Angel 6.0 Episode I Concubine: Chapter 4

Dazed, and barely able to see past my tears, Carver led me through the hallways and access corridors towards the docking bay. The station was strangely silent. I assumed people must have returned to their cabins to rest after the ordeal I had put them through trying to escape the inescapable. We passed D’Anton’s personal lab and I caught a glimpse of him through the window. He stood in front of his desk, a brooding look on his face. Our eyes locked and his features flipped to rage.

I wished he wouldn’t be angry. There was nothing he could do to change my fate. No point in getting angry. But it warmed me inside to know that D’Anton cared enough to be upset. To most people on the station I was a thing. A thing to be watched. An object to be studied. An oddity to be wary of. A problem to be worried about. To D’Anton and Carver, I was a person.

I waved goodbye to D’Anton through the window, and tried to impart my wish for him to accept this, to be at peace. As he slammed into the door of his lab and rattled the handle, it struck me funny. Why would he still be locked inside?

If the Gran were gone …

Strange ideas began to seep into my dazed mind, and I slowed down. Carver pulled me along to the entrance of the docking bay. “We are running out of time, Angel.”

A crackling-burning noise drew my attention to the door of D’Anton’s lab. The man I considered a father and one of my only friends kicked through his door and stepped into the hallway with his plasma pistol in hand. He looked enraged beyond reason.

“Carver! Traitor to humanity! You’re giving away our most prized possession! She’s worth every drop of your imbecile blood. Don’t you dare take her to them!”

Carver yanked hard and pulled me into the docking bay doors. He immediately set the doors to lock out D’Anton in the hallway.

“What’s he saying? Why is he so angry?”

Carver looked at me with eyes full of desperation. I had never seen this look on his face. I knew then he was capable of things I had never thought he would do, to me, to anyone. This was not the man I loved. A sharp pain stung my left arm. Carver emptied a syringe of clear fluid into me.

“I don’t understand…” My tongue turned to a hunk of lead in my mouth and I lost the ability to speak. Heavy weights draped my entire body and my limbs grew numb. I could no longer hold my weight on my feet.

Carver caught me as I fell. His teary, intense, desperate eyes pierced my soul. “I’m so sorry, Angel. They’ll kill me if I don’t deliver you to them.”

He carried me cradled in his arms, as if he loved me. How could he do this if he loved me? My drug-hazed mind couldn’t piece together the meaning of it all.

He never looked away from my face as he carried me to the waiting shuttle. “We can make more of you, Angel. I promise to treat you better next time, you have my word. I’m not replaceable like you.”

Swimming through the thick gooey drugs, I finally understood what he was saying. An apology.

I heard their growls and yips as they stepped down off the shuttle craft. The Gran were waiting for me. Waiting for Carver to do whatever it took to survive. Humanity’s greatest asset as a species, and yet our greatest weakness.

The crackle-burn noise came from the docking bay doors and another smashing-kick sounded. My heart leapt, my father was coming to save me.

“Put her down or I’ll burn your face off.” D’Anton aimed his pistol at Carver’s head and approached.

The yip-growling noises of the Gran hit a sharp pitch. The partial translation floated in my mind. Stop him.

That electric whining sound buzzed and I caught flashes of light in my peripheral vision as three Warriors flew past me with their gauntlet blades activated. They surrounded D’Anton menacingly, and I knew there was no way he could shoot them all and survive. They were too strong, too fast, had too long a reach on him. They were trained Warriors, he was only a doctor.

The glowing light spun in a downward arc as one of the Cats severed D’Anton’s gun hand from his body. He looked down at the stump of his right forearm in shock. Strange gibbering noises issued from him as he cradled his bloody-roasted arm to his body.

He swayed on his feet as he looked up at me and Carver. “She is the untapped potential of the human genome. You’ve bartered our Angel for a moment of peace. How will you placate them the next time they come for their pound of flesh?”

Carver had no words for the doctor or me, and he could no longer look me in the eyes. I read it in his face, in everything about him – a deep shame. When he handed me off into the waiting arms of Captain Cronin, I understood that Carver could live with his shame. He was planning to make it up to the next generation Angel. I was Angelina 6.0. My fuzzy mind reached for a strange idea – had Carver been intimate with previous Angelina generations before me?

