Chapter 3

THREE

Taki

My toes dug into the thick layer of ash as the figures in the distance sped down the hill toward the wreckage of my escape pod. They weren't quiet either—they hooted and hollered while clanging crude weapons together that they clutched in their meaty fists.

Most were humian. A few were Erushik, which was a warring species that ran on all fours and were known to steal Radian females for breeding. A few of them stopped to beat their hairy chests, and I shuddered.

The humian next to me remained crouched and nearly motionless. Only his eyes moved as he took in the approaching gang of criminals. I didn't necessarily trust him, but I thought my odds of beating one humian versus a whole crowd were better, so I'd stick with him. For now.

I'd pressed the emergency signal on the pod as it sped toward the ground. Not for my rescue, since I hadn't expected to survive the impact. I'd only wished to let someone know the location of my smashed body. But somehow, I was alive. Bleeding, but alive. And now my hope for that emergency signal was that someone saw it and would send rescue. The humian at my side had smashed the controls so the signal was no longer sending, but it had to have shown up on some radar. Right?

My hair blew around my face and slapped the humian's mouth. He huffed quietly in annoyance before gathering it into a bundle in his massive hand. His fist rested on my upper back, and the hot weight of it was an odd feeling.

The gang had reached my pod now, and several dove inside to scavenge. The biggest humian—bald with a bushy brown beard and 005 tattooed on his chest—reached inside and rubbed at something. He withdrew his fingers and from this distance I could see the dark color of my blood. He sniffed it, and then let out a roar that shook my bones. "It's blood. Find herrrrr ," he called into the sky, and my stomach cramped while my head spun. "Double the rations for anyone who brings her to me untouched."

I couldn't stop the whimper that escaped my lips as he wiped my blood on a rag tied to his pants.

"Fuck," the humian muttered to me, and then grabbed my arm. He tugged me toward another rock where he knelt and swiped his hand over a patch of ash. Suddenly, a hatch peeled back to reveal a hole in the ground. He pointed at it and growled at me. "Go."

"Go—?"

He didn't give me time. With a vicious yank that nearly tore my arm out of the socket, he threw me down the hole. I hit the ground with a pained grunt, and then next to my head, thick boots landed in the dirt. Scrambling away until my back hit a wall, I watched as he slid the hatch closed and plunged us into total darkness.

All I could hear was my breathing and then the sound of soft footfalls. Suddenly a light bloomed nearby, and I blinked up to see the humian holding a small lantern with a flickering flame inside.

He stared at me before turning away quickly, his boots kicking up dust. "Fuck," he spat again, and I pulled my knees to my chest as my body trembled. I rarely heard cursing as it wasn't proper in the social circles I ran in. But I was a long way from home.

Setting the lantern on a crude table, he dropped to a crouch and tossed his bag on the ground. He rooted around inside before finding a freeze-dried bag of fruit, which he tossed at me. The bag hit my chin and fell to the ground. I stared at it, as I could still taste the expensive meal I'd had with G'ersh in the back of my throat.

"Eat now," the humian ordered. "Because once you're hungry, you're weak."

Once you're hungry, you're weak.

Those words were not part of any life I could understand, but yet here I was, plunged into a whole other world where survival and strength were of importance, not money or social status.

I picked up the bag gingerly and opened it. The freeze-dried fruit tasted like barely edible dust, but I ate them anyway as the humian shoved an entire strip of jerky in his mouth and chewed.

He paid me little mind as he dug through his bag of new treasures, and I took the time to study him in the dim light of this underground bunker. He wore only a pair of worn pants with large pockets on the sides and thick-soled boots that had a few holes. His muscled chest was bare and streaked with ash and dirt. His face carried a bit of stubble along his cheeks and chin while his head was topped with short brown hair. The inmate number on his chest—032—flexed with every movement.

He was massive with broad shoulders and thick muscles. His thighs alone were the size of my torso. Suddenly he stopped and his eyes swung to me. Green orbs assessed me, and fear once again took hold. The fruit tasted sour on the back of my tongue. To a humian male on a planet like this, I was nothing but prey. As a privileged Radian female, I'd only heard stories about how less-fortunate Radian females were treated, but they were exactly that—stories. Tales that felt so detached from my real life.

But I knew most other species viewed Radian females as nothing but bodies to use for pleasure and breeding. Was that why he hid me down here? So he could keep me for his own? My chest heaved, and I knew my vettes were blanched a nearly translucent white in fear.

He snorted in disgust, a reaction I hadn't expected, before he tossed me a skin of liquid which sloshed when it hit the ground near my hand. "Drink."

"Wh-why did you bring me down here?" I hated how my voice shook.

"Good question," he muttered as he began to organize his new finds on a few crates.

"What?"

He stopped and looked at me over his shoulder, lip curled into a snarl. "I don't know yet. But if I left you up there, 005 and his crew would have torn you apart."

