Regulator
EL-Vashti let the cool water of the shower flow over her sore body.
She scrubbed her skin vigorously under the watchful gaze of Crais’
commandos. His revenge was a harsh reality beyond her dreaded
imaginings. She was under guard around the clock, never permitted a
microt alone. She was
not even allowed the simple dignity of bathing or going to the toilet
without a commando escort. She would have his meevunks
skewered and roasted over a bonfire for this, she vowed as she soaped
and rinsed her aching genitals for the tenth time.
Though mild and respectful during
the ritual, Crais became a ferocious beast when they actually
copulated. Of the dozens of men and women she had recreated with
since she was 14 cycles old, no one had ever savaged her in the
manner Crais did. Showing no indication he saw her discomfort, he
bit, pinched and rammed into her with every ounce of his hatred and
contempt. He drew blood frequently but pounded along like an
automaton. Her body carried the bruises, whisker burns, and angry red
bite marks to prove it.
While in his presence she suffered
her degradation and pain with stony resolve. She would not give him
the pleasure of hearing her cry out or seeing her weep. Nothing more
than a wince had she surrendered to him when he brutalized tender
skin repeatedly. She was of the Founding Four.
She would show this dren-eating
first genner what
dignity was.
She stepped out of the open shower
stall, looking with disdain at the pulse rifles aimed at her. What
did they think they would do with weapons if she attempted an escape
or harmed herself? Shoot her? Crais would have them flayed alive.
Besides, even if she were able to conceive, no Peacekeeper would harm
an unborn child. It was anathema. If a child was proven incompetent
or genetically defective, it would be euthanized on its sixth
birthday, as was tradition in Peacekeeper ranks. A helpless fetus was
never put at risk.
She laughed condescendingly at the
guns and idiotic grunts that held them. They looked at her, then at
one another assuming she must be mad. She knew what was running
through their minds as she peered at herself in the full-length
mirror. Her battered body gave the impression of having been through
a battle. Even the corner of her bottom lip was split thanks to one
of Crais’ bites. She smiled indifferently as she ran a comb through
the tangles of her wet hair.
One more day and she would be free
to return home to the Directorate and Khetyr. Free to plot her
revenge against Crais and Pollivar. She mentally built the fire over
which to roast Crais’ meevunks
and sharpened the stake that she’d mount Pollivar’s head upon.
With a quiet laugh, she turned her back to the commandos and slipped
into her clothes.
**
** ** ** **
“Officer
Crais’ prowler is returning from the Leviathan, Captain.” Teeg
informed him, not looking up from her console. “He reports there
was a minor incident with the Luxan prisoner, but that it was quelled
immediately. All prisoners are now secured and the new complement of
guards posted as ordered.”
“Excellent,”
Crais responded as he straightened his uniform jacket and smoothed
his already perfectly coiffed hair. “With that taken care of, I
leave command to you, Lieutenant.”
“Of
course, sir,” Teeg replied watching his back as he strode from the
command core.
Crais
could feel his heart beating faster with every step. By the time he
reached his quarters it seemed as though it would leap from his
chest. He smiled with exultation to see his physician waiting for him
and EL-Vashti as well, still bracketed by her commando escort. It was
the true moment of victory he’d been waiting for.
Humiliating
and brutalizing her had been mere foreplay before the main event.
Seeing the realization on her face that she was pregnant with his
child and could hold her lover responsible held satisfaction beyond
anything sexual. She represented everything he secretly hated about
Peacekeeper society. This would be a coup de
grace far grander than the impregnation of
the Leviathan. It would not garner him the Admiralty, but the
remuneration it offered his battered soul was inestimable.
“Well,
doctor. Are we ready?” He said smoothly as he sat down behind his
desk.
“Of
course, sir.” His physician replied.
The doctor
produced a scanner from his kit and stepped toward EL-Vashti. Her
face was molded into any icy, smug glare. It was obvious she did not
even remotely suspect her fate. She still believed her lover had
saved her from carrying Crais’ child. Even though she was a hated
IAD Agent, the captain’s physician felt a stab of pity for the
woman.
“Sorry
about the bad news, Captain.” She purred, her eyes like two burning
embers. “We can’t have everything we want.”
“Shall
we let my physician decide whether the news is good or bad. . .and
for whom?” Crais smiled placidly in response. “Doctor?”
“The
scan is conclusive, sir,” he answered. “Regulator EL-Vashti has
successfully conceived and the offspring will be male.”
