Savage in the Cell: A Scifi Alien Romance (Fated Mates of Breeder Prison Book 2) Read online

  In the blink of an eye, two of Fayn’s gang members were on the floor. One lay unconscious on his back, the other screamed as he clutched his fractured arm in his other hand.

  I focused on Trayem, who drove his knee into the third gang member’s gut, then spun his elbow around and caught the creature on the side of the head with a hard thwak noise.

  Trayem marched on Fayn. His movements were confident, determined. He didn’t stop.

  Fayn bent down for the clothes he’d removed earlier and came out with a pair of sharpened blades.

  Trayem altered his stance. It was strong, his movements stiff and yet graceful. Precise, powerful, and faster than a python’s strike.

  Fayn attacked Trayem. His blades sliced through the air, making a sharp hissing noise.

  Trayem backed away, but not quick enough. One blade found his cheek, another his forearm. He shifted his weight and went on the attack. He lurched out with a coiled fist to Fayn’s chin.

  Fayn staggered back, stunned.

  Trayem pressed the advantage, throwing one blow after another, striking the leader in the face, gut, and chest.

  Fayn was nothing if not tough and struck with his blades, slicing Fayn across the stomach and chest.

  Fayn backed away.

  Injured.

  Bleeding.

  Beaten?

  As Fayn leaned forward to maintain his attack, Trayem leaped, spun, and performed a perfect kick that I’d only ever seen in the movies.

  Fayn took the blow on the chin. It knocked him sideways. As he turned back to Trayem, another spin came, loaded with another vicious strike to the face.

  Fayn grunted painfully, staggered, and hit the floor. He landed on his hands and knees and lost his grip on his blades. They skittered across the floor and out of reach. He spat out a wad of blood and turned to look up at Trayem.

  “Who are you?” he said.

  In response, Trayem drew back his foot and smacked the leader across the chin.

  Fayn slumped to the ground. Two, maybe three, teeth came loose from their moorings and danced across the floor and struck the opposite wall.

  I just stared, my chest heaving, my breath heavy. As fearful as I might have been, I was less afraid of a single alien than a gang of them.

  I watched him and didn’t move a muscle. I fully expected him to claim what he had fought for—what he was entitled to.

  He rounded the bed and stood facing me. His eyes drilled into mine. His breath was heavy with exertion, or perhaps it was desire. His face was cut from Fayn’s blades but they were already healing.

  Then his eyes moved down my neck to my swollen breasts. I was ashamed to admit the fight had excited me, turning my nipples hard and alert.

  His eyes swept down my flat stomach to my sex. He must have noticed how excited I had become at watching the fight, how unembarrassed I was to lie there before him.

  Was this any different from the fighters coming to claim their Prize in the Pool?

  Not so far as I could tell.

  I wondered if he was going to take me right then and there. He had every right to, by the prison’s rules.

  Okay, so the fights usually took place in the pits and not in a cell but he was still entitled to me.

  If he wanted me.

  With a single great wrench, he tore his eyes from me and bent down to pick up the clothes Fayn had stripped from me.

  He handed them over.

  “Get dressed. You’re coming with me.”

  I’d been in Ikmal prison for the past five years. Like the other girls, I’d been abducted. There had been no bright lights, no flying saucers, no broken-down old truck in the middle of nowhere. I had gone to sleep one night and then awoken the next in this place.

  This hell.

  When I arrived, I was surrounded by female aliens, each stranger and more bizarre than the last. One had the skin of a snake that could change color on demand. Another had googly eyes that spun of their own free will in their sockets. Another had hair that changed depending on her mood.

  They had all been abducted and now, for better or worse, we were sisters.

  The most terrifying thing was the reason we’d been brought there.

  “You’re to pleasure the fighters victorious in battle,” Lily said.

  Lily was the madam of the Prize Pool. It was a small domain, but it belonged to her. She was human like me. I thought the fact we came from the same planet had to account for something, so I asked her for help in escaping this place.

  “There is no escape,” she said shortly. “And the sooner you put it out of your mind, the sooner you can get to learning to survive.”

  Survive? I thought. What was there to put our lives at risk in this place?

  The klaxon sounded and I pressed my hands over my ears, it was so loud.

  “Follow the other girls,” Lily said and proceeded to march away.

  I did as she said. They were busy dressing up nicely, with perfectly primped hair and makeup.

  It turned my stomach.

  The clothes we wore were little more than single-ply tissues. I wore more when I went to bed at night. But I followed the others through a doorway and stepped onto a raised dais.

  I felt like a fraud standing there among the other girls, who smiled and pursed their lips, turning their bodies to their most favored angles.

  I shivered. The sheer negligee I wore gave me little protection and even less warmth against the persistent prison chill.

  Or maybe I was just shivering with fear.

  And if I wasn’t afraid enough already, I was when I saw the “victor” who would be choosing from us, the Prizes.

  The fighter was big, brash, and smothered with scars. There wasn’t an inch of his skin that hadn’t been kissed by a blade. Two enormous tusks jutted from his bottom jaw. They curved inwards and almost met two feet in front of his face.

