Nova: A Scifi Alien Romance (Rebel Lords) (3 page)

F
or whatever reason
, my eyes couldn’t leave her as she slept. This ridiculously stubborn and vile human was gorgeous. I couldn’t even begin to estimate how many times I scanned over her plush rosy lips, defined cheeks, and gently closed eyelids covering her pale olive hues. With her shirt raised to let the wound air out, I could see the dip of her hip bones and the slight muscle lines she had. I could tell she was strong for a human woman, which rather surprised me. The female guards we had fought over the years were always rather slim and easily squashed. There was something different about this woman, I could feel it; and something about that both excited me and made my stomach turn into knots.

How could it be that I was so attracted to this puny human? I couldn’t understand it. Never had I found their pale skin or their small statures at all appealing. In fact, I had always had the outlook that they were just vile and boar-faced. There was something about her that was almost….
sexy
. And it unnerved me completely. Julia was just as pigheaded as the rest of the humans, completely blind to the destruction the humans were bringing to Shaviro. If anything, I should want to kill her just for the things she had said. But, I didn’t even have the urge. Perhaps the urge to smack her in the mouth, but nothing that could cause bodily harm. I tried to convince myself that was because she was already in rough shape, and that I needed her alive to use her for bargaining—but I knew that those reasons weren’t all of it. It all was driving me completely insane.

As I sat watching over her, there was a jolting explosion from outside, shaking the hut and all of my belongings. I rose to my feet and ran out of the hut, looking around to see my people scrambling from the panic of whatever had caused the explosion. My eyes jumped around until they landed on my second in command, Dran, who was running up to me. “Nova! The humans have opened up a new mining location just outside the village. It isn’t as large as the other, but it’s
much
closer.”

My eyes narrowed at the news, looking to the sky to see thick black clouds of smoke coming from the west. They were mining just on the brink of the jungle, closest to our village; and they were using explosives to create craters in the earth to expose the site. My eyes fell back onto Dran, “Prepare the men. Bring on archers and the lower ranks. We’ll need them to help us destroy that site,” I instructed him. Dran gave a brisk nod. “We’ll attack tomorrow.”

Dran ran off to gather the men to inform them of the attack. I briskly walked towards the building where we had kept the additional weapons. Traditionally our people only made one weapon per warrior, but with the relentlessness of the attacks we had planned, our blacksmiths had created several backup weapons. Every warrior had a traditional sword, a laser weapon of choice, and a war-hammer. They had also made an abundance of arrows for our archers. I knew it wasn’t the best or the noblest to use access materials to make weapons, when we were fighting humans because they were using too many resources. But, our expansion of weapons was a miniscule amount of additional materials compared to what the humans had extracted from Shaviro.

I checked over the weapons to make sure we had enough war-hammers. We were going to destroy any equipment they had to set them back as much as possible. I have had it with the humans and their selfishness. I was taking back Shaviro by force, no matter the consequences. No longer would I or my people be disrespected. Once I saw that we did, I grabbed one for myself and crossed it over my sword. War-hammers were heavy from the metal plates, but it wasn’t too much. Walking back, I headed to meet up with Dran and the warriors to discuss strategies; already ideas were formulating in my mind.

M
y body turned
as I slept, but when I did, a dull pain shot through my side. The pain woke me up, my eyes fluttering open. Ugh, I had never felt so groggy and disoriented. I couldn’t even remember where I was and why I was in pain. As my eyes regained focus and looked about, reality came crashing down. My convoy had been attacked, my best friend murdered, and I was kidnapped and held captive by a savage group of aliens—not before being beaten to a pulp, though.

After a few moments of just lying there and gaining my strength, I finally pushed myself to sit up. I strained to do so with the large open wound on my side and my back covered in bruises, but I did it. My head spun a little bit when I did, really being able to feel how groggy I was. That painkiller he gave me must have really doped me up. Hell, it probably was some sort of native street drug or something. My eyes fell to my hands, my wrists bound together with a strange thick black lock; my ankle was tied with a regular rope to the leg of the cot. I supposed he had doubted my ability to move because of my injuries, but he had certainly underestimated me. Struggling to scoot down to the edge of the cot, I pulled my ankle up to me and began to try to get the knot out of the rope. Even trying to reach the knot was difficult, it being around my ankle was awkward and hard to reach with my wrists being bound. I tried from several different angles to get to the rope, having to be mindful of which way I turned my body. After several minutes of attempts, I finally managed to get both of my hands to the knot.

