Page 33 of Alien Prince’s Fake Bride (The Tentacle Throne #1)

I see the creature now. It’s a vivid pink, the color jarringly wrong in this green and brown world.

It moves with a terrifying grace, its two massive hind legs carrying it swiftly and silently through the undergrowth.

Its head is all brown teeth in uneven rows, a horrifying display of jagged points.

Dead, yellow eyes stare right at me as the thing comes closer, its head close to the ground, sniffing the air.

“ That looks like a dinosaur,” I seethe between clenched teeth as I pull harder at the hatch. “ A raptor.”

“ Its basic configuration does resemble the velociraptor from Earth’s prehistoric past,” Vera agrees.

“ Although this one is bigger than any velociraptor fossils. Indeed I would compare it to a deinonychus , or even to a dakotaraptor from the late Cretaceous, judging from the sheer size of it. It must be more than five meters long.”

I pull harder at the hatch, panic tugging at the edges of my mind, threatening to overwhelm me. “Come onnn !”

The alien raptor comes closer on its two legs, waddling from side to side with each step.

Its short forelimbs are tipped with big, ugly claws that look like carving knives, serrated and stained with dried blood, hinting at carnage it has inflicted.

In its pink hue it should look like a ridiculously mis-shapen flamingo, but instead the cheerful color helps make it blood-chillingly scary, as if its real skin has been flayed off, exposing raw muscle beneath.

I pull at the door, trying to yank it loose. My breath is going ragged with the effort and the fear. “Come on, damn it!”

The raptor snaps its jaws with hard, moist clicks , spraying greenish slime as it approaches. I can see every blemish in its thick hide, every wrinkle and scar. And there’s a lot of them.

“ Pull back,” Vera says sharply. “ If he pounces, he can reach.”

I let go of the open hatch and stumble backwards into the pod, my heart hammering against my ribs.

Desperately looking around for a weapon of any kind, I find a light, ten-feet rod that must have some mysterious purpose, possibly as an antenna.

It feels flexible and flimsy in my hands, not much good as a weapon.

The raptor fills the whole view outside the hatch. It lowers its head further and peers into the pod with a small, yellow eye.

I take a step back and hold the rod out in front of me, pushing it at the raptor in a way that I hope is threatening. “Shoo! Go away!”

The raptor pushes its upper body inside, through the hatch. Then it seems to get stuck at the hips, where its massive legs flare out to the sides.

I have to retch as the smell hits me. It’s rotting meat, sulfur, and some alien stench I don’t want to identify. It’s the smell of death and decay.

“Go!” I yell, making the inside of the pod resonate. “Get lost! Beat it!”

On an impulse I scream as loudly as I can, straining my voice to make a high, piercing pitch that makes my own ears ring.

The raptor snaps at me, three times in a row, green slime flying.

At least it looks like it can’t get in?—

The predator pulls back, then charges at the round opening, terrible gape first. It gets to a point where its thickest part gets stuck, but it’s slowly sliding past the jammed hatch, its rough skin making a grating sound against the metal.

“No!” I scream, jabbing the rod at its eyes. “Get out!”

It slowly slides past the hatch until the whole raptor is in the pod with me, towering over me with its terrible gape.

Tears of panic burn in my eyes as I stumble backwards to the other end of the pod. But there’s no hatch there. The little window is closed with a metal plate on the outside.

Shit. I think I’m dead.

Suddenly the predator jerks and gives off a terrible screech through a throat that was never meant to produce sound.

Its legs start to claw uselessly against the ground as it desperately tries to turn around inside the pod.

It scrambles wildly, laying its head back and screeching again.

A big pool of thin-looking blood is quickly gathering on the floor, the metallic scent mixing with the smell of rot.

I spot movement behind the dinosaur. Something is attacking it. Probably another predator.

The raptor falls to the side with a splash of its own blood, making the whole pod rock violently. Kicking its legs uselessly into the air, it tries to get back up, but there’s less force in its movements now.

A big shape climbs past it, using one of the hanging harnesses to pull himself around the dinosaur. “What a wonderful planet you’ve found, Umbra.”

I drop the rod in sheer relief as my knees nearly buckle beneath me. I’ve never felt such relief. “Mareliux!”

He thrusts Bellatriz into the raptor’s head. The glass sword goes deep, and the dinosaur’s frantic movements stop instantly. “That was getting tedious.” He shakes blood off the sword and glances at me. “I know some people like having dangerous pets, but this is ridiculous.”

I stumble towards him, splashing through the dinosaur blood until I’m embracing him, weeping with relief. “That was terrible! I was so scared.”

“I don’t blame you,” he says, big body vibrating against me when he speaks and pulls me close so firmly I can’t breathe.

“Not the kind of enemy we usually have to deal with. But bad enough. Are you injured?” He grabs my shoulders and gently pushes me out from him so he can check.

“I hope all those stains are from your pet.”

“I’m fine,” I sniffle. “But you’re not.” I point to several injuries on his hand, torso, and legs that someone has bandaged in a manner so careless that it has to be himself.

“It’s not bad,” he says. “The Vyrpy were taken by surprise. They had not expected that anyone would look inside the escape pods. They were likely waiting for a better chance. Shall we get away from that thing? It smells.” He takes my hand and helps me over and around the dead raptor.

