Copyright © 2022 Ava Mona and Bethany-Kris. All Rights Reserved.
*
ONE
There’s something about the smell of war.
Something exhilarating.
Something I like.
At the gate of the compound where my army of Hallans have taken control and made camp until our duty here is done and we leave this awful planet, I stop for a moment. Long enough to catch the scent on the breeze. I breathe a good chest full in, and then exhale.
Ah.
There it is.
Suffering and the beginnings of a long restitution. This planet will pay in a river of blood. I don’t need to return to the Hallan war horns in the distance to pick up on the cries of mercy from the newest wave of human males captured in our latest attack. As I leave the destruction and death cries behind, I still want that moment to appreciate the unfurling, unpleasant truth coming undone beneath these earthlings’ feet.
If I’m being honest, I did not expect to be on Earth for this long after first arriving. Yet, those left in power after the recent demolishment of their capitol by our destroyer ships remain a stone in my shoe.
Forever on my last nerve.
And not one more step ahead of me for long.
I found the sanatorium shown to me in my brother’s memories taken from his mate. I found it within mere days of our arrival, in fact.
I found it empty.
Ransacked.
Practically useless.
Except for the records. We may be getting closer to the ability of reading the human language—the library of books we’ve amassed just from the general’s home alone is astounding—but I didn't need to understand the words inside a file to match the photograph of a mature-aged, black-haired woman to one found in General Lockett’s home.
Zarah.
That’s the name a dying male croaked under the crushing grip of my hands around his throat before I made sure his death was painless.
Mostly.
Selina Lockett’s mother will be found if it’s the last thing I do here. I won’t fail in that promise to my baby brother. No matter how determined the males in power of this planet are to use Zarah as the bait for the return of Bothaki’s mate.
I no longer listen to those demands.
Now, I simply answer them with more violence.
Apparently, I’ve not yet amassed a large enough altar of skulls for the warning to be clear to those who need to know and heed it. That, too, will happen soon enough.
My return beyond the gate after another successful mission is greeted with the bang of staffs against the ground, mirrored bows across the board of waiting guards, and a murmur of, “Waliz Halun.”
The greeting of my people, even on the day of my birth, has yet to fail in settling heavily on my shoulders. Like the hug of an old cloak that fits my contours perfectly but I can’t forget it is there.
Not for a second.
“Mecha,” I reply in kind.
A good day, I tell them. Another well done round of making our position here unbearably clear to any human within distance to hear it. And they will, everywhere.
Until I get what I want.
I make my way through the front of our compound quickly, weaving between a circle of Hallans cheering on two who go fist to fist in the middle. Their cheers and jeers for the fight only stops long enough to greet me respectfully as I pass.
The same treatment follows me deeper into the compound, beyond the open pits of cooking food and the game of golden rings another group plays under a tent. Knowing news waits for me once I get inside the laboratory we now call our headquarters, and that I’ll be able to get what I’ve been yearning for all day, I don’t pay the delicious scents or game any mind as I head by.
I despise waiting for things.
It makes me restless.
Reckless.
Neither of which I currently need to be given the circumstances.
I do pause in my trek at the sight of a Hallan that reminds me of my brother. Perhaps it’s the way he grins mischievously that makes me think of Bothaki, or it could be the dark-haired human female at his side. Which is far more likely. She beams up at him as they exit the domed tent set up on the sprawling grass. Another of our kind to have—fatefully—found his mate on this troubled planet.
Bothaki was the first.
The Hallan in front of me isn’t the last.
The sight does remind me of what should be important here, next to fulfilling the promise I made to my brother, of course. The ease of knowing that doesn’t change the fleeting happiness from drifting out of me, however.
I do not expect to be one of those Hallans. The mate fated to me mere days after my birth won’t be found on a planet full of women so oppressed that some even seem to enjoy being meek under the boots of the males above them.
A warrior as much as he, a savior she’ll need him not to be.
The Mina who spoke those words into my existence did not mean I would find a mate here. I’m sure of it.
So, while I let the sight of the Hallan and his human mate give me some comfort, I swiftly move on to the more pressing matters at hand. I’m in the belly of the laboratory before long, and the oldest son of my father’s youngest brother meets me where he waits on the other side of a table made of shiny metal.
