Chapter 11

Without any pressing engagements to fling me out of bed, I sleep late again and wake with a delicious stretch and an exaggerated yawn. Padding to the bathroom, I use the toilet, drink my fill of fresh water, and then head out to the main area of the ship to see if Dragon Dude’s around.

“Morning,” I greet, nodding at Zero’s empty screen.

“Where is the Falopex you spoke of?” she demands, but I’ve already explained about fifty times that my guess is as good as hers. “Perhaps he is never coming. The Falopex claim to be righteous keepers of moral code, but where were they when my research team was torn apart and eaten?”

I don’t know what to say to that.

“Were they … did the Aspis eat them?” I look out the front of the ship to see Big D stalking back in my direction. My skin is on fire, a too tight suit that I want to shed. I exhale and try to act casual. Not the easiest task with my tits hanging out. I crinkle my brow.

“Fuck off, human.” That’s the response I get from Zero. I ignore her. Pretty sure the years of sitting here in the forest alone have eroded her peopling skills. Or, seeing as she’s such a crabby bitch, maybe she never had any of which to speak?

Big D jumps into the ship, landing in a crouch in front of me, flickering with shadows, horns catching the light and shimmering at the tips.

“Hey.” I clasp my hands together behind my back. His eyes find my tits. There’s definitely something going on between us, but even if I were inclined to have some kinky alien sex … We’re not physically compatible. He’s … well, he’s packing.

His eyes narrow on me, like he knows the dirty thoughts behind my innocent expression.

“Female, come with me.” His tail whips out, like he might snatch me up again, but I hold out a palm.

“Sure, but let me get dressed.” He can’t understand me, fine, but he tilts his head and then follows after me into the bathroom, crouching in the doorway as I slip my bra on first, and then yank the spacesuit up my body. I don’t know how it’s possible, but it seems to have gotten even tighter. I can’t get the damn zipper up at all this time. I turn a look on Big D, and then shove the translator onto his head. “You’re feeding me so well that I’ve actually gained weight here.”

He splits a violent grin at that, snatching me up in his tail before I can grab my boots. I scramble to steal the translator back.

“Plump females are happy females.” Big D takes me to the edge of the ship and hops off, setting me down and then rising to stand on two feet. He starts walking, and I scramble to keep up. I have to take three steps for every one of his.

“Where are we going?” I ask, trying to gesture the question out with my hands. “Oh, and could you please steal a second translator? It’d be nice if we could just, you know, talk.”

He seems amused, tail twitching, chin raised, wings folded against his back. With his mouth shut, he has this pensive, contemplative look about him. It’s only when he splits that gaping maw open that he gets some sass in his expression. He doesn’t answer my question, just keeps walking.

The air is thick with humidity, wet. As I walk, condensation collects on my face, sticks my long hair to the back of my neck. I’m seriously regretting wearing the suit. Shoulda just come with him in my damn panties. There’s nobody around, right?

“This better be good, wherever we’re going,” I continue, but to be honest, I’m enjoying the walk. I’m out here with an apex predator. This is my chance to explore this place while I’ve got the chance. Who the fuck is going to bother Big D? “You were pretty cool, back at the market.” I scratch at my temple, relieved that he can’t understand the nonsense spewing from my mouth. “Cop Guy seems alright. But Moth Guy? Talk about a stalker. If he shows up, you can eat him.” I study Dragon Dude as he strolls beside me, seemingly content to let me talk without understanding a damn word of what I’m saying. “I liked the way you challenged him though, bravo. The guy needs to be brought down a few levels.”

I lock my fingers together behind my neck, studying the landscape, the trees as thin as twigs, the ones with circumferences bigger than the Empire State Building. Low clouds are building in the sky, purple and sapphire and full of rage. I catch flashes of them through small breaks in the canopy. A storm is coming in then? I’d be worried if not for Big D. Surely he knows how to navigate the storms here.

Also … I weirdly feel like if some shit went down, he’d protect me. He’s done it once, twice, thrice before.

“I’m starting to owe you a lot of favors,” I hedge, hating that I have to admit to a debt but unwilling to let it go unacknowledged. I try to hand over the translator so I can repeat myself, but he isn’t having any of it. With a sigh, I put it back on.

We come up on a stream, trickling through the woods on our left, shallow but teeming with creatures. There’s an odd white stag-like creature with a neck like a giraffe, some of those fluffy pigs snorting and whuffling through the bushes, an alien heron with legs as tall as Big D. They ignore him, as if he isn’t the biggest, baddest boss in the jungle. I’m guessing they know the truth of the situation: if he wanted to, he could hunt and kill each and every one of them.

