23. CHAPTER 23

Ihad no friends, which was the best motto to use while I was here. Fuck trying to make them too. This place was ruthless; if you wanted to survive, you had to become just as ruthless as the next person. Now I was seeing that. I couldn"t even trust my own kind, and now I felt like a fool for bothering.

If Lorvian wanted to fight them, then I hope he enjoys himself! But what would it matter because I would probably be dead before it happens. I stared at him as Connor told Kevin to lie on the table of the still intact med bay of our colony ship to perform the pregnancy tests. I avoided Lorvian"s gaze as usual, but this time, out of fear, I could feel his eyes burning into me. What was he thinking?

I vowed to myself that I would not die a pointless death here, not after everything I"ve done to get here.

"What happened to your omegas?" I asked Lorvian, trying to keep up a normal conversation, that is if asking why his people were dying off was a normal conversation. "You were born and so was your brother, so I would assume the virus isn"t that bad."

"Virus? Where did you hear that?" His brow cocked in my direction.

"Tavi told me…"

"I see…"

"Is that wrong?"

"No." He sighed. "The virus did more than just cripple our birth rates. It forced our people to destroy each other. Before the virus, there were two ruling families on our planet. The Id"arshar and Cra"ozatharn. They ruled in peace from what I heard, I wasn"t born then." He waved his hand dismissively. "They fought over the few remaining members of their population still capable of breeding. Especially the omegas. My father inherited the war with the Id"arshar and once he defeated them he created the hegemony under House Cra"ozatharn. He created the system we have now. With this, we staved off the death of our species. The hegemony, along with the discovery of the Travols two hundred years ago. We enslaved them, experimented on them as we had done to you, and impregnated the ones we could. Now, over half of our population is mixed. But Travols aren"t capable of carrying to term in most cases, so it"s still not a viable way to keep our species from dying. That"s why the discovery of a race of aliens who look almost similar to us is important. And why we must know if you are capable of birthing our children."

"What about your war?"

"We would be fools to wipe out a source we need. I want no more talk of your precious Earth right now and how I shouldn"t attack them." He scoffed.

"I wasn"t going to say anything like that," I replied, not interested in another argument.

"Oh?"

"Yeah, I think I give up. I don"t even know what the hell I would fight for." I sighed as I thought of the dreaded question of what would happen to me, but I couldn"t bring myself to ask it.

"The results are in." Connor approached Lorvian, and Xil joined us from the other side of the room. Lorvian translated to Xil that the results were in, and from the corner of my eye, Kevin bolted like hell out of the room. I went after him, and Lorvian and Xil were hot on my heels.

We ducked around a corner, and I noticed the sign as I passed. He was heading to the escape pods.

Were there any left?

I entered the massive room right behind him and followed his climb up the stairs to a small row of what looked like one functioning pod above. "Kevin, wait!" I hollered, not wanting him to escape. Was he a spy? There was no way I was gonna just let him ruin my life and get away with it!

He entered the pod, and a blow to my stomach pushed me back, and I tumbled into Lorvian"s arms. Before I knew it, he was off, blasting away from the ship.

"Fire on that pod but do not destroy it!" Xil yelled into his comms device, and the pod whipped about once a blast of energy hit the tail end. "Good, prepare to retrieve the pod and take the occupant to my capital ship for interrogation."

Connor wasn"t too far behind.

"What are you going to do to him?" I asked, trembling with fear and pain. Lorvian pulled me close to him to soothe me, and I breathed deep from the gut kick that nearly knocked the wind outta me.

"I informed them while we were chasing after you that he was not pregnant," Connor said from the back.

"What is this?" Xil approached and touched my ears. Lorvian pushed him back and stood in front of me.

"Nothing!" He said with a snarl.

I realized that when he kicked me back, my hood came off, revealing my pointed shell-like ears.

"Oh, I wouldn"t say it is, little brother." He pulled his weapons, two crazy-looking blades from his sheath, and Lorvian followed.

"Connor, get Caspian to the ship."

"Lorvian!"

"Go!"

