Page 5

Tanin

T he females followed him back to their half-finished medbay, but he could tell that the braver of the two wasn’t happy about it. Alred told him that she’d accepted his offer to help them with gratitude, but he didn’t need the translation to tell it was begrudging.

Garnet, Alred said her name was. The other was called Goldie. She hid behind Garnet while Garnet walked forward, facing the new situation with grim determination. She’d accepted his offer, but she was just waiting for him to betray her.

The mixture of bravery and suspicion and determination as she acted as a shield for her sister was unbelievably attractive. Tanin’s eyes kept being drawn to her as he moved around their mediring. The bed and scanning ring that went around it were both up and ready and fully functional. Or it should be. He didn’t have anyone on board who knew how to use one. The room also had plenty of medical supplies, but they were all still in boxes.

When it came to their health, they either suffered and healed the long way, or they used what little they had to the best of their ability. Alred could operate the mediring itself, but they could only use the automatic functions. That had served them fine thus far since they only used it to treat minor wounds. Sway knew anatomy and how to piece a body together, but his skillset wasn’t really trained towards healing , and he didn’t know how to use the mediring at all. He patched them up if necessary. Neither of them were healers though. They had to make do with what they had.

But scanning and helping humans? Were human standard scans even included in the data for medirings yet? Or was that something they needed to get specially? If it was, he didn’t want to try. Unlike Alred downloading the human language, that seemed the sort of thing that would make people question what they were doing.

Humans were still rare in the universe. Their protector species were very cautious about the ones that were sent out to their mates. The last thing he needed was someone misunderstanding and thinking his crew were the ones who captured these females.

They were trouble. A lot of trouble. The kind of trouble he absolutely couldn’t get involved with. They were just a delivery company. Having human females onboard, illegal ones, would only complicate everything.

But he also couldn’t blame them for being here. It wasn’t their fault. And so long as they were here, regardless of why, they were his responsibility. Anything that was on his ship belonged to Tanin, no matter how temporary it was. That was why he didn’t let anything onboard he didn’t know about. If something was his, he took care of it, no matter how he got it.

“Alred, ask one of them to lay down on the bed. And get ready to scan them.”

“ I will try my best. But, again, I am not trained in healing sciences. ”

“Just run the basic programs. That should be enough.”

Garnet was looking at him again. She was so suspicious. And he could understand why. He would have been just as distrusting in her position. For all she knew, they were lying to her to force their compliance.

Not that they’d really need to. She had been fighting him like her life depended on it, but her blows weren’t even hard enough to bruise. The first one, the punch to his nose, had hurt just because it was a sensitive spot, but it had been surprise more than pain that made him drop her.

She wasn’t strong enough to stop him from doing whatever he wanted to her. Neither of them were, not even together. They’d been scrappy, he could admit. Punching his nose, pulling his tail – they were the kind of sneaky tactics someone not used to fighting would use.

But if he was serious, it wouldn’t be enough. They weren’t a match for even the least of his crew. Surely, they knew it as well. That knowledge alone had to be terrifying.

But Garnet was still so strong and defiant, cutting him another suspicious look as Alred passed on Tanin’s instructions. He hadn’t specified which of them should lie down, but he wasn’t surprised when it was Garnet who moved forward first.

She inspected the bed like she was checking for weapons. Literally touching all over it, even bending down to check underneath, before she finally turned and hopped up onto it. Alred was speaking to her, likely telling her to lay back so the rings of the device could move around her.

She looked from Alred then right back to Tanin before doing so. She kept her gaze on him, and Tanin stared right back at her. Was she looking to him for some kind of comfort? Was she just trying to keep an eye on him to make sure he didn’t do anything? He really couldn’t tell based on the expression on her face.

But he didn’t mind her gaze on him.

Tanin didn’t tangle with females very often. He’d been raised on a space station, not the ancestral planet of his species, so he’d been exposed to females of every species from a young age. Because of that, it wasn’t odd for him to be attracted to alien females over his own species – the only example of which he knew was his mother.

But females of any species would have demands of their male. Even if Tanin wasn’t their mate, they would want things from him he couldn’t afford to give. Time, attention, devotion. Tanin’s only goal right now was to secure the stability and future of himself and his crew. He couldn’t afford to give a female the dedication she would need. Those he did take as pleasure mates wanted nothing more than a mark or two of fun. It kept things simple.

These were not simple females. These ones were trouble.

But he could stare back at her as Alred started up the scanner. Until he returned them to the proper authorities and bailed, he could enjoy the sight.

“ Captain. ”

Tanin looked at Alred, then up to the wire that was coming from above. Like the one he’d attached to the chest, it ended in a circle. He grabbed it and approached Garnet. Goldie was standing beside her, just outside of the spinning rings, both of their wary faces glowing in the pale light. So different from the light that had bathed them in the casket.

Tanin held up the disc attachment. Showing it to her before slowly approaching and aiming it at the collar around her neck. Garnet tilted her head slightly, giving him better access, but she kept her gaze on him until the device attached, magnets keeping it in place.

“ Physical scan in progress, ” Alred declared, once in both languages, as his light form vanished, leaving the three of them alone in the medbay. Tanin had waved off Sorbet and Tebros before they could follow them inside, not wanting to overwhelm the females any further.

His crew was, no doubt, highly curious about their guests, but he couldn’t satisfy their curiosity until he finished his inspection.

Anything that came onto his ship needed a complete inspection to make sure he knew everything that was here. No matter what.

“ I found the automated imprinting program, so I can get them to speak Standard. But that’s the only thing I can imprint. I’ve already explained that it might make them pass out, but that it’s vital for communication. They’re not happy about it, but they understand. ”

“Good. How’s their scan so far?”

“ It’s definitely a scan. ”

Tanin gave the ceiling an unamused glare.

