After a fight so brief it could hardly be dignified with the title of battle, the Andromeda Ascendant captured the pirate vessel Eureka Maru and brought her into one of the battleship's landing bays. Captain Tyr Anasazi stood by personally, curious to meet the captain brazen enough to attempt to outwit him.
His eyebrows rose in surprise when the hatch opened and a blond human woman in tight black leather stepped out, followed by a young human male, a purple female and a large human male who bore a startling resemblance to Dylan Hunt, a High Guard captain from the time of the Tactical Offensive.
"Crap, this was not exactly your best idea, Hunt," Harper grumbled as he looked warily at the Nietzschean captain. He really, really, really hated Nietzscheans, almost as much as he hated Magog. "You had to listen to his no guts, no glory spiel, hunh, Bek? Well, this ain't gonna be glorious, but I heard that Nietzscheans are partial to disemboweling human guts!"
Tucking himself deeper into his leather jacket, Harper resigned himself to a long and painful death. On the bright side he'd lived longer than most of his family, had made something of himself, had managed to live pretty well and had seen the galaxy. On the down side - he was about to die on a freakin' Nietzschean ship commanded by a seriously hot, albeit Nietzschean Alpha, stud.
Tyr observed the captain and her crew with interest. The woman and the large male, clearly her mate, were of acceptable stock. They might be of use in breeding slaves. The other two, however... He had no idea what the purple female might be, but she appeared inappropriately cheerful. And then there was the young man... small and scrawny by Nietzschean standards but still attractive. Perhaps he would keep them all alive.
"I am Captain Tyr Anasazi of the Nietzschean warship Andromeda Ascendant. And you are?"
Harper sneered. "Dead meat so who gives a fuck?" he spat, glaring at the Nietzschean.
"Harper, shut up!" Beka glared at her chief engineer. "I'm Captain Valentine of the Eureka Maru, and we're going to be missed if we don't report in, Nietzschean. You'd be smart to let us go," she continued in a controlled voice. Dylan moved to stand behind his captain, glowering at the captain of the Andromeda, quietly establishing himself as the Alpha of the Maru and Beka's mate.
"Report in. An interesting choice of words for a pirate," Tyr mused. "Who would you be reporting to that could possibly concern me?
"Ship, are there any other ships in the sector?"
A hologram of the ship's AI appeared, her eyes darting toward the man who so resembled her last High Guard captain before she responded. "Three, captain. All known members of our fleet."
"So, nothing of interest," Tyr dismissed, turning back to the crew of the Maru. "Now," staring at Harper unblinkingly, "who are you, and why do you assume you will die?"
"Rommie," Dylan gasped out quietly, only to have Beka shoot him a warning look.
"Gee, I wonder why I think I'm gonna die," Seamus sneered. "Oh wait, that's right, why kill a human when you can experiment on them, right, Nietzschean? You and your kind gonna stick another jack in on the opposite side of my neck so you can have me hack into some other pride's computer core? Oh wait, you're just gonna stick me in a slave camp and starve me. Been there, done both, would rather die, thanks."
Tyr glanced at the young man with interest. He had spirit. Perhaps he would make a worthy trophy. For the moment, however, he had other concerns. "Rommie?" he repeated, brown eyes fixed on the other man. "Just how is you know my ship's former name and look very much like Dylan Hunt?"
Hunt shrugged. "I am Dylan Hunt." Seeing the disbelief, he added, "Not that one, but he is a direct ancestor. The firstborn male of every generation in the direct line of descent is named after him."
The Nietzschean captain made a mental note of this odd event and resolved to delve further into it later on. For the moment, most of his attention was centered on the other man.
"You still haven't told me your name," he said in a near growl, nostrils flaring as he caught the younger man's scent. He ignored the rest of the human's comments as irrelevant.
Harper was not about to give the Nietzschean anything but trouble. To hell with Dylan and Beka, he was gonna die and he knew it. Let the others keep dreaming about ancient Commonwealths and reestablishing the High Guard and overthrowing their oppressors, he knew better.
Spitting on the floor in front of the towering Nietzschean demi-god, Seamus snarled. "I'd say bite me, but knowing your kind, you would, and I haven't had my rabies shots yet this year."
