Page 38 of Stripped By the Alien

It’s the first time I can remember when I struggle to take control of the situation. Any underling pushing me like this would find himself ripped to pieces on the spot.

I reach out and grab Nora’s cool little wrist. She gasps and tries to pull away, but I hold her firmly. Her arm has a scratch from the rescue, possibly where Sris was too quick cutting off the suit and clothing with her claws.

“Not bleeding anymore,” I point out, just to have something to say.

She looks up at me, breath quickening. When I’m this close, it becomes almost laughable how small she is. And how soft and warm. My mind spins. How can she live this unprotected? She’s absurdly fragile, far too vulnerable to travel in space. And really too fragile to even survive aboard the Beast, especially as a female.

I reach out with my other hand, wanting to stroke the skin. Surely there must be scales underneath-

Crack.

A bolt of lightning shoots from my finger to her arm and stands there for a full heartbeat, vibrating in intensely blue, bridging us.

“Wither!” I yank my hand away. “Are… are you all right?”

Nora rubs her arm. “There’s no pain. Just bright light. What is that?”

I wonder about that, myself. It’s not Sris doing it, but I knew that already. It’s not static electricity - that could never support an arc of light like that. Perhaps this female isn’t as undefended as I thought. “You tell me, Nora. How do you do it?”

“I don’t,” she says. “I can’t. It’s obviously you.”

I fear she’s right. At least one time, the lightning was limited to me. But that may mean that it’s a weapon. Probably not wielded by Nora. She’s far too bare to hide weapons.

With one quick move, I snatch the flying machine out of the air. It spins its rotors and whines in protest as its hard casing creaks in my hard grip.

I hold the disk up to my face. “I recommend you stop that electricity show. It’s becoming an annoyance.”

“I’m not doing that!” the machine says. “It’s not me or Nora, Chief Harrower! It’s you!”

“It’s not Lucius,” Nora says quickly. “He can’t do anything like that. His only weapon is the things he says. And they're worse.”

I tighten my grip and the casing creaks more. “I never use machines. They aren’t trustworthy, the way a living creature is when you give it just a bit of pain or present the possibility of it. Machines feel no pain and most of them are indifferent to whether they live or die.”

“I’m not!” the machine insists. “I care a great deal about being alive!”

I fling it away. It wobbles through the air, and with a whine of its rotors it stabilizes a finger’s width from the wall.

“Krix’vorr,” Nora says softly, and I find I like the sound of it. “I understand you’re afraid of your Queen. Why not leave her service? Perhaps there are others who would take you in. You’re obviously a capable warrior.”

Thoughts collide in my mind and I almost laugh. “Leave? Leave the Brood? Afraid of the Queen? Others? Take me in?!” It’s all too insane, but perhaps I should try to explain. “The Brood is the life, and the Queen is the provider of that life. Nobody has ever left their Brood. It does happen that a brood and queen die by some calamity and only a few brood members are left alive. They all kill themselves on the spot. Always.”

“Why would your Queen kill you?” Nora asks, like a newly hatched fledgling. “You’re big and strong, brave and skilled.”

This time I do laugh, a dry bark without mirth. “The Queen has a dozen Chief Harrowers, just like me. Beneath them are hundreds of Harrowers and Junior Harrowers, just waiting for a chance to disgrace a Chief and so take his place. Any Queen revels in the competition. And a Chief Harrower is expected to deliver, to prove his place at the top of the Swarm.”

“And if he doesn’t? He’s just killed?”

“Just killed would not be enough. He’s painfully killed, disgraced and humiliated in view of the Queen’s Court. The pain is not the worst part. It’s the disgrace.”

She looks away. “That doesn’t sound like a Queen worth working for.”

“Working for? This isn’t work, little female. This is life. This is helping the Brood and the Queen and the Swarm.”

“And then? Say you find a great target for stripping and destroying. Your Swarm and Queen destroy it and are happy. What do you get?”

I frown at the alien weirdness of the question. “Honor. Public recognition. The gratitude of the Brood and the Queen. Sometimes a Chief Harrower is allowed to become the sire of the new generation of the Brood.”

“Like a consort?” Nora asks, and I suspect the Kast is translating her words more accurately than she knows.