  “Congratulations on your victory,” Lily said, bowing low to the tusked fighter. “Come check out my wares. And I have something new that might interest you.”

  I knew without a doubt the huge creature was going to pick me. There was a sense of morbid destiny about it.

  He was going to claim me and there was nothing I could do about it.

  The tusked one snorted as he ran a fat finger along my jaw. His crooked nail scratched the tip of my chin. He grinned at me, his huge teeth chipped and rotten. I could smell the haggard breath on my face.

  I emitted a high-pitched squeal like a child confronted with a feared and dreaded clown.

  “This one,” he growled.

  “No—” I managed before he grabbed me by the arm and dragged me toward the hallway.

  Lily and the others just stood and watched.

  I beat at his arm and kicked at his muscular calves but it was no use. A gnat would have the same effect on him as I was.

  He marched me through the hallways, turning this way and that.

  Prisoners nudged each other in the ribs and glaring at me and gave chase, pinching my ass and cupping a breast when they got close enough.

  The only thing holding them back were the guards armed with their heavy bolt rifles. They alone could put these animals down with a single twitch of their trigger fingers. I doubted the hairy, smelly tusked one would lift a finger to help me.

  He gripped my arm so tightly I was afraid he might snap it.

  Not that he cared about that. There was only one part of me he was interested in. And he dragged me to his cell to make good use of it.

  The door to his cell drew shut and he tossed me onto his bed. He removed his armor and undergarments, and threw himself on top of me.

  He tore my dress—such as it was—off me and fucked me. There was no better word to describe it, really. We rucked like animals, with no foreplay, no softness, no tender moments, it was hard and rough and lasted far too long.

  I cried the entire time.

  Once he was done with me, he rolled off, and shoved me off his tiny bed and onto the floor.

/>   I landed hard on my ass but I counted myself lucky. If it meant I could get away from him, it was all to the good.

  His was a single cell, with no bathroom, no kitchen, no amenities to entertain myself with.

  When I approached the door, it didn’t open. I was trapped and didn’t know when I could leave.

  The answer turned out to be the next morning.

  By that time, the beast had taken me three times. He got up from his bed, found me, put me into the position he wanted—usually mercenary or doggy—and hammered me until he was done. Then he returned to bed and fell back to sleep.

  Each time was unpleasant, but none had been as painful as the first.

  I was relieved to leave that place once morning rolled around. The guards stood outside and didn’t lift a finger to help conceal my nakedness.

  They led me back to the Prize Pool. I hugged my arms across my chest in a vain attempt to cover myself. The only positive point was that it was early and few prisoners were awake yet. I didn’t think I could take the jeers and howls of derision again.

  When I returned to the Prize Pool, Lily placed a comforting hand on my arm and another on my back. She led me toward the communal bathroom.

  “Come on, my dear. Let’s get you nice and warm and clean.”

  Clean? I wondered how I could ever be clean again. The monster’s fingerprints would forever stain my soul. I’d never been a religious person but I began to wonder if this was some form of recompense for my bad behavior in the past. I couldn’t think of what I might have done to deserve this treatment though. Maybe I was a dictator in a past life or something?

  Lily led me into the communal showers and into a small side room that she, as the madam, had exclusive use of.

  When we got there, I found she’d drawn me a bath. It was a small tub and had been filled using a leaky wooden bucket that sat to one side. Steam billowed in soft plumes from the still surface. I looked forward to easing my aching bones in it.

  “It was rough, wasn’t it?” Lily said.

  I nodded but didn’t say a word. I feared if I did, tears would stream down my face. And Lily didn’t seem like the kind of person I should show weakness to.

  “It’s always rough the first time,” she said.

  She removed what remained of the torn garment from me and dropped it in a garbage can. Then she led me into the bath. I sank into it. I felt my muscles unfurl.

  “Head back,” Lily said, and she began to wash my hair.

  Ever since I arrived in this place, Lily had been strict. I was surprised, and more than a little suspicious, why she was being kind to me now.

  “Where are you from?” I said.

  “It doesn’t matter where I’m from,” she said. “The only thing that matters is that I’m here now.”

  “Don’t you think you’re going to get out of here?” I said.

  “No. And you shouldn’t waste your time thinking on such things either. You’re here and you’re not going anywhere. Trust me, things will go a lot easier if you accept you’re never escaping. I’ve been here much longer than anyone else and the reason I managed to survive this long is because I followed the rules and did as I was told.”

  I looked Lily over. She was older than the other girls but not by much. The lines on her face were caused by hardship, not advanced years. She had a firm set to her jaw and a scowl I associated with her whenever one of us refused to follow the “rules.”

  She picked up a sponge and dipped it in the water. She let it swell and then squeezed most of the water out before rubbing soap over it and scrubbing my back.

  “You need to accept this situation,” she said. “The only way you’re going to survive is if you turn your weakness into strength. And the fighters’ strength into weakness.”

  I had no idea what that meant.