The truth hit me then. There were no hostages to exchange for my life. Listening to his lies, the lies he’d warned me of, I had given myself over to save the pathetic life of Carver Liddell.

The Captain hefted my limp weight in his arms. Numbed as I was, I could still feel the short, soft fur of his muscular arms and the sharp pinch of his claws digging into my leg and arm. His vertically slit eyes assessed me with an unmistakable look of satisfaction. He growled orders to his crew. “Kill them both.”

One of the three warriors surrounding D’Anton swiped his glowing hot gauntlet down the front of the doctor’s torso and cut him wide open. D’Anton fell to the floor screaming in agony. The warrior standing near Carver activated his gauntlet in mid swing. His blade lit up with white-hot energy and sliced all the way through Carver’s throat and out the other side.

Carver’s head flew through the air and rolled to a stop on the floor. His beautifully sculpted face stared at me with a look of surprise. He’d given up his chance of happiness with the woman he loved, and gained nothing in return.

I was so numb with paralysis from the drug, I could hardly sob as tears of grief streamed down my face. Though he’d lied and betrayed me to save himself, I could never stop loving him.

* * * *

I had no sense of time as I lay numb in the Captain’s arms, cradled close like a hard-won prize, a valuable new pet to be used and exploited. The shuttle docked with the Gran ship and I tasted strange scents and chemicals in the air. The Gran breathed the same oxygen-rich air we did, mostly, but their homeworld must have other trace elements in its atmosphere. The harsh reality hit me: I was trapped in an alien jumpship bound for the far reaches of the galaxy, to be bought and sold as property.

D’Anton had once explained that thousands of years ago, the Gran, in their cycle of evolution on their homeworld, had enslaved their primates and used them for hard labor, like trained monkeys. Their primates never evolved past a fraction of human intelligence. The Gran, much like the long-extinct large predator cats of Earth, were a dominant species, and had found ways to develop higher intelligence and use it against their primate competitors.

Fifty years ago, when the Gran encountered our first jumpship explorations across the galaxy and boarded our ships, they immediately recognized an advanced race of primates. To them, we were nothing more than high grade slaves to be put to work. Their attack on our solar system came quick and devastating. We fought them off for three decades, until the treaty was signed, and Nugene Corporation went into business servicing the treaty by supplying the human slaves the Gran wanted.

I had become the Gran’s newest model of high grade slave.

This was not my purpose in the universe. I was so much better. I deserved better. Cold anger flooded me with adrenaline. I could feel the numbness receding as my roaring metabolism burned away the effects of the drug. Tingling sensations ushered in a flame of fury that spread across my body.

I had known love, but it was taken from me. Now I knew only misery and a blazing hatred of the creatures that ruined my life.

Strength filled my limbs and I felt my knuckles crack as I balled up my fists. I let the fury consume me as my muscles and tendons vibrated with the adrenaline screaming through me. The Captain noticed me then, as I shoved my knee hard into his face. His head snapped back in a surprised yowl of pain and I leaped up out of his arms.

In the low G environment, I flew so high I bounced off the ceiling of the corridor. Falling through the air, I managed to align with another Warrior and smashed my right fist through his face. I landed on him and sent another fistful of rage across his bloodied lips.

A Warrior grabbed me from behind and I shoved up into him – the back of my head a battering ram to his face. As I fell back into his arms, I reached down between his legs, past the skirt of loose cloth hanging from his waist, and found a large, furry scrotum.

With all the strength of my hand I crushed Cat balls. He felt my fury in full measure. I gave him the pain of the loss of everyone I loved.

An unholy yowl sounded in my ear as he fell over and puked on the floor. I went down with him, crushed testicles grinding in my grip. He batted me off with the club swing of his arms and I flew into the Captain’s embrace.

We grappled and rolled and flipped over in a tumble of snarling fur and tearing claws. I screamed my fury into his face and head butted his nose three times. The satisfying crunch of broken bone put a smile on my busted lips. I sunk my hands around his muscular throat and squeezed the life out of him. I could feel gristle and tendons popping in the power of my grip. I was going to take his head off, like they’d taken the head of my lover.

His claws shredded my shoulders and backside until two other warriors wrestled me off the top of him. They held my arms pinned down against the floor. I kicked at them, but I could hardly move as they settled all their weight on me. A clawed foot came from somewhere and stomped my face into the floor. The hammering impact brought black unconsciousness and ended my struggles.