Knight in Shining Alien?: Athrian Warriors Book One

ISBN: 978-0-9863424-0-0

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Knight In Shining Alien? (Athrian Warriors Book 1) is a work of fiction and the characters; events and dialogue found within the story are of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, either living, dead, or actual events and locales is purely coincidental.

Warning: This book is intended for adults 18+ only. It contains scenes of violence, rape, profanity, death, consensual sex between m/f and dubious consent between m/m.

For my Mom - who is my best friend and confident! You taught me, and pushed me on occasion, okay a great many occasions, to reach for the stars.  This first one is just for you
.

With special thanks to all my beta readers Brittney Estrada, Cindi Holley, Linda Scott, Nicole Saph Marheine, Lee A. Weems, Vicki Grewal, Janice Green, Ed Decal and Sean Barry. You are an author’s superhero! Thank you very much for your insights.

Knight In Shining Alien?

By Ginger Branch

Copyright Warning

Dedication and Thanks

Prologue

Chapter 1 – Kidnapped by Aliens? Is this a joke?

Chapter 2 – I’m Not your Cordisa!

Chapter 3 – A Little Healing

Chapter 4 – Kidnapped Again.

Chapter 5 – A Real Cordisa?

Chapter 6 – A Disturbing Message

Chapter 7 – A Small Explanation

Chapter 8 – It’s Been How Long?

Chapter 9 – How Many People Saw That?

Chapter 10 – Almost Bonded

Chapter 11 – No Turning Back Now

Chapter 12 – Conversation with a Goddess

Chapter 13 - Rescue

Chapter 14 – That Simple?

Chapter 15 – A Little Torture

Chapter 16 – To Save a Corduva

Chapter 17 – An Unexpected Passenger

Chapter 18 – The Perfect Way to Kill an Argument

Epilogue

Language Lexicon

            
 
In a war that lasted for a thousand years, the Quarnon family finally managed to decimate a large portion of their enemies ships and push their hated enemy the Krakill's away from their planet. Instead of celebrating their victory, they found themselves on the brink of extinction. Knowing that the Krakill's wanted to steal their women for reproduction, they had hid them away deep in their mountains with two thousand warriors to guard them. All they found upon their return was a cavern full of dead warriors and severely hurt, dying, traumatized or missing women. The women who remained told of the horrors visited upon them. That when the Krakill where finished with them, they either executed their sisters or injected them with chemicals which burned and hurt their bellies. Discovering that the Krakill's had destroyed their reproduction capabilities, the Athrian’s, led by King Arbus Marrek Quarnon, turned the throne and planet over to his son and  vowed to wipe the Krakill from existence. He took half of his battle destroyers, filled them with warriors, scientists, mechanics, and other personnel and told them to search out every star and moon for two things.  First, seek out the fleeing hoard and kill all that they found, while searching for the Krakill's home world, so that they could destroy the evil at its source. The second task was just as important. Seek out any species that they could successfully breed with to try to preserve their race. The remainder of their race guarded against any further return of their enemy and prayed to the Goddess for a miracle. Will she hear their prayers and guide the future king of Athria, Jarrek, to his destiny? Will he manage to win her heart?

If a “do-over” were an actual thing, I would reconsider the idea of getting out of bed this morning and call into work with a serious case of swine flu. Awake and up before six that morning, showered and dressed by six fifteen in faded denim and a peasant blouse of emerald green. It looked like a medieval gown, with elastic just under the breasts and above the elbows, leaving the rest of the fabric loose and free to hang down. Black Justin lace up boots with the fringed tongue completed the wardrobe for the day and I was ready to head off for breakfast.

Normally, I hit the snooze button about twelve times and talk myself into getting up, but this morning I never even touched the snooze button and was perkily awake. I should have figured that was a bad omen. I am never bouncy and rarely perky, I am sarcastic and even “bitchy” a good percent of the time. Why I started the day so happy and bouncy I will probably never know, but I did and went merrily on my way to work singing along to the radio the whole way.

I work alone as a property manager for a storage company, and now that we just entered the fall season, with winter coming quickly behind, the days are slowing and quiet. Which, honestly I prefer, as then I don’t have to deal with a lot of my fellow bitchy people out in the big bad world. The smell, however, when I walked in the door was the most disgusting thing ever. It smelled like a four-day corpse during the height of a 115-degree summer where the air conditioner is broken, with a helping of just sprayed skunk and something that rolled in a very full septic tank.  At first, I just thought that maybe something got stuck and died under the house or in the vents- it had happened at the beginning of summer. As I walked to the kitchen area, the smell just got worse.