At least this time, Katur doesn’t fix his stare to the sealed specimen jar I keep on the middle of the table. The black orb, my brother’s eye, sits suspended in the same substance I found other unsightly things preserved in because I put it there. It is yet another reminder for me.
Something else to declare exactly why I am here, and that I won’t even give those who would do us harm the benefit of keeping a single piece of a Hallan. Well, certainly not a piece of my brother.
“How was it?” I ask Katur.
He comes up from his bow, and grins in a way that takes me back to a time when he and I were a great deal younger. An age when we had far less duty and responsibility, and the two of us were playmates testing one another’s skills.
I knew who to send for the latest raid.
Katur never fails.
“A good trip. We’ve taken three males, and already, one has talked.”
Instantly, he has my attention.
All of it.
I extend an arm, the bareness of my forearm other than the familial markings that tie Katur and I open to him to answer me back. He does with the reach of his own arm, and the clasp of our hands around each of our wrists tells the rest.
Then, we no longer need to even speak.
In my mind, I’m transported through the eyes of Katur to somewhere else entirely. A compound not unlike ours in the deep wilderness of the valley between nearby mountain ranges. We knew there had been human activity in the area despite how careful they were to hide it. I’m less enthused that we were right and more interested in where Katur’s mind shifts to next.
From his eyes, I see the human males who waste no time expressing their intentions once Katur and his handful of males make child’s play out of controlling the camp. The Opposition, they call themselves. Men, and apparently a few women, who disagree with The New Order and their control over their people. The camp, a last-minute creation after our initial destruction upon arrival, is where one of their leaders should return to.
“I get the impression he's important,” I say, referring to the man I hear the human males call Frances in Katur’s memories.
“Able to rile himself up an army if you give him a voice loud enough,” Katur returns, shrugging. “If you believe it as they tell it, apparently.”
Hmm.
I know it’s possible for the words of a single being to inspire great masses, but I have yet to be someone who stands like the rest. No, the rest stand for me. Just as Hallalah determined it to be on the day my mother gave me life.
“You didn’t kill them, then? These … Opposition.”
I release Katur’s arm, and he does the same to mine.
“As I said, we took three. One made it clear we would find the leader valuable to our cause of finding where the humans have hidden the general’s wife, but he said we should hear it from the man himself. This … Frances.”
I nod. “And what about the rest of the camp?”
“I left a Hallan or two behind. They’ll pass the message along that he, Frances, well, he can come to you.”
As surely as this planet they call Earth will rotate to make us suffer under the sun for another unpleasant day, Katur never fails.
“Well done,” I tell him, reaching across the table to slap my kin on his shoulder.
“Now what?” he asks.
I grin. “Now, we wait.”
And I shall prepare.
*
It takes countless passes of the sun and moon before the male his followers call Frances finally makes himself known. I wouldn’t go as far as expressing appreciation at the fact that he comes alone with no one to protect him and hands bare of weapons, but I do take notice. Arriving at the very end of the long road we carved into the land, he’s still greeted by an army of Hallans poised with staffs of burning tips that direct him to where I wait.
I keenly watch the human male’s gaze sweep from side to side, careful not to look behind him at the line of Hallans forcing him forward. He finds the sight waiting for him at the gate, and the seconds seem to suspend into minutes the longer he stares up at the possible fate awaiting him.
Resting in the throne made of molted human weapons just before the gate, my backdrop is a wall of pikes topped with decapitated heads of his kind. Every single one stares back with only one eye, a ghastly scene amongst the glow of high bonfires behind the gates.
It amuses me how each head has its own expression. Horror after horror, face after face.
His head will be the next to join my collection should today not go the right way.
“Quite … interesting decorations,” the human male mutters.
I smirk. The guards at his side glance my way, waiting to see if I’m unhappy that Frances spoke before he could be properly introduced as he came to the foot of my altar.
“The sight of them should make my intentions here very clear,” I reply in the language I know he understands.
“The sight of them tells me you have a chip on your shoulder, actually.”
