Their skin had the subtle gray luster of a polished meteorite. Their hair, worn long, but bound into severe plaits and tied with cord, ranged across a color spectrum from bone white to silver gray to ink black. Their faces were bold, sharply angled, with heavy square jaws and high, straight-bridged noses. Their eyes gleamed in shades of ochre, with predators’ elliptical pupils. They wore armored black flight suits and heavy gravity-boots that adhered to the ship’s deck like spiders’ feet.
Lyra straightened her spine and released her hold on Tsende, trying to look as commanding as she could while floating helplessly in middle of the deadened bridge.
“I am Lyra Hallas, Captain of this vessel.” She spoke in the Galactic Creole—it was a merchants’ language rather than a diplomatic one, but it was the most commonly shared language across all known species. “We are a scientific research vessel, protected under Intergalactic Council Provision 59. You have boarded illegally, and I demand—”
One of the intruders moved swiftly, pulling an unrecognizable weapon from his hip and aiming it at Tsende. It discharged with a sharp crackle, and a bright net of white-hot light consumed Tsende’s body. He convulsed beneath the electrifying web. The light danced and snapped around him for a long, horrifying second and then flickered out. Tsende’s body was limp and still.
Lyra recoiled, too stunned to speak.
He was dead. Cocky, competent, hard-working Tsende was dead. This wasn’t the first time Lyra had looked into the lifeless eyes of a fallen comrade. But after resigning her military commission, she hadn’t expected to have to do it ever again. A research vessel was supposed to be safe. Boring, even. And now—
The invaders moved into the cabin, their boots treading heavily on the deck. One of them paused to examine Tsende—pushing his inert body out of the way—while the other two approached Lyra.
She windmilled her arms, struggling in the zero-gravity. There was nothing in reach for her to grab onto. She was a flailing, sitting duck.
Those yellow, vulpine eyes raked over her body in a calculating, avaricious sweep. One of them spoke—a deep, rumbling language that sounded like a tiger attempting to speak Russian.
The other one replied, a single syllable. His mouth, with its iron-colored lips, stretched into a terrifying smile, exposing eye teeth as long and sharp as a jaguar’s.
“Get away from me,” Lyra snarled, kicking out as they neared.
Her boot contacted with a rock hard chest, propelling her backwards.
Big, gray hands reached for her, but missed.
Lyra slammed up against the bulkhead with a force that rattled her skull. She didn’t waste time reacting to the pain. Bracing her hands and feet, she pushed off, sailing over the invaders’ heads and towards the ruined door.
A big hand closed over her ankle, abruptly stopping her. Her dead comm slid from her chest pocket, and her braid swung forward, hitting her in the face. Lyra kicked and thrashed, but the alien reeled her in like a hooked fish.
“Let go of me!” she growled, lashing out with her booted foot towards his groin.
Most anthropoid species kept their delicate genitals in the same general region. Before she could connect and find out for sure, his other hand closed over her other ankle.
She pedaled her legs furiously, but only succeeded in thrashing her body in a dizzying loop. Panting, she let herself be dragged in. When she was close enough, she curled in towards her captor, and raked her nails down his face.
His skin was as hard as stone, impervious to her assault. But his corneas were not. He roared his pain, releasing Lyra to clutch at his eyes. She pushed off his body with her feet, soaring for the open door. Gravity boots clomped loudly, swiftly, behind her.
Lyra flew through the door and into the passageway—and into the arms of another giant alien. She brought her knee into his groin, and was rewarded with a pained grunt, and freedom. She pushed off his body—and crashed into another alien.
She twisted like an eel, avoiding his grasp, and found herself surrounded on all sides by massive, iron-bodied, cat-eyed raiders. She kicked against the handrail, sending herself shooting upwards, but more than one hand closed around her feet and calves, dragging her back down.
She fought, but in the end, it was futile.
When they’d pulled her back down, one alien held her in an unbreakable, constricting embrace. She panted, slick with sweat, straining against her captor’s unmatchable strength. As she struggled, she felt the press of something thick and hard rise against her back.
His cock. And it was huge.
Lyra froze. “Please,” she gasped, her fury breaking down into mind-numbing panic. “Please don’t—”
One of the other aliens came to stand in front of her. He licked the pad of his thumb, and before Lyra could react, he pressed it into her open mouth. His thumb, cool and wet with his saliva, swept over her tongue.
She recoiled. The taste of him spread swiftly from her tongue, filling her mouth, then seeping through her throat. The taste became a feeling, and it filled her head—crowding out fear, and rage, and all thought entirely. It sank into her blood and hummed through her entire body.
Drunken, languid, she sagged against the creature who held her in his arms. His erection still pressed against her, but instead of fear, a hot wash of desire bolted through her. She rolled her hips back, rubbing herself against him. His arms tightened on her, and he spoke a few guttural syllables in his strange, growling language.
In an instant, she was wrestled from his grasp. Rough hands passed her along a line of alien men while the first one struggled to regain her, snarling in his language.
Several of the other aliens rushed him, pinning him to the deck while he thrashed and roared. He was wrestled into submission, and hauled along the passageway towards the flight deck.
The alien who held Lyra now, did so at arm’s length. His big hand circled her bicep, his arm fully extended from his body. The zero-gravity kept her aloft as he marched down the passageway with her.
She was well and truly captured and she didn’t care. She felt nothing. No fear, no anger, no sadness. Only a languid headiness, and an aimless sexual arousal that grew more intense with each passing second.
She turned a drunken, sloe-eyed gaze upon the alien who held her at arm’s length. He had to be nearly eight feet tall, and beneath the flight suit, he had a broad, thickly-muscled body. Never mind the snake eyes and the tiger fangs and nickel-gray skin. He was big and strong and everything about him projected maleness, and the intoxicating delirium coursing through her veins responded to that maleness with a surge of desperate need.
She twisted in his grasp and reached for him with her free arm. But she moved slowly, clumsily, and he stopped her. He pulled both her wrists behind her back, and held her in front of him, far away from the press of his chest and his pelvis. She moaned softly, weakly, at the denial. Her blood hummed hotly beneath her skin. She twisted ineffectively. She needed him—needed any of them—to assuage the burning need.
They reached the flight deck. With little interest, Lyra observed the breech their ship had carved into the hull of her vessel. It was a perfectly round, cleanly carved passage, smooth-walled and airtight.
The invading aliens marched towards the opening, their gravity boots clanking loudly on the deck. There were a dozen or so of them, and among them, they held some of Lyra’s crew members in similar outstretched grasps. She saw Inri and Sanishe.