself what it’s like to be truly alive. All around us is the sound of things falling apart, but I don’t care, because I’m here, with her and I know this is where I was always meant to be.
“Myk,” she murmurs as I tease her mouth. “We don’t have time for this.”
“You’re right, we don’t.”
Then the floor beneath us opens up.
I land awkwardly on my injured wing and only just manage not to make a noise. It’s very dark, even for my vision, but I feel around for my eregri. She was in my arms.
And now she’s gone.
“PROTO!” I roar as I scramble to my feet. “Show yourself!”
It won’t take her from me. It won’t win, whatever it thinks.
“Do you want your mate returned to you?”
What I now recognize as three voices splits the darkness.
“I don’t need you to return her to me. I will kill you, and I will take her.” I growl, feral and with extreme violence.
Proto might have managed to trick my eregri from me, but it hasn’t taken my trusty sword.
“You forgot, or you were too arrogant to care.” I advance towards the voice, seeing the creatures resolve out of the dark as a writhing mass. “You made me.”
“We didn’t forget, that’s why we know you will surrender to us for your mate. All Gryn are captured by fate.”
“You forgot that you made me.” I raise my sword and although Proto squirms, it doesn’t seem to try to get away. “You forgot that I am the blunt instrument. You forgot that my destiny was to destroy you.”
“If you destroy us, you lose your mate.”
“No he doesn’t. He will never lose me. I am always with him.” Emma’s voice rings out through the pitch black of the ruined base. “Do what you will, Myk. End them.”
I have her. I have all that I ever needed. In my mind’s eye, I can see Lyra, and she smiles on me.
Go, my brother, and be happy.
I go to bring my sword down on the horrible mass beneath me only to see it slither away into a crack.
“You can run, but you will not hide from me. I will find you.” I call after it, but I’m already turning to find my eregri.
Except, like smoke, like Lyra. She is not there; it is only the thoughtbond. I reach out for her, probing, attempting to find her.
We link and, I see stars. Her mind slams into mine with an ability that she shouldn’t have.
I see it, Myk. Proto is here, with me.
Emma’s guiding me, she wants me to succeed.
My heart is no longer weighted by my past. Everything I do from now is for my future. My future with my perfect mate and my youngling.
All my younglings, because my mate wants a big family.
And she wants to go home, to our nest.
Sword in hand, I stalk forward through the destruction that I’ve already wrought on our ancient enemy. This will be no different. I will be triumphant.
And we will go home.
EMMA
I’m so angry I can hardly breathe. There’s so much I wanted in life. I wanted to be successful, to make people happy through my food, to be in a loving relationship.
But when it abducted me, Proto wanted to ensure I wouldn’t have any of that. It wanted to use me, in the same way it wanted to use the Gryn, the whole of Ustokos as an experiment for its own gain.
And what’s worse is that it claims to be from Earth.
Which makes it my problem.
I’m really, really not going to accept this from a bunch of space worms. I have an injured mate and his unborn child to think of. If Proto thinks for one minute I intend letting it get the upper hand, it’s wrong. So very wrong.
Because you can take the chef out of the kitchen, but she’ll always be able to take the heat.
“You are a weak human. Your mate will not find you and you will die.”
I look around the dimly lit area, some sort of storage, or so it seems.
“You don’t frighten me. Not when you’ve resorted to hiding in the closet. You’re scared of my warrior, and you’re scared of us, just admit it.” I retort.
“We have far more resources than you can ever imagine.”
“Not anymore.” I look around me with an eye roll. “Looks to me like you don’t have very much at all.”
“Neither do you, human female.”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” I lift my leg and give the door a good hard kick, to my surprise, rather than just making my leg hurt, it bursts open, and I half fall out.
Into the arms of Myk.
“I think you’ll find I’ve got everything I want, right here.” I grin up at him. “You found me?”
“Always. I’m never leaving you.”
“Not ever?”
“No. You are mine. You were always mine.” Myk shifts his sword in his hand and then holds it out to me.
“They took you from your planet. They stole your life. As much as I would never want to change that, it should be you.”
I look up at him, his face is set, but his eyes glow with love for me.
“I don’t understand.”
“Its life is yours.”
I look back at the squirming mass of worms.
“You wouldn’t dare, human female.” It squeaks.
My eyes find Myk’s. They are so dark, they are almost black. His need for closure, it invades my soul.
“Together, or not at all.” I grab his hand and wrap it around mine. We lift the sword and bring it down. It slices through one head, severing it.
I should feel sick. I only feel my triumph and that of my mate. His burden is lifted, and so is mine. We no longer need to be what our pasts made us.
Instead we are something so much better.
“One of them is getting away!” I cry out, as one of Proto uncoils from the others and bolts. Myk takes charge of the sword, hacking and slashing the sharp blade into the segmented worms. Until he stands back, swaying on his feet and panting.
“Did I get them? Did I get it all?” He stumbles back and sits down, hard.
“I think so.” I stare at the pile of flesh, leaking black blood and ooze. It’s hard to tell what it once was.