Tyr's eyebrows rose. Definitely worthy of his attention. Without breaking eye contact with the young man, he spoke to the men at attention behind him. "Take these three to the pens. Put the purple girl in a separate enclosure until we can establish what she is. Put the breeding pair in another. And take this one to my quarters. Make sure he cannot damage anything."
Ignoring the sputtering protests from the new slaves, he turned to leave, then paused, glancing back over his shoulder. "Since you choose not to use your own name, I shall call you Pet." With a teeth-baring smile, the captain was gone.
<>
Harper eyed the Nietzschean captain's quarters with the same fear he had the Nietzschean laboratory where he'd gotten his cyber implant. He was in deep, deep shit. Although it had almost been worth it all to watch the color drain from Captain Beka I'll-never-be-a-man's-broodmare Valentine's face. They were all in deep shit.
Licking his split lip, Seamus winced at the bruise that was forming. No Mr. Nice Nietzschean for his escort, or in his case Miss Nice Nietzschean. The female had backhanded him as soon as they'd entered the captain's quarters, sending him flying across the room. If it weren't for the fact that the big guy in charge seemed to want him alive, he was pretty sure he'd be dead now. Maybe she was the pairmate or whatever the hell they called a wife.
When Harper had finally come to, he was chained to the foot of a very large bed in a very Spartan bedroom. Typical. "These guys have absolutely no sense of style," he muttered, as he tasted the copper tang of blood on his tongue. "And even less of a sense of humor!"
"Neither style nor humor is required for survival," Tyr replied from where he sat at ease in a leather chair just out of Harper's view. Seeing the young man jerk in his restraints, he smiled slightly, though it was gone before he stepped forward to where his new toy could see him.
"Yes," he said contemplatively, "you'll do nicely." He pulled out a knife, slicing through the hideous green t-shirt and leaving the tattered halves hanging from the young man's arms. He decided that he liked the way the leather pants clung to his new pet's body, so those were removed more carefully.
"Hey, what the hell?!" Harper jerked back, feeling the knife slip and slice a shallow furrow along his skin. "Jesus, you think I'm gonna bend over for you, you fucked up sack of Magog shit, guess again!" Struggling desperately, Harper tried everything he could to get away, including kicking the captain straight in the groin. He was not doing this!
Tyr had stepped away from the blow so it did him no harm, and he stared down at the squirming, naked man. He'd forgotten the pleasure of taming a mate. As the alpha male of the Kodiak Pride, any Nietzschean female or male he turned his eye toward was eager to share his bed, the women in hopes of bearing a superior child, the men for the pleasure of being with the best male in the pride. This boy, this mere human, however, would have to be subdued and taken, and Tyr found himself looking forward to it.
"Yes, Pet, we are both going to enjoy this," he purred, the flat of the blade now trailing over the bound man's chest.
"Like hell we are!" Harper gasped, his skin shrinking back as far as it could from the blade. He'd survived before, from things like this, because he'd had no choice, had known no other life until Beka and Dylan had rescued him from the science lab he'd been kept at. But now, now he knew what life outside of a Nietzschean Pride holding was like, and he'd grown stronger, grown up and learned how to say no. There was no way he was going back to that person he once was.
"Get your fucking hands off me, you pathetic excuse for a sterile has-been," the young man shouted, hoping beyond hope that he'd drive the Nietzschean into a rage with his questioning Anasazi's right to be called Alpha, prompting the captain to kill him and put him out of his misery.
Tyr growled and backhanded the foul-mouthed human, splitting his lip again. "Careful, little Pet. My patience is not unlimited. Nor am I so brainless as to fail to realize that you'd prefer that I kill you. That's not going to happen, at least not tonight. I have other plans for you."
As he spoke, the Nietzschean captain was stripping off his clothes, baring the superb musculature to his captive's view. Ignoring the squirming and cursing, he sat comfortably on the side of the bed and drew one finger down the center of his pet's chest.
Harper whimpered softly and tried desperately to move away. Fighting the urge to panic, scream or beg for mercy proved almost too much for him. "Bastard," he whispered, knowing full well that there was no way to stop him. "Fine, go ahead and do your worst, but the minute you relax around me or turn your back, I will kill you for this."