“Running is futile, eh?” I salute the creatures, startling the alien heron. Its wings are even longer than its legs which is a feat in and of itself. I cock a brow. Now that I’ve made contact with the Cop and heard Jane’s voice, I feel like I can take some time to appreciate the scenery.

I do not think about that room or those chains, the smell or the possibilities.

Shit, now I’m starting to worry about stupid Tabbi Kat. She’s just the sort of idiot that would mouth off and end up … punched in the face by a Tusk Man and dragged by the hair? Damn it. Maybe the pretty pop star and I aren’t so different after all.

Okay, fine, I’ll tell Cop Guy about her and leave it to him. That’s it. I’m not going out of my way for a woman who forces Jane to hand-wash her Bugatti in kitten heels and a pantsuit.

A tree limb hangs heavy over the grassy area where we’re walking. Big D uses one of his wing hands to push it up and out of the way. A glossy ripe piece of fruit falls to the ground and bounces. It’s pink and white on the outside, splitting open to reveal bloodred flesh inside. Oh, and the smell? Like sugar and strawberries. I bend down to pick it up, and Big D’s tail lashes out. He snags my wrist in a tight grip to keep me from touching the thing.

I look up at him, the edge of his mouth curling up to reveal shiny teeth.

“Toxic. Bleed from the eyes.” He tugs me along with him, and I stumble. He doesn’t let me hit the ground, holding onto me until I’ve got my feet. When he uncurls his tail and draws it back, my skin feels cool and bereft in an odd way.

Eve, you’re vibing with an alien dragon.

“Thanks again for that,” I tell him, trying to get him to take the translator. He narrows his eyes but deigns to grab it in a winged hand, holding it up to his … I guess he’s got ear holes, IDK. There are no ears for me to see, just those massive horns of his. “Thank you again,” I repeat, and he makes a face at me, chucking the translator back. I catch it in my hands, jogging to keep up with his sudden speed increase.

Here and there, we pass more of those strange vents. Purple and red smoke drifts up from inside, heating the already warm air even further. When I stop to peer inside of one, Big D lets me so I figure it’s safe. I squat down and see flames dancing across an oozing dark pitch-like substance inside.

Hmm.

I look over my shoulder to find that he’s watching me. I wish he’d talk to me more. Whenever he does deign to talk, he seems like a cool guy. A cool guy? Eve, he’s an alien monster that changes size. One minute he’s as big as a bus, the next, he’s a really tall dude. I can’t figure that one out for the life of me, the shapeshifting stuff.

I stand up and off we go, detouring into the trees and over the stream. He walks right through it so I do, too. The cool water feels good on my feet, the stones smooth. Tiny purple flowers grow straight from the sandy bottom, their stems long and hairlike, making me wonder how they even stay upright.

We reemerge from the shadowy thicket to bright sunshine, and I lift a hand to shade my eyes. The suns on this planet are killer. Tabbi Kat must be in a tizzy. If anyone dares suggest she leave the house without sunscreen—only Zinc Oxide will do—she starts screaming about UV rays and premature aging. She’s twenty-one years old, by the way, and regularly gets Botox.

Why do I know so much about freakin’ Tabbi Kat?

I push aside the thought and squint through the sunshine. There are a scant few beams breaking through the clouds and yet, it’s as bright as a hot summer day back on earth.

“Oh.” I realize suddenly why Big D brought me here.

There’s a view.

Not just any view, the most magnificent view I’ve ever seen in my life.

The woods extend as far as the eye can see, broken only by a handful of downed ships. One of those ships is as big as the entire Portland airport. How the hell did that end up down here? Right. The heavy gravity. I didn’t notice it much at first, but it’s starting to get to me. My feet are swollen, and I only feel better when I lie on my back with them propped up against the wall. I even laid with my head hanging over the edge of the ship yesterday, resting there until all the blood rushed to my skull and made me dizzy.

“This is amazing,” I breathe, using both hands to shield my eyes so I can see better. There are mountains in the distance, but they’re not snow-capped. They’re black and glittery, topped with flames. Err. Right. Toto, no Kansas, blah blah. Just beyond them, I catch a glimpse of sapphire brilliance and white capped waves. An ocean? A really big lake? “How long does it take you to fly over there?” I ask, wondering if we couldn’t, like, make a beach trip or something.

I’ve lost my damn mind.