The translator in my ear doesn’t catch the turn of phrase he uses as something I understand, but when Frances raises one thick, gray eyebrow high and points at his own brown eyes—just one—I understand. But it’s how he says it, without judgment or condemnation in his tone, that earns him another few minutes before me.
Alive, anyway.
“Yes,” I say, then, “there is a point I am making there.”
He nods, but his passive expression makes it hard to read the action as anything other than a respectful acceptance of the facts laid before him.
There is a small chance I may find it slightly more bearable to converse with this human male. He lacks the initial air of arrogance and self-importance that almost every other one I’ve come in contact with seemed to have in abundance.
I enjoyed draining it out of them.
“Frances, is it?” I ask.
Before the human can reply, the guard at his right steps forward with a bow, reminding us all in that moment that we still have customs to maintain.
“Waliz Halun, I declare the arrival of Frances Heartforth, leader of the group they call The Opposition.”
I eye the older gentleman as the line of Hallans behind him begins to disperse. His very small world gets a lot larger as they create an aisle of sorts on either side.
“What can you tell me of your … Is it a party?” I ask.
“Of sorts,” Frances replies.
He wears a garb not unlike what the general was wearing when we finally found his body. Less metals and patches on the chest and arm, but it tells me that he has high ranking in The New Order of Earth.
A concern for me.
“We were gearing up for our next move when your people made an untimely arrival, and we had to change plans. I still intend to overtake The New Order and overthrow the control they’ve had over us, should the opportunity present itself, but I’ve been a bit distracted as of late.”
“Fascinating,” I say.
“What part?”
“That you're so intent on saving something here and I need but one more thing on this planet before I can finally leave it behind. I was liking something about you. Careful it doesn’t lessen the longer you talk.”
He’s quite a few paces away from me, but that doesn’t stop me from seeing his throat bobs with a swallow or the way his gaze darts back to the rows of head-topped pikes.
“I hear you’re looking for a woman,” Frances says, then.
I arch a brow. “What of it?”
“Interestingly enough, I am, too.”
“Looking for a woman.”
It isn’t even a question, and yet it still sounds unsure.
“Yes, a young woman. Luna. My daughter.” Suddenly, the male before me seems to stand a little straighter, as if more weight has come to rest upon his shoulders. I know the feeling, but I doubt his reasons are in any way similar to mine. He clears his throat, and admits, “I’ve been on her trail for weeks. They moved her when the shit went down, and chances are, given what The New Order has made known they want from you, and what having my daughter means to them, there’s a good chance the woman you’re looking for might be in the very same place as my daughter.”
“Why?”
“Why, what?”
“Why is having your daughter important? I’ve seen how your kind treats the females who give you life … so why is having her so important for them?”
Frances doesn’t think long about it. “To get to me. Because she’s mine.”
There’s something about his words that triggers the scowl my father swears I’m infamous for. The same one I greeted my parents with as soon I entered their universe. The human male didn’t say anything specifically to irk the reaction out of me, but I can’t control it.
I don’t like the way it sounds.
“You and I both know,” Frances continues. “If we have any good intelligence on our sides, and I think we both probably do, that the leaders of The New Order have gone into hiding.”
“The better question,” I return the moment he stops speaking, “is whether you know where this hiding place is?”
That is when Frances smiles.
I show my canines when I offer one back.
“You’re right,” he says, “I think I do. But I’m not in a position to go in on them. You, on the other hand—”
“I definitely can,” I interject before Frances even finishes.
Just like that, it seems the day will go well, after all. I know Frances can tell as much also as he looks up at me from down below. There are still many details to be decided yet about what this human male might want in exchange for his information, perhaps beyond the retrieval of his daughter, if that is even possible—because I expect there to be something.
If he’s smart, there will be something.
And still, I find myself liking whatever it is about him just enough to give the human male the benefit of the doubt. At least, for the time being.
What will it hurt to hunt his daughter down? Especially if it means finding the mother of Bothaki’s mate in the process. The sooner that happens, the quicker I can return to my family.
“If this is some trick,” I tell Frances, “or should I find out you’re lying to me in any way, your head will be the first to get skewered on a pike with one eye missing and your cock in your mouth.”
Frances blinks at my declaration.