Tyr laughed. "If you can kill me, I deserve to die." His fingers closed around the limp cock lying against the young man's thigh, slowly, knowingly, stroking it into unwilling arousal. He bent over, catching the mingled scents of fear, anger, and arousal. Unable to resist, he licked the tip of the cock he held in his fist, tasting the other man for the first time.
Harper groaned, fighting his arousal, willing his body into submission. He bit down hard on his bloody lip, causing himself pain. His fingers gouged into his palms, his knuckles white with strain. "You think you can make me enjoy rape, you've got another thing coming, bastard. And I will kill you, some how, some day I will. I swear!"
Tyr ignored the threats, having little interest in anything the human had to say. He was more concerned with arousing him to the point that he was begging to be fucked, since the Nietzschean found more pleasure when he had his partner's full participation. He didn't really care whether it was willing or not.
He now had his pet's cock in his mouth, sucking hard, tongue playing along the shaft, and his fingers scratched lightly at the portion still outside his mouth. His other hand plucked teasingly at the young man's nipples, tugging and twisting lightly.
Harper's fists beat uselessly on the mattress, his lip bloody and raw where he'd chewed it. No, oh god, no, please. I don't want this. I don't want to want him. Stop, please, oh please, stop, don't do this to me. I'll be good. I'll be a good boy, I promise!
Harper screamed silently as he was taken back to a time long gone, a time he thought he'd never live again, his body wrested from his control, driven by the imperatives that had been trained into him from an early age, the responses and the need. His cock hardened, his breathing became erratic, and his pulse thundered as his body was driven to the knife's edge of arousal.
Startled by the rapid submission and arousal, Tyr glanced up at his captive's face and frowned at what he saw. He realized that at some point his pet had been a Nietzschean slave and a well-trained one at that. How fortunate for him. He would have the human's full participation with only a little more effort.
Tyr licked his fingers then worked one into his pet, slowly pushing deeper then adding a second and flicking a fingertip over his prostate.
Throwing an arm over his eyes to hide the tears that streamed, Harper yielded to whatever the damned Nietzschean captain wanted to do to him. He'd survive this, he would! He had survived before - but he hadn't known what freedom was back then; he hadn't known.
Anasazi might not be goaded into killing him, but it didn't mean that Harper couldn't kill himself. All he had to do was wait until his captor was asleep and then... Nietzscheans always had weapons lying around - it was part of their breed. Harper moaned quietly as he felt his balls draw up and his cock release its heated liquid into the captain's mouth. Shivering and fighting not to sob, he lay there like a rag doll and waited for the next assault.
After drinking down the evidence of his pet's climax, Tyr sat up and shifted between the human's legs. He pressed against the ring of muscle, still lax from his fingers and the young man's own climax, and he slid inside easily. His fingers curled around the still semi-hard organ and started to stroke again in time with his thrusts inside his ass.
Knowing the kind of sexual training Nietzschean slaves received, Tyr was certain that he could arouse the human and bring him to at least one more climax before he himself came for the first time.
Whimpering, Harper bit down hard on his ravaged lip, trying not to make any noise, not to feel the pleasure coursing through him. Tears continued to seep from beneath his lashes as he was forced to relive the training that had marked years of his early life, that of a Nietzschean pleasure slave.
Please, god, please let this be over soon, let him leave me alone! he begged silently, his nails leaving wounded and raw crescents in the palms of his hands as his body once more roused and betrayed him with its instinctive need. Too soon tiny mewls of pleasure escaped against his will as his prostate was teased and his cock stroked to new life.
Tyr saw the blood start to drip from the young man's hands, and he reached down, uncurling the tightly clenched fists and interlacing his own fingers with the other man's. For some odd reason, he didn't like the idea of him hurting himself. Unable to kiss him since he knew his pet would bite him, he lowered his head to lick and suck at the rigid pink nipples while his belly rubbed against the now untouched cock with every stroke into him.
"No," Harper finally whispered, his head thrashing madly about, "nonononononononononononononoNOOOO!" Screaming as his body convulsed and his cock spat another round of semen between their writhing bodies, the young man lost all control, trying to flail and rip his arms free of the Nietzschean captain, trying to deny the pleasure that ripped through his body and heated his blood.