I held my breath, hoping that the smell would dissipate a little when I opened the back door, but as I passed the hall, a tall figure came at me and I screamed at the top of my lungs and swung my purse at what looked like twigs coming at me. When my purse connected to whatever the twig looking things were, I found myself nauseous and blinded by a weird flashing strobe light. When I blinked a few times, I found myself lying on a mat in a cage. Seriously, a freaking metal bar cage.

Now, I’m not someone that will cry at the drop of the hat, scared of confrontation. I am usually the one doing the yelling and confronting with sarcasm at the ready, but I honestly think that I began to have a little emotional melt down at this point. I went the gamut from thinking that maybe this was all a nightmare and I would wake up in a minute and be relieved it was over, to knowing it was real and not understanding how I could believe it was real. I felt as though I was going crazy.

I was completely ready for the big strong orderlies to come in with the straight jacket and send me off with happy drugs to a little padded room.

I paced back and forth for a while in that cage; every now and again pinching myself to make sure, I was still in the real! It probably took me an hour to calm myself down and take a good look around me. I was hoping that whatever had put me in this cage- I still was not going to say alien at this point, not even inside my own head- would think I had the intelligence of a gerbil and it would be easy to escape.

That was what my cage reminded me of, something you would find in a pet store for a rabbit or guinea pig. Guinea pig was not a thought I should have had, so I scolded myself… “Bad thought, don’t go there.”

The bars were about three inches apart and about two inches thick with a horizontal bar about every four feet. It held a padded cushion on one side of the floor with a light blanket and on the other side was a round hole where a huge bottle of water hung upside down. It steadily dripped water that would run down the little hole. I figured it was probably the toilet, shower and water source all in one. Gross! I debated on whether to call out for help and see if anything else was out there, but the more I thought about it the more I scared my own damn self.

Where was the knight in shining armor to rescue me? I practically snorted myself into passing out I laughed so hard at that thought. Okay, I was also maybe still in emotional freak out land. So sue me. You get kidnapped by a weird twig armed thing, and then see how you handle it.

Calm again, I tried to move on. I was on my own in figuring out how to get home. Outside my little slice of heaven, there were stacks and rows of cages. It looked like a huge cavern from my vantage point of the second floor of row Crazy town as I named my humble abode. I could not see into any of the cages. It looked dark out there, just shapes of cages and little lights that lit a corridor between my row and the one across from me.

The problem was I could see no door or opening on my little cage. The hole in the floor was no bigger than my closed fist. I found nothing that looked remotely like a lock or way out. Great, just what I was looking for, a hopeless feeling. I sank down onto the little padded mattress. Where were the pom-poms so I could shake them as I chanted, “Rock ‘em, sock ‘em, knock ‘em down. You are so going to die. Goooooo team Death!”

As I sat there being snarky with myself, a little ray of hope and sunshine broke through. If whatever or whoever had wanted me dead, then presumably I would be so. Since not wanting me dead would likely lead to feedings and maybe taking me out of this cage at some point, I needed to get smart and figure out how I would take advantage of that time. I grabbed my purse and started rifling through the contents.

I got into carrying a big purse from my Mom, who always held to the tenant of, “You never know what you may need.” I pretty much have everything and the kitchen sink with me at all times.  My Kindle, small ratchet set, small screwdriver set with Phillips, flat and hexagon heads, Swiss army knife with a corkscrew opener. I have straws, travel shower set, a manicure kit, a handful of wet-ones wipes, some plastic sporks, eight packets of energy crystal light in peach mango flavor (the best and only flavor in my personal opinion) and even a vast array of condiments. There was a small make-up case with perfume and jewelry. I had a decent selection of medicines and feminine hygiene products. The usual suspects of brush, comb, germx and some lotion finished the contents.  I laid out all the items in rows to go over my supplies and see if anything was helpful. The cell phone had no service, I tried that as soon as my brain connected and I remembered I had them.

At the bottom of my purse I found my little jewelry making and repair kit. Tada! Eureka! I wanted to giggle and dance around the room. The kit has some needle nose pliers and best of all, wire cutters! I quickly threw everything back in my purse except the wire cutters and needle nose pliers. I pulled my purse across me like a messenger bag and stepped up to the bars. I was not quite sure this would work, but better to try and fail than to sit on your ass and let who knows what happen to you.

I cannot tell you how long I worked on cutting into the bars before I heard some noise coming towards me, but it felt like several hours. I had some blisters and torn a couple of nails, but I could see progress was being made; I had about seven bars almost completely cut through.

The swishy sound of fabric dragging on the ground and weird jibberish came into my hearing, so I quickly stashed my tools before looking down. Three tall lizard-like aliens with skin like an alligator with protruding ridges walked down the corridor, two of them dragging another captive. He looked huge even from my vantage point. At least seven feet tall with deep red skin, long black hair, and muscles on top of muscles, but mostly still humanoid in appearance. He had on a very form-fitting suit in black with heavy biker boots. At this point, I don’t think I could deny aliens had abducted me. Then there was that remembered stench from walking into my office. These creatures, whatever they were, they could not have an olfactory sense. They would have shot themselves long ago and did the universe a favor by going extinct.

