Rebellion (A Titan Romance Book 1) (8 page)

They faced each other but found it impossible to make eye contact.

Raemus wanted to grab her to him, to feel her close. Even with the clunky armor. He’d never felt that before so strongly. “Let’s send two squads out and search the neighborhood. It’s time to start looking around.”

“One of mine and one of yours?”

Never had he felt this urge to press himself onto a woman before. In truth, he never knew this type urge was
so
powerful. “That’s what I was thinking. I’m going out with the first one.”

“Funny, I was planning on doing the same thing.”

“Okay.”

“Okay.”

“Feel clean?”

Akyra laughed awkwardly. “Captain?”

“Yes?”

“Excuse me, I’m going to get a squad together. If… if I could get… around you?”

This is what it’s like to be horny for someone, is it! From her red face, it seems she feels it, too.

* * *

B
y the time
they were in the lanes of the squalid ghetto, armed to the teeth and ready for action, Raemus was simply furious at himself.

What am I, a young Titan pledge at indoctrination? I’ve seen naked women before! I’ve shared showers with women before. Many women! I’ve been aroused… But this!

He groaned to himself and slapped his helmet a few times.

Levi cut into his thoughts over the comm. “Captain? Banshees want to move up and take the lead.”

Raemus held up a fist to halt his squad along a row of squat broken-down shop fronts. “What? No way.”

“Captain, they say it’s their mission. They take the lead.”

“Noble. But no. We provide protection. We take the lead.”

There was a pause, and Raemus motioned for the group to begin moving forward again. Before moving himself, he peaked back down the narrow lane to see the six Banshees in their red armor, also hugging the shopfronts, behind his own guys.

Akyra’s voice broke in just as he saw one of the red Banshees lean out into the lane to see him. It was Akyra, of course, breaking radio discipline to get her point across. “Hey Raemus! I don’t need any macho tactics. We can take lead just fine.”

“Akyra, I know this town a little more than you.”

“Maybe that’s a fault. It’s my mission,
big
guy
.”

Raemus actually gulped at her emphasis on
big
.

Comical. Back in the showers I was trying to tease her, but I’ve only gotten myself worked up. Fuck. I’m such a dumb bast—

Just then a rocket streamed down the uneven lane and exploded against the ground halfway down their patrol line.

Which meant it exploded right next to Akyra.

“Get inside! Get inside!” Raemus shouted to everyone, and no one wasted time following his orders. Titans and Banshees kicked in doors and windows, diving out of the open area.

Raemus waited just long enough to activate his visor scanners and make an immediate reconnaissance of the shops further down the way. His equipment highlighted the faint residual stream of heat the rocket left behind. His eyes followed that line right to a dark, open window forty meters away.

Do the unexpected. That’s the Titan way.

He shouldered his weapon, activated his exo-muscle system mid-stride, and began a mad sprint toward the window. He attempted to zigzag as he ran, but his focus on destroying whoever was in that window muddled his ability to follow basic tactics.

Instead, he fired continually as he ran, round after round of explosives in and around the window.

Metal, glass, and dust flew about the rising firestorm he created, and by the time he arrived, there was no longer a window. Or a wall.

He realized he might have just ran into a trap, but he was experiencing a fury greater than he’d ever felt before.
Someone almost killed Akyra! And this someone needed to die. Right now. By me.

He did swivel his head around, looking for signs of other hostiles poking out of doors or windows, but the lane seemed clear. For the moment.

By the time he edged his helmet around the burning exterior of the crumbling shop, Levi, Tomohiko, and Aejax had raced to him, giving him the cover he needed.

Inside, the place was destroyed, flames covering all the broken and scattered furniture. Among countless shoes and sandals, all blackened and ablaze, lay the broken, burning body of a man still clinging to a rocket launcher. His body was bent horribly and his lips were tight in a display of final agony.

Seeing the creature who almost took Akyra’s life only made him more angry. He unholstered his sidearm and shot a slug into the dead man’s chest.

“What you got, captain?” Levi said next to him, obviously startled by Raemus' unusual behavior. “One of Xerxus' spies?”

Raemus realized he was breathing a lot harder than he should be. “Fucker fired on her.”

The rest of Titans moved into a secure perimeter, securing the rest of the lane.

Levi patted Raemus on his armored shoulder. “Well… that’ll teach him.”

It occurred to Raemus right then that he’d been distracted by Akyra just when their attacker had stuck his weapon out the window. If he was doing his job, this might have turned out different. “Damn right.”

Levi laughed, pointing to the body inside the shop that was continuing to char. “You want to ask him who he’s working for?”

So… this is what sexual frustration feels like.

A
kyra walked
up and down the square adjacent to the now-compromised safe house with Clarx in tow.

Since it was compromised, there wasn’t any reason to hold back on security. So the convoy had established solid security, deployed all the drones, and broken the teams down to watch shifts until they felt ready to get back on the road.

As Akyra walked, mentally dissecting the latest incident, she occasionally talked out loud to herself, mostly in mumbles, which Clarx had learned to ignore if he knew what was best for him.

She felt better knowing all their equipment was intact. No one was hurt. Not yet, anyways.