Feeling the young man come again, Tyr found a bit of mercy in himself and allowed the rippling convulsions to make him come as well, driving deeper one last time as his seed spilled uselessly inside the man. Done, the Nietzschean stood up, checking that his pet's arms and legs were securely restrained, finally seeing the slave mark on the back of his hand that he had managed to keep hidden earlier.
"Sleep now," he said quietly. "Much as you might wish otherwise, you are in Nietzschean hands once again, and you will need the energy sleep will give you."
He turned away to dress again, then left the quarters to see to ship's business. As he left, he paused by the door. "Ship, keep an eye on him and talk to him if he will."
Harper curled into a fetal position and finally gave in to his pain. He was so tired, and he hurt inside, in his heart. "I wish, I wish you'd just killed me. At least that way I wouldn't hate myself," he whimpered as he at last gave vent to his tears and sobbed himself to sleep.
<>
Tyr returned to his quarters several hours later, immediately checking on the young human. He was somewhat surprised by the strength of his relief when he saw him curled up on the bed asleep. Rather than taking him again, the Nietzschean moved past him, letting him sleep. He would let the human have the bed for this night instead of moving him. He himself could sleep in his chair.
He settled into the chair, arms crossed, and closed his eyes, falling asleep almost instantly.
Harper's eyes opened slowly, and he silently slithered farther away from the chair and the big Nietzschean asleep there. There was no way in hell he'd willingly let that... thing near him again, not that he was given much choice in the matter. He needed to get out of here and rescue Bekka, Dylan and Trance. He'd figure it out somehow.
Maybe the ship would help; it used to be High Guard; it used to serve Dylan's ancestor; maybe it would turn a blind sensor to their escape or something... what would it hurt to ask? But only when the captain wasn't in hearing range and so fucking huge and threatening. Harper closed his eyes and regulated his breathing, pretending to sleep as he let his smarter than average brain run through scenarios and escape plans. He was gonna get away from here if it was the last thing he did.
Tyr's eyes opened to watch the young man, having awoken as soon as he moved. Deciding that allowing Pet to get away with something on the first night would set a bad precedent, he stood up, removed his clothes and climbed into the bed. He pulled Pet against him, holding him tightly while making sure no part of him was in range of the younger man's teeth.
Harper whimpered quietly and went stiff; he could feel the huge man against him, covering him, and he began to shiver with fear. It was like the camps all over again. If he didn't get out of here soon he'd go mad; he'd lose himself and all he'd worked for, the person he'd made himself into.
Unable to help himself, the terrified young man let one word escape his tightly clenched lips, his voice quivering and dark with barely leashed emotions. "Why??"
Tyr found himself answering honestly, giving a reply he hadn't even formulated to himself. "Because I wanted you. Something about you drew me as no one else ever has. I couldn't see you and not want you. You can thank that for the lives of your shipmates."
A single tear tracked down the young man's pale and shivering cheek. "I would rather you have killed me."
"That wasn't an option." Tyr's arms tightened around Pet as if to prevent his escape. "I can imagine what your life was like last time, but it's not the same now. You are mine only. I'll kill anyone who touches you."
"And that's supposed to make me feel better?" Harper choked, an almost hysterical laugh escaping. "I was free for the first time in my life. I was something better than a slave, and you've taken that away from me. I'll hate you to the day I die."
Tyr shrugged. "That's your choice. The only person you will hurt is yourself."
Harper went rigid in the Nietzschean's arms, trying to forget where he was and who he was with. His damned body began to betray him as the captain's arm spikes caressed the skin of his belly lightly where they held him. He remembered what they felt like, how he'd come to enjoy the sharp, pained pleasure they could bring. No, dammit, he wasn't going to do this again.
"Too late, you bastard, you did that when you raped me instead of killed me. Not that you give a damn; you Nietzscheans are all the same, murderers, rapists and slavers. You fit the bill on all three."
Tyr's patience had finally come to an end. "We are survivors. We survive because we are the strongest and fittest. And as such, we reap the spoils. Be careful, little pet, or you'll find yourself back in the breeding pens. The fact that you were trained in the first place and the jack on the side of your neck say that there is something worthy in you."
