Page 104 of Galaxy Games Four-Book Box Set (Galaxy Games)

104

Willow’s Cellmates

W illow

My two cellmates attack my attacker as if they’ve trained for this their entire lives. The purple suede male peels the guy’s clawed grip from my breast while the bald one reaches through the bars and delivers an uppercut so forceful I hear my attacker’s teeth snap together. After one more good punch, my cellmate tosses him so hard, he slams against the bars on the opposite side of his cell.

The three of us are still smashed into the corner as I try to gather my wits and breathe.

“Thanks,” I pant. My whole body is shaking from the giant blast of adrenaline coursing through me.

The two back away as I stand here gasping for breath, trying to keep from crying. My boob feels like it’s been dipped in the fires of hell. When I dredge up the courage to look, my thin tunic is shredded, the tatters covered in my blood.

“Was that supposed to be foreplay, asshole?” I sneer. I’ve seen enough prison movies to know I shouldn’t let them see my weakness. Who am I kidding? I’m a five-foot-four female from Earth. My weakness is obvious.

“Sit,” the furred guy says as he motions toward his bed.

Yeah, like I didn’t see that coming. These two probably saved me so they didn’t have to share.

The front of the cell isn’t safe from the guards or our neighbors, so I move to the back wall and stand in the middle with my shoulders touching the stone.

“Uh,” furred guy says as he points.

“Uh,” evidently means, “It’s dripping water, you’re going to be soaked in less than a minute.”

It’s not my fault I didn’t notice the condensation running in rivulets down the wall. How could I possibly see the water against the pitch-black stone?

He moves toward three-eyes’ bed and extends his arm toward his own bed as if he were Vanna White indicating a prize.

Not on your life. Is every male on this planet a perve?

I step into the middle of the cell and decide I’ll stay here. I’d stand here all night if I could, but I’m shaking like a leaf as I descend from my adrenaline-induced panic. The moment I sink to my knees, furry says, “You don’t want to do that.”

Why, so it will be harder for you to rape me when you feel like it? I wonder.

“Rodents,” he says.

He almost reaches out his hand to help me up, then thinks better of it, takes a step back, and watches.

As if on cue, the rodents he was referring to scratch and make soft meeping sounds from somewhere. The end of the cellblock? I’d like to pretend I don’t hear them, but I’m all out of wishes. I decide it would be stupid to stay on the floor waiting to be a rat buffet. I stand, paralyzed, wishing I won’t have to choose any of my shitty options.

“I won’t harm you,” furry says.

I give him a closer inspection. Even though he scares the hell out of me, I have to admit, he’s maybe the most handsome male I’ve ever seen. It’s not just that purple has always been my favorite color, either.

Dark stripes reminiscent of a tiger’s crisscross lavender suede that makes my fingers itch to stroke it. And the body his gorgeous skin is stretched over? Every muscle is perfectly defined—every abdominal, every pec, even the ropey muscles coiling up his arms.

I don’t know how, but his face is totally humanoid although it screams of animal origins. The way he’s not looking directly at me reminds me of a canine who’s already identified its prey and is pretending not to watch—all the while waiting for its prey to let its guard down.

When his gaze flicks to mine, I summon the courage to look, then get caught in its golden heat. Although my heart is still pounding and my boob is throbbing in pain, I think he was telling the truth when he said he won’t harm me. I’m still debating his offer when I factor three-eyes into the equation.

He’s the biggest one in this cell by far and has been remarkably silent. I can’t read him at all. He’s like a wax statue. I hate that old saying, “better the devil you know than the devil you don’t,” but if cyclops wants to get jiggy, maybe furry will protect me.

Dream on , Willow.

I can’t stand here all night, so I walk to furry’s bed as if I were walking to the gallows. Then I sit. The bed is narrower than a twin, and the mattress is less than two inches thick. That doesn’t matter, though. Sitting down gives my body permission to react to the attack that happened moments ago. My whole body shivers in fear tinged with relief that I’m still alive.

Cyclops is sitting on his bed, Furry is standing next to him. They protected me from my attacker and haven’t assaulted me—yet. I guess that’s a win.

“I’m Willow.” I know everyone in prison insists on their innocence, but I can’t control my urge to explain, “I don’t belong here. I’m innocent.”

“What are you in for?” Furry asks.

I laugh. Although it has no place here, I can’t control my half-hearted giggle. I don’t think there’s any way to tell them without it sounding like some nursery rhyme gone bad.

“Stealing a pie, but I didn’t do it.”

The two give each other puzzled looks. They don’t even ask the obvious, “Stealing a pie?” They just wait for me to explain.

“I was a good slave. I cooked and cleaned for an elderly Hyperion female. It was an easy gig. Until her daughter and grandson hit hard times and moved in with her. That little boy was hellspawn.

“My Mistress told me to make a fruit pie in the food synthesizer and an hour later there was nothing left but crumbs. Although I’d done nothing like that before and the little jerk never followed the rules, when he accused me of doing it, she believed him.”

I shrug and swallow several times. The story is laughable, but my situation isn’t. It’s surprising how fast things escalated from an accusation to a prison sentence. There’s no such thing as due process for slaves.

Looking around this hellhole, it’s obvious the punishment doesn’t fit the crime—even if I had eaten the damn pie.

I shouldn’t have said anything. They’re just staring, assessing. They’re the first people I told my story to out loud. I have to admit, it’s ridiculous. Unbelievable.