I remain unbothered. “Is that clear?”
*
ONE
There’s something about the smell of war.
Something exhilarating.
Something I like.
At the gate of the compound where my army of Hallans have taken control and made camp until our duty here is done and we leave this awful planet, I stop for a moment. Long enough to catch the scent on the breeze. I breathe a good chest full in, and then exhale.
Ah.
There it is.
Suffering and the beginnings of a long restitution. This planet will pay in a river of blood. I don’t need to return to the Hallan war horns in the distance to pick up on the cries of mercy from the newest wave of human males captured in our latest attack. As I leave the destruction and death cries behind, I still want that moment to appreciate the unfurling, unpleasant truth coming undone beneath these earthlings’ feet.
If I’m being honest, I did not expect to be on Earth for this long after first arriving. Yet, those left in power after the recent demolishment of their capitol by our destroyer ships remain a stone in my shoe.
Forever on my last nerve.
And not one more step ahead of me for long.
I found the sanatorium shown to me in my brother’s memories taken from his mate. I found it within mere days of our arrival, in fact.
I found it empty.
Ransacked.
Practically useless.
Except for the records. We may be getting closer to the ability of reading the human language—the library of books we’ve amassed just from the general’s home alone is astounding—but I didn't need to understand the words inside a file to match the photograph of a mature-aged, black-haired woman to one found in General Lockett’s home.
Zarah.
That’s the name a dying male croaked under the crushing grip of my hands around his throat before I made sure his death was painless.
Mostly.
Selina Lockett’s mother will be found if it’s the last thing I do here. I won’t fail in that promise to my baby brother. No matter how determined the males in power of this planet are to use Zarah as the bait for the return of Bothaki’s mate.
I no longer listen to those demands.
Now, I simply answer them with more violence.
Apparently, I’ve not yet amassed a large enough altar of skulls for the warning to be clear to those who need to know and heed it. That, too, will happen soon enough.
My return beyond the gate after another successful mission is greeted with the bang of staffs against the ground, mirrored bows across the board of waiting guards, and a murmur of, “Waliz Halun.”
The greeting of my people, even on the day of my birth, has yet to fail in settling heavily on my shoulders. Like the hug of an old cloak that fits my contours perfectly but I can’t forget it is there.
Not for a second.
“Mecha,” I reply in kind.
A good day, I tell them. Another well done round of making our position here unbearably clear to any human within distance to hear it. And they will, everywhere.
Until I get what I want.
I make my way through the front of our compound quickly, weaving between a circle of Hallans cheering on two who go fist to fist in the middle. Their cheers and jeers for the fight only stops long enough to greet me respectfully as I pass.
The same treatment follows me deeper into the compound, beyond the open pits of cooking food and the game of golden rings another group plays under a tent. Knowing news waits for me once I get inside the laboratory we now call our headquarters, and that I’ll be able to get what I’ve been yearning for all day, I don’t pay the delicious scents or game any mind as I head by.
I despise waiting for things.
It makes me restless.
Reckless.
Neither of which I currently need to be given the circumstances.
I do pause in my trek at the sight of a Hallan that reminds me of my brother. Perhaps it’s the way he grins mischievously that makes me think of Bothaki, or it could be the dark-haired human female at his side. Which is far more likely. She beams up at him as they exit the domed tent set up on the sprawling grass. Another of our kind to have—fatefully—found his mate on this troubled planet.
Bothaki was the first.
The Hallan in front of me isn’t the last.
The sight does remind me of what should be important here, next to fulfilling the promise I made to my brother, of course. The ease of knowing that doesn’t change the fleeting happiness from drifting out of me, however.
I do not expect to be one of those Hallans. The mate fated to me mere days after my birth won’t be found on a planet full of women so oppressed that some even seem to enjoy being meek under the boots of the males above them.
A warrior as much as he, a savior she’ll need him not to be.
The Mina who spoke those words into my existence did not mean I would find a mate here. I’m sure of it.
So, while I let the sight of the Hallan and his human mate give me some comfort, I swiftly move on to the more pressing matters at hand. I’m in the belly of the laboratory before long, and the oldest son of my father’s youngest brother meets me where he waits on the other side of a table made of shiny metal.
