Alien Forces Of Affinity: Episode Two Read online

  ALIEN FORCES OF AFFINITY: EPISODE TWO

  (Alien Forces Serial)

  KAT EMM

  Contents

  Untitled

  Event Four: Cassie (Space)

  Event Five: Khan (Allies)

  Event Six: Bo (Invasion)

  Read exciting excerpts! (Unedited)

  About the Author

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to any persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales, is entirely coincidental.

  No part of this book maybe be reproduced, scanned, or printed in any printed or electronic form without permission from the author. Please do not participate or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights.

  All rights reserved. Written by Cher Hollis at [email protected]

  Purchase only authorized editions. Copyright © 2017 by Cher Hollis

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  Event Four: Cassie (Space)

  Bereft of sanity for days on end and with no concept on how to reassert individual thought, Vytor continued his aimless journey through space, alone. Then his first concrete thought came in a most unusual way.

  It was a threat.

  He’d been devastated, not caring or paying attention to his surroundings. Not until it was nearly too late. His ship had been suctioning inward toward a nebula black hole for days and he hadn’t realized it, until the formation of his vessel started to stretch and lose its consistency in the vacuum.

  He was forced back into awareness by the pain of unfamiliar pressure to his matrix. In confusion, he saw the immediate galaxy, planets, stars, and the dark matter around him were losing their symmetry.

  Frantically, reason returned to him with the battle to save his existence, and the battle was tremendous. He used every ounce of his preternatural energy to fight the swirling cosmic hurricane of the black hole.

  It took three full cycles before he’d managed to wrench free from the suctioning vacuum of the gravitational pull. The slingshot effect, of pulling free, shot his vessel reeling into open space, and he was completely drained. So feeble, he didn’t have the emotion left to continue being consumed by his previous madness.

  “I’m alive!” he shouted.

  That thought firmly returned him to the edges of rationality as he jubilantly welcomed being alive. It buoyed him. The desire to live and the effort to attain that goal were the beginnings of partial healing.

  He’d begun to have coherent thoughts again. Small at first, but it was a start. And he found that he was no longer terrified of the singular thoughts. Each thought was individual without his Circle and his race inside him.

  “These are my thoughts, about my life.”

  He enjoyed the confidence that rational conviction seemed to bring him. It was then he started to imagine a course of action for his future. By himself, he would begin a journey to attain fulfillment of the desperate need he had.

  “I must get Ramon back,” he declared into the empty confines of his space vessel.

  If he found Ramon, it would be the key to all he hoped to gain for himself.

  Cassie regained consciousness reluctantly under the influence of the drug Simon had hypo-shot into her. It was the pain in her wrists and shoulders that brought her awake. Opening her eyes, she saw a synthetic rope wound around her wrists that tied her to pipes above her head, while an acidic odor flooded the air. She blinked and tried to look around.

  “Bo!” she cried.

  He was hung by his wrists, several feet away from her. She could see he was unconscious, but breathing. Relief brought tears to her eyes. His handsome face was lax but there was evidence of harsh treatment marking it. There was dried blood at the corner of his mouth, a cut under one eye, and on his temple. His undershirt was ripped nearly off, and it showed a reddish purple bruise on his ridged abdomen.

  Cassie called out to him several times, but he didn’t answer. She thought he’d been drugged, the same way she had been. But she was never more thankful to see anyone in her life. Thank god, they hadn’t killed him.

  When she craned her neck down, she could see a bench seat a little behind her, against the hull. She struggled on her toes to keep balanced on the bench, which she finally managed, and it eased the pain in her shoulders and wrists. It was a precarious balance on her tiptoes as she looked around and tried to figure out where they were.

  It was a small area, maybe a storage room of some kind. She could see atmosphere suits were hanging in a partially opened storage locker. The acidic smell had to be some type of unrefined ore, because she could see equipment strewn in a corner, which looked like the gear that space miners would use.

  “We’re in space,” she whispered, as she shuddered and the quake had little to do with being half-dressed. She only wore her partially buttoned silk blouse and underwear. It left her feeling very vulnerable.

  Straining to control her fear, she tried to convince herself that the man she knew as Simon Preston, a militant Variant, had to be taking her to her father.

  “That means he won’t harm us,” she whispered, suddenly willing to believe her father had to be in league with Variants, because the alternative had her struggling to control old fears. “Please be that,” she said, even though it was so impossible to believe.

  Simon had wanted her badly, when she’d been imprisoned under Korpal’s power. But Korpal had denied Simon each time he’d tried to press it. Those thoughts made Cassie pray that Bo would wake up soon, because it was hard to stop imagining what could happen.

  That was when her breath hitched, because she’d heard the hatch clicking. It made her jerk with fear. Then Simon stalked into the compartment. He was on her list of nightmares. Helplessly hung by her wrists, she couldn’t stop his bold gaze as it raked her from head to toe with a look of savagery that she knew he could back up.

  She struggled uselessly against the ropes that held her prisoner.

