Saved by the Scientist: alien barbarian warrior romance, page 1
SAVED BY THE SCIENTIST
BANISHED ALIEN WARRIORS
RILEY ONYX
Copyright © 2024 by Riley Onyx
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.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Created with Vellum
CONTENTS
Saved by the Scientist
1. Tiril
2. Chloe
3. Tiril
4. Chloe
5. Chloe
6. Tiril
7. Chloe
8. Tiril
9. Chloe
10. Tiril
11. Chloe
12. Tiril
13. Chloe
14. Tiril
15. Chloe
16. Tiril
17. Chloe
18. Chloe
19. Tiril
20. Chloe
21. Tiril
22. Chloe
Epilogue
Also by Riley Onyx
About the Author
SAVED BY THE SCIENTIST
They call themselves the Honey, but there's nothing sweet about these warriors.
Tiril
Agreeing to go with the human soldiers was the right thing to do to protect my brothers and the women they'd rescued. As a banished fourth son, I never expected to grow old, so dying doesn't scare me. Going to the human colony is just another adventure, though it is one I must do alone. When I arrive at the colony, I am not put to work the way I expected, the way the Honey would put a captured warrior to work. Instead, I am shut in a room and examined and questioned.
Chloe
The whispers that there are aliens on this world are true. Those who survived the animal attack claimed they saw big men with swords but were quickly hushed by the leaders who didn’t want people to panic. A captured alien will be much harder to keep secret, and he is the proof that the colony leaders lied. Again. The alien may be the only way I can find out what happened to Sabine, my sister. While the alien is resigned to his capture, he makes it clear the only thing he has of value is information and that I will need to work for every morsel. When the colony leaders decide he is no longer useful, I cannot let them bury the evidence that we share this world with aliens.
For readers who like exploring new worlds, big alien barbarians, and smart, kick ass heroines.
1
TIRIL
Ido not expect any kindness from the human soldiers when I agree to go with them so my brother can keep the women we rescued from the screamer. That one soldier accepted the whisperer, and seems to understand me, I take as a good sign. Though I expect to be put to work as a brute, doing the jobs that are beneath warriors. Brutes are fed last and given the roughest clothing and accommodation. And only after they have proven they have accepted their place.
Some brutes fight to their last breath. If I had not surrendered to give my brothers a chance, then we all would have fought. It is what is expected from banished warriors. As I follow the human in front, aware of their weapons pointed at my back, I know I could not have denied my brothers this small chance of happiness. I hope Sabine takes Edilk as her mate. I hope the other women also claim one of my brothers for their own.
While my stomach churns, not with fear of what is to come, I try to focus on the positive. The human colony has far more women than men. Perhaps one of them will choose me.
I will also be the first Honey warrior to see inside the human tribe.
However, that information is only useful if I can leave. There has been no discussion of how long my service will be. A debtor has a defined sentence as a brute. For a captured warrior, there may be no end. That is why many choose to fight and die.
Before joining Edilk's tribe of banished warriors, I would've been happy to die fighting. That is an honorable death.
But I have seen there is more than struggling and fighting and the life the banished are expected to lead. We can work together and make our own tribe instead of fighting over scraps.
None of the humans speak to me and the nerves in my belly turn to dread. Were those few words exchanged for show?
In those couple of heartbeats, I understand what the dread means. I don't want to die. It's fear that these human men, who do not value the women of their tribe, will behave dishonorably and kill me when I have done nothing wrong. I draw in a deep breath and exhale. If they were going to kill me, they would have done it already. There would have been a bloody fight, and either they would have died, or they would have killed my brothers and taken back the women.
Instead, they surrendered their women as if they no longer wanted them. Perhaps because they have so many…
The thought catches like a thorn the more I think about it. I am so used to there being an excess of warriors, and too few women, that imagining the opposite means I am looking at the situation the wrong way. If too many warriors cause problems, then perhaps too many women also cause problems. So perhaps giving up three women and gaining a warrior in return is a desired outcome.
Does that mean I will not be treated as a brute?
I'm tempted to ask, but as no one is speaking and there is a tension between the humans that I feel best not to break.
These soldiers do not like me. But a soldier does not need to like their orders to follow them. And talking to a soldier will not change my fate. That will be decided by those in charge.
I glance up at the stars. Will the banished warriors who came before me watch over me in the human tribe? Or have they abandoned me for surrendering instead of dying with honor?
There is a small seed of hope that I will find a mate among the humans, but even that does not soothe the wound caused by leaving my brothers. I have been banished for nearly five years, and the first two of them were bleak.
