Page 18 of Meteor Storm

My blood began to rush south, filling my cock with need. I balled my hands into fists, trying to breathe through the artificial desire, but it didn’t take long for me to realize what they’d given me. It was rukia. A tea brewed on one of the valerian planets. It was meant to help their inability to breed like most other species were able to. It was potent, even to a monrian. It heightened my senses in all the wrong ways. It made my heart race and before long, my mind did not feel like my own anymore. The longer I resisted, the more insistent it became until my cock began to ache. Heat boiled in the base of my stomach, twisting and cramping in a way that begged for relief.

I could resist. I had been trained to resist. Pain. Torture. Isolation. Stress. Emotion.

But then Penny slithered into my thoughts like a serpent, finding the smallest space between madness and surrender. If I did not perform now, Pek-Tol would find a way to take it out on Penny later. There was a weakness in me when it came to her. One that blossomed swiftly and unexpectedly. One that Pek-Tol was going to exploit every chance he had.

I wasn’t careful enough…

The longer I was away from my people and our practices, the more broken I became and it mortified me. I should have been able to focus through it all. The tea. Thoughts of Penny. Everything.

Instead, I was falling victim to the primitive manipulations of that damned port. It started to strip me down to something… less. Something solely focused on one thing. Sticking my dick in something and fucking it until my mind and body were my own again.

Opening my eyes, the room had become painfully bright. So bright, I was almost seeing colors that weren’t there. There was a voice in my head telling me to resist and stay true to my monrian nature. Death before defilement. Another voice said that, to get through it all, I had to give in.

I chose to do the latter, knowing it would take another piece of my dignity away.

. . .

The tea’s effects had been overwhelming, but brief. I stood in Pek-Tol’s office once more, my mind slowly coming back to me. I felt more in need of a bath at that moment than I had before I walked into that room. My body was sticky with dried sweat and other secretions I didn’t want on me. Pek-Tol sat proud at his desk, smiling over the fact that the valerian sisters had sent him additional credits to secure me for another visit after they recovered. He laughed about it and I stood tall, fury sinking its teeth deep and holding me back as if to say “there will be a better time to strike.”

“Well done,” Pek-Tol said. “Word will soon get out that I have a monrian willing to bed any woman for the right price. You will make Mekah Prime the most popular pleasure port in the galaxy.”

Mekah Prime was never a pleasure port. It was a place for unlawful dealings. A port for pirates and fugitives. Pek-Tol was transforming it into something even more awful, and I was unlucky enough to be one of the reasons he was succeeding. Me… and soon, Penny. A monrian and a human. Two unattainable things had been obtained, and it was only going to get worse from that point on.

Behind Pek-Tol was a cabinet. One with a transparent barrier allowing me to see every object he had inside. His trophies. My khof kaar was among them. It was a diamond shaped object that meant nothing to anyone but me. It was linked to my DNA and it would answer to me alone. He kept it as a trinket and nothing more, but the amount of power stored in the little thing was tremendously out of his league.

My nose twitched at the sight of it. He always had it on display, mocking me every time I walked into his office. But without his remotes and his guards, he would be nothing. That fact should have infuriated me, but instead, it calmed me. I knew I would be without my limitations one day and Pek-Tol and his whole operation would perish. It was strong, but it had so many weak spots. I just needed to utilize one.

“Now,” he said, standing from his desk to grab a bottle with a faintly glowing blue liquid inside. He set out two small glasses as if to offer me one. “Perform like that more often and you could be a king here. You make me happy and I’ll make you happy. Bigger living quarters. More credits in your reserves. What do you want?”

“Take this collar off my neck,” I said flatly.

He scoffed at that. “Besides that. You want the human? I can tell you’ve taken a liking to her.” I eyed the little silver device on the corner of the desk and Pek-Tol caught the gesture. “That? Take it,” he shrugged. “The information within is useless. They’re too primitive for me to care what they’re doing on that little station of theirs.”

He laughed, a clicking, wheezy sound, as if the idea was ridiculous. I agreed humans were in their technological infancy, but not so basic to be dismissed. If they were beginning to expand off their blue world, their future was part of galactic matters. It was only a matter of time before they became significant.

But shikari, especially Pek-Tol, were not known for thinking that far ahead. It was why they were scattered. They had no organized militia. They were talkers. Manipulators. Cheats. A species filled with gangs and criminals. Bounty hunters and rogues. Their dishonesty was legendary and their loyalty was nonexistent.

They disgusted me. Most of the time they weren’t worth our attention. Unless they had the credits and a cause, but most of the time, they did not.

I reached out and swiped the little device, closing it in my hand just as Pek-Tol waved me away.

“One more thing,” he said just before I reached the door. “There is a game coming up. Ratings indicate that spectators enjoy the idea of you and the human, as I thought they would. You’re both rare commodities.”

I narrowed my eyes, waiting for him to get to the point.

“In the next game,” he continued. “I want you to target her. There’s already chatter that you’re attracted to her, and people enjoy a good bloodbath in the name of claiming a mate.”

“Monrians do not claim mates.”

“It does not matter. That is what the populace thinks and it’s bringing an audience.”

“I will not—”

“There are two new nozun that I’ll be speaking to next and I’m going to tell them the same thing,” he cut me off, looking at me lazily. “And perhaps, by some sliver of a chance, I can even convince Thraxxen to do as he’s told.”

No one could tell Thraxxen to do anything. He’d proven too many times that he would die before bending and Pek-Tol would not risk losing anything that brought him riches. The only reason he was still alive was because he actually enjoyed the games. In his own, calculated way, at least.

I did not have that advantage. I wanted revenge too much, despite that it was against my code. And now, I had Penny to think about.