  “You will be light and bouncy, you will smile—and trust me, you have a beautiful smile—and you will pretend like you enjoy being here, enjoy servicing these aliens. You won’t. You will hate it every moment but there are some moments you can learn to enjoy if you’re smart. You will wear makeup, you will wear sexy dresses, and you will be everything they want you to be. You will boast confidence but you will not be obnoxious. You will be funny and never insulting. You will learn about each alien species in the prison and learn how to pleasure them. Each has their own preferences. Do this, and your time here, although it won’t be fun, it will be less scary. And I promise you, things will get easier.”

  “I don’t want things to get easier. I want to get out of here.”

  “I told you. That’s not going to happen.”

  “Why me? Why did I have to be the one to get abducted and brought here? Why couldn’t they have taken someone else?”

  “Those questions will play on your mind every minute of every day you’re here if you let them. My advice is to ignore them every time they come up.”

  “What about you?” I said. “How did you end up here?”

  “That breaks another rule. You do not ask about the past life of the other girls before they came here. It’s not fair. This is a place to forget, not to regret or relive.”

  “But there must be a way out of here. There must be a way to escape.”

  “You’re welcome to try but you will fail. Just as everyone else has failed. Even if you escape this place, there is nothing outside but an endless desert. The sun will bake your skin. The shade will freeze your bones. Forget escaping. The only escape you can do is in here.”

  She tapped the side of her head.

  “You will learn you can become anything in your mind. And nothing can harm you.”

  “What about my life back on Earth? What about my friends? My family?”

  Even as I said the words, my throat clogged with emotion, the tears ready to slide down my cheeks.

  “There’s one other rule you must obey,” Lily said. “Your sanity depends on it.”

  “What?”

  “You must never, under any circumstances, fall in love.”

  I glanced at her over my shoulder to see if she was being serious. I was surprised to find she was. I snorted. It was an ugly sound with my blocked nose.

  “Fall in love?” I said. “In this place? With these things? Give me a break.”

  “You say that now but many a Prize has fallen for their captors.”

  There was a flicker behind her eyes, I thought. It was the first time I’d seen a crack in the veneer of her expression. It was hairline-thin, but it was there.

  “Your body and mind evolved to adapt to any situation thrown at them,” Lily said. “Including this one. Later, there might be an alien you take a fancy to. Not all these prisoners are hideous and ugly. Some are exceptionally gorgeous. And when that one comes along, you must refuse any warm feelings toward him. You must focus on your task—to survive through each night. Love in this place can only end in tragedy.”

  She picked up a cup, dipped it in the water, and rinsed my hair. She grabbed a ratty towel and held it up.

  “There,” she said. “All done.”

  I had thought she was referring to the bath but it turned out she meant our heart to heart conversation. This was the first and only time she showed any warmth toward me or the other girls. The next time I saw her, she treated me with the same cold attitude she had since I arrived.

  I took her advice to heart and practiced it each time I was claimed by a fighter.

  I smiled even though it was the very last thing I wanted to do. I studied each alien species and got to know their strengths and weaknesses. I also befriended the other girls. They really weren’t so bad once you got to know them.

  I realized Lily was right. Although I could never enjoy this way of life, I could learn to deal with it.

  Suddenly, the monsters were no longer monsters. They were prisoners forced to fight and deserved a little… appreciation for their efforts.

  When I was nice to them, they were nicer to me. I was no longer just a piece of meat.

 
I was pleased when one of my “clients” took it upon himself to dispose of the tusked demon who fucked me that first night. The poor old sport was skewered by his own tusks in a freak accident.

  There was power in controlling the pleasure of others.

  And never once in all my five years had I broken the most important rule: to never fall in love.

  Never once had I considered even one prisoner might be the one I’d like to spend the rest of my life with.

  All that changed when I met Trayem.

  Trayem

  The girl remained silent as she followed me, dressed in her oversized clothes that had to belong to the owner of the cell we’d just come from.

  What was her relationship with Kren? I wondered. Was she a part of what happened before all this rioting kicked off? Or was she innocent in all this?

  I was aware, just as the rest of the prison was aware, that Kren had taken a fancy to a particular human female from the Prize Pool. Ever since then, strange things had happened.

  Was this human female the girl that had attracted the champions eye? Was she the one he’d found unable to resist?

  Looking at her, I could believe it. She was a cute little thing, small, but perfectly formed with pert breasts and wanting eyes.

  I had seen what she had beneath those unattractive clothes and it could tame even the most violent souls.

  I cleared my throat and moved out of the way of a pair of prisoners that hastened around a corner. I sensed another fight was soon approaching. The sooner we got to my cell and out of the way of danger, the better.

  The riot was only getting worse. The gangs gathered, fighting each other at hastily-constructed barricade choke points.

  They carried primitive weapons for the most part. Shards of metal, glass, and pieces of plastic. Others had managed to commandeer shock rifles from the fallen prison guards.

  I wasn’t part of any gang. At least, no gang they were aware of.

  The prisoners looked me and the small figure tucked behind me over before moving on. A single wayward glance and the situation would implode.

  We needed to get out of the hallways before the approaching battle took place.

  We came to a barricade of chairs and tables and beds, crammed together with barely a hole in sight.