Alred laughed. “ I told you, I don’t know this machine, or healing. I can only note the most obvious things. Even this imprint is only possible because imprinting Standard is considered to be a vital, emergency sort of procedure that should always be able to be performed. Just in case. The scan isn’t done yet anyway. ”

“Get ready for the imprint then. And figure out how to unlock the collars.”

“ Heading into the collar now. ”

Tanin moved to the console that controlled the mediring. There was a great deal of information displayed as Garnet was scanned, but he didn’t really recognize much of it. Like Alred, healing sciences weren’t his strength either.

But there was Garnet displayed on the 3D hologram. The scan perfectly mimicking the real thing to the cellular level. It could go deeper, he was sure, but that required a degree of proficiency none of them possessed.

The females were chatting. He couldn’t understand their tongue, but the syllables falling from their lips were sweet and charming.

How long had it been since they’d been around females? Sometimes, Tanin would let everyone have a night or two of fun on a station they stopped at, and there were always females there willing to trade love for credz for a few marks.

But that wasn’t the same as actually being around a female. Having her infect your life. Your surroundings. It was a dangerous thing to get accustomed to, or a male might start having foolish thoughts.

He and his crew were a company. They lived on this ship, yes, but they were nearly constantly working. It was stupid to try to bring a female here. To let her get comfortable. Females needed safety, stability, and a certain level of comfort and beauty they sometimes couldn’t spare. Just a few tendays ago, their life support had gone on the fritz and it had been freezing for days before they could buy the part they needed to fix it. Before that, their food synthesizer began spoiling all the food it created, and they’d starved for days before they could replace it. It was still better than where they came from, but it wasn’t an easy existence they chose.

No. This was no life for females. Especially not fragile human females. The moment Alred came out of their collars, he’d have him comm Sway and tell him to find a peacekeeper ship or station to drop them off at.

Though, now that he thought about it, what was taking Alred so long?

Tanin turned from Garnet’s scan – he didn’t see anything flashing like it might be dangerous, so he assumed it was going fine. Instead, he looked back at the collar. It was still attached to the transfer cable, but what was taking Alred so long? There weren’t many things capable of capturing him or even stumping him. So what-

“ Captain! ”

Alred’s voice, distorted in panic, rang out before his light form burst into life beside him. He had no face, but he still managed to appear frightened.

“ I-It’s a ring! It’s a- THAT ! ”

“Calm down,” Tanin frowned, turning to him. “You’re scaring the females.”

“ They should be scared. Those are Vletch Rings! ”

“What?” Tanin’s stomach dropped. “You’re joking. That’s not funny.”

“ Who would joke about this?! Those are Vletch Rings! ”

Tanin looked past his form to Garnet. She was halfway sitting up, trapped in place by the medirings, giving the two of them a concerned glare. She might not understand what Alred was saying, but his tone clearly indicated that something was wrong.

And something was very wrong.

Human females were protected. Because they could create hybrid young while being so sexual but completely defenseless, they were an unspeakable temptation. However, it wasn’t enough that they created hybrids. The hybrids they created were better than their parent species. Notably, the domini that first mated with them had young that were superior at camouflaging, a trait unique to the domini and a strength of theirs. Such a thing meant they weren’t just something to desire, but something to claim as a means of creating super soldiers. They were beyond temptation.

As Gissrn had clearly just proved by taking them in the first place. Tanin could say he didn’t know, definitively, what the king wanted them for, but there was only one reason someone would go through the trouble, cost, and risk of capturing human females.

However, the cost of breeding a hybrid on a female was the danger inherent in them carrying and delivering their young. Even Tanin, who didn’t tend to pay attention to such things, had heard about the human female that had been first to give birth the natural way without any aid whatsoever and the suffering she had gone through as a result.

Because of that, attacking, kidnapping, or assaulting a human female was a high crime. If either of them told the peacekeepers that Tanin was at fault in their capture, he could be in serious danger while they performed an investigation.

High crimes were incredibly serious. It was part of the reason he was so eager to deliver them to the peacekeepers as soon as possible – he didn’t need any of the trouble they could bring.

The Vletch Rings were worse.

Tanin, his crew, possibly even the human females were at risk of execution just by having those things on his ship.

Vletch Rings were the stuff of legend. Illegal in the worst way. It was a crime to hold one, much less own or use one. It didn’t matter that he didn’t make or buy those rings, that he didn’t consent to them being on his ship, or even that he didn’t know what they were until Alred read their programming. Just being there, they were threatening his entire life.

Gissrn was a fool. No wonder he didn’t care about the cost or risk of obtaining illegal human females if he was willing to go so far that he’d even use those .

“Can you break them?” He asked, looking at Alred.

The hesitation made his hands clutch into fists.

“Alred.”

“ I’m thinking. ” Alred’s light form flashed once. “ I… think I can. ”

“You think or you know?”

“ It’s complicated, okay?! It’s literally fused to them! I think I can break it without hurting or maiming them, but it’s not an easy task! ”

Tanin let out a short breath. “Fine. Can we imprint Standard into their heads without issue?”

“ Yeah, it will be fine. Neither collar is active right now. They’re totally inert, they’re just fused. I doubt the remote Gissrn gave you would be enough to turn them on either. ”

“Not unless he’s a bigger fool than I thought. Alert Vytln. Have him crank up the engines. I want them destroyed and melted down and all evidence of them gone . Got it?”

“ Message sent. Let me calm the females down. They look ready to fight. ”

“Don’t tell them about the collar yet. Just tell them about the language imprint.”

Alred made a sound of understanding before turning to the females. Tanin tuned out the alien words as he stared at the ring around Garnet’s neck.

There was only reason it would be there. Tanin was going to be sick. The sooner those rings were gone and destroyed, the better.