I turn to find Big D crouched beside me. He lifts up one of his wings and brings it over the top of me, shading me so that I don’t have to shade myself. I drop my arms to my sides as I stare at him. I can’t quite shake the feeling that I’m being wooed.

“Are you trying to impress me?” I ask, lifting a brow. “If so, it’s almost working.” I purse my lips. It shouldn’t work. It can’t work. I have a strong inner voice warning me that this guy doesn’t do casual sex. If … well, I don’t think we’d even fit together, but if we somehow did manage something, it wouldn’t be a hey, you’re hot, let’s have some fun sort of deal. It’d be … The guy brought me to a vista. He spruced up his nest. He hunted bacon for me. Proving my theory that the grubs and the arugula and the tasteless nuts were a slight. “This is very nice.”

I sound condescending.

He picks up on it. His eyes narrow, and that massive mouth of his ripples in annoyance. He growls at me and the translator relays his words.

“You are displeased?” It’s a genuine question. I shake my head, but I don’t know if he understands my body language enough to get it.

“No,” I respond carefully, trying to decide how to phrase this. I give him the translator, and he willingly accepts it. “You … I don’t … what do you want from me?”

I’ve never dated anyone who didn’t want something from me. Maybe that’s a ‘me’ problem and I’m picking the wrong guys, but that also means I can’t trust my own judgment. This stupid alien dragon is almost too nice. We trade the translator again.

Now he has the audacity to look confused. He stares at me, reaching up a finger and tracing it down the curving length of his horn. It seems like a mindless tick, but oh God, I wish I could touch his horns. I want to see what would happen if I gripped them in my palms and gave them a rub. I wonder what he’d do?

“Want?” he asks me, and then he licks his mouth with that sinuous tongue, and my throat goes bone-dry at the sight. “From? I want only you.”

Oh lord.

That has to be a mistranslation.

He stands up then, and he’s right there in front of me, nine-foot-whatever of shimmering black scales, purple spirals on his horns and chest and stomach. He has abs, too. Did I mention that? Beautiful abs and strong thighs, and a muscular tail. His mouth disappears into his face, leaving only those gem-like eyes and slightly flared nostrils as he breathes me in. His wings remain above us, providing welcome shade.

He lifts one hand up, withdrawing his claws and then sliding a fingertip over my lips. I close my eyes as he continues his exploration, teasing the bridge of my nose, stroking my eyebrows. My body trembles under those simple touches, and I press a palm against my stomach. Please stop, I think, but I don’t say it aloud because that’s not what I really want.

He plays with my hair, giving my scalp a rub with four fingers, thumb teasing the shell of my ear. When he presses his palm flat against my cheek, those pheromones of his sink into my skin, and I shudder violently. My hand comes up to grip his wrist.

“That’s cheating.” I open my eyes to stare at him, and he smirks at me. He might not know what I’m saying, but he understands the gist of it. The guy is much smarter than I’ve been giving him credit for.

“Pheromones … only work on some females.” That’s a clear enough statement if I’ve ever heard one. “They work well on you.”

Oh, look, a complete sentence. The translator is learning as it goes, and I’m all here for it. Finally, some alien tech that isn’t complete horseshit. Some of these species might have intergalactic travel, but this place is—for lack of a better word—technologically challenged.

I tuck some hair behind my ears, trying to be nonchalant. I’m not fooling anybody.

“You exude pheromones as well.” He steps closer and inhales, nosing at my hair. I can’t breathe for the nearness of him, and I can’t explain why. I want him even though I know I shouldn’t. “They work well on me.”

Shit.

Big D crouches in front of me like a gargoyle, evening out our height difference a little.

He grabs me then, massive hands on my waist. They encircle me, his long fingers. He’s got my entire rib cage, waist, and hips in his possession. Even through the fabric of the space suit, I can feel it, that sticky musk on his skin calling out to mine.

“We don’t fit.” I say that, even though I want to try. I’m so wet, maybe it would actually work? Can he smell that, too? Is that what he means by pheromones? I look up, and it’s like I’m being pursued and romanced all at the same time. He’s a beast—a male—who wants to fuck. He’s a man who genuinely likes a woman. What am I supposed to do when I’m being hit on both fronts? Sex and romance in conjunction.

He drops his head and his tongue laves along the column of my throat, up to my ear, along my jaw. My hands press tight against his ab muscles, feeling them contract under my fingertips. Something hot and hard pokes me, and I see that both of his cocks have emerged from inside of him, slick at the tips, ready to mate. He has a sack, too, that I haven’t seen before. It’s heavy and tight, an invitation in and of itself.