My attempts felt fruitless at first, with the knot not at all budging. But, the more I worked at it, it began to loosen up. Finally, after several minutes of sitting there pulling at the knot, it began to come undone. The rope finally fell to the ground and I wanted to scream in victory. I tossed my legs over the edge of the cot and slowly stood up. I had to get out of there, I needed to get home. I wasn’t about to hang around to be these aliens’ bait just to wind up dead. I moved across the room, looking for the best way to escape. My eyes took in the room as I walked, completely surprised by how lavish this alien’s home was. All of the furniture looked handcrafted and polished, giving it an expensive look; the blankets and curtains were made of valuable looking fabrics. I suppose I shouldn’t have been too surprised, considering he was a prince of some sort. I just hadn’t expected a savage people to have such intricate décor, nor the technology I saw. The lights around the room weren’t LED lights like humans had, but rather were like light bulbs in the fact they were little glass shapes. But instead of filament, they had blue electricity coursing through it, giving the room a light blue shade. Nova also had weapons hung above his bed, made of materials I wasn’t sure I even recognized. They were made of some sort of metal, with a line of blue light running down the side making it seem like it had some sort of power or something to it. Honestly, I hadn’t expected them to have electricity or any sort of advanced weaponry.

But none of that mattered, I didn’t care about their advancements; I cared about getting the hell out of there. I slowly approached one window after another, but outside of each I spotted Navani people, who would definitely kill me if they glanced over and saw me climbing out of a window. I groaned from frustration, looking around for any more options. Even though I knew there was no chance in hell of being able to just walk out the front door, I moved into the front part of the hut to see if there was anything at all that could help me escape.

When I walked through the doorway between the bedroom area and what appeared to be a kitchen area, the front door to the hut opened. I hardly had time to register that the man in the door was Nova, before he charged at me. He tackled me to the ground with a large hand around my throat. My eyes were wide as he hovered over me, completely terrified that he was going to kill me for trying to escape. I realized as he loomed overhead just how large this man was; I wasn’t exactly a petite human, I was over an average weight and I was 5’7” in height—but this man was seriously huge. He had to be over six and a half feet tall, and his muscles were so large that his bicep was the size of my head. Nova could kill me with his bare hands without even breaking a sweat.

But as I stared up at his face in terror, I realized that he didn’t seem to want to hurt me. While his hand was around my throat, he didn’t squeeze it or apply any pressure. It was as though it was his way of warning me that he could, but he wasn’t going to. His citrine eyes bore into mine, anger flared in them along with other mixed emotions. After a few long, intense moments, he finally stood and pulled me to my feet by the lock around my wrists. He dragged me into the other room again and sat me on the bed. Nova walked across the room to a dresser. The front of the wooden dresser had cerulean blue panels. The man reached
through
the blue, the material parting around his hand. He then withdrew his hand with another larger lock in hand. Pacing back over, Nova knelt in front of me and wrapped it around my ankle and then the other end around the leg of the cot. “These locks were designed to constrict the more you struggle against it. So if you like blood being able to flow to your foot, I suggest you don’t try to escape again,” he said in a plain tone. Nova stood then, looking down at me before walking away as he spoke, “We’re attacking your people soon. They’ve opened a new mine just outside the village, barely outside the jungle.”

My eyes followed him as he sat on the edge of his large plush bed. New mining site? It had to be the small mine I had overheard some crew members talking about when I took the tour of the big site. Even though it was a small mine being opened on the side, there would be a lot of crew members there because there always were the first few days of any expedition to get things going. A lot of crew members meant a lot of lives that could be lost. “It’s just a small mine, couldn’t you just leave them alone?” I asked, trying to think of anything to get him to not attack the mine. If I could protect human lives, I was going to. It was just hard to do much of anything when you were chained inside a hut.

“It doesn’t matter the size. A mine is a mine, and they are polluting the air by using explosives. Above all, it’s to make a statement that my tribe will not be tolerating anymore destruction,” he told me, glaring over at me.