For a
microt she knew she
heard wrong or that it was a trick. Khetyr had given her the birth
control drug. It was foolproof. She could not have conceived.
“Stop
this charade, Crais.” She said, a tightness growing in her throat.
“Oh, I
assure you it isn’t a charade, Liliina,” he replied, venom hiding
just behind his dazzling smile. “You have conceived. You are
carrying my child. My son.”
“That is
not possible!” snarled EL-Vashti as she broke away from her
commandos. She strode to his desk and leaned toward him, balanced on
the tips of her fingers.
“Why?”
Crais blinked innocently up at her. “Because your lover gave you a
drug to prevent ovulation?”
Her eyes
widened and she began to realize the worst. A cold sweat began to
form on her forehead and her entire body trembled.
“I’m
afraid I couldn’t let Dr. Khetyr give you the birth control agent.”
Crais explained sweetly. “I convinced him it would be in his best
interest to give you a conceptual stimulant instead. He mixed in a
genetic enhancer as well. . .to assure you’d have a male
offspring.”
He watched
as the truth of it sank in and delighted more in the emotional pain
he saw on her face than any he had inflicted on her body.
“He was
quite helpful actually,” Crais said, his tone a serpent’s strike.
“He acted as any true Peacekeeper would, recognizing where his
loyalties best lie.”
“You
scheming bastard!” EL-Vashti shrieked, lunging over the desk bent
on wrapping her hands around his throat.
He leaned
back, signaling the commandos who were on her in a microt.
They dragged her away from him kicking and cursing. Crais watched and
laughed harder than he had in cycles. The high born, noble EL-Vashti
reduced to a spitting, cursing wretch by a common first
genner. You could cut yourself upon the irony
of it all. He was glad the monitors in his quarters were capturing
this display. He would want to watch and relive it for many cycles to
come.
“You
see, Liliina, your mistake was in assuming the inferiority of a
commoner.” He explained helpfully. “High Command and the Genetics
Directorate found me of some value. Pity you did not.”
She hurled
more curses then spat at him, all the while struggling to be free of
the commandos’ grip.
“So much
for breeding,” he observed with cool disdain.
“I’ll
see you dead for this you bastard!” she vowed. “Dead and your
body ripped to shreds!”
“I don’t
have time for this,” Crais sighed. “Take her out of here. See
that she is under guard at all times until she is put into the
custody of the maternity unit.”
With this
all personnel in his quarters were dismissed. He looked down at the
assortment of transparencies on his desk completely ignoring
EL-Vashti as she was dragged away. His mission accomplished, he would
never have to think of her again.
**
** ** ** **
Within
three arns of being
taken from Crais’ quarters, Regulator EL-Vashti was on a transport
heading back to the Directorate. She was in restraints and lying
prone on the bunk in her miniscule cabin. Crais’ physician had
given her a sedative and she fought its effects by biting the inside
of her bottom lip. The taste of her own blood on her tongue was
bitter, metallic.
Could it
be true? Did Khetyr deliberately betray her? If so, why? How did
Crais force him into it? Her mind was becoming hazier by the microt.
The drugs. She had to fight them. Had to think. What could Khetyr
possibly get from an alliance with Crais? Surely he knew there would
be nowhere he could escape her revenge. She had the power to have him
executed or banished. Could Crais protect him from that?
Two cycles
of her life with him, her most intimate thoughts and emotions his for
the asking. His for the taking. What could Crais have offered to him
that he would turn his back on all they’d shared? She would find
out, even if she had to tear Khetyr’s still-beating heart from his
chest and eat it.
**
** ** ** **
“She’s
been drugged, Scorpius,” said a female voice from somewhere very
far off.
EL-Vashti
tried very hard to open her eyes but the room was so bright it made
her brain ache. She felt an ampoule thrust between her lips and a
warm bitter fluid flow onto her tongue. A gloved hand was roughly
patting her cheek as she gagged and tried to sit up. Failing this,
she turned her head to one side and vomited until nothing came up
from her roiling stomach.
A cold wet
rag was pressed against her throat and the heaving stopped. Daring to
open her eyes again, the shape of a woman bending over her coalesced.
She was tall, silvery pale with long red hair and golden eyes. She
was not Sebacean that much was for certain, EL-Vashti decided as she
closed her eyes again and drifted into the blessed state of
unconsciousness.
**
** ** ** **
“Her
status, Niem?” Scorpius asked softly, his arms crossed over his
chest as he looked down at the sleeping IAD Agent.