He growls at me, breath ruffling my hair, tail curling around my legs. It spirals around both his and mine, trapping us together, pinning us to one another.

“What are you doing?” I ask, but it’s a useless question. One, he can’t understand me. Two, I know exactly what it is that he’s doing.

Big D releases my waist and scoots back a step, remaining in a crouched position. He’s at eye-level with me now, his genitals exposed, tail tip lashing. I’m so wet right now, so turned-on, I don’t have the energy to resist.

This is a bad idea. Sex means more to him than it does to you. He’s an alien you’ve known for nine days. The way he glows, he’s probably poisonous or something.

None of that registers in my sex-addled brain. The smell of him, it’s all around me, a cloud making me dizzy, smashing through my inhibitions, drugging me. Male. Female. Mate. Together. Nest. I put my hands up on either side of my head and he uncoils his tail, extending his claws and dropping to all fours.

As I watch, he turns to the side, showing off his cocks and his sack in a very purposeful way. Looking at them now, they seem … doable. He seems doable. He’s much smaller than he was the first day I met him, shrunk down to a more reasonable size.

Once he’s certain I’ve gotten a good enough look, he makes his way over to one of the vents on the ground, peeling back the earth so that the crevice is wider. He climbs right in like it was built for him, and then he rolls around in the pitch and the flames.

My jaw is hanging open at this point, but not because I’m less turned-on.

More. I’m more turned-on.

He coats himself in that dark pitch, tiny flames dancing across his skin, and then he rises to his feet.

Lightning crashes off the side of the cliff, igniting one of the trees in the distance. I don’t even look at it. I can’t. All I can see is him, standing there on two feet with his horns dripping and his eyes blazing and his massive cocks on fire. Literally.

He inhales, and his scales ruffle, wings spreading. His markings darken and then flare, casting violet light on the trees, shining amethyst across the grass, bathing my skin in purple. He gets bigger right before my eyes, holding his arms out to either side, hands up, claws extended.

And the smell.

I’ve never been a scent person. Jane is a scent person. She has matching candles, bath bombs, and body sprays for every mood. She says smell triggers old memories for her or helps her make new ones. Not me. I could wear a shirt that smells like last night’s buttered popcorn and forget I ever watched a movie.

This is … I’m alive with the scent of him, like I’m awake for the very first time in the history of my existence. I am here. I’m present. Nothing in the past matters. The future is unimportant. I’m in the present, and I’m breathing in hot, smoky, musky male and want. Desire. Need. Invitation.

He’s asking me to be the female to his male, to come to him, to surrender to whatever this is.

My knees go weak and I actually collapse onto the grass, hands over my mouth.

He—because there’s only one ‘he’ here, and he doesn’t even need a name—steps out of the vent and gets onto all fours, stalking over to me. I fall back onto my ass, trembling, dripping, feeling more like a woman now than I ever have before.

He comes right over to me, one clawed hand on either side of my body, his massive form overshadowing mine. He’s enormous now, as big as I have ever seen him. Larger than a bus, as big as a small house.

My eyes drop to his cocks again.

There’s no way. There is literally no way that I can—I close my eyes. I’ve never wanted anything more or hated reality any less. I’m not an Aspis. I’m not a female that he can or should have. I’m a human being who doesn’t belong here, whose anatomy isn’t equipped to handle a creature this magnificent.

I feel like a fraud.

I shove the heels of both hands into my eyes—hard. I see stars behind my closed lids, but I don’t care about that. All I care about is the smell, the heat. He’s so hot that my skin aches, that sweat pours down my spine beneath the bubblegum pink suit.

Tears of frustration prick my eyes, but there’s no getting around it. I can see how big he is, and I know what my limits are. It’s not a question or a contest. His dicks are each as big as my thigh. Could I touch them in other ways? Lick them? Rub them with my hands? Rub them with my whole body?

“I can’t do this,” I whisper, the pressure in my lower belly tightening along with the storm. I can feel the thunder there, the need, the frustration. I want to scream. I drop my hands and look up to see that he’s curled his spine to stare down at me, waiting.

He’s waiting for an answer, and I’m telling him no when he’s literally the only thing I want.

Right there in that moment, if I could’ve shifted into an Aspis female and stayed forever on that stupid planet, I would’ve done it. I would’ve done it without thinking the consequences over. Without thinking about my family. Or Jane. Or my catering business.

