Broken Earth Read online

  It was alien, but as far as she could judge it was still a dog. She could handle that.

  She not only liked dogs but trusted animals in this crazy world more than she trusted other humans. She stroked down, grazing over its ridged shoulders and chest. It jerked under her touch and she turned her head to get a better look at the area just behind its shoulder blades. She pulled her hands back as she stared down at the taser burns marring huge patches of skin on its lower torso. The Reapers had rounded up the few remaining generators from the ruins of the offices and schools that littered the city. They were the only ones in the city capable of charging anything. She had no doubt that the wounds were from a Reaper’s taser.

  She winced at the burns. She didn’t have anything to treat them. The best she could do was rinse the area clean. Taking the little water left in her currently opened bottle, she poured it over its wounds. Water was precious in the desert, especially now, but she wanted to get a good idea of what she was dealing with. Gently, she wetted the entire stretch of its lower torso, dabbing at it with a cloth she recently washed. After several minutes of careful work, she was able to see the damage inflicted by the Reapers. Aside from the burns, it had lost several scales, leaving the exposed flesh angry and raw where it was split. Other areas were crusted with dried blood from where bullets apparently had grazed it, ripping off scales and leaving furrows in its hide that had already stopped bleeding.

  Satisfied that it was at least clean, she leaned back against the wall and poured some water into her cupped hand, offering it. She didn’t have a bowl and the water already trickled out of her hand, but its long gray tongue lashed out to greedily lick at every drop. She repeated the process until the bottle was empty. Bringing her hand back to its head, she leisurely stroked between its long ears.

  “I’ll find you a bowl tomorrow when I refill my water bottles at the spring. It’s too dangerous to stay near water around here,” she mumbled. “Though I have no doubt that you’ll protect me, won’t you?”

  The animal lifted its head, regarding her intelligently before huffing at her and snuggling closer. She wasn’t sure if that was an affirmation or amusement from her new friend, but she decided to be optimistic enough to go with the former interpretation. It was possible that she was assigning too much intelligence to a creature that may not have any more reasoning ability than a Golden Retriever, but somehow, she didn’t think so. From the way that it looked at her, it had a lot more going on behind its strange eyes. She needed to believe that it would willingly protect her.

  It had been a long time since she felt even remotely safe. Not since her father died trying to hide her from a Reaper raid when a routine that they’d done hundreds of times since the arrival of the gang went terribly wrong.

  Terri blinked back tears and pushed back the memory as she smiled down at the beast.

  “I guess every girl around here would be a lot safer if they had a monster like you to protect them,” she said. “You’re a very good beast to have around. I don’t mind sharing my food, water, and fire with you. It isn’t so scary with you here. You look bigger and meaner than the men around here, which is a plus in my book,” Terri observed as she lightly rubbed its chest. “If you’re a woman here, you can’t trust males.”

  The beast gave an unnerving rattling, clicking sound and rolled on her lap as he bumped her hand to scratch at his belly, giving her an eyeful in the process. She choked back a laugh. “Sorry. Unless I’m wrong and males and females are built differently where you’re from, you would have to be the one male exception to the rule. Right now, I can’t think of anyone else I would trust my safety with.”

  He raised his head and chirp-clicked at her in agreement. That was going to take some getting used to. She looked down at him in quiet contemplation as she rubbed the alien’s chest, neck and head once more until she was stroking her fingers over the scale between his eyes. They half-closed in pleasure at her touch, making her smile. Even the thin, rope-like tentacles around his head rippled sedately. Despite how unusual he was, this was… nice.

  Pulling her hand away, she reached into her sack and opened another can. The sound brought his head up to investigate, the tentacles rattling in a quiet shushing sound as he watched her curiously, his nostrils expanding to sniff at the can. He chirped again and Terri laughed. The bizarre hellhound had already charmed her. With a grin, she set the can in front of him and watched him attack it with gusto as she continued to stroke his thick neck.

