table before turning back to me with her data pad firmly in hand and a frown on her face. “And I’m sorry for the headache you’ll have for the next few hours. Normally, you would be in transport while your brain adapted to the NPU, but you won’t have that luxury.”
“NPU? What is that?” I wanted to lift my hand to the side of my neck and rub the aching spot there. What the hell had she just done? “What did you do to me?”
The restraints about my wrists came undone with a single swipe of the warden’s finger on her tablet. She lifted her gaze from the tablet to meet mine, and I saw no sympathy there, more like pity. “The NPU is a neural processing unit required for transport off the planet. Its neural technology will merge with your brain’s language centers, allowing you to understand and speak all known languages of the Coalition Fleet. You can’t be processed as a bride without one.”
“I don’t want to be a bride.” As I rose to stand, a guard walked in with the all too familiar shackles, a long chain rattling between the wrist cuffs. I knew where he would take me, back to prison, back to solitary confinement where the guards would treat me like I was invisible, a rat in a cage that needed food and water, and nothing else. Still, that was better than the alternative. I didn’t want to be more to them than another inmate, another mouth to feed. I didn’t want them to notice me.
But I was innocent. Surely my attorney and my friends on the outside would figure out the truth. I had to believe the judge sitting my case would see through the prosecution’s lies.
“If you didn’t want to be a bride, then why did you follow your attorney’s recommendation for processing?” Her question struck a nerve, but I refused to back down. I refused to believe the justice system would fail me so completely.
“Just in case.”
Her nod was quick and precise. “Exactly. And now you have an NPU, just in case.”
She threw my own words back at me, but the underlying tone made it clear she believed I would be back, sooner rather than later. And if the system failed me and I was convicted, maybe I would come back. That dream. My body still ached with lust. I wanted those big hands on my body. I felt like I was a touch starved idiot, but I wouldn’t stop thinking about the way their hands had stroked my skin, their huge cocks had stretched me open. The intense pleasure as I’d ridden them to the strongest orgasm of my pathetic life.
A fake orgasm, from some stupid computerized highjack of my brain. If I understood the process correctly, I’d been living another woman’s actual memories, experiencing what she experienced.
The whole thing freaked me out. And I didn’t want to leave Earth. I wanted my damn life back, and I was going to get it.
I could survive another two months in solitary. I refused to break. But a nagging voice had begun to haunt me in the quiet silence of my existence in the prison. Even if I beat the charges and won my appeal, what would become of me? Even if I were allowed to go home, would I ever be truly free? If the charges were dropped, if my name was cleared, there would always be those who doubted, who would consider me and any data I found to be tainted. No lab would touch me. At least not in the US. I’d have to relocate, start a new life.
And if I didn’t win, if the system failed? I’d either be shackled and jailed for decades or be sent to a new planet where I would be at the mercy of not one huge alien, but two.
Sounded like, one way or the other, I was already doomed to serving a life sentence.
2
Maxim, Governor of Base 3, Prillon Colony Planet, Sector 901
The crush of heavy combat boots filled the narrow hallway with a loud, clomping sound. My steps were eager, too eager, and yet I could not force myself to slow my pace as I hurried to the communications center. Warden Egara, the female in charge of The Colony’s new Interstellar Brides Processing center on Earth, waited to speak to me. I had to assume she had news, news of a matched mate for one of the soul-weary soldiers under my command. News those of us condemned to live out our lives on The Colony very much needed to hear.
“Ryston.” I nodded, my expression grim as my chosen Second, Captain Ryston Rayall, my friend and brother-in-arms for many years, fell into step beside me. Covered head to toe in the mottled black-and brown-armor of a Prillon warrior, I was both relieved and worried by his presence.
“I hear there is news from Earth.” His expression was grim. Despite the pale golden color of his hair and eyes, his gaze was dark. Rejected by his family after his rescue, he’d become a shadow of his former self. Mean. Bitter. Reckless and unpredictable. Bad news would not improve his temperament nor his current mood.
“I am on my way, brother. Patience. I do not yet know what Warden Egara will say.” I thumped him on the shoulder in affection. He was my most trusted friend and closest ally on this base. I would trust no other with a mate, despite his recent sullenness. He was a fierce fighter, honorable to the core. I had no doubt a female’s sweet touch could banish the darkness from his heart and bring my friend back to life.
“She is probably going to tell you that none of you fuckers have a match and we’re all fools for hoping.” His growl was full of pain, but he could not hide his hope from me. If he did not hope, he would not have rushed to be at my side to hear the news from Earth.
“That would imply that I am not perfect, Ryston. We both know that is not the case.”
Ryston’s soft chuckle was his only response, but some of the tension drained from my shoulders and neck. It was good to face whatever might come with Ryston at my back. As Governor of Base 3, it was my duty to set an example for the other contaminated warriors here. All good men, the warriors on The Colony had served their planets well, fought the Hive menace and suffered at the enemies’ hands. Everyone on The Colony carried the scars of that fight, for what the Hive captured, they tried to make their own. Hive Integration Units tortured Coalition fighters, converting them into new machines for the Hive to deploy, new Hive-controlled soldiers, walking weapons. Those of us lucky enough to survive and return to our units with our minds intact were sentenced to a fate that, for some, was worse than death—banishment. For as advanced as the Interstellar Coalition’s technology had become, there were still things that could not be undone.
Microscopic cybernetic implants, living cyborg flesh, optical implants, brain stem filaments, enhanced muscle fibers, artificial intelligence that merged with our bodies on a cellular level, with our very DNA. For centuries, Coalition fighters rescued from Hive Integration Units were simply executed. But nearly sixty years ago, Prime Nial’s father had established The Colony, where contaminated warriors could live out their lives safely and away from potential Hive interference or control. Away from those untainted.
Safety was highly overrated. The Colony became more a prison than a mercy, warriors doomed to live out their lives without hope of a home or a mate, fighting a never-ending battle to live a life filled with purpose, with honor. Few women fought in the Fleet. Fewer still were captured by the hive. For those females who were captured and survived, they ended up here as well. But they were so few, so very rare, that a man could go months or years without ever setting eyes on female flesh. We were feared by our own people, and forgotten by the other planets, by those we sacrificed so much to protect. Forgotten until the other worlds began sending their warriors here as well.
Now the contaminated fighters banished to The Colony world included Atlan Warlords, Trion and Viken fighters,