This is not the first time I have surrendered.
When Sunif found me, I was half starved, wounded from a fight with another banished warrior, and ready for death. I offered him no fight, hoping that he'd give me the mercy of stopping my heart.
Instead, he offered me a place as his brother.
I swallow and re-fix my gaze forward. I have survived without a tribe before, and I will survive this. Whatever this is.
Perhaps it is the not knowing that is twisting in my gut.
I study the human soldiers as we make our way through the woods toward the human colony. A man carries a light that sweeps over the ground and into the trees because the humans cannot see in the dark. They step heavily on twigs and leaves and stumble over rocks. I could kill at least three before they retaliate…and then what?
If I do that, I will have broken the deal, and more humans will attack my brothers.
No, I will follow, and I will obey…at least until I know if the humans have honor.
2
CHLOE
When I'm escorted beyond the colony boundary, my first thought is that they have found out I'm a dissenter and they are leading me away to kill me. I'm sure that's what happened to the other missing people. That survivors returned talking about an animal attack has helped the leaders with their story that the missing people were sent on an errand and attacked.
My sister didn’t return from the expedition. And I have heard whispered talk of aliens with swords. Though the survivors were quickly isolated—to be treated for their injuries.
Unlike some of the others who are unhappy with the leadership, I haven't been loud with my protests. I try to make changes from within. I don't believe overthrowing the leaders and starting over will be beneficial. There's too much we don't know about this world, nor do we know all the plans that were put in place on Earth—a place many of us have only ever heard of. A place our parents rarely mention. Because they're not allowed? Or because it was so bad, they wish to pretend that it doesn't exist?
"Where are we going?" I ask, hoping for a different answer now that we are beyond the fence.
"To the scientific outpost," the man in charge of escorting me says.
It's the same line he said when he collected me from the lab. Which sounds great in front of other people, legitimate even. Except as far as I am aware, there is no scientific outpost.
There are people working on hydroelectricity, and a sewage pump, and other infrastructure beyond the fence. But there is no other lab.
"Right… Except I wasn't aware there was a scientific outpost. People go out and retrieve samples and we study them in the lab." And after the attack by the giant bat-like creature, very few teams have left the colony. Officially, it's because of a backlog in processing the existing samples.
While we have a lot of samples. It is a bullshit excuse.
And it's not because of the ferocious animal either—it's because of the alien rumors, which means they aren’t rumors. And they give me hope Sabine is alive and captured.
The people who were there are no longer talking, and I had to stop asking questions when one of the leaders pulled me aside. I cried and acted as though distraught I didn't even have a body to burn—if my sister is dead, there is nothing I can do about it. But if she is alive, I want to know. My tears, the leader
And since I don't want them watching me too carefully, I have bitten my tongue, instead of asking more questions about the aliens who battled with the giant creature, which is something like a featherless ostrich from Earth, according to the pictures I've seen of both.
Whenever people leave the colony, they take photos of the animals they see. But I want to sit out and watch the animals in the wild. I want to observe them and see how they live and what they eat. I want to do my job.
I'm a biologist. I'm supposed to be studying the animals that live on this world, to determine if they are edible, and if we can breed them. So far we can eat what lives here without ill effect. So far, I haven't been allowed to keep live specimens. People are worried about diseases—and so am I. But most people won't be thinking how our diseases could destroy life on this planet. They worry that the diseases on this planet will destroy the colony without understanding it works both ways. "Is the scientific outpost a place where I can study live animals?"
I've been asking to study live animals since finding out they were edible. But no, priority was given to plants and mushrooms, and after the attack the wildlife is now considered dangerous. Even though I pointed out that stealing an animal's egg is always a bad move, even if you can't see the parents, they won't be far away.
Perhaps the leaders have decided that it will be okay for me to study living animals, as long as they are kept away from the colony, and that it will give me something to do besides question my sister's death. I don't believe she's dead. Sabine is tough and smart.
Smart enough to have never gotten mixed up with the dissenters.
She doesn't think that making noise will change anything. She thinks we need to shut up and put up for the first two years, and if we're still alive after that, then we can review how things are working. To me, it's already clear they aren't working.
Because I haven't been able to study the animals native to this world, I study the humans around me and the way they are dealing with the stress of this new world, the way the jobs were picked for them depending on their attitude, not their interest, and the clinical way the breeding of the next generation of humans has been decided.
I'm not fucking stupid. I know exactly why certain pairings were created—they are needed for genetic diversity along with accurate records to prevent inbreeding—and I understand the gender imbalance as more women means more babies. However, we aren't chickens, or cattle, or pure-bred cats—they were a thing two hundred years ago.