“They are innocent lives,” I pressed, “The miners are just doing their job, trying to provide for their families.”

“And?” Nova snapped. “I’m trying to protect my people. Don’t try to act like you know what is happening on Shaviro. You clearly do not know and you speak with great ignorance.”

I glared at him. I may not know what was going on exactly, but I had seen plenty first hand—
like being taken prisoner when I am not in their war
. These Navani people were far from innocent little creatures, and from what I had seen and heard, the Navani were the ones causing the violence. How in the hell did he expect me to believe any different? I couldn’t just give up though, those miners were my employees. “They aren’t hurting anyone though. Why not spare them?”

“They are hurting my tribe’s future generations by drilling away our planet. They are a part of a colony that attacks and kills our innocent civilians. This isn’t just a feud, this is a war; which means revenge and retaliation. Nothing you can say will change my mind because you do not know the hardships my people have faced with the human colonists. You cannot begin to speak intelligently on the subject since you do not know.”

“Have you never heard the phrase ‘an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind’?” I questioned. “If you hurt over something others are doing, you don’t just go back and do the same thing. It makes you just as bad as them.”

“
Enough!
” he snapped once again. “I’ve had it with your talking. Be quiet and keep your thoughts to yourself. I don’t want to hear another word on it; you’re pissing me off.” Nova then rose from his spot on his bed and walked through the door and slammed it behind him. My heart sank. Those poor miners…

I
left
the hut in a huff, completely enraged by the sheer ignorance of that human. She dared to speak to me like that? Who the hell did she think she was? Julia certainly wasn’t in a position to be speaking to me like that, I could kill her any moment I wanted to. A dead body shipped to Harp would make the same impact as any other plans we had for her. I tried to ease my anger though as I approached the men, not wanting to go into battle with a distracted mind. Julia had seriously plucked a nerve within me, truly getting under my skin.

The men had rallied at the center of the village, each of them having their weapons and a war-hammer. I looked to Dran, “Are they ready?” I asked.

He gave a sharp nod, “Yes sir.”

I drew my sword and raised it in the air, “FOR THE TRIBE!” I yelled.

The men all raised their weapons of choice as well, responding with, “FOR THE NAVANI!”

With that, the men formed into rows as Dran, the archers, and I led the group through the tribe and into the jungle. The walk certainly wasn’t but a few minutes outside of the jungle. As we walked through the trees, the archers began to climb the trees to get to higher ground. We had adapted untraditional methods of fighting to be on equal grounds with our enemy. Before the humans, there wasn’t much fighting on Shaviro, just the occasional squabble between clans. Back then, our weapons had been carried primarily for hunting purposes—but now they were essential for every adult with humans being able to ambush us at any time.

We stopped just at the brim of the jungle, staying in the shadows as we observed what we were up against. There were far more men there than I had anticipated, but that didn’t matter. We were going to attack no matter what, our presence had to be known. We stood watching the workers for several minutes, trying to find out the best way to attack. The humans had blown a massive hole in the clearing, their machines positioned all around and inside the hole as they worked to get deeper into the earth. They buzzed about, crowding around the machines as others were inside with pick axes, chipping away at the areas that the drills weren’t getting. It didn’t seem like there was any sort of better way to attack other than just ambushing them. I motioned up to the archers to begin striking. Within moments, several metal arrows flew from the trees and struck several of the miners. The humans looked up in a panic as their comrades fell to the ground.

The lower ranked warriors then broke from the tree line, running at the men with weapons drawn. Once they made impact, I and the stronger warriors charged out as well. Luckily we had a slight advantage at first since we surprised them and the humans hadn’t been armed. My blade drawn, I swung out with fierceness as the humans lunged in my direction. Many men fell to the ground by the blade of my sword, bleeding their rich red blood into the soil. Some managed to get cheap shots, nicking my arms and sides with stray bullets. My men pushed hard through the men, though some of them unfortunately met a grim fate and fell to the ground among the dead humans. Each of them would be avenged though, I would make sure of it myself. None of my warriors would ever die in vain.

