“Yes, as I was saying...because of the Vepar attitude, we will have to walk you off the ship in cuffs...as our prisoner.”
“How perfect. I wouldn’t expect anything less,” I said in a dull voice. This time I saw Thane flinch at my tone out of the corner of my eye.
“You’ll be kept in a prison until we can talk to the rest of the counsel and convince them of your suitability in the project,” Corran continued.
Their words were like punches to my gut, and they kept coming, kept taking and taking from me. A tear slid down my face as I watched my life disintegrate into ruins.
Silence, but I felt both Thane and Corran’s piercing stares as they watched my tears continue to fall.
“We’re just here to keep you safe. The experiment is a front,” came Derrial’s voice from behind me.
I freeze and then slowly turn around to look at him. We stared at each other. There was a muscle twitching in Derrial’s cheek and his eyes seemed glossier than usual. “That’s all we want to do is to keep you safe. This might have started out as something else. But it’s not that way anymore. It hasn’t been that way since the first time I held you in my arms...since I tasted you.”
His voice was choked with emotion, and I felt like I couldn’t breathe. There was a part of me, the stupid girl who wanted to believe in fairy tales...even if they were the science fiction version, that wanted to believe him. But I promised myself I wouldn’t be that girl anymore. I refused to be sucked in again. It hurt too much.
My heart couldn’t handle it again.
“I know you don’t believe us, pet. But we have so much to tell you. You’ll see. We’ll gain back your trust,” Thane murmured from behind me. He walked towards me and I sensed the heat emanating from his body against mine at my back.
I took a step away from him and walked to a nearby chair, settling in so I could control the trembling in my body.
“It’s very important that you don’t talk back in front of others. The Vepar are looking for any chance to cut you down, to punish you, to take you from us. Please don’t make our jobs any harder than they will be already.”
I nodded stiffly, feeling like there really wasn’t another option but for me to cooperate.
“The air on Veon has a higher concentration of nitrogen than what you are used to and that’s why I implanted that ring in your throat. But now I need to inject you with a chip that will allow your body to adapt quicker in these conditions compared to the ship,” Corran explained, his voice softening.
“Is that all the chip does? Not sure I want all these things inside me.” I stared him straight in the eyes, daring him to lie to me. He gulped.
“It also has a tracking device in it,” he replied hesitantly. “It’s important just in case anyone tries to take you.”
“Tries to take me?” I asked, my voice quivering. “Why would they want to take me?”
Corran opened his mouth to answer but Derrial replied instead. “We aren’t sure that our reaction to you and your blood isn’t something that other males on the planet will be attracted to as well. The Vepar are an extremely competitive and territorial race and there’s a chance that some of the males will be tempted to steal you for themselves.”
I tried to comprehend a whole planet full of overbearing, chauvinist pigs like the three of them. It sounded like a nightmare.
“And what about the Vepar women? Are you worried about them?” I finally asked, my mind filled with images of packs of men running after me with spears. I wasn’t sure why they were all dressed in loincloths, but it was still an intimidating sight.
The three of them looked at each other grimly and suddenly I was afraid of what they were going to say next.
“Our females don’t take kindly to competition for the attention of their males,” Thane added grimly. “There’s a chance that they will try to take you out if they find out about fertility experiments and calculations that Corran has come up with. As of right now they don’t know that one of the main reasons that we were sent to Earth was to try and find a solution to our planet’s fertility problems using humans. If they do find out...well we don’t think they will take it well.”
I gulped, the images in my mind changing to women in loincloths chasing after me in spears.
“So you’re saying I’m not going to be welcomed with open arms,” I finally retorted, and Thane let out a snort.
“She’s a lunatic,” he said to Derrial and Corran, waving his arms at me. “She’s going to get herself killed.”
“I do have some kind of self preservation mechanism,” I retorted. “I’ll do what I’m told, because I don’t feel like dying on this trip. But I need answers.”
Derrial gazed at me, an almost proud look in his eyes. “A worthy mate indeed,” he muttered as he walked out of the room.
I blushed, not believing what I had just heard. A mate? Please say that wasn’t what he just said.
I ignored the part of me that swelled up with happiness at the thought of being his...of being all of theirs.
I turned back to Corran, the intensity in Derrial’s voice too much to take.