  It almost felt like he was sent to her to be hers, and hers alone.

  Her smile fell. She couldn’t ignore the fact that he wasn’t hers. He belonged to a very scary fucking alien, and no doubt desired to be reunited with it. The thought didn’t make her happy, although she couldn’t blame him. If she had anyone that cared about her who was mean and terrifying enough to keep the Reapers at bay, she wouldn’t rest until she was reunited with them either. She gave her companion a longing look. It was always possible that the alien was dead…

  Terri grimaced at the selfish direction of her thoughts. Despite the world being utter shit, she had always prided herself on being reasonably compassionate, sometimes more than was wise. She sighed with self-loathing.

  “I bet your big alien misses you too,” she murmured in disgust. “You’re pretty incredible. The perfect companion for something big and scary. I hope it terrorizes those assholes plenty before it comes looking for you.”

  Her eyes slid closed, but she continued to stroke her new friend.

  “It’s been a long time since I’ve had a dog,” she said. “I wonder if your master may not miss you too much and let me keep you. No one would fuck with a woman who had you nearby.” She laughed. “You and your master are both scary motherfuckers. Crazy scary, in fact. You do look like a Bedlam to me. I think I’ll call you that.”

  Groaning, she leaned back once more and stared at the midday light scattered across the room from the remaining broken glass in the window. Broken. That pretty much summed up everything on Earth. The entire planet was broken. The only good news was that nature was recovering and starting to take over. In just a few decades, humankind would probably be nothing more than a memory on the face of a world that they had no shame in destroying.

  Scooting down, she lay her head on her pack and closed her eyes. She felt the alien shift its weight to settle next to her, his nose buried against her neck. For now, they would rest and recover. Everything else could wait.

  3

  Veral groaned as his processors rebooted and his mind swam back into consciousness. His mandibles opened and closed, tiny receptors on the thin inner membrane tasting the air. The foul taste of sewage, sweat, smoke, and spoiled meat flooded his mouth. He wrinkled his nose and attempted to move his head, only to perceive that he was restrained with something unfamiliar flooding his system, inhibiting his nanos and keeping him in a weakened state. He growled and strained, testing his restraints.

  “Ah, finally you’re awake,” a raspy voice intruded. Veral’s processors picked up on the native tongue and he turned his attention to the speaker. Another one of the filthy filament-faced beings. He sneered distastefully. He preferred the first one he saw. At least that one faced him respectfully in combat and hadn’t been so… dirty. With this one, he felt nothing but disgust and a desire to rip out the eyes of the being looking at him as if he were a commodity.

  He extended his mandibles and growled from deep within his chest. The alien paled and swallowed before it bared its teeth at him in a weak gesture. Pathetic. Veral rolled his eyes away from the being, uninterested in giving it any more of his time. He would close his eyes altogether, but he did not trust anything enough to willingly close his eyes around them. He didn’t even sleep near others of his own bloodline since becoming an adult. Even littermates become potentially dangerous rivals.

  To his frustration, the alien leisurely paced into his line of sight once more. It smirked as it looked at him while sucking on a stick that stank like jibwa weeds,
a rank plant used medicinally only by the desperate. The alien cocked its head.

  “I have to admit you’re a fascinating creature. Ugly as sin, but terrifying… strong too, from what my men tell me. Right now, you’re looking at me as if you wanna rip my innards out. I imagine you understand every word I’m saying too, don’t you?” Its face wrinkled as it bared its teeth again with more enthusiasm.

  Veral wasn’t impressed. The teeth were dull and flat, and the jaws small and delicate in appearance. It was nothing compared to the massive jaws, mandibles, and sharp teeth of an Argurma. He bared his own teeth at it but the creature, although it stank and tasted of fear, had the audacity to laugh. Veral bared his own teeth in a terrible grin, threatening violence that was sure to come as soon as he regained complete control of his limbs and systems. He was gratified to see it stumble back a few steps.