Once we managed to break through their crowds, I along with many of the others drew our war-hammers. Turning mine on, I ran up to a drill and swung the hammer far above my head before smashing it down. The metal of the drill crumpled under the force of the hammer. I swung again and again, trying my damnedest to destroy the machinery. I only turned away from smashing the horrid machinery to defend myself against the miners who approached me. I glanced around to see groups of my men crushing the other machines, pride soaring through me. But as I continued to look around, I saw more Navani men lying dead on the ground than I had anticipated. Panic surged through my body. We needed to get out of there before they killed anymore of us. I raised my hammer and called out in Navanian, “Retreat! Head back to the village!” I slammed the hammer down against the drill one last time, an eruption of fire and smoke coming from the contraption. I then turned and dodged through the humans, drawing my sword to fight off any other human who tried to get in my way. I helped any struggling Navani I passed in combat, nudging them to go to the jungle.

Finally, all the men left the scene, taking to the forest. My feet carried me swiftly through the trees, not stopping until I reached the village. I spotted one of the commanding officers, Kuro, and called to him, “Tell the men to rest. We will meet in a few hours to go over it all.” The man gave a brisk nod and walked away to inform the others. I rubbed my face and walked back to my hut, the loss of the Navani men heavy on my heart. Typically, we didn’t lose that many men and would carry the fallen warriors back to the village to give them a proper warrior burial. But with them being so many and being at a mining site, there was no way to gather them without losing more lives from the humans attacking us. With a heavy sigh, I walked into the hut, yearning for a shower to wash the blood, dirt, and oil from that drill from my skin. However, when I walked into my living quarters, Julia was glaring hard at me. Her eyes widened a bit as she glanced me over, taking note of the blood that was splattered all over me.

“You’re a monster!” she snapped at me. “You really took your men to slaughter innocent miners?! How can you even try to say the humans are in the wrong when they weren’t even provoking you and yet you went and killed them?. They have families and friends that will mourn their loss because you had to senselessly kill them!” Her voice dripped with venom and hatred, her eyes intense from her fury.

“What did I tell you before? I don’t want to hear your pathetic, ignorant remarks. You have no idea what is going on,” I retorted, not at all in the mood for her mouth. I had just lost over a dozen men, right then was not the time for her to give me attitude over politics she had no knowledge of.

“I have no idea what’s going on?!” she laughed bitterly. “I know you ambushed my convoy, killing my
best friend
along with the guards who were sworn to protect us; and took me as your prisoner. And then you and your savage men made it a mission to go murder as many miners as you could. You’re drenched in their blood! You sicken me,” she growled, tears stinging her eyes at the mention of her friend.

“BE SILENT!” I bellowed in her direction, my eyes growing hard and vicious. “You act as though the Navani invaded
your
planet and that we are just going around slaughtering your hard workers. The humans invaded
our
home and have yet to treat us or our home with any respect. They are
destroying
our planet; how can you not understand that? How do you work for a mining company and not understand that mining kills the ecosystem? Air pollution, deforestation, blowing massive holes in the ground and taking materials that
do not
belong to them. Tell me, how are
any
of you innocent in the eyes of the Navani?” he growled, growing close to her then.

My words seemed to fluster her, but I could tell she wasn’t backing down. “Your people don’t even use Dremalite! So why does it matter if they mine it!?”

I got in her face then, my eyes locked onto hers, “Because it’s not fucking theirs to take,” I nearly spat. “Now not another word, understand?” I then turned and walked to my dresser, reaching through the shield and grabbing a piece of cloth and another snake lock; the snake lock was much shorter than most.

Julia glared at the back of my head, “You are not my leader. I don’t have to listen to you. Just because you took me hostage doesn’t mean that you—!” Her words were cut off by me shoving the cloth into her open mouth. I then quickly wrapped the lock around her mouth, locking it together on the back of her head. It kept secure across her mouth, making it to where she couldn’t spit out the cloth. She glared up at me, trying to speak but wasn’t able to even make more than a muffled noise.

“You’ll learn to keep quiet if you want your stay in my village to be even remotely pleasant. Right now, you’re getting royal treatment. Test me and things will get very,
very
uncomfortable for you,” I warned her. I basked in her silence for a minute before finally leaving to go shower like I had wanted to. I needed to get that incessant woman’s words out of my head. Luckily my hatred for her was burning so immensely that it had tamed the attraction I felt for her.