Connor grabbed me, pulling me away as Lorvian attacked.

Goddamnit! I couldn"t leave him alone. "Connor, I have to stay—"

"These particular aliens are violent and strong; what could you do for him that he can"t do for himself right now?"

I couldn"t answer, so I let him whisk me away until we reached the ship. I felt useless as usual, and my confidence in everything deflated.

Connor sat next to Cormac, filling him in on the details when the airlock opened, and Lorvian had entered okay for the most part, if not for the bloody scar on the edge of his jaw.

"Fire on Xil"s engines!" he ordered, standing at the podium and fiddling with the console. "Let the bastard stew there for a while."

Connor disappeared to the turret station, and it wasn"t long before several blasts hit the tail end of the other ship.

Cormac controlled the ship, putting some distance between us and the Ignis.

What the heck was I thinking, trying to run away? Did he know that"s what I was trying to do, or did it look like I was chasing down Kevin? Would Lorvian even believe me about his accusations? My uncertainty spoke volumes. Perhaps I didn"t really trust him?

A bead of sweat rolled down my face, and a cold chill filled every bone. That damn stomach pain came again in waves, like ripples of something beating and thumping inside. I wanted to vomit, though I hadn"t eaten anything. I rushed to our quarters and locked the door, but Lorvian wasn"t too far behind.

"Caspian," Lorvian called to me from the other side. His voice was calm.

"Y—es," I replied. If I had to stay in this room forever, I would.

"Open the door; the danger has passed."

"I don"t want to."

"Why? Is it about what that other human said about you?"

"He was lying!" I yelled, unable to keep myself in check. "Do you believe him?"

"No, I don"t. Even if you were a spy, would the humans trust you again? You"re looking more and more Valisian by the second."

"So, you don"t trust me." I wiped my nose. "You just figured humans would reject me because of how I look."

"Do you trust me?"

I didn"t answer.

"Ah, you don"t, do you? If you did, you wouldn"t be making such a big deal of this. You would simply tell me he was a liar and then leave it at that. So, why should I trust you if you don"t trust me?"

"You"re right. Maybe I can"t help it."

"I want you to hear something." He said before I heard the comms system in action again. "This is Cra"ozatharn to Eberkenezer speaking to second Swarti."

"Sir. What"s your ETA?"

"There will be no ETA. My orders are for you to take my ship home. I will make all arrangements to pay the civvie fee, and all crew will be dismissed until further notice."

"Lorvian…"

"Swarti, congratulations on your upcoming nuptials. It"s been a pleasure serving with you all."

"Y—yes sir. I feel the same way…"

Once the comms shut off, I spoke. "You did that for me?" I breathed, unable to believe what I was hearing.

"For us both. There"s no point in riding around in a warship if I"m not going to war; besides, a smaller ship may be what I need. If my father is determined not to fight these new aliens, and there could be possible deals happening behind my back to ensure peace, then I am merely fighting a losing battle against the tides. You have nothing to fear of me."

I opened the door and nearly fell into his arms, that kick was rough but I"ve been through worse and yet I was having a hard time recovering.

"Caspian?" He felt my burning forehead. "Connor!"

"No!" I said, pulling away. "I think I need to lie down."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. And are you sure about us staying on this ship?"

"Yeah," Cormac said over the loudspeaker. "Because you promised me a ship."

"And I"ve kept my word. In my own way. It"s my ship, but I won"t interfere in your private business, and you need money, you won"t get a better paying customer than myself."

"Well, when you put it that way."

I was happy to hear this. I would show him how happy I would be if I didn"t feel like death right now.

"I know this will not make you trust me completely, but I hope it shows that I"m willing to meet you halfway." He kissed me, and it was almost enough to make me forget the pain.

"Me too; I want this to work." I sighed with relief. "So, what will we do now? Smuggle supplies, take on pirates, explore distant planets?"

He laughed. "We should head to a refueling station and stock up on food. I"m hungry and willing to bet you are too."

"Famished," I said, feeling embarrassed by the little snot I left on my sleeve. "I"m going to wash this, take a shower, and get some sleep."