I might’ve been happy.

That black substance drips all around me, the air thick and heady with sex.

“No?” he asks, the word like a crash of lightning. I jump, those tiny hairs rising up again. Electrified, that’s what I am right now. He doesn’t ask it in his own language; he asks it in English. I tilt my head back so that I can see his eyes on me. I’ve got tears again, and he reaches down with his wing-hands, swiping his thumbs over my cheeks. He brings them to his mouth and tastes them for a second time.

“No.”

It’s the hardest decision I’ve ever made.

Some part of me knows that if I give into him, I’ll lose something else. The other humans that were abducted with me. The people I love on earth. Maybe even myself. I’ve got logistics to think of. I won’t ever be able to give him what he wants. He’ll never be able to do the same for me. If I agree, he’ll think it’s for more than just a night of fooling around.

This guy—Dragon Dude is all I know him by—retreats very slowly from me, whuffling my hair as he goes. He crouches down in front of me and then looks away, toward the horizon and the cliff edge, toward the distant lightning and the forest fire that’s just started. He swipes his hand down his face, flicking that black substance across the earth. It’s such a human move. He looks so painfully goddamn human right now.

“It’s not because I don’t want to.” I take the translator off and hand it out to him, but he doesn’t take it. He turns his attention toward the trees, mouth flattened into an invisible seam, eyes searching the woods.

He looks worried.

“We … leave now,” he growls, low and rumbling. The sound travels through the dirt and prematurely scares some of the grasshopper aliens out of the ground. They take off toward the forest, spared the fate of the sun as the clouds roll in. “Females might come.”

He says this to me just before he snags me with his tail and starts to run, bounding through the woods at a pace that’s easily twenty times faster than we walked earlier. He heads straight back to the den as a roar explodes in the distance. Females? My brain is so scrambled that I don’t know which way is up. I didn’t reject him because I didn’t want him. I … I don’t know what to do.

I’m as afraid as I am aroused.

Big D hops into the ship, setting me on my feet, and then pacing a nervous rut into the floor. Or … he tries to. He takes up the entire living room area of the space, filling it with shadows and bioluminescent flickers. He paints the walls purple with his bright blow, and he makes me unsteady on my feet with the smell. I’m breathing him in with every inhale, and I feel my body plumping, swelling, making room.

I catch my lip under my teeth.

“You’re saying that if I don’t mate you, other females might come?” I repeat his statement as a question, trying to understand. I hold out the translator, but he won’t take it. He’s agitated, and I’m worried that it’s partially my fault. “Why?”

What a dumb question, Eve. He’s all puffed up and jacked up and smelling like sex on a stick. If you’re not going to fuck him, somebody else will surely take up the torch.

That’s when I know: I’m going to do it.

I am.

It’s a terrible idea that I’m going to regret later, and I don’t fucking care. The thought of another female taking all of these things that are meant for me? It puts me into a blind rage. The hunting, the nest-making, the heroic rescues, the affection, the posturing, his thick cocks, that swollen sack. I’d sooner die than let some alien dragon bitch snag those things.

Even if I’m leaving. Even if I’m going home. Even if it’s just for a short while.

I step up beside him, breathing hard, a little bit scared, a lot excited.

He looks at me.

I’m shaking now.

I open my mouth to tell him that I want it, to tell him to fuck me, to see what he’ll do if I give him free rein to touch me.

There’s movement in the bushes, and I turn just in time to see her.

The crimson female is back.

Big D snarls, back arching, scales lifting like the hair of an angry cat. His spikes raise along his spine and tail, oozing violet venom. He digs his claws into the floor with a grating sound, tearing up fine ribbons of silver. He pulses and glows, like purple lightning flickering across his skin. He lowers his horns in her direction, a clear warning.

“Leave.” The sound of that word, it rumbles the ship, shaking the floor beneath my feet. It’s so loud that I can feel it in my bones. I wouldn’t even need the translator to understand any of it. How or why that bitch doesn’t turn tail and run—literally—I don’t understand. Looking at her from here, I can see she’s as puffed up and bright as he is, like she, too, rolled around in one of those heat vents.

She’s here because of me, because he’s been trying to court me, and she wants to buy what he’s selling.

Her eyes, ruby and violet with silver rings around the pupils, flick to me.