  “You owe me something, little Ela Cassandra. Do you remember?” Simon spat viciously as he stepped toward her. He stopped at Bo and took Bo’s chin in his hand, to shake it.

  Bo didn’t wake up! Cassie watched in horror as Simon stalked in front of her. He was tall and powerfully built as most Variants, and even at the height she hung from, he could still look directly into her eyes. Cassie tried to turn her gaze away from the ugly intent she saw in his glare.

  “Korpal was very stingy with you the last time we were together. I don’t think that was fair, do you?” Simon asked.

  His voice dripped with suggestion and his face was only inches from hers.

  “My father,” she gasped.

  It was a desperate attempt, while she tried to keep her voice from wavering. But then her toes slipped off the bench and the pain of it made her whimper, with a sharp intake of breath.

  “Hurts, does it?” Simon sneered. “I remember how you begged, little Ela.” His wide hand rapidly moved with Variant speed and touched the outside of her exposed thigh. The swift caress of his calloused palm felt like sandpaper scraping her skin as he groped her. “What of your father? Why bring up his name?” he demanded.

  Dread whimpered in Cassie’s throat as she tried to move away from the swiftness of his touch, while her inner thoughts screamed “No.” It had to be her father he was taking her too. It had to be! He pressed closer to her dangling body, and his hand groped her buttock before she saw it move, it was so fast, then it stayed.

  Her skin crawled at the invasion, and she d
esperately gasped, “My father would not want to see me hurt. That’s where you are taking me, Simon, isn’t it?”

  Simon’s eyes burned with lust, and he stepped back with a look of brutal intent scarring his hawk-like features. Cassie could see she’d failed to stop him, and she wrestled frantically as she swung from her wrists, praying she’d inherited some of the Variant strength and speed—but she hadn’t.

  She tried without success to struggle away from his raising hands, but his wide hand shot up and grabbed the edges of her blouse, while his mouth twisted, and then he ripped her blouse open. She wanted to scream, but her throat constricted. She was barely able to whimper, as Simon continued to rip her blouse away.

  “No!” she finally managed to cry out, while frantically trying to twist her body away from him.

  “Your father has nothing to do with this,” Simon spat. “You’re mine now, and I will have you now and until we reach our destination.”

  Simon spun her around and grabbed her blouse by the collar, then he jerked down and rented the fabric off her back. She was bare, except for her underwear, and she sobbed while helplessly clenching her eyes.

  Simon stepped back to ogle her nearly naked body, then he ordered, “Look at me!”

  Cassie twisted her head away from him and buried her face on her upper arm as she cringed with fear. But she refused to look at him.

  “I said look at me,” Simon bellowed.

  He stepped forward and tore his hands into her hair, then he yanked backward. She clenched her eyes tighter, while he painfully stretched her neck. It arched her throat and thrust her exposed breasts forward.

  Simon kept her neck painfully stretched with one hand, while he used his other to seize her breast. It was a hold that brought tears to her eyes, and made her gnaw on her bottom lip to keep from screaming.

  His fingertips twisted, and she whimpered.

  Abruptly, he stopped, and it left her gasping.

  “That is how Korpal did it, wasn’t it? He used pain, then—” He released her hair and began rubbing his hands, with gentler but firmer motions, up her rib cage to cup her breasts “—this.”

  An agonized sob escaped when she shamefully felt her nipples harden under the pressure of his thumbs.

  “Please,” she choked. Her head hung back with tears falling off the side of her face into her hair.

  “Please, what?” Simon asked thickly into her ear, while his hands continued their invasive kneading. His lips touched her neck. It made her skin crawl. She trembled beneath the repulsive feeling, and he must have mistaken her reaction for another emotion.

  His head lifted, and he rasped, “You like that, don’t you?”

  “No!” she cried, through her tears.

  His hands skimmed down both sides of her bare waist. “I think you do! You’re shaking with need.”

  His voice was heavy with arousal as he moved his hands lower, and then his fingers hooked the edges of her panties.

  “Let’s see what you have here, little Ela.” He began to jerk on the edges, while he lowered to his knees in front of her.

  “Bastard! Do you have to tie your women? Force them to get what you want?”

  It was Bo! Cassie’s eyes flew open as hope rushed through her, while Simon started to rise with a curse.

  Cassie couldn’t understand exactly what she was seeing, as she watched the rapid blur of Bo’s long legs drop over Simon’s shoulders. With his wrists still bound over his head, Bo’s thighs clamped over Simon’s neck, then with enormous strength Bo dragged Simon backward. In a feat that looked superhuman, Bo twisted his body with a massive jerk, which caused a loud cracking sound.

  It all happened within seconds, and Cassie watched Simon’s body go limp as the life in his eyes darkened, then went out. A tide of emotions overwhelmed her, as she realized she’d been saved, while sobs stole her breath.

  She saw Bo swinging and releasing Simon’s lifeless body to the side in another blur of Variant speed. Bo’s hands were wrapped around the pipe above him, which he’d used as leverage to rescue her.