Stepping out of the pod, I luxuriate in the smelly jungle atmosphere as if it were air straight from a pine forest in the Alps. “Thanks for taking care of it. It was about to eat me.”

“That’s how it sounded,” he agrees as he rips some leaves off a bush, then proceeds to wipe Bellatriz’s glass blade with it.

It’s a very fine sword, now that I can see it properly.

It’s etched with fine, alien sigils or some kind of flowing decoration.

The glass is so clear that it doesn’t reflect much light, and from some angles it’s so transparent it’s totally invisible and only the black hilt can be seen.

That must be where the AI resides. The whole sword is probably five feet long, but Mareliux must be eight, and so he can comfortably keep it in his belt.

“ So no cloth around?” the sword whines. “ No moist wipes? We’re just using leaves on me now?”

“Would you prefer I sheath you dripping with alien monster blood?” Mareliux asks, taking great care to get the sword clean.

I have to ask. “Why do you fight with swords? Why not use guns or some other weapon that’s more effective? No offense, Bellatriz. I just want to understand.”

Mareliux holds the long, crystal blade up to the light.

No sunrays reach this far down. “Some would say the honor and beauty and tradition of sword fighting is enough. But we do sometimes use guns. Depends on the enemy. We fight a lot inside spaceships, where using ranged weapons is usually not a good idea. If the walls burst, we could be all sucked out into space and die. Against the Vyrpy we always use blades. Guns tend to not work well with them. They are fast enough to get out of the way of the shots. Blades are harder to dodge.”

“They are fast,” I concede.

“ Such a fascinating conversation,” Bellatriz chirps. “ Meanwhile, what’s the plan?”

Mareliux replaces the sword in its sheath and looks at me, raising an eyebrow. “Any ideas, Umbra?”

So I think that most guys would just make up a plan rather than ask a girl for advice. But this one, arguably the second most powerful man in the galaxy, has no problem with ego. At least not that kind. It sends a bright warmth through me.

Then I kick myself inwardly. Damn it, I don’t want to fall for real!

I stare into the jungle, seeing movement everywhere. “I think we should get off this planet.”

He smirks. “Really? You don’t like it here among the monsters? I thought you made friends with that one.”

“I’m pretty sure the monsters here make friends with you by eating you,” I point out. “I wish they could be less direct.”

Mareliux nods, tendrils waving. “Good point. Yes, of course getting away from here should be our first task. Does your pod have a beacon? I’m not sure mine works.” He nods to a point behind my pod.

I walk a little to the side to see what he means. And there, in among the trees, I spot a big, black cylinder leaned up against a tree. “Your pod?”

“I think my AI hitched onto your pod and followed it here. Don’t ask me how. But I’m happy it did.”

I notice that my own pod is also badly burned and scorched on the outside. It’s dented and terribly scratched. “We’re both lucky to be alive.” I turn to look at him. “Mareliux?”

“Umbra?”

I tilt my head to the side. “Why are you here?”

He looks away. “Ah. That. Well, you left so abruptly and I thought, ‘My fake wife has terrible manners. I have to go after her and lecture her about how to appear classy.’”

I frown. “Really? Is that why? I didn’t mean to push that launch button. I fainted and fell on it.”

He gives me a lopsided smile. “No, that’s not why. It was an impulse. I wanted to make sure you were not alone, wherever you were going.”

I understand what he’s really saying: ‘I took a terrible risk so I could keep you safe, on the miniscule chance that I’d survive that landing.’ I go over to him and put my hand on his bare chest. “Thank you. I know you didn’t have to do that.”

His eyes pierce me. “I felt that I did. And it was a quick way to escape the Vyrpy.”

I look up as if to check if the Gladiux is coming, but above me there are only treetops. “What will happen with your ship, anyway? And with Caret’ax and Sigise and the soldier girls?”

He looks around us. “I don’t envy a gang of Vyrpy being stowaways on a ship where both Caret’ax and Grast’s squad are worried about what happened to their prince and princess.

Unless everything aboard the Gladiux has gone awry, including all the alarm systems, those Vyrpy are now floating dead in space.

And the Gladiux will be searching for us.

That is the basis for everything you and I will do now.

We’ll get your beacon going and then see what kind of equipment we can find in our pods.

Mine is unfortunately in worse shape than yours. ”

He’s right — one side of his pod has been ripped open, almost tearing the pod in half.

“That must have been a hard landing,” I comment. “Mine was too, but not like this.”

“Crushed almost everything inside. Except me, but including the beacon.”

It takes us an hour to get my beacon started, signalling our location to anyone with a radio receiver. At least while the alien battery lasts, which I suspect won’t be long.

Then we gather a heap of things from the pods. There are emergency rations, first-aid kits, lightweight tools, and several things I can’t identify, but which look like random trash someone threw into an escape pod just to get rid of it.

“That should keep us alive for a while,” Mareliux says. “We might even be comfortable here.”

I’m not impressed by any of it. And I suspect I have much more survival training behind me than the prince.

“There’s no water. No water-cleaning stuff.

No filters. No weapons. These first-aid kits are a joke.

There’s no flashlight. No spare beacon. No extra power source for the beacon.

No communication equipment. These rations will keep us fed for maybe five days.

We’ll burn a lot of energy in a survival situation.

These blankets are probably the most useful items here.

Sorry, we’d need more to get through this alive.

Because as survival packs go, this is pitiful . ”