At least this time, Katur doesn’t fix his stare to the sealed specimen jar I keep on the middle of the table. The black orb, my brother’s eye, sits suspended in the same substance I found other unsightly things preserved in because I put it there. It is yet another reminder for me.
Something else to declare exactly why I am here, and that I won’t even give those who would do us harm the benefit of keeping a single piece of a Hallan. Well, certainly not a piece of my brother.
“How was it?” I ask Katur.
He comes up from his bow, and grins in a way that takes me back to a time when he and I were a great deal younger. An age when we had far less duty and responsibility, and the two of us were playmates testing one another’s skills.
I knew who to send for the latest raid.
Katur never fails.
“A good trip. We’ve taken three males, and already, one has talked.”
Instantly, he has my attention.
All of it.
I extend an arm, the bareness of my forearm other than the familial markings that tie Katur and I open to him to answer me back. He does with the reach of his own arm, and the clasp of our hands around each of our wrists tells the rest.
Then, we no longer need to even speak.
In my mind, I’m transported through the eyes of Katur to somewhere else entirely. A compound not unlike ours in the deep wilderness of the valley between nearby mountain ranges. We knew there had been human activity in the area despite how careful they were to hide it. I’m less enthused that we were right and more interested in where Katur’s mind shifts to next.
From his eyes, I see the human males who waste no time expressing their intentions once Katur and his handful of males make child’s play out of controlling the camp. The Opposition, they call themselves. Men, and apparently a few women, who disagree with The New Order and their control over their people. The camp, a last-minute creation after our initial destruction upon arrival, is where one of their leaders should return to.
“I get the impression he's important,” I say, referring to the man I hear the human males call Frances in Katur’s memories.
“Able to rile himself up an army if you give him a voice loud enough,” Katur returns, shrugging. “If you believe it as they tell it, apparently.”
Hmm.
I know it’s possible for the words of a single being to inspire great masses, but I have yet to be someone who stands like the rest. No, the rest stand for me. Just as Hallalah determined it to be on the day my mother gave me life.
“You didn’t kill them, then? These … Opposition.”
I release Katur’s arm, and he does the same to mine.
“As I said, we took three. One made it clear we would find the leader valuable to our cause of finding where the humans have hidden the general’s wife, but he said we should hear it from the man himself. This … Frances.”
I nod. “And what about the rest of the camp?”
“I left a Hallan or two behind. They’ll pass the message along that he, Frances, well, he can come to you.”
As surely as this planet they call Earth will rotate to make us suffer under the sun for another unpleasant day, Katur never fails.
“Well done,” I tell him, reaching across the table to slap my kin on his shoulder.
“Now what?” he asks.
I grin. “Now, we wait.”
And I shall prepare.
*
It takes countless passes of the sun and moon before the male his followers call Frances finally makes himself known. I wouldn’t go as far as expressing appreciation at the fact that he comes alone with no one to protect him and hands bare of weapons, but I do take notice. Arriving at the very end of the long road we carved into the land, he’s still greeted by an army of Hallans poised with staffs of burning tips that direct him to where I wait.
I keenly watch the human male’s gaze sweep from side to side, careful not to look behind him at the line of Hallans forcing him forward. He finds the sight waiting for him at the gate, and the seconds seem to suspend into minutes the longer he stares up at the possible fate awaiting him.
Resting in the throne made of molted human weapons just before the gate, my backdrop is a wall of pikes topped with decapitated heads of his kind. Every single one stares back with only one eye, a ghastly scene amongst the glow of high bonfires behind the gates.
It amuses me how each head has its own expression. Horror after horror, face after face.
His head will be the next to join my collection should today not go the right way.
“Quite … interesting decorations,” the human male mutters.
I smirk. The guards at his side glance my way, waiting to see if I’m unhappy that Frances spoke before he could be properly introduced as he came to the foot of my altar.
“The sight of them should make my intentions here very clear,” I reply in the language I know he understands.
“The sight of them tells me you have a chip on your shoulder, actually.”