  Cassie buried her face in her arm with a sob.

  “Won’t put his hands on you again,” Bo ground out. “I’ll see if I can get loose.”

  Cassie couldn’t stop her tears, as she heard the loud sound of renting metal. Only a Variant could have done something that used so much strength. She heard Bo’s growl of exertion as he physically pulled the pipe down to get free. It was a superhuman Variant effort, efforts that Variants usually hid from others. Like his incredible speed.

  He was next to her in seconds, and she felt his strong hands clasping her bare waist, which he used to lift her. Immediately, the biting pain eased in her wrists and shoulders.

  “It’s all right, angel.” Bo’s voice was tight. “I’ll get you untied.”

  He was strong, so strong. She could feel his strength as he pressed against her body, while she shook, and he worked to untie her wrists. One of his arms never left her waist and he took her full weight when her wrists came free. She cried out in pain, bawling, and then threw her arms around his neck.

  “Baby, it’s okay,” he muttered against her ear, as he fitted an arm under her thighs.

  She buried her face in his neck and her hot tears ran down his chest. Cassie didn’t know how long it had taken to gain control again, but slowly she realized she was sitting in Bo’s lap. His strong arm was across her bare back and he held her tightly to his chest.

  He was slightly rocking her as he murmured deep sounds.

  Her sobbing had turned to hard caught hiccups, and he began to brush back wet strands of hair from her face. Then his warm lips touched her temple with a kiss, and that nearly made her start crying again.

  “Never more glad to be a Variant in my life,” Bo said. “It’s why they finally took me along.”

  Cassie tried to use one hand to wipe away tears from her face, while she breathed in deeply to calm her short breath.

  Bo turned her slightly in his lap, and his hand cupped her chin. He tilted her gaze up to his.

  “Better?” he asked, with concern on the edges of his gaze and voice.

  “Yes,” she whispered. “You were here, you saved me.”

  His head lowered as he watched her, and then he slowly touched his lips to her cheek with a kiss she felt deeply.

  “I’ll find you something to wear,” he said.

  It made her realize she had nothing on except her underwear. Immediately, she felt exposed as she self-consciously tried to cover her nakedness with her arms.

  Bo lifted her off his lap and sat her on the bench. She looked away from him, clutching one arm across her breasts and the other hand between her thighs, as she shivered. She heard him moving around, and then she heard the sounds as if he was rummaging through the few cabinets in the compartment.

  Leaning against the bulkhead wall, she kept her eyes away from Simon’s body with her face turned down and her long hair fallen forward. It helped cover her nakedness. She wondered if she’d ever feel clean again, but she remembered when she had felt the same way, and those feelings had eased after time. Never gone away, but eased.

  “I could only find a miner’s jacket,” Bo said from above her.

  Cassie felt the coldness of some kind of slick material as it came down over her shoulders. It was a yellow rubberized jacket, used to wear underneath the miners atmospheric suits. Bo helped her put her arms through the sleeves meant for a man’s size. It was uncomfortable, but she was really thankful for anything to wear, and having it on made her feel better.

  Bo asked her to stand so he could fasten the front, and when she did, she looked up into his face. His brow was furrowed as he concentrated on the fasteners, and she reached up to touch his cheek. His gaze turned to hers, while she felt the texture of his skin and she ran her fingers along the firm line of his jaw.

  He lifted his hand up to cup her hand on his jaw, as she said, “What would I do without you?”

  She couldn’t find enough
words to tell him how she felt. He smiled, and her heartbeat fluttered.

  “You’re not going to find out, Cassie. I’m going to protect you.”

  The promise meant so much to her—this Variant, this man that had risked everything, even his life, to follow her and protect her. He turned her hand over and he kissed her wrist where her pulse beat, which told her that it meant more to him than just his duty or a mission.

  She knew they would have made love, if they hadn’t been stopped in the shower room—and she wanted that from him.

  He lifted his head, locking his deep blue eyes onto hers with a penetrating quality. “Do you trust me, angel?” he asked.

  Caught in the intensity of his gaze, Cassie felt a quiver run through her.

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  “Good.” He looked at her with considerable concern, and then he took both of her hands. “I have to leave you here. Just for a little while.”

  She reacted, and started to protest. But he brought a finger to her lips and silenced her.

  “Angel ... five of them are left on this ship. There is one of me,” he paused, and let that sink in, and then he said, “I know what I’m doing, but I have to do it alone. You understand that?”

  Cassie glanced quickly at Simon’s body. But then with determination, she mentally shook off the dread of being left alone with a dead man, and she looked back to Bo.

  Bravely as she could, she said, “I’ll be all right. Please be careful.”

  A look of confidence shifted in Bo’s eyes. “Rapid military response is what I do, and I will be careful.”

  He turned and crouched by Simon’s body and began to search him. Cassie saw Bo found a knife, then a small weapon Simon had tucked into his belt.

  “An IP,” Bo said, and he sounded pleased. “I’ll leave this pistol with you.”