ROMANCE: MENAGE ROMANCE: Tapped and Taken by Two (Pregnancy Sports MMA UFC Fighter Romance) (Alpha Male Romance) (47 page)

Had a neighbor found her passed out on her lawn? Did she accidentally overexert herself?

Larisa tried to quiet the aching in her head and listen. There was the sound of metal scratching against metal, and footfalls on a hard surface. They sounded across the room, and that felt too close. Much too close. Was that the shape of someone in the room watching her?

Then she realized that maybe she was in a hospital. There wasn’t the typical chatter she expected, but it was possible she was put in a private room.

The scratching sound ceased and something scampered across the room. Larisa could hear the mumble of whispers.

There was a moment of silence and then the footsteps turned in her direction, and a figure seemed to be coming closer to the bed she was on.

“So, you are finally awake,” the figure clearly said from the foot of her bed.

Larisa blinked her eyes and was about to respond, but the words got stuck in her throat. Whatever was wrong with her eyes seemed to vanish and everything came into clear focus. She scrambled backwards, but only succeeded in pressing herself into a corner. The wall was strikingly cold.

The being before her was humanoid, but far from human. No human had violet pupiled eyes or a slight gold shimmer to their skin. Nor ears that sloped down before drawing up into a point.

“We’re not going to hurt you,” the being said in a gentle voice. The figure was tall and slim, with little in the way of curves, but facial features and long white hair that suggested it was female.

Larisa’s eyes darted across the room at the implication of there being more than one strange creature standing watch over her.

Another one of the beings, even taller than the one standing before her, sat on a high stool across the room. Its shoulders were broad and it wore pants instead of a skirt. It was mid stroke of brushing a dagger across the lid of a metal box when it paused to look up at her, expressionless.

There were two others standing at the opposite end. One was garbed in a silver gown and held what looked like a tablet, while the other simply stood straight, watching quietly with its hands clasped before it.  

“It’s all right,” the woman in front of her said. She turned to the one holding the tablet. “What’s that greeting they like to say here?”

“‘We come in peace’?”

“Yes,” she turned back to Larisa. “We come in peace.”

“Who—who are you? What are you?” Larisa’s hands started to sweat as she suddenly became aware that she was no longer in her exercise attire, but wearing a satin gown with spaghetti straps. “Where am I?”

The creature before her smiled. “My name is Nillana Nyh’jas. We are Halpasen, of the planet Halpa. And this,” she waved a hand in a massive arc above her head and in front of her. “This is the New Nova, my ship.”

“Why don’t you tell her what happened to the old one?” The Halpasen sitting on the stool said with a short laugh.

“Thrust it, Gero,” Nillana snapped. “Don’t listen to him. That was an isolated case and this ship is leagues ahead.”

“I—I’m on a spaceship?” Larisa couldn’t believe what she was hearing. This had to be a dream.

“Spaceship? Well, yes, I suppose you would call it that. Since it does traverse space.”

Larisa put a hand to her head and pinched her eyes closed.

“Where did you think you were?”

“In a hospital?” Larisa said, hoping that her initial guess was actually correct and all of this was just some strange hallucination. She reopened her eyes, but nothing had changed. The aliens were still there, with their slightly golden hued skin and elven ears. The sleek, metallic walls and spherical electrical equipment lining one of them—those were still there as well. If anything, everything seemed more there now. Clearer.

“Well, this does serve as our medical bay,” the alien said. She brushed her long white hair over one shoulder. It rippled in the overhead pot lights like ocean waves in the sun. “Not quite a hospital, however.”

“Why…why am I here?”

“There’s no easy way to say this,” Nillana said. “You’ve been selected to marry Lord Kallos, my brother and heir to the Halpasen thrown. You will wed him and become his queen. This will be the start of a new life for you.”

“What?” Larisa blinked. “M—marry?”

“I understand this is sudden and a great deal to process, but you need not be afraid. Our people will take care of you, as will he. You will be our first human queen.”