Harper's jaw slammed shut, and his body quivered with repressed rage. Arrogant bastard! his mind screamed as he thought over his options. There was one... "In that case you might as well kill me now and get it over with. Your experiments left me sterile. Can't procreate to make you more little slaves to jack and fuck and enslave. Sorry, you lose."
"That leaves you with exactly two options: me or sex slave to anyone who wants you. And for the moment, the choice is mine, not yours. You stay here." Wide-awake now, Tyr rolled them over so that Pet was on his belly and Tyr lay over him. He reached down, finding the human still relatively loose from their encounter earlier, and pressed inside him.
Groaning, Harper bit down on the sheet underneath him, his hands gripping the sheets as he forced his body to go limp. Not again, he wasn't going to give the bastard the satisfaction again. Anasazi might be able to take him, but Harper was damned if he'd enjoy it!
Annoyed by Pet's attempts to pretend this wasn't happening, Tyr shoved a pillow under his belly, raising him and giving the Nietzschean access to his cock. He stroked the firming length, equally determined to make him participate.
Whimpering as he fought the response that was threatening to emerge, Harper bucked up and back, trying to unbalance the bigger man and throw him off, but only succeeded in burying Tyr's cock further into his ass so that it slammed into his prostate. "Oh GOD!" he wailed unexpectedly.
Tyr growled in his arousal, teeth closing lightly over the nape of Pet's neck. His hips drove him in and out of the other man rapidly, and one arm wrapped around his middle, spikes brushing against his belly while his hand pumped his cock. "Yess," he growled, "like that."
Whining, Harper thrust his hips up and backward then forward, impaling himself between hand and cock, feeling the spikes scrape across his belly adding to his pleasure. Mindlessly he thrust and whined and mewled his need, his baser needs usurping his normally rational and highly intelligent mind, making him a slave to the needs that had been trained into him.
Gasping, the Nietzschean captain rode his pet, loving every moment of his eager response. He drove into him harder and harder, taking him, feeling Pet's body cling to him, not wanting to let him go. His fingers teased the other man's cock, seeking to arouse him further.
It was too much for the young man to take. After a day full of fear, emotional upheaval, terror, hate, anger and sex, his senses were on overload. With an almost strangulated mewl of bliss, Harper climaxed and slipped into unconsciousness as his body was forced beyond what it had been used to for years.
Once again Pet's convulsions milked the Nietzschean's climax from him. He was startled to find the younger man had passed out from the intensity of his climax. He settled them both on their sides, and he fell asleep with an arm thrown possessively over the young man.
<>
Harper woke up, what felt like days later, to yet another 'new' home. "Where... where am I?" he groaned.
Gentle hands held a glass of water to his lips and let him drink his fill. "You're in InSidious Pleasure, a brothel on Kyros 14," the man who held him gently replied quietly. "You're Harper, aren't you? Seamus Harper. You're my sister's chief engineer," Rafe Valentine said quietly as he picked up the sponge he'd discarded when the younger man had begun to stir and continued to clean the week old semen from his body.
"You poor kid, what happened to you?"
"You're Rafe, really?" Harper turned wide, terrified eyes to the older man, praying this wasn't a dream. Seeing the face he'd seen in Beka's pictures, Harper at last allowed himself to relax. "How'd I get here? Last thing I remember was," Harper choked, "was me... servicing Captain Anasazi. He got a call; one of his wives had just had another brat, and he had to return to Kodiak Pride to acknowledge it as his. He left me alone, on that damned ship, and then this woman - she really hates me - came in, and then I woke up here."
"You were sold by a Nietzschean woman who claimed you no longer pleased her as a pleasure slave. Uncle Sid bought you, and I recognized you from the vids Bek sent us. Is she... is she dead?" Rafe whispered, his eyes gone dark with pain.
"Last I knew she, Dylan and Trance were in the Andromeda Ascendant's breeding pens on a lower level. Dylan recognized his ancestor's ship and wanted to reclaim it, so he talked Bek into mounting an assault. We got captured and... I got claimed by the captain while they got sent down to the pens. Oh god, we gotta rescue them somehow!"
"You gotta get better first, kid. You took one hell of a beating at the hands of those Nietzscheans. You're damn lucky you're only bruised and not broken. You may have a cracked rib or two, and you... you've been sexually assaulted recently. Just get better first, okay? Heal and then we'll worry about getting my sister out of there."