“Meat.” That’s what she says—thank you, handy-dandy translator—opening her massive maw wide. Saliva rolls down her teeth and pools on the forest floor. As beautiful as I find Big D, I find this other Aspis terrifying. Her mouth is a cruel gash across the lower half of her face, the rictus grin of a predator. The way she stares at me, I have the implicit understanding that she would’ve eaten me had she been the one to attack the wagon that day. Hell, she’ll eat me now if she gets the chance. Her gaze drifts back to Big D. “You … ready to mate.”

Big D lets out this grating growl of a laugh, equal parts primitive and sinister. It makes my skin ripple with happy terror. I don’t even know what that means exactly, but that’s what happens to me.

“Not with you.”

Well. That was succinct and unmistakable in intent. I tap a fingernail against one of the translator’s green ear pieces. What a vibrantly clear—and obviously mocking—response.

He doesn’t just want to fuck; he wants to fuck me specifically.

The female snarls and then, without warning, she charges.

I drop down and curl into a ball, trying to make myself as small as possible. I needn’t have worried. Big D launches himself out of the ship and slams the bulk of his body into hers. The two of them roll across the ground, crashing into the base of a tree. I lift my hands away from my ears, realizing that I subconsciously covered them like a child trying to fend off a nightmare. What good would that have done? Covering my ears wouldn’t have prevented me from hearing the crush of my own bones in the female’s mouth.

I scramble to the edge of the ship on my hands and knees, gaping at the clash of titans that’s occurring on my front lawn.

“Zero, they’re fighting with each other!” If I sound breathless, it’s because I am. I’ve never seen a confrontation as violent and wild as the one taking place in front of me. This is basic biology at its finest, a clash of creatures with no happy ending in sight. This is unchecked violence without rules, without society, without social pressures or expectations. I spare a quick glance for the screen.

“I can hear the sounds of combat. My analysis of the audio tells me that the female Aspis wishes to mate with our resident male. He does not return her advances so they have engaged in a fight. If she wins, she will force herself on him. If he wins, he will kill her.”

I can barely grasp what I’ve just read, turning back to the melee with my mouth hanging wide open.

If Big D loses, she’ll … she’ll rape him because he made himself vulnerable and wild and irresistible—for me. Because of me. God, if I’d just done what I wanted to do in the first place!

Beyond that, if he loses, I am straight-fucked.

What are the chances that she’ll mate him and leave peacefully? None. Zero. Zilch. If she wins, she’s going to eat me. I stand up suddenly, determined to intervene somehow. I did it with the sex trafficking orcs, didn’t I? Don’t see why I can’t help out now.

I look around for a weapon, but of course, there are none.

The dragon horde. I mean, that’s not what it is, but … it is what it is. I’m sporting wet thighs and a throbbing core when I sprint across the ship to the door. It’s still wide open, the gleaming pile of items resting in the dusky half-light. I take a few steps back and look over at Zero’s screen.

“Did your people have guns of any sort? Something that might still be in working order now?” I turn back to the horde, trying to imagine using any part of it to fight a dragon. Alien. Alien dragon. Yeah, that. I check the screen for another response.

“My people are quite peaceable—oftentimes to their own detriment. If anything were to be useful to you now, it would be one of the nets on the exterior of the ship. They were installed with the hopes that we might capture an Aspis alive and run some tests on it.”

The ship seems pretty well, dead to me, but then, the sprinklers worked, right? Something is powering Zero and her bitchy attitude. Not to mention the motorcycle.

“Where are these nets?” I ask, moving back into the living room while simultaneously plotting out Plan B. If Big D is overpowered, should I run? In that scenario, would there be any other choice? Leaving Big D to be raped seems like a pretty fucked up way to repay the help he’s given me. He could’ve left me with the orc dudes and went about his day. Hell, he could’ve left me in the field of purple flytraps to bleed to death. He could’ve let me die alone in the jungle. He could’ve left me in the market.

He could’ve let me starve and sleep in the living room and never taken me to that vista point.

He did none of those things.

“Shit, Eve. Shit!” I’m cursing my good nature as I scan over the instructions on the screen.

“The nets are designed to home in on the Aspis, so if you find one, it should be easy enough to deploy. As the ship is lacking power, a manual switch will be required. They were built with the understanding that we might crash, and that we might have to exist here for some time before rescue. In such a case, we wanted our research to continue without interruption.”

As fascinating as all this information is, I get the idea that Zero is a bit of a chatterbox when she’s not chewing me out in a rage. It’s a moment for immediacy, not for useless backstory.

