“This is a very long-winded way of calling me a tyrant because you can’t see your lover,” Dominax drawled.
Darma was forced to bite his lip to avoid exclaiming something he would regret.
12 And It Was Called Yellow
“Fucking Dominax. Stupid winged king asshole,” Katie muttered under her breath. “Goddamn bastard with his flappy wings and…”
She was not in a good mood. Having escaped Dominax’s custody, she was realizing just how far from home she was, and just how lonely she was. Of course, being a fugitive on a far off planet was going to suck, but there was more to it; a longing she'd never had when she was a virgin too scared of anything that looked like a relationship to ever risk getting into one.
She missed Dominax.
God, she hated that she missed him, but she did. She’d probably just gotten used to him. Like the rat that had haunted her apartment before the building manager put out traps. She’d get over him once she was back home, on Earth, where she belonged.
That’s what she told herself, anyway. She didn’t know if it was true. She didn’t recognize herself anymore. Every feeling she felt was foreign and inconvenient. She’d never needed anyone. That's how she had evaded the soldiers for so long. She could survive on her own just fine.
So why the fuckety fuck was her brain playing imaginary montages of all the soft and tender times she shared with Dominax? And why did the memory of that very last punishment fuck he’d given her before she escaped pop up in the middle of the night and make her want to touch herself?
It was time to strike back. Take revenge. Make a statement. Dominax had his soldiers out looking for her, but they weren't able to cover every inch of the city, and she didn’t have too much trouble dodging them. It was always easier to hide than to seek.
Right now, she was looking at a statue of the king displayed in one of the lava gardens. It was naked and anatomically complete, but not correct. His real life cock was much, much larger.
Her very presence irritated her. On some level, she knew she was basically sitting near the statue so she could see the king's face again, because she… ugh…gross… no. She was not going to finish that thought.
Katie decided then and there, in a fit of avoiding the contents of her own brain, that the statue was going to bear the brunt of her ire. Pulling it down was out of the question. With her luck she'd end up with a ton of rock crushing her. But… she could decorate it. Okay, deface it. She could show Dominax her complete scorn for him. She could make his crimes against her public. She could show the entire city what their king was really like through the medium of art. Or maybe she’d just piss them off, but that was good too.
In the middle of the night, she crept in the flickering lava shadows toward the statue of the winged king. The buzz and hubbub of the day had gone all muted, the absence of fire in the sky serving to highlight the searing volcanic fissures around which the city had been built, as if they were barely an inconvenience.
Dominax’s stone face was even more handsome in the darkness, red light making him look almost lifelike. As she approached the statue, she could have sworn she saw it breathe.
She hesitated, almost tempted to apologize for some bizarre reason.
“You brought this on yourself," she told the stone. “Or, the guy you’re supposed to be did.”
In her past raids on various stores, which had started as ways to survive, but lately had become more entertaining in nature than a desperate waif’s attempt to feed herself, meant that she had a supply of materials which weren’t useful for survival. Like paint. And these big sticker things that the Homelanders used for covering burn stains until things could be replaced.
She had a backpack full of stuff to decorate the statue with. No, not decorate. Deface. She had to get that straight. This wasn’t trimming a Christmas tree. This was an act of human rebellion against an alien oppressor.
Rummaging through her bag, she found a can of what looked like paint. Yellow paint. Yellow was a coward's color, so that suited him. Somehow. For some reason. She couldn’t rationalize it, but nothing about this was rational. Rational people didn’t tell space dudes it was fine to abduct them.
Shit. Was that a near brush with accepting her role in the entire situation? No. She had to stay well away from that train of thought which might lead her to a station of having fucked up herself just a little bit. Responsibility was better when projected onto statues.
“Your fault," she told the solid rock beast. “Everything is your fault.”