<>
Tyr Anasazi returned to his ship with a sense of relief. His wife had presented him with twins, a boy and a girl, which ensured her high status in the pride and made him even more sought after. He'd lost count of how many women he'd bedded while home. Being back on the Andromeda, where only the most junior of his wives, Freya, served, would allow him to relax. He looked forward to spending some time with his human pet as well.
Entering his quarters almost eagerly, he halted abruptly when he found them vacant and feeling as if they'd been unoccupied since his own departure.
"Ship!"
The hologram of the Andromeda's avatar flickered into existence directly in front him, with an inquisitive expression on her face. "Captain?"
"Where is the human male I left here?" he growled.
"Freya sold him to a brothel within hours of your departure."
Tyr gaped at the hologram in disbelief, his eyes narrowing into a ferocious expression. "Communications," he barked. "Freya! My quarters, now."
The Nietzschean captain stood, arms crossed, waiting, until his wife arrived. "Explain yourself."
"I am your wife, and I am not yet pregnant, yet you waste your seed on that human sport. I removed him." Freya glared back, clearly insulted.
"You deny the right of an Alpha to take a sex slave?" Tyr couldn't quite believe what he heard. "You are no longer my wife. Remove yourself from my ship." That easily he dismissed her from his life and turned back to the waiting hologram.
"Ship, do you know where Pet was left?"
"Yes, sir." Both ignored the furious utterances of the Nietzschean female and her eventual departure.
"Then set a course. I want him back." Tyr sat down to wait until they arrived at their destination and he could reclaim the oddly compelling human.
<>
Harper woke with a pair of strange human arms around his waist and come on his belly from a wet dream. A wet dream about a certain Nietzschean captain he pretended didn't exist in his waking thoughts, unless of course he was plotting to kill the bastard and save his crewmates.
Slipping out from beneath the arm pinning him, Harper looked at his latest bedmate. Dark skinned with long hair and a beard, above average height for a human and a disturbingly similar look to that of... shit! Hastily pulling on his clothes, Harper sneaked out of the room. Sid would take care of Harper's fee minus his own cut.
"Seamus, why do you insist on working?"
Rafe was standing in the hallway waiting. "You're Beka's engineer, and you're family. You don't have to..."
"Prostitute myself?" Harper replied derisively. "Why not, that's what I was trained to be - a Nietzschean whore. Besides, that bastard captain reawakened... my conditioning. I need sex now, whether I want it or not," Harper admitted with disturbing honesty.
"Dylan and Beka got me through the withdrawal I felt last time - but it took a long time to get over the craving. He," the young man spat, "didn't give me any choice. He just took me and...
"Did you know I was celibate on the Maru?" Harper suddenly told his friend. "I had to be. If I'd engaged in sexual activity with anyone, even a woman, it would have reawakened the conditioning. I was made to be a sex slave, Rafe. It's how they controlled me when they needed me to jack into things, hack into computers, design weapons or new bombs and toys for them. They withheld the physical contact. I need sex like your uncle's junkies need their Flash hit.
"So why do I prostitute myself now? Your uncle lets me choose my partners, lets me keep 70% of the profits and takes care of me. Fair trade to feed my addiction, don't you think?"
"Harper I'm..." Rafe began helplessly, only to hug the smaller man tightly then let him go. "Go back to your room, eat, wash, get some rest. When you're ready, we'll talk about how we're gonna rescue Bek and the others, okay?" the older Valentine continued gently.
"Rafe," Harper's eyes misted. Complete and total acceptance of what he was, of what he'd been, of his faults and addictions. "You Valentines - you're something special. Thanks. Thanks for being my friend."
<>
Tyr looked around with faintly veiled distaste. This brothel appealed to his fellow Nietzscheans as well as humans? It was disgusting, overblown and decadent. The thought of his Pet here enraged him. If he could hunt down every person who had touched him and rend them limb from limb, he would. Freya had gotten off lightly.
The only comfort was that at least Pet wouldn't have suffered. The Nietzschean knew how he would crave sex now that his conditioning had been reawakened. Under normal circumstances, he would have provided it, but these were far from normal. He'd arranged to have one of the human women brought to Pet once a day while he was away, but Freya's actions had made that moot.