Larisa shook her head repeatedly. “No, no. I’m not marrying an alien! This must be some sick joke.” Her gut wound into knots.

“A joke?” Nillana’s eyes narrowed. “It is a remarkable honor.”

“Easy, Lady Nillana,” said the alien holding the tablet. “Remember, she’s in shock. And her species is not spacefaring.”

“Wait…” Larisa clenched the bedsheets. “If this is real, and if you’re aliens, how can we understand each other?”

“Trella here,” Nillana gestured to the one who had just spoke, “adjusted your body so you can function in Halpa: breathe our atmosphere, eat our food, understand and speak our language.”

“What? You—you did what to me?” Larisa ran her hands over her arms and legs, then up to her trace along her neck and head. Her fingers stopped their panicked search upon touching a thumbnail-sized bandage just above her ear.

“Please, do not worry,” Trella walked forward, her eyes wide with sympathy. “I can understand this might sound frightening, but the procedure is quite harmless. So far, you have been free of any negative reactions. You appear to be, so far, an ideal candidate.”

“Did—did you turn me into a robot?”

Gero burst into a laughter that shook the ship.

“No, nothing so absurd. Only equipped you with the most basic of biological implants.”

“
Basic
?” Larisa’s head began to throb again. She leaned back against the wall, head to the ceiling and willing herself to wake up from this far too realistic dream.

“Perhaps it’d be best to let her rest for some time,” Nillana said, her lips turning to a slight frown. “Trella, give her something to soothe her nerves.”

“Yes, my lady,” Trella said. She walked over to cabinet that slid open at the wave of her hand.

Larisa’s mind didn’t register what either of them had said. She didn’t hear the sound of bottles clanking against each other as Trella shifted through them to withdraw a jar of pale green liquid with fibrous herbs resting at the bottom. She just stared into the ceiling, everything outside of that falling away into white noise.

“Here,” Trella shoved a small cup towards her. “Drink this tea. It will help.”

Larisa didn’t move. Trella glanced back at Nillana, who nodded curtly. Trella took Larisa’s hands and wrapped them around the cup and helped the woman lift it to her lips.

“Drink it, slowly,” Trella coaxed. “You will feel better shortly. After you rest, we can discuss more.”

The liquid dribbled past Larisa’s lips, over her tongue, and down her throat. Larisa hadn’t noticed that her mouth had been dry. She tasted a spice that reminded her of ginger, and a floral essence caught somewhere between jasmine and rose. But the sensation only played in the background. It was still an alien that poured the drink into her mouth.

“There,” Trella said, taking the cup away and gently guiding Larisa’s hands back to her side. “Now, rest. Let your mind and body process everything.”

The words were a release, and with them, Larisa fell back into unconsciousness.

~

“…Yes, entry code 9854-Theta-A,” Nillana was saying into her wrist, her back to Larisa, who was paused in the threshold to what looked like the central hub of the ship. There was a large screen of glass along one wall, covered in various projections of charts and texts. “Relay to Lord Kallos that we’ve arrived.”

Larisa felt much less groggy than earlier. The throbbing of her head had cleared and after a long moment of simply sitting silently in her bed with the one called Trella observing from afar, she was beginning to accept the possibility of this not being a dream at all. Sounds felt real in her ears, the hull of the ship felt solid beneath her feet, and, if she focused, she could feel her heart beat reliably within her chest. The hazy memory of being told she was here to marry some alien prince left a sickly taste in her mouth, and that too, felt real.

“Yes,” Nillana said. She turned at Larisa’s arrival and smiled. “Your service is appreciated.” She said into her wrist. She tapped the metal bracelet once and let her wrist fall to her side. Larisa noticed then just how slender the woman was, and wondered if all Halpasen women were as thin and whimsical looking as she and Trella.