Braveheart

Her tale has to be true. Anyone with adequate intelligence would make up a better lie. I glance at Valor to see what he thinks. His third eye is flickering. He’s reading her mind.

He nods, then says telepathically, S he’s telling the truth .

“The galaxy’s not a fair place,” I say. “Especially for slaves.”

“Shower time,” a male voice announces overhead. “Assume the position, assholes.”

Valor rises. We remove our clothes, fold our blankets as small and tight as we can, tuck our clothing inside the little bundles, then walk to the back wall as ordered. Willow is frozen and wide-eyed, still sitting on my bed.

“They’re coming in with hoses to spray us. The pressure’s hard. It will shred your clothes if you keep them on,” I tell her.

The guards are striding down the walkway, using their usual protocol, where they spray us with the stinging force of a firehose. It’s swift if not efficient. The large males in the cells in front of us are grunting in pain. The female can see for herself how powerful it is. One spindly Dacian falls to the floor from the force of it. I shouldn’t have to tell her to hurry, but I do.

“Hurry. Your clothes won’t protect you from the pain of the spray, but at least they’ll survive if you remove them.”

I see the exact moment it dawns on her I’m telling the truth. She shucks her clothes in record time, joins us at the back wall, and stands at my side. Valor hasn’t said a word. I can see why she doesn’t want to stand near him, although he was the one who protected her from Kalletta in the next cell.

Just as the guards approach our cell, I grip her by her waist and move her between us. Valor and I grab her wrists just as the water hits us with full force. I’ve been here long enough to have learned how to enjoy the cool sting of the water. Willow shrieks from the pain of it, then snaps her mouth closed to keep the spray out of her mouth.

Valor and I turn so the water hits our backs, nudging Willow to do the same. When the guards move to the next cell, the female is panting. She might be crying. It’s hard to tell as she gasps for air, her face dripping, eyelashes spikey.

Her skin had been a creamy beige before the hose. Now it’s splotched with red.

“Crap! That hurt.” She spends a moment squeegeeing the water off her skin as best she can, then she hurries to grab her clothes, which are sopping from the over-spray.

Valor grips his blanket, which is only wet on the small square at the top of his tightly wrapped bundle. He gently pulls her clothes from her hands, then uses his rough blanket to wipe her dry.

We were raised in the same geneslave barracks and have been together since our last mission. Our handlers took us to the Down to Two Gameshow set and ordered us to kill one of the contestants, another geneslave like ourselves. Circumstances caused us to stand down at the last minute. Although we had no choice, we’re in prison as punishment for the mission’s failure.

In all the time I’ve known him, I’ve never seen this gentle side of Valor. He’s always calm, unruffled, and methodical. There are a lot of deep thoughts rolling around in his mind, although he seldom shares them. His tender motions as he dries her, though, surprise me.

She’s trying to escape his grasp. Maybe it’s fear. She looks tiny next to his enormous frame. He gently keeps her next to him and wipes her dry. Soft pats to her forehead, brushing strokes to her back, and then he bends to dry her legs. He’s thorough without being intrusive between her legs or the globes on her chest, barely touching the raw scratches on the one Kalletta mauled.

He almost never talks, and seldom shares much through his psychic powers, but it’s so strong, even I feel the gust of his compassion toward this little female.

Valor

One of the guards shoves a clean pair of coveralls and a pair of boots through the bars just as, “Lights out,” booms from the speakers. We’re bathed in darkness with just the dimmest glow from the nightlights to give enough illumination for the guards to abuse us during the night if they’re inclined toward those things.

I’ve never touched a female before. I’ve been touched by some at the genefarm where I was created in a test tube, born, and raised. My previous physical contact was never consensual and certainly never pleasant. I know I’m big, and imagine I scare the little Earther. I know I can never have her, but I can protect her.

I push a gust of calm her way. Then another and another until I feel her relax. If I knew how, I’d smile at her, but I don’t think my face was built to move that way. I comb my fingers through her long, blond hair, wrap the blanket more tightly around her, then release her.

She takes one step away, then turns to look at me. Her head tips up to see my face and she takes me in.

I hadn’t wanted to intrude into her mind. My masters never taught me how to leash my powers. Before they came near me, they sprayed something in my cell to dim my psychic powers so I couldn’t read them. I’ve had to learn the technique here, though.

If my psychic powers were open wide, like a throttle on full power, I would have to absorb the thoughts of everyone around me. Except for Braveheart, they’re uniformly evil, depraved, lustful, and murderous. I’ve taught myself how to tune those out.

I’ve tuned out Willow’s thoughts for different reasons. I don’t slip inside her mind, but I feel her fear. It blasts at me like shock waves after a bomb. When I slide beneath that, I find anger. She’s on this prison planet because of a pie? I’d be furious, too.

But when I dive deeper, hating myself for trespassing but unable to stop myself, it’s like being immersed in a magical kingdom.

All I’ve ever known was hatred, anger, dismissal, and disdain. With Braveheart, there is mutual respect and acceptance. Inside Willow, I feel like I’m bathing in cool spring water in a sun-drenched meadow. Deep inside her mind, there are calm places, happy memories, and something I have no frame of reference for, but she calls it love.

I could live in there forever. She doesn’t know I’ve trespassed. How could she? There’s nothing in her memory banks that shows she’s aware of strong psy powers like mine. I think if she knew what I just did, she’d hate me.

I skim my palm across her forehead and tuck a wayward strand of her long, blonde hair behind her ear, then step back and sit on my bunk.