  The alien pursed its lips and let out a low, piercing sound. “You’re something special, indeed. That’s why, instead of just outright killing you for coming into our territory, I’m going to make you an offer.” The creature paused as Veral snarled at the insult. “I’m sure you know that you don’t have control. We’re using our generators to shock your system in combination with some pretty powerful drugs. It took some experimenting to find a dosage that kept you unconscious. You’re only awake now because I allow it.”

  “And what are you?” Veral growled back in a rough voice.

  “I’m the only human being on this miserable planet you need to worry about. I am Marcus, President of these here Red Reapers. I run this place. Anything that goes on here does so only with my say so. Which brings me to the purpose of our little meeting. It has been reported to me that you’re collecting various bits of junk. Old tech and metal mostly. We have no use for it, as you can imagine. We’ve already collected what we need and run off our own limited power systems. As far as I’m concerned, you can take as much of it as you like from the city with my blessing. All you have to do is one very small, insignificant thing for me in return. Do this and you’ll be left in peace to work.”

  Veral narrowed his eyes on the human as he saved the species identification to his memory. His processors were already reporting wide-scale interference and damage. Despite the intentions of the technicians, they have never been able to create an invincible model when it came time for the change. Adult Argurmas were superior to other beings but could be damaged and overpowered, especially those who were far from the network of their planetary alliance. The worst of the damage to his systems would take months before his nanos would be able to repair it all and return him to optimal performance.

  Although he wanted nothing more than to make the human suffer, he had to acknowledge that the offer was a good one and worth considering if it allowed him to carry out his work undisturbed. His salvaging was his primary concern, and he already lost a day. Still, logic demanded that he proceed with caution. Despite the numerous advantages to the proposition, he didn’t trust this so-called president.

  “What do you want?” Veral hissed, his body jerking as he felt another low-level jolt of energy shock his circuits.

  “Really, it’s a small thing,” Marcus said as his lips twisted upward. He turned and gestured to another by a canvas structure. The human standing there nodded once and disappeared inside only to return minutes later hauling a smaller human with a smooth face.

  “All right, I’m coming. Jeez, Dale,” the smaller human snapped. Although it was not the same one he saw earlier, it had similar features and a pleasant pitch to its voice. “I’d better not be putting out to fuck another guy. You agreed I wouldn’t have to do that anymore,” it said.

  Veral recoiled at the idea of anything touching him intimately. Unmated

  Argurma did not possess sexual desire. It was an essential part of their programming that kept their people in line socially and limited reproduction. Unauthorized reproduction, especially across species, was a punishable offense on Argurumal. He snarled in objection but was ignored by the humans, much to his displeasure.

  “Shut it, Meg,” the one named Dale grumbled as it dragged the smaller one to Marcus’s side. “Do what you’re told and be thankful I’m not making you do worse.”

  Marcus smiled down at the small human and stroked a hand through the long dark filaments on Meg’s head. If it had been Argurma, the vibrissae would have either attacked the offending touch or twined around it affectionately as one mated. A mate or parent was the only one who ever touched another’s vibrissae. The long filaments on the human’s head did not react, although it winced and flinched away from the touch.

  “Relax, Meg,” Marcus crooned. “You won’t be required to fuck anyone right now. You’re here as an example only.”

  Meg shook nervously, its wide eyes falling on Veral fearfully as Marcus turned it fully to face him. Marcus gestured the length of the human’s body with one hand.

  “My request is simple: I want you to hunt for me. I want more of these for my men. Women are prized commodities these days. They break too easy and are hard to replace. Their families hide them, and they make every effort to evade us despite the fact that we offer them protection in a cruel world. Isn’t that right, Meg?”

  Meg shied away from Marcus’s touch but nodded in affirmation. “Yes, that is right. We’re protected,” the small human whimpered as the hand knotted tightly in its head filaments.