The translator in my ear doesn’t catch the turn of phrase he uses as something I understand, but when Frances raises one thick, gray eyebrow high and points at his own brown eyes—just one—I understand. But it’s how he says it, without judgment or condemnation in his tone, that earns him another few minutes before me.
Alive, anyway.
“Yes,” I say, then, “there is a point I am making there.”
He nods, but his passive expression makes it hard to read the action as anything other than a respectful acceptance of the facts laid before him.
There is a small chance I may find it slightly more bearable to converse with this human male. He lacks the initial air of arrogance and self-importance that almost every other one I’ve come in contact with seemed to have in abundance.
I enjoyed draining it out of them.
“Frances, is it?” I ask.
Before the human can reply, the guard at his right steps forward with a bow, reminding us all in that moment that we still have customs to maintain.
“Waliz Halun, I declare the arrival of Frances Heartforth, leader of the group they call The Opposition.”
I eye the older gentleman as the line of Hallans behind him begins to disperse. His very small world gets a lot larger as they create an aisle of sorts on either side.
“What can you tell me of your … Is it a party?” I ask.
“Of sorts,” Frances replies.
He wears a garb not unlike what the general was wearing when we finally found his body. Less metals and patches on the chest and arm, but it tells me that he has high ranking in The New Order of Earth.
A concern for me.
“We were gearing up for our next move when your people made an untimely arrival, and we had to change plans. I still intend to overtake The New Order and overthrow the control they’ve had over us, should the opportunity present itself, but I’ve been a bit distracted as of late.”
“Fascinating,” I say.
“What part?”
“That you're so intent on saving something here and I need but one more thing on this planet before I can finally leave it behind. I was liking something about you. Careful it doesn’t lessen the longer you talk.”
He’s quite a few paces away from me, but that doesn’t stop me from seeing his throat bobs with a swallow or the way his gaze darts back to the rows of head-topped pikes.
“I hear you’re looking for a woman,” Frances says, then.
I arch a brow. “What of it?”
“Interestingly enough, I am, too.”
“Looking for a woman.”
It isn’t even a question, and yet it still sounds unsure.
“Yes, a young woman. Luna. My daughter.” Suddenly, the male before me seems to stand a little straighter, as if more weight has come to rest upon his shoulders. I know the feeling, but I doubt his reasons are in any way similar to mine. He clears his throat, and admits, “I’ve been on her trail for weeks. They moved her when the shit went down, and chances are, given what The New Order has made known they want from you, and what having my daughter means to them, there’s a good chance the woman you’re looking for might be in the very same place as my daughter.”
“Why?”
“Why, what?”
“Why is having your daughter important? I’ve seen how your kind treats the females who give you life … so why is having her so important for them?”
Frances doesn’t think long about it. “To get to me. Because she’s mine.”
There’s something about his words that triggers the scowl my father swears I’m infamous for. The same one I greeted my parents with as soon I entered their universe. The human male didn’t say anything specifically to irk the reaction out of me, but I can’t control it.
I don’t like the way it sounds.
“You and I both know,” Frances continues. “If we have any good intelligence on our sides, and I think we both probably do, that the leaders of The New Order have gone into hiding.”
“The better question,” I return the moment he stops speaking, “is whether you know where this hiding place is?”
That is when Frances smiles.
I show my canines when I offer one back.
“You’re right,” he says, “I think I do. But I’m not in a position to go in on them. You, on the other hand—”
“I definitely can,” I interject before Frances even finishes.
Just like that, it seems the day will go well, after all. I know Frances can tell as much also as he looks up at me from down below. There are still many details to be decided yet about what this human male might want in exchange for his information, perhaps beyond the retrieval of his daughter, if that is even possible—because I expect there to be something.
If he’s smart, there will be something.
And still, I find myself liking whatever it is about him just enough to give the human male the benefit of the doubt. At least, for the time being.
What will it hurt to hunt his daughter down? Especially if it means finding the mother of Bothaki’s mate in the process. The sooner that happens, the quicker I can return to my family.
“If this is some trick,” I tell Frances, “or should I find out you’re lying to me in any way, your head will be the first to get skewered on a pike with one eye missing and your cock in your mouth.”
Frances blinks at my declaration.
I remain unbothered. “Is that clear?”