I was surprised that it only took two of the creatures to drag Mr. Red Alien. They had very thin arms, with spines running down the back of each arm. On the top of their heads, more spines ran all the way down to a tail that helped them stay upright.  They had big, ball-like rounded eyes on the top of their almost triangular heads and when they talked to each other out of a wide slit for a mouth with no lips, they showed a set of razor sharp teeth. I could not see ears, but they could have been flat against their skull. They were making weird thrrrwwping tweets in various bass, baritone and alto chords between one another that I assumed was a language.

They let go of Mr. Red Alien and shot him with the same twig arms they had used on me. So, I guess I wasn’t abducted by a tree, nice to know. He disappeared and reappeared inside the cage across from me on the bottom floor. The cages above him and next to him, all along the row also lit up briefly with more of the red aliens as occupants. It looked like they had captured quite a few of the red guys. I started wondering why I was apparently alone in my captivity, but Mr. Red got company. Then I completely forgot about it as one of the stink men, the one who had not helped carry the other prisoner, walked over to my side and climbed up to look in at me.

I couldn’t tell if he was looking me over as a delicacy that he wanted to eat or if I was some science experiment, but I tried to back as far away as I could get. The smell alone had me ready to hurl. How can you fight something that makes you want to vomit before you can get close enough to kill it? Twenty feet was excessively close for my stomach’s sake. I held my breath and hoped they would not kill me or take away my stuff. I don’t think that he noticed I was cutting the bars, but I didn’t want to take the chance that he would. Especially as one of his four claw hands were inches from where I had cut. I put my arm across my nose and tried to breath in the smell of my perfume on my clothes. Unfortunately all I could smell was the nasty alien. Wondering if I was about to be killed pissed me off and there went my brain to mouth filter.

I put my arm down, stepped forward a few feet, leaned forward, looked that bubble-headed jerk in the eye, and said, “Can you go the fuck away before I vomit? You really stink! Have you even heard of soap and water? Either kill me and get it over with, or go the fuck away! Seriously! I can’t take your disgusting smell anymore.” I held my breath again as I waited to see what would happen.

Mr. Stinky chirped and tweeted, -which if you wondered, may sound all cute and cuddly, but is downright scary- and then a long, forked tongue came out of his slit of a mouth and licked up my cheek. My stomach dropped a little more. I had not thought of that. I don’t speak alien, but being looked at as if I was a new toy to be undressed and played with and having some creepy thing lick you, ugh. Well, let’s just say that some things don’t need a translator, they are universally understood.

“Buddy there is no way on my or any other planet that I will let you rape me. You can just get that thought right out of your tiny little mind.” I put my hand in my purse and came out with what I hoped was my Swiss knife, but turned out to be hand sanitizer. I poured some in my hand and flung it at him. It sizzled on his scaly skin and he jerked back. “I will melt your skin right off your face, you creep! Back off! My pussy has razor blades inside that will bite your tiny little dick off!” I screamed at him as I tried to push my body through the bars on the other side of the cage.

Mr. Stinky alien raised his hand to his smoking face and then did the scariest thing yet. His lip-less mouth tilted up in a parody of a smile and then he opened that slit, showing many scary teeth and with his forked tongue, the word “Sssssoooon” came out. I prayed to all the Gods and Goddesses of the universe that he was wrong.

As soon as he left I went back to work on the cage with a vengeance. I had all kinds of new reasons to get the heck out of dodge. My mind kept up a running commentary of stupid thoughts and phrases along the lines of “Why me? What the heck? Have you slipped off the deep end and forgot to tell me? And how could they want to rape me?” I am not ugly, but I am not Miss America or Miss Universe. I am a size sixteen on a good day and eighteen on a bad day. I am jiggly and soft with a rounded, pudgy tummy that has not seen crunches since elementary school. Sure, I have big boobs and hips, but J-Lo and Kim Kardashian I am not. I have big gray eyes and long brown hair with blonde highlights. I hit the average lottery for height at five feet five inches. That is it, Hailey Rose Edmondson in the flesh. Nothing spectacular, well except to my mom. I had to stop thinking of my mom. I would break down into a blubbery mess. No one would even think to look for me until dinnertime. What would this do to my mom’s health?  “Oh God,” I moaned. I tried to keep my mind focused on being pissed and getting free, but trying to get through each section of bars was a process that felt like an eternity. I did not know what kind of period I was looking at for stink man’s return. Then a loud moan came from the opposite side. Looks like Red was waking up.