But there was an attack. Perhaps it was random.

Maybe folks around here hate anything in a uniform. That’s not too unusual in large, segregated ghettoes. Seen lots of that before.

Every planet was a different set of customs and expectations, sometimes only a twisted, mutated relic of a heavy church presence from hundreds of years ago. Humanity was too spread out, too varied, to unpredictable to make quick judgements. Even though, yes, quick judgments were part of her job.

These locals, the ones who slinked in and around their location, were incredible to watch. Buried in poverty. Intricately ordained with lots of simple, metal jewelry. Carefully tattooed with symbols she hadn’t seen since her ancient church history classes at Academy. They moved swiftly, their sunken eyes shifting around as though they saw something that no one else could see. They hid in shadows yet danced at every whisper of music. They were like The Church’s lost refugees, reminding Akyra of the strange humans rumored to live in the deep water colonies of Europa, cut off from the rest of humanity for millennia.

She’d wanted to interrogate their attacker this afternoon, while Raemus was more interested in pulverizing the body. She realized this situation was the opposite of the initial ambush on her convoy four days ago, when Raemus wanted to search and fingerprint all the bodies. She laughed to herself.

“Captain Roux?” Clarx, always eager to serve, hated being left out of a joke.

“Nothing, corporal.”

She stopped pacing for a moment and looked up to see Polli in a dilapidated doorway with one of Raemus' Titans. They weren’t on duty, so their location didn’t strike her as odd, and they were allowed to have the top half of their armor off when off duty. Except, they were whispering together. And…
Holy shit, they’re giggling!

Akyra looked around the square where she’d been lost in thought, and suddenly saw more than a few of her Banshees were chatting up the big, strapping, not-entirely-human soldiers.

Wait… they’re not just chatting.

She knew her girls too well. She’d seen them in space ports and bars and even the occasional base party.

They’re fucking flirting with them!

“Clarx, what the hell am I seeing all around me?”

“You mean a bunch of tired, men-deprived Banshees who seem to be in handsome, hunky heaven?”

“Yeah… that.” She looked back to Polli—who was actually running a finger along the seams of the Titan’s T-shirt—and in a moment of honesty, Akyra wished she was doing the same. “Okay.” She took a deep breath. “Okay, this probably should be dealt with before its gets messy.”

“What’s the problem, captain?”

“They’re Titans, Clarx. We don’t know anything about them. And I sure as fuck don’t want any Banshee getting in over her head.” She took another moment, examining the scene, counting four couples. “Clarx, get online and call another leaders' meeting. Better talk about this sooner than later.” She caught a glimpse of Jexica, her sniper team leader, with one of the Titan weapons specialists, Alexio. She was doing that ridiculous thing where she can’t stop pulling on her hair while
pretending
to be shy.

Jexica, you may be able to put a bullet in someone’s skull from three thousand meters, but you are such a hussy!

The impromptu meeting put them in the middle of the square, Akyra and most of them cross-legged on the roof of one of their armored troop carriers, the bright sunshine beating down on them, occasionally darkened by one of the many drones circling the entire area. Gayla was on her back, her forearm tapper shadowing her face as she rummaged through every database on the Titan Class soldier program that she had access to as a medical specialist. Jexica was doing the same, her nose in her tapper as usual, soaking up files and facts to fill her insatiably inquisitive brain. Valarae was the only one on her feet, expressionless as usual, next to Akyra.

“Ladies, it’s not like I can say who you can get cozy with… It’s just I want everyone to use their heads as much as…” Akyra shifted uncomfortably on her ass. They had countless meetings on the roof of their vehicles before.
Why is this thing so damn uncomfortable today?
“I get it, most of us haven’t gotten laid in months. Great. Well, let’s hold it together for a few more days.”

Emilia and Gayla both blurted a laugh. Which got everyone else laughing.

Except Akyra. “Shit. Come on. We clear this town in the next few days. We probably won’t find shit here. We move on to the next. We find that Bio-Teck cube. We haul ass back to Zebra, and we show Bin Ar-Drezar
and
Colonel Weir we’re all not total fuck ups… Why are you all still laughing?”

Rayeley jumped on the moment, “Hey captain, it’s all good that you want us to keep our dick in our pants. We’re good with that, but…” She and everyone snickered. “We all kinda think
you
were the one having trouble keeping… you know, your
personal space
intact.”

Emilia added with a grin, “Captain, it’s kinda true.
We
weren’t the ones who couldn’t take our eyes off Mr. Giganto-schlong.”

In a move completely uncharacteristic to Captain Akyra Roux, she slapped a hand to her mouth and squealed. She actually squealed.

Everyone lost it, and three days of sexual tension came out as riotous laughter. Which felt good. It felt
really
good to laugh. The entire poverty-ridden square, now converted to a bastion of military technology and power, echoed with the laughter of women.

Gayla sat up and broke up the lingering giggles. “Hold on, ladies.” She read from her tapper as she spoke. “Get this. They have
markers
in their
semen
that makes any sexual activity traceable.”

“Their DNA is one of them most valuable commodities in the galaxy. Of course they’d want to make it traceable.”