“Severely
dehydrated for starters,” the woman replied. “Also still
suffering the effects of over-medication. And. . .”
“And?”
Scorpius prompted turning to face his aide.
“She’s
pregnant,” the woman replied. “Genetic scans indicate the father
to be Bialar Crais.”
The
Scarran half-breed hissed as he spun back to the unconscious IAD
Agent.
“I send
her to destroy him and this is what she accomplishes?” he growled.
“I should strangle this duplicitous tralk
where she lays.”
“Scorpius,”
Niem warned softly.
“I know,
I know.” He replied angrily as he strode from the room.
**
** ** ** **
EL-Vashti
awoke with a start, sitting bolt upright in the bed. She had been
dreaming of her last moments with Crais and the horror of it all came
rushing back to her.
She shuddered and touched her abdomen
gingerly. A child by that bastard was growing insider her.
“Welcome back to the living,”
said Niem from across the room. “You’ve been unconscious for
nearly three days.”
“Where the frell
am I?” rasped EL-Vashti. “And who the frell
are you?”
“She is my aide,” Scorpius
answered as he entered the room. “You are aboard my private
courier.”
“Why?” she whispered unable to
speak louder through her scalded throat.
“Why is she my aide, or why are
you aboard my ship?” Scorpius asked in his tortuously soft voice.
“Where are Crais’ commandos?”
she said, barely audible.
“They’ve been. . .reassigned.”
he replied.
EL-Vashti shook her head and rubbed
her eyes painfully.
“Oh, I can assure you, Regulator
EL-Vashti, you are not dreaming this,” he said coming to sit on the
edge of the bed.
She recoiled from his nearness and
he spared her a wounded look. She responded with an expression of
pure hatred. Scorpius smiled and patted her leg tenderly. Then before
her mind could grasp what was happening, his long, spidery fingers
were wrapped around her throat. All air to her lungs was blocked and
her head sung with razors and broken glass.
“I should crush your high born
neck between my fingers like a twig for what you’ve done!” His
voice a deep, Scarran growl. “You were sent to destroy Crais, not
frell him!”
Just as
she was certain he would make good his threat, his hand slipped from
her throat and she fell against the bed with a resounding thud.
Rubbing the tender skin she tried to sit up but lacked the strength.
She coughed until she nearly vomited again.
“You
came highly recommended, you know.” Scorpius said softly, a
complete contradiction to his beastly tone only microts
before. “Magistrate Pollivar sung your praises most eloquently.”
“I’m
certain he did,” she finally managed to croak at him.
Scorpius
cocked his head and considered her silently for a few microts.
“That
had a distinct ring of disrespect in it, my dear.” He observed
flatly.
“Oh,
I’ll have a great deal of respect for that freller
once I mount his head on a pike,” she groaned covering her stinging
eyes with her forearm.
“Perhaps I’ve missed something
here,” Scorpius said as he returned to sit beside her, the slick,
cold material of his environmental suit pressing against her bare
leg. “Please enlighten me. What has Magistrate Pollivar done that
you long for his death so vigorously?”
EL-Vashti laughed, a hollow and
bitter sound. Never moving her arm from over her eyes she spoke, “It
was a set up, from the very beginning. A no-win situation. He knew I
would be caught between Crais. . .and you. If I failed to get a
confession out of Crais, you would destroy me. If I succeeded in
smearing his good name, Crais would destroy me. The old bastard never
had the meevunks to
kill me himself. He had to sit around waiting for someone to do his
dirty work for him.”
“Why would he seek to destroy you,
child?” Scorpius asked incredulously.
“I am not the most popular Agent
at the Internal Affairs Directorate. What a surprise, yes?” she
replied, dripping sarcasm. “I’m quite certain at this point in my
life that I am the only Peacekeeper with more enemies than even
Bialar Crais.”
“It is not easy being an outsider,
is it?” Scorpius ventured. “Your status as a member of the
Founding Four makes
you as much a pariah as. . .myself.”
EL-Vashti lifted her arm from her
eyes and gaped in amazement at him.
“Listen, Scarran. . .”she
protested only to find Scorpius’ icy, gloved fingers pressing
painfully against her split lip.
“Now, now Regulator,” he caution
in a ludicrously effeminate voice. “Keep a civil tongue in your
head. . .or you will force me to rip it out.”
She gritted her teeth, her elegant
jaw set hard as stone, then nodded her agreement.