The arrival of a middle-aged human male focused his attention. "You have something that belongs to me."
Sid eyed the Nietzschean warily. Thanks to what Harper had told him directly and what he'd learned through Rafe, he knew who he had to be. It didn't hurt that he bore a striking resemblance to nearly every client Harper had chosen. "Could you be more specific?" he asked, stalling.
"My former wife sold you a slave that did not belong to her. Human, young, early 20s, blond, blue-eyed...mine. I want him back."
<>
Harper sat on the lap of his latest customer in the music room of the brothel, listening to one of the bands play what passed as music while the man he'd chosen for the night finished conducting his business. A Flash peddler talking to a client, but who was Seamus to judge the man, he was a Nietzschean whore.
The hand that idly stroked his hair and back was soothing, and gently, it lulled Harper nicely, making him relax and feel almost happy for the first time since Dylan got his wild idea to save his ancestor's ship from Nietzschean tyranny. That was until Rafe raced into the room. "Harper, run!" he bellowed just as Sid was practically thrown into the room through another entrance, followed by a very irate and pissed off Nietzschean captain in full battle dress.
"Oh shit!" Harper was off the Flash peddler's lap and weaving through people, picking up speed as he bolted. Sliding through the door, he pounded up the stairs to his room, stopping long enough to grab his jacket, and then he was scrabbling out the window and climbing down the drainpipe.
Pausing only long enough to pick up the human who'd dared to touch his pet and hurl him full force into the nearest wall, Tyr charged after his human, going through anyone and anything that got in his way. He reached the room in time to see Pet lunge through the window, and when he reached it, Pet was already more than halfway to the ground. Tyr simply jumped out the window, muscles engineered to handle much heavier gravities easily absorbing the shock. He reached the ground ahead of his human and simply plucked him off the pipe when he came within reach and carted him away over his shoulder.
Ignoring the thrashing and cursing man over his shoulder, though he did smack his ass sharply when he kicked Tyr in the chest, the Nietzschean glanced back at the owner of the brothel, who watched from the open front door. "If you call me tomorrow, I will see that you are reimbursed what you paid for him."
"No, let me go, damn you to hell! I'm free, I'm a free man!" Harper screamed, beating his fists uselessly against the Nietzschean's back. He could barely draw a breath; he was terrified beyond belief and totally confused. Why had Anasazi come after him? It was counterproductive, and no human was worth the effort that the captain had expended to track him down and recapture him.
Rafe watched from the door where Sid was holding him back, his eyes burning in unholy anger. He'd find a way to rescue Harper and his sister. There was no way he was going to let the troubled and vulnerable young man live in that kind of hellish slavery, not for long. "I'll get you out, Seamus, I promise," he croaked.
Tyr carried Pet back to the shuttle in silence, strapped him in and flew them back to the Andromeda. Once there, he stood, unstrapped the young human and stepped toward the hatch. "Will you come under your own power, or shall I carry you the rest of the way?" he asked, a growl clear in his tone. The Nietzschean was not happy.
Harper shivered where he sat, deathly afraid of the Nietzschean without knowing why. When the larger man made to move towards him, he shot out of his chair and pressed himself as far into the shuttle wall as he could, cringing. His eyes, large enough to swallow his face, and his pinched and white lips were the only outward evidence he gave of just how close to losing control he was. He felt like a trapped animal, and he hated the feeling.
The captain's expression tightened at the blatant fear the human was displaying. He'd gone out of his way to avoid hurting his pet, and still he feared him. A growl forced its way from his throat, and the young man tried to back away still more. A thought suddenly struck him.
"If you fear that Freya might do anything else, there is no need. She is no longer aboard the Andromeda. In fact, I have returned her to her own pride."
Harper swallowed visibly, trying desperately to get himself under control. Thing was, the Nietzschean was displaying all the signs of a master - Harper's master. And Harper didn't want to go back to being that... creature he'd been before he'd been rescued and given his freedom.
"Your bitch can rot and die for all I care; the only good thing about her was she gave me my freedom, even if she didn't think she was. I don't belong to you, dammit; you can't make me do this!"
His patience at an end, Tyr moved faster than any human could and grabbed the other man. "In fact, you do belong to me. Freya ignored that fact, and she is no longer my