“Right. Any guardian forensics team can scan a woman’s junk
months
later to see if she’d been exposed to Titan DNA.”

“Okay. Makes sense.”

“No, no. Wait it gets way better. The side-effect of the traceability is that Titans have—are you ready?—bio-luminescent semen!”

“Wait. What?”

“They have glow-in-the-dark…
cum
?”

“Are you fucking kidding?”

Gayla shook her head slowly. “Yeah, and it also comes in various shades of blue.”

A few of them tried laughing again, but they were simply too dumbstruck.

“Holy fuck.”

“Holy fuck, indeed.”

“I don’t know if that’s super hot or super weird.”

“Both. I think it’s… both.”

“How the hell didn’t we know that? Because that’s
insane
.”

“We don’t know anything about them. We only know what Oversight wants us to know.”

“Which is nothing.”

Akyra leaned back on her elbows, shaking her head. “Thank you, Gayla. I
did
tell you to dig up whatever you could on them.”

“And you’re welcome.”

Akyra closed her eyes for few moments while the others finished chatting and snickering about this new, absolutely useless fact that wasn’t going away. Of course, in the heat of the bright sunshine, behind her closed eyes, her mind went directly to Raemus. And his cock. Except now, she pictured that gorgeous thick cock pumping out blue tinted, glow-in-the-dark cum.
Which is not a bad image. At all.
Then, as her whole pelvic area began to ache and buzz, she thought of how insanely satisfying it would be to stroke that same gorgeous thick cock up and down until it
did
cum, pulsing in her tight grip, imagining Raemus' handsome, noble face in ecstasy as he came.
Is he a locking eyes kind of guy? Or is he a roll his head back in unashamed, blissful ecstasy kind of guy?

Akyra quickly shook it off before it went too far, as her fantasies lately tended to go far beyond what she’d ever consider doing in real life with anyone.
Gotta re-start this meeting before I imagine my tongue involved.
Which, of course, she did anyways. She opened one eye and peered at Gayla, still scrolling around on her tapper. “Shit. Blue jizz?”

“Actually, blue
glow-in-the-dark
jizz.”

“How bad can they be?” Akyra asked, quite serious. “Aren’t they basically human?”

Gayla perked up, her face quite serious. “That’s just it. How much of them is human? How much of them comes from… something else?”

“They
look
human,” Jexica said. “Sort of. Maybe, you know, really
big
humans.”

Akyra held a hand up to Val, who grabbed it, pulling Akyra to her feet, a motion repeated hundreds of times at the end of their meetings. By standing up, Akyra had no doubt how wet she was starting to get. Perfect reason to stop all this and get back to business. “I don’t care if they shoot blue fire out their dicks, ladies. Obviously Oversight doesn’t want us fooling with these guys. We have a job to do. Seriously. Show some professional decorum.”

“You too, captain!” Jexica and Emilia said almost in perfect unison, barely suppressing yet another round of giggles.

Rayeley raised her hand. “Captain? I think
I’d
care if they shot fire out of their dicks. Just saying.”

Akyra pointed a finger at Rayeley and smiled. “Got my eye on you, you little tramp.” She turned to Valarae, realizing her team sergeant wasn’t amused by all this. Akyra straightened her face. “Keep our soldiers on their game, Val. We have a shit-ton of work to do. Even if last night was just a random potshot at soldiers in uniform, I can’t imagine we’ll be in this part of town this time tomorrow.”

“You got it, sir.”

Akyra took a moment an examined Valarae’s expression. “You okay, Val?”

“You said it. Lots to do.”

“Indeed.” Akyra turned back to the team leaders, who were starting to slouch or lie on their backs in the warming sunshine. “Well, ladies. Probably the least productive meeting we’ve ever had, thank you. Don’t fuck anyone. Meeting adjourned.”

In accord with military tradition, everyone groaned and mumbled. Then with the grace of countless repetitions, they slid from the roof of the troop carrier to the dirt.

Facing Valarae, Akyra added, “Sorry about that. That one kinda got away from me.”

In their moment of privacy, Valarae finally smirked. “Bio-luminescent jizz?”

Akyra laughed. “I know, right?”

But Valarae’s smile vanished. “I don’t trust the Titans, captain. They’re not… like us.”

From below them, Clarx, who was always near his captain, doing his best not to eavesdrop—and failing miserably—stepped from the shadow of the massive troop carrier’s rear wheels. “Hey, Captain Roux?”

“What’s up, Clarx?”

“Sorry, I didn’t want to interrupt your meeting…” He almost laughed.

“Clarx, I said what’s up?”

“Right. Inbound message from Zebra. It’s encrypted.”

Akyra lifted her forearm to open up the messages folder on her tapper. “Yeah? Who from?” But she saw on the screen, which dimmed red, “HIGH LVL ENCRYPT INCOMING: BIN AR-DREZAR, R.O.”

Valarae stepped away having caught sight the color of the screen and looked to the ground. “Can I ask?”

Akyra nodded gravely. “Bin Ar-Drezar. I’ll let you know in a minute.”

Valarae stepped off the vehicle, landing soundlessly on the dirt three and a half meters below.