“Good,” he blows out a harsh breath.
I can see his wing is still bleeding, the feathers matted with blood. In my head and heart I can feel his exhaustion that’s not just physical.
God, I know how he feels!
“Let’s go home then.” He adds and uses the sword to get to his feet. I slip underneath his good wing and do my best to support my brave warrior.
The male who only ever wanted revenge and who gave it up to the woman who only ever wanted to be whole.
Myk leans heavily on me as we negotiate the fallen ceiling and quiet bots. Off in the distance I can hear something.
“What’s that?” I stop and he cocks his head, listening intently.
“Vrex it! It’s a joykill! Kyt’s weapon can’t have worked.” He half groans as the sound resolves itself into a horrible familiar cackle.
My ears suddenly go dead, as if all the air has been sucked out of the world and we’re in a vacuum. I open my mouth to try to clear my hearing. Then time seems to slow down and it’s as if I’m in some sort of slo-mo film. Next to us, the wall flies apart and I fling my arms around Myk, holding onto him for dear life as all hell breaks loose.
For the second time.
“Kyt must have had a second weapon.” Myk yells in my ear as my hearing makes a dramatic comeback, and all I can hear is crashing, smashing and the sound of a vicious, terrible wind. “A stronger one.”
“But he must know we’re still inside?”
“He doesn’t know that we’re alive.” Myk says grimly.
A shower of sparks arcs over us and I duck, pulling Myk back, except my warrior is immovable.
“Is there a way out now?” From all the noises, it sounded like we were being buried, and I can feel my chest heave with the terror of being stuck down here.
“We will make it out, my eregri.” Myk places his hand over my stomach. “I owe it to you. I owe you everything and most of all, I want to see my youngling grow up.”
His sensible, soothing thoughts make it through my terror.
You are the bravest creature I have ever met.
His thought makes me sniffle and smile.
“I don’t think I am.”
“There are not many warriors who would follow me into battle and stand beside me.” Myk pulls me to him. “Time to go, my beautiful mate. We’ve been stuck in this stinking hole far too long. All of Ustokos awaits us.” He pauses, his dark eyes searching my face. “If that’s what you want?”
More than anything I have ever wanted.
His serious face splits into his delicious smile, and I feel the tingle that always runs through me whenever I am near him.
Myk lifts his sword and slices through some of the debris in front of us. A glint of daylight appears, and my heart begins to sing.
Is it possible to start off having nothing and end up with everything you ever wanted? Because if it is, that’s what my mate is going to give to me.
MYK
The desire and drive to get the vrex out of Proto’s base has never been stronger, not even when I escaped the first time with Jyr and the other seniors. Back then I felt I was losing because we had to leave behind the thing that I knew I had to destroy.
How wrong I was. My destiny was to create life, and not just out of a sense of duty, but because I fell in love.
I fell in love with such a beautiful creature who only ever wanted to help others before she helped herself, one who wanted to help me when I didn’t even know what I wanted.
Ignoring the pain in my wing, I hack and hack at the tangle of metal and stone that blocks our way until the light we can see slowly resolves into being daylight and there is a stream of relatively fresh air. I push at Emma until she’s in front of me and climbing out of the hole I have made.
“What can you see?” I ask her as I attempt to make the hole bigger.
“Not a lot, we’re still a way below the surface.” She’s staring straight up. Her clothing is ripped and filthy, but I see the gentle rounding of her stomach and it makes me redouble my efforts.
Proto will not have me.
Emma hurries back to where I’m smashing at a heavy piece of metal wall. She grabs at it with her hands and pulls with all her strength. It’s not much, she’s such a little thing, but her deep seated desire to free me makes me work harder.
“Can you get out?” She peers in at me.
My wing aches, the pain thumping dully in time with my pulse. It’s healing, but much slower than normal. I already know that getting through the gap is going to be incredibly painful, and given my body is concentrated on healing my wing, this is not going to be fun.
“Shit!” Emma stares at something I can’t see. “Myk, it’s collapsing!”
I push my head and shoulders through the hole. We are somewhere in the bottom of the base, the vast majority of what is above us has either been blown away or it lies in various heaps. I see what Emma is staring at, one of the sides of the square hole we are in is crumbling, various pillars and struts that are holding what remains of the structure together buckle and ping apart.
I don’t have time to make this nice, and I struggle my way through the gap I’ve made, folding my wings down behind me in the hope that I can minimize the damage to my already injured one. With a yell of both pain and victory, I squeeze my way out.
“We’ve got to go, now.” I grab at Emma, heaving her into my arms.
“But your wing?” She gasps as I beat down hard.
I’m unbalanced as we lift off the ground. She’s as light as one of my feathers, but I’ve only got one good wing left and it’s having to do most of the work. We spin, and I drop down in height, making Emma squeak in alarm.
“I’ve got you. There’s no way it’s ending for us down here.” I murmur, as much down the thoughtbond as I say it out loud, concentrating hard on gaining height in the still air.