I shuddered. "A-and what do you plan to do with me?"

"I don't know yet."

"You don't know yet?"

He flailed his hand with a snort. "It's not like I had time to formulate a plan. I never expected whatever was in that pod to survive the crash. I heard 005 coming and got you away from them. That was the extent of my thoughts. Happy?"

"Thank you," I whispered.

He continued to stare at me with his intense green eyes, which darkened the longer he looked at me. His fists clenched rhythmically, and his chest rose and fell as he inhaled deeply.

We barter only in food and flesh.

Those were the words he'd said to me, and he'd already taken my food. "Do I—" My mouth went dry as the walls seemed to close in around me. This bunker wasn't big, and even now I could smell the sweat on his skin. "Do I need to earn my safety with… flesh?"

His nostrils flared, and his full lips parted to reveal white teeth—one front tooth overlapped another—before his lips twisted and he wrinkled his nose. "No thanks, Princess."

He turned away to give me his back, and I muffled a gasp behind my hand at the deep scars on his skin. I knew what those were from—the Radian Crime Enforcement, or RCE. I counted them and when I reached twenty, my entire body went ice cold. That meant he'd been sentenced to this planet for murder. And not just any murder. He'd killed a Radian female.

My hands shook as I grabbed at the skin of the liquid, and I drank without tasting. I watched his every move from the way he folded the clothes he'd taken from the pod to the care with which he handled the food.

And when he picked up an axe that was nearly as tall as me while rising to his feet, I let out a squeak and scuttled away from him as fast as I could. Was this it? Would he just kill me instead?

He stalked toward me, and I held up my hands. "Please don't kill me."

Stopping short, he lowered his thick brown brows with a scowl. "Why the fuck would I hide you from 005 just to kill you?"

Right, that didn't make sense, but then he was a criminal. "I-I don't know, but the axe?—"

"Has nothing to do with you. I have to work to meet my quota. No quota, no food. Get it, princess? I can tell by looking at you that you likely didn't have to work a day in your life, right? You just wait for your Radian daddy to hand you off to your Radian mate so you can produce more little Radian shits."

I swallowed. He was right, I didn't work, but what right did he have to judge me? And the disdain in his voice raised my hackles so much that I couldn't keep my mouth shut. "You have to work because you're a criminal and you killed someone." As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I pressed my lips together and cowered. What was I thinking antagonizing this humian who held an axe ? I must have bumped my head in the crash harder than I thought.

He threw back his head and let out a laugh that was decidedly not amused. "Yeah, princess. You would think everyone here on Xal has been rightfully sentenced. No mistakes. No scapegoats just because some of us are half-Radian."

I felt off-kilter. What was he trying to say? That the RCE made mistakes or preyed on humians? Or both? "You don't… you don't know what you're talking about."

His thick brows rose. "I don't know what I'm talking about? Sure, believe that, princess."

"Stop calling me that!" I hollered at him. "I don't even know what princess means!"

He blinked at me and then let his head fall back. With his hands braced on his hips, he towered above me, all muscles and humian hormones.

Turning around, he dug into a pocket of his pack. I braced, ready to defend myself if he brought out a weapon, but instead when he straightened, he tossed me a small object which I bobbled in my hands before losing a grip on it. It thunked into the dirt beside me. In the dim light, I couldn't see what it was.

As I closed my fingers around it, he looked down his nose at me with eyes that had gone decidedly blank and disinterested. "I don't care what you do. Stay here or go out there and try your chances with everyone else. I have to go work."

He hopped up the short ladder, slid back the hatch, and left without another word. The lamp flickered in the corner, and I sat in stunned silence wondering what the hell I was thinking yelling at a murderer with a life sentence and nothing to lose.

"Stupid Taki," I murmured, smacking myself on the forehead. For one moment, I considered leaving too, but then I remembered that gang, the way they'd been nearly bloodthirsty with their weapons, and the way the leader had smelled my blood and wanted me for himself. Gagging, I pressed a hand to my stomach.

When the nausea passed, the sharp edges of the object clutched in my hand reminded me of its presence. I scrambled closer to the lamplight and unfurled my fist to study what lay in my palm.

I sucked in a breath as I took in the small screen of the escape pod locator. After blowing off the dirt and wiping the small screen, small white dots winked at me, letting me know that the signal locator was in fact on. With this, my signal would be seen by the RCE, and I would also be notified if they sent a rescue crew. No, not if, when. Think positive, Taki.

That prisoner had retrieved this for me. I had assumed my last signal was caught off abruptly after the crash and when he smashed the screen, but instead he'd kept this safe. Why would he do that for me?

That proved that 032 was my best bet. If I could stay here until rescue arrived, maybe I'd get out of here alive. Slowly getting to my feet on shaky legs, I glanced around the small bunker. I could start by preparing a meal for him when he got off work. He said barter in food and flesh, right? Well then, I was going to do my best to work on the first.