  Veral watched, unmoved by the interaction, before finally grunting, unclear of exactly what the humans were talking about. Man and woman didn’t translate in a way that he understood. “Why do you want women?” he asked at last.

  Marcus watched him for a moment before bursting out into laughter. “Surely our species work similarly in at least one fashion. Don’t your males want females?”

  Female. So that was it. Marcus and the other rough faces were males. Meg and the one from before were females. The males wished for him to procure mates for them rather than win them by their own efforts. Disdain rose sharply in his belly. He did not hold with the ethical code upheld by his species, but the rules of courting were sensible and for the wellbeing of everyone. The most that was permitted for an Argurma was to run their mate down and lock themselves together in a mating hold until the other yielded. They did not trap mates… and certainly not for other males. A male who wished a female had to conquer her on his own.

  “You wish for me to gather mates for you,” he snarled in offense.

  Marcus lifted his shoulders carelessly. He didn’t understand the gesture but read the expression on the male’s face clearly. Callous disinterest.

  “I wouldn’t go so far as to say mates.” He laughed with a contemptuous glance at Meg, who shrank before him. The sound was echoed by the other male, Dale, standing just behind him. “More like a pleasant diversion.”

  “We do have a few who are pregnant,” Dale said with a chuckle.

  “Unfortunately, not everyone in the camp is good at following directions,” Marcus agreed with a sigh. “The bottom line is that we need enough women to keep the boys from trying to kill each other. Not enough pussy to go around makes them irritable. What I want is for you to hunt them out for us. We get women, and you get access to anything you want. What do you say?”

  Veral sneered at the humans and turned his head away in disgust, allowing his silence to answer for him. He could kill and hunt at his leisure whatever prey he set his mind on. He even thought to hunt down the alien, the female, when he first saw her, but he would not help these lesser beings trap the female who remained in his thoughts for a dishonorable purpose. He would rather hunt her and subdue her, triumphant in his own victory over her strength, and kill her if necessary than turn her over to them.

  “Very well,” Marcus said at length. “Maybe we need to give you some time to think about it. Dale…”

  A stream of energy lit through him with such strength that, though it had been brief, it was enough to disorient him. He watched through unfocused eyes and curled his lip as the human approached
with a syringe. His body jerked as it was plunged into his neck, the drug pulling him down into darkness as his nanos remained disabled and helpless to aide him.

  When he woke again, the sky was dark, the camp lit only by a fire in the distance. He inhaled, his mandibles flaring, and he caught the taste and stench of males near him. Furious, he opened his eyes. Several males were gathered around them. Many of them had their clothing opened, their strange, shapeless civix clenched in their hands as they stood near the fire. Several females had been brought out and were being held against the ground as the males took turns rutting into them.

  Sex, aggression, and impatience flavored the air with its rank musk.

  A male stepped away, his civix still leaking seed, revealing the female’s oddly exposed wet quin as she shivered and made small noises in her throat. The glimpse was brief as another male slid behind her and thrust within the welcoming opening. She squealed beneath him, her hips jerking as the male pounded into her, his breath coming in grunts of pleasure. The display was both informative and disturbing, the way they shared a female together that clearly none were mated to.

  His gaze shifted to several of the males who were peering at him curiously as they waited for their turn. One nodded to him as he spoke to the other by his side. “What do you think? Might be interesting to try and fuck that.” He rubbed his civix as he eyed Veral.

  “Dude, don’t be stupid.” His companion laughed. “It’s an alien. It’ll probably tear your junk off if you tried to stick it in anywhere.”

  Veral growled and rattled his mandibles aggressively in agreement. Just let any one of them attempt to get near him with their civix… He bunched his muscles, rattling the chains as he twisted violently. The males scurried away, stinking of terror. Its taste was to his satisfaction. He hissed, daring them to return. He didn’t see the needle come toward him until he felt the wave of nothingness flood his veins, dragging him once again deep into his mind.