“How do I find the nets? Or a manual switch?” I sound hysterical now. I’m sure I look hysterical, standing there aroused and wild in the middle of a barbaric alien battle. Hot blood spatters across the floor at my feet, staining my toes. I look down at it and then slowly turn to stare out at the pair of Aspises as they circle one another.

Big D is the one who’s bleeding. He’s got a gash across his right wing that must’ve been inflicted with such force that his blood was sent flying to spatter all over me.

“You’ll need to climb up the side of the ship. There should be one just above the door on my left. That is, if I recall the layout correctly. I no longer have access to the ship’s floor plans, only my own fallible memory.”

Fantastic.

All I have to do is scale the side of a giant spaceship, locate a manual switch, and shoot a homing net at a dragon. Lovely. Exactly how I planned on spending my summer.

“The suit I provided you will allow you to climb the ship with ease; it was designed for that purpose. You’ll need the boots and the gloves.”

Now she tells me.

“Nice, really, thanks for the history lesson, Zero.” And thanks for making something so hard sound so reasonable and easy. Yeah, I’ll just climb the crashed spaceship and shoot a net gun at a hostile alien female.

But the mind and body will do incredible things when faced with certain death.

I pretend like that’s my primary concern, my own mortality. It’s not.

Yeah, if I don’t do this, and Big D loses, I’m dead. That’s it. I’ll be eaten, and even though I said I didn’t care if he ate me, I didn’t mean it. I don’t want to die. More importantly, I don’t want Jane to feel alone. If she’s holding onto some thin strand of hope the way I am, we can be each other’s support in a crazy, impossible situation. She’s fighting for me; I have to fight for her.

Mostly … I don’t want to disappoint Dragon Dude.

I yank on the boots and the matching white gloves, and I sprint to the doorway, searching around for one of the huge vines that have a stranglehold on the ship. I do my best to get a grip on one. Doesn’t work. It’s humid and somewhat slimy to the touch. I turn back to the screen in time to see Zero typing out fresh instructions.

“There should be handholds beside the door. The gloves and boots will adhere to them, preventing you from falling as you climb.”

I try my best to ignore the fight that’s occurring just below me, but it’s impossible not to look. The female has Big D on his back currently, one of her wing-hands at his throat. He’s flailing in a puddle of blood, desperate to get her off. She’s not doing much more than keeping him contained, but I notice that the pair of them are pushing at one another’s tails, as if they’re trying to impale the other—or avoid being impaled.

He overpowers her as I watch, throwing her so hard against another tree trunk that it actually snaps, crashing into the woods behind her. Big D and the female circle one another, teeth bared, spikes raised, horns flashing. They charge forward and clash, locked at the head, fighting to flip the other onto their back.

Shit.

I turn away and then reach around the doorway, shoving vines and leaves and glowing snails out of my way. The handholds are there, but it makes sense why I didn’t see them right away. They’re absolutely buried beneath the foliage, stuffed with debris and dead leaves. Once I’ve got a few cleared out, I grab onto one, fit my foot into the other, and swing myself out of the doorway.

For a second there, I’m sure that I’ve got this in the bag. I’m going to deploy the net and be a hero. It does not turn out that way.

Whatever the boots and gloves and handholds are supposed to do, they don’t work. When I try to wedge my right foot into another of the notches, it slips right out and I overbalance. My left hand grasps uselessly for another hold but misses, and then I’m falling backward with a gasp. I don’t even have time to scream.

The female catches me with a wing-hand, having spun away from Dragon Dude to go for me instead. She lifts me right to her face and sniffs me. Her bright eyes are so close to mine that I see striations of red and blue in her irises. Specks of silver. That ring around her pupil.

“Mate … this?” she asks, and then she laughs, and her mouth is opening like some sort of fucked-up Lovecraftian nightmare. I knew these creatures had big mouths, but not that big. She opens wide enough to swallow me whole, wrapping my waist with her tongue and pulling me into the heat of her mouth. I’m screaming now, mindless sounds of terror that I’m ashamed of but can’t seem to help.

I’m just a normal person trapped in a place I do not belong.

I am a human woman, not an FBI agent or a marine or a vampire slayer or a wizard.

A person.

A soon to be dead person.

I don’t close my eyes even though I know that I should. I see everything: the pinkness of the female’s tongue, the saliva dripping from the roof of her mouth, the darkness of her throat as she pushes me toward oblivion. Her teeth press into my back and pain explodes through me, knocking the fear right out of me. There’s no room to be afraid; there’s only room to hurt. Blood—my blood—splashes onto her tongue as she releases me and I tumble headfirst toward death.