"Okay."

I entered our cabin—it had a nice ring to it—but I couldn"t spend too much time dreaming about my little two-hundred-square-foot home. I had tripped over something and caught myself on the wall before I fell to the floor.

A green substance trail followed me, and when I looked at the cause of my stumble, I screamed in horror.

It was the body of an alien sprawled on the floor, greenish blood pooled about.

Lorvian rushed inside, weapon out and ready to fight.

"Tavi?!" He kneeled beside her and checked to see if she was alive.

"I remember her."

Lorvian lifted her, and together, we headed to the med bay, with Connor entering not too long after we did.

She moaned and groaned as Connor applied something under her nose, and then he went to work on her various wounds in a manner that only a machine could.

"Lorvian." She opened her eyes. "Thank the stars."

"Remain calm," Connor instructed as he applied a gel and wrapped the wound clean.

"What happened?" Lorvian asked the million-dollar question.

"It was Swarti. I saw him conversing with another Valisian over comms. He tried to silence me."

"Swarti?" Lorvian pinched his nose. "Who was it, one of my siblings?"

"I don"t know. The conversation didn"t seem so damning."

"You"d be surprised. What did he say when you walked in before he noticed you?"

"Um." Her eyes darted about. "I think it was something like Id"arshar, ashi dasher. I don"t know what that is."

"Id"arshar, ever for tyrants," Lorvian repeated somberly. "It"s old script, my Damma insisted I learn it. The Id"arshar are no more, I"m not familiar with the saying. Unless Swarti is trying to revive a dead house." Lorvian chuckled.

"I lost him, but not before he wounded me. I had no other place to go, so I hid onboard this ship, hoping you would have need of it. I must have passed out from my wounds."

"Anything else you heard?" he asked.

"I think he mentioned something about the location of the human colony. In the Wallachia Valley on Cerulia."

"Get some rest." He urged before leaving the room.

So, Scion 37y already had a name. I would laugh if a part of me weren"t nervous. Just when we were making progress, something came along to blow us back a few notches.

"I"m sorry." Tavi breathed.

"Don"t be; you work for Lorvian, not me; we don"t know each other." I sat down in the next bed because I needed to. "I don"t know if I will understand why you are loyal despite your people"s conflict with him. But I might find out for myself soon."

"Wait a minute… you look like a Valisian… almost!" Her eyes widened.

"It"s a long story that not even I understand. But this place is changing me, and I don"t know if it"s good or bad."

"Amazing. Perhaps you will be immortal like them as well."

"Lorvian said they have long lives, but immortality?"

"I"ve only heard of them dying in battle or murder. Never of old age." She coughed.

"As for your curiosity, the Valisians are brutal. I think their near-immortality gives them a lot of confidence while fighting; they are hard to kill. But Lorvian"s ship is the best to work on. Others, like Zantos, his brother, are not good ships at all. Zantos has a twisted soul. He would have passed me around to every Alpha onboard his ship until I popped out a baby. Lorvian is more of a warmonger but he"s no tyrant."

"That keeps him busy."

"Yes, more or less."

"He loves fighting more than fucking."

"You trust him, even after he killed your people?"

"My King condemned me to the life of a sex slave. It was a hard life. Eventually, the people had enough of our terrible royal family and rose against them. Not everything is as black and white as good guys vs bad. To some, like Prince Daruuk, Lorvian is a monster who stole his people and usurped him. Lorvian saved me and gave me a purpose other than pleasing a group of nobles. Surely, not every royal family was like mine, but still, he saved my soul. Was everything great back home among your people?"

"We have our conflicts. Even though we are the same, we come from different places and cultures. We judge each other based on where we come from. It works both ways; we judge people as good or bad based on it. Women have freedom in other parts of the world and none in others. People eat like gluttons while others starve and die. If Lorvian invaded my planet, the ones living free and eating hearty would hate it, but maybe those who feel trapped would love him."

I wondered how I would have felt about Lorvian if I had been stuck on Earth living my dead-end life.