I've read things in the history database, which I find almost impossible to believe, but it's held up as the epitome of human society before the ecological collapse.
And while it might take us a couple of thousand years, repeating those mistakes and destroying a second planet isn't the smart thing to do. I also don't think treating us like chickens is the way to run a colony.
People want answers. They want free will. They need more than just being useful and knowing that their contribution will benefit a future generation. People want to live.
I want to live.
I cross my fingers and hope that wherever Sabine is, she is alive and that it's not a terrible life.
The man in charge of my four-person escort, which seems a little excessive considering I'm a scientist, turns to look at me and finally answers my question. "Yes, it is where you will study the local wildlife."
My eyes widen and I almost let out a squeal of delight. But there's something in his tone that holds me back. There's a cruelness in his eyes that makes me wonder if I am being set up.
I'm glad the man I am genetically matched with has no interest in being with me. He enjoys the company of men over women, which means that we get on rather well.
Some women are very unhappy with the man who has been chosen to father two of their children. When these plans were made on Earth, I don't think anyone considered what living would be like on the ground.
I refuse to play the game and vie for male attention. Sure, I love getting laid, but the opportunities are slim. Most people assume Patrick and I are together, and everyone is so happy that we will raise our children together—that we can agree on. Being close to me also helps protect him from the colony leaders who might disagree with the things he enjoys.
Humans aren't chickens.
We want to find love.
I'm jealous of those that have. But it's far too few. And everybody else is out there fucking around and hoping their heart won't be destroyed.
The outpost isn't far away, a half hour hike through the trees with the dark red leaves. Even though I knew the trees here are different from the ones on Earth, I was still surprised the first time I saw them, because every picture I had ever seen of a tree had green leaves. Plants here don't have green chlorophyll, they have red.
In some ways, this world is similar to the pictures of Earth I grew up with, filled with the promises of sun and soil and snow. The mountains and the sun rises. They filled a part of me I didn't realize had been empty before we landed. Some people feared the openness of an entire world and missed the confines of the ship. I love the open space because there is room to grow and explore, or at least there would be if the leaders pull their heads out of their asses and realize that we are so far away that the people on Earth would never find out if we made our own rules. The only thing that matters is being successful.
And success means survival.
"What kind of wildlife have you caught? Who caught it? And where was it found?" Because some random animal they picked up will not be useful. I want to watch and study them in the wild, and eventually try to tame them, or at least see if we can breed them in captivity.
The man smirks, and I know that I'm not going to like whatever it is waiting for me.
Did I ask too many questions about Sabine's disappearance?
Is this where they took the others that vanished?
For a moment, I'm terrified that I will be left out as bait for the local wildlife to eat. Sure, I'll get to study them…for a whole five minutes before they eat me.
With the four guards surrounding me, running is ridiculous, as I'll be caught before I've gone a dozen paces. But it's the only thing I can think of doing because my brain seems to have gone offline. I can't think on my feet like Sabine.
What would she do in this situation?
She'd tell me I don't have all the facts. She used to tell me that a lot, particularly about the leaders. No one has all the facts except them and that's the way they like it.
I exhale slowly. Running won't help, because if it's a completely innocent scientific outpost, there's nothing to worry about. Only someone who is suspicious of the colony's motives would expect something underhand.
Right, so I need to play along. At least until I find out what is going on.
A gray demountable sits in a small clearing. The demountable has seen better days, and I suspect it's one of the parts of the ship that took damage. It's only after seeing the holes in the metal that I realize how precarious our lives were as we traveled from Earth. Being on the ground is much safer.
"Is that the lab?" I point, even though it's obvious.
"It is, and you're not allowed to tell anyone about it." The man in charge glares at me, as if he expects me to gossip the moment he's out of sight. "It's a secret project."
One of my eyebrows lifts before I can stop it. "A secret project that you need a biologist on?"
There shouldn't be any secret projects. Everything we do is for…well, I do it, so we all survive. The leaders like to think everyone is doing it for the colony as if the colony matters more than the people.
"You are exactly the right scientist for the job," he says.
Now I'm really suspicious. I'm not naïve enough to think I've fallen in favor, or that the leaders are trying to soothe the loss of my sister with science. "So, I'm supposed to come out here every day to work?"
"That depends on if you think it's necessary."
"Generally, it's easier to study an animal if you spend more time with it."
One of the other men rests his hand on his gun. "This is what you might call a very special animal. He could be really useful, or no use at all."