“It still remains to be explained
why you would go from rabid investigator to falling, legs agape into
Captain Crais’ bed.” Scorpius said stroking her cheek softly.
She murdered him with her eyes but
remained silent.
“It is surely not standard IAD
procedure to frell
your victims into submission and then bear them children,” his
fingers tightening around her chin.
Her eyes went wide at that
pronouncement and she gasped.
“My aide found out when she was
scanning you,” he admitted sweetly. “Now, this begs the question:
will you explain this mystery to me or will I need to take you to my
Gammak base and put you into the Aurora chair?”
“You needn’t bother going so far
out of the way.” EL-Vashti retorted tersely. “We have them at the
Directorate and I’m positive Pollivar would be delighted to offer
his assistance.”
“Again with conspiracies, my
dear.” Scorpius scoffed. “Aren’t we being a bit paranoid?”
“I think you’re operating under
the false assumption that I give a Sheyang’s eema
about Crais,” EL-Vashti spat. “You should
be duly advised that I will be roasting his meevunks
over an open fire as soon as I’m done parading Pollivar’s head
around IAD Square.”
“Such hatred in one so young,”
Scorpius teased, clicking his tongue at her.
“Listen you freak,” she hissed
as she swiped his hand away from her face. “You are the one
responsible for setting this disaster into motion!”
“Temper, temper.” He warned
dangerously.
“Frell
you and your bizarre sense of humor,” she snapped.
She slid to the end of the bed and
lifted herself unsteadily to her feet. Staggering toward Niem, she
motioned for a glass of water from the woman. Scorpius’ aide
provided it quickly and wordlessly. EL-Vashti drank it down greedily
and motioned for more. As Niem poured, the Regulator turned an icy
stare on him.
“How much do you know, beyond the
fact that I’m pregnant?” she asked before downing the second
glass of water. “How did you find my transport?
“We’ve been monitoring what few
communiqués that have been going out of the Mhultaan.”
Scorpius explained. “Breaking your coding was surprisingly easy.
When your transport emerged from Crais’ ship, we remained cloaked
until sure of its departure. We then came to your. . .rescue.”
EL-Vashti spared him a harsh look
before continuing.
“Then you should know Crais pulled
in favors from his cronies at High Command and the Genetics
Directorate.” She said. “What? You didn’t actually believe I
would willingly
bear the child of a first genner,
did you? Perhaps our code is easily broken, but you didn’t break
his did you?
“As painful as it is to admit, the
freller outwitted me,”
she sighed bitterly. “Just when I thought I had him, a message came
in from Admiral Menkena overturning the investigation, clearing
Crais’ name and assigning us for procreation.”
“Admiral Menkena of the First
Council,” Scorpius mused. “He is more powerful than I ever
imagined.”
“Not more powerful,” EL-Vashti
corrected. “He just has more powerful allies. He’s obviously
whored himself and sold his soul a million times over. How else could
a first genner be in
command of a ship of the line like the Mhultaan?”
“Point well taken,” Scorpius
smiled. “Pray continue.”
“There is little else to say. .
.beyond reiterating my intentions to slay both Pollivar and Crais,”
she replied. “As soon as I am relieved of this. . .embarrassment.”
All three looked at her still
slender midsection.
“And have you a plan for this bold
undertaking?” asked Scorpius, his tone like syrup.
EL-Vashti spared him a harsh glance
before collapsing into a nearby chair.
“In that case, might I offer my
assistance to you?” Scorpius purred with a deadly smile. “Even
though you proved insufficient to your original task, you may yet
have a use.”
“And what makes you think I would
ally myself with an abomination like you, Scorpius?” she countered.
“You should keep in mind that you
will not be pregnant forever.” He said, his voice as unpleasant as
a death rattle. “While I cannot harm you now. . .”
The implied threat hung in the air
between them and she knew it was very real indeed. She swallowed hard
and glared at him for many microts.
“Scorpius,” Niem interrupted.
“We’re entering orbit of Khorlan VII. The IAD tower is hailing
us.”
“Request permission to land,”
Scorpius instructed his aide.
EL-Vashti inhaled sharply and shook
her head. Reality was closing in all around her. She was returning
home in disgrace to face Pollivar’s gloating and Khetyr’s
possible treachery. Her head was about to explode into tiny shards
and the water was sitting hard in her stomach.
“It is a generous offer, my dear.”
Scorpius said as the ship settled onto the landing field. “It is
also one that will not be open indefinitely.”
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