“I—I’m sorry for interrupting,” Larisa said, the courage she had felt when she first ventured out of the medical bay beginning to fade.

“There is no need for you to apologize,” Nillana said, stopping a few feet away from her. “I’m glad to see you’re awake. Are you feeling better?”

“A little.” Larisa resisted shifting a step back. Although she still felt uneasy, she didn’t want to appear rude. Especially not when these aliens held her future in their hands. She wondered if throwing people out the airlock in science fiction movies was accurate.

“That’s good news. Come, you have impeccable timing.” Nillana put an arm around Larisa and guided her to the massive floor-to-ceiling screen. “We’re arriving.”

“Arriving?”

“Yes,” Nillana said. She tapped her bracelet without looking at it.

The holograms dissipated and in the same instant, the screen turned entirely transparent.

Larisa gasped. A mass of orange and green filled two-thirds of the viewport, spirals of flimsy white clouds gathered near the uppermost pole.

“It’s…beautiful,” Larisa pressed her palms against the glass.

“Welcome to Halpa.”

~

Kallos paced the length of his room, cracking his fingers. He ignored the lone bee that had somehow found its way four stories high to circle the Yllian blossoms sitting in the window. He paid no mind to the bird squawking outside. And he didn’t even notice the pale blue light insistently flashing at his wrist. Instead, his mind tumbled with its own turmoil.

Nillana had contacted him to give word that his bride-to-be had been located and secured, but he hadn’t heard from her since. For the first time in some time, he had grown truly impatient. He wondered at the color of his bride’s hair, at the shimmer in her eyes, and at the shape of her body. And more importantly, he was anxious at the wiring of her mind. Would she adapt to life here on Halpa easily?

Kallos had sent Nillana a brief list of traits he desired in a mate, then left it in her hands. He tried to remember that he couldn’t be too picky. Who he got was who he’d have to marry as there wasn’t enough time to send for another. And yet he worried that they wouldn’t complement each other—that he’d hate her and grow unable to stand her. Or, alternatively, that she would hate and resent him for eternity.

He let out a sound halfway between a sigh and a growl, and slammed his fist into his thigh. What if he couldn’t court her? What if, biologically, she would never be able to find him attractive? He dismayed at the possibility that she would be immune to what most referred to as his “royalty’s charisma”.

Kallos moved to the carved wooden box that rested atop a dresser. He unlocked the golden latch and lifted its lid, somehow hoping that looking upon the gift would settle his nerves. But they were only strained further as his mind jumped to the thought of his new bride rejecting the gift. He had gone through a great deal of effort to commission such an elegant design befitting a new queen, and he had even researched what little they had on record of Earthen art to draw inspiration from. Was all of his effort to go to waste?

His thoughts were interrupted by a beeping at his door. Belatedly, he realized that it had been beeping for some time now.

He stalked up to it, wiping the lines of stress away from his face.

“What is it?”

“A message from Lady Nillana, my lord,” came a voice.

Kallos tapped a panel on the wall and the door slide into the wall. His personal messenger, Dren, stood before him.

“I apologize for calling on you personally,” Dren said, copper eyes falling to Kallos’ chest. “I tried your diss-link, but got no response.”

“I was otherwise occupied.”

“Yes, my lord,” Dren said. “I gathered that, but the message was flagged as priority.”

“Right,” Kallos said, blinking, and finally registering who Dren had said the message was from. “What word do you bring?”

“The New Nova has entered orbit and will be landing shortly. The audience chambers are already being prepped for their arrival.”

Kallos swallowed hard, but kept his expression neutral.

“Thank you, Dren,” Kallos said. “You may go. I will be there shortly. Inform me on my diss-link when they have landed.”

Dren bowed and stepped backwards. The door slid shut.

Kallos spun to his wardrobe and tapped the side of it, springing it open.

Leave it to Nillana to give warning only at the last minute, Kallos thought with a frown. And he began to shift through the wardrobe for something fitting for the occasion.