My body slams into her throat, and then she swallows, and the contraction of her muscles drags me down into blackness. It’s utterly horrifying. I—like most people—have had thoughts like, what’s the worst way to die? Fire was one of my great fears. Hot lava, irrationally enough. Disintegrating in some hot spring in Yellowstone like a bumbling tourist. Those were all ideas that had occurred to me.

Swallowed by an alien monster? That was not on my list.

Another contraction of the female’s throat sends me deeper into her body, and I tumble into a vat of acid. Her stomach. It’s not an open space like I might’ve imagined if I’d ever imagined something this horrendous, but rather like being trapped in hot, slimy plastic wrap. It’s smothering me, and I can’t decide if I’m going to suffocate first or melt away into nothing.

The suit—and boots and gloves—seem to be doing an admirable job of protecting my body, but my face … I wish I could scream, but that’s not an option. No sound will come out. I’m stuck there inside a fucking alien and wishing I hadn’t been so glib about the lawyer’s last moments. Douchebag he might’ve been, but very few people deserve this level of torture.

Jane, I’m sorry, I think, and if I could’ve cried then, I would’ve. Mom. Dad. Nate. My sisters, Jenna, Kari, and Maribel. I love you guys. I love you guys so much.

I’m sorry, Dragon Dude. You were fucking awesome.

My dying wish is to see them all, one last time.

A strange contraction ripples around me, smothering me further, and then I’m being expelled with such violent force that I’m convinced I just died. This velocity and speed, it’s all the sensation of my soul slipping from my body. It’s a feeling similar to that sort you get when you’re drifting asleep, and then it feels like you’re falling off a cliff, and you wake with a startle. I assume that’s what dying feels like.

Then I hit the tree.

A groan of pure agony slips past my burning lips, and I fall to the ground—on my head. The pain in my neck and shoulders is nothing compared to the acid burns on my face, so I barely acknowledge it. I lie there on alien soil, more or less blind, bleeding everywhere, skin on fire. I can hear the sounds of the fight as it continues, but I can’t see anything.

I truly don’t think I’ll ever be able to see anything ever again.

When I try to move, my body ignores the command. There’s a disturbing numbness from my lower half, and I can only guess that when the female bit down, she severed or broke something in my spine. I’m alive, but not for long.

I lay my head down on the grass and find that my body is taking in these strange, erratic gulps of air. They’re wet and gurgly, and I just wish that it was over already. If I’m going to die, why does it have to be such a long and painful death?

There’s a horrible sound not long after that, a death rattle that brings a fresh sob to my lips. That’ll be me soon enough. I hate that. I hate it. I don’t want to die here, an infinitesimal nothing, a speck in the universe. If I were at home, surrounded by people who love me, I wouldn’t feel this way, this sad and pathetic and small and useless. I just want my family and friends back.

“Tiny female.” The ground shivers as a massive body trundles over to where I’m lying on the ground. I’m rolled onto my back, but there’s no pain. As of now, I’m barely aware of what’s going on.

“Why didn’t you wake me up?!” I’m shouting at my mom as I struggle to find my car keys. I know that I left them around here somewhere. “I have a gig in thirty minutes!”

“You’ve built a tight ship, Eve. You have reliable employees who know what they’re doing. Take the day off and have lunch with your sisters.”

I remember thinking how insane that sounded, how a day off was like giving into laziness and forgoing everything that I’d worked so hard to build. But then I’d looked at my mother’s face, and I’d really thought about it. During my dying breath, would I remember that I worked an extra day or would I remember that I went to lunch with my sisters? Only one of those things would have staying power in my flickering memory.

Luckily for me, I remember my sisters. Luckily for me, I went to lunch.

I’m smiling as I die, giving into the softness and relaxing as I stretch my arms above my head.

That’s when the pain hits.

It wakes me from my stupor and I start to scream.

I’m on my back outside the ship with Big D above me, his tongue bathing my acidic, bloodied form. He washes me with hot saliva as I continue to scream, head thrown back as my body bows with the pain. I’m looking upside down at the dead female now, her throat torn out, blood soaking the forest floor around her.

I’m also in agony.

Big D must’ve licked my eyes first—um, gross—so I have no trouble seeing. What I do have trouble with is the blinding pain in my spine as he licks me back together. Quite literally, when I drop my head down to stare at my midsection, I see that I was nearly bitten in half.

I pass out again, either from the pain or the view of my severed body, I’m not sure. When I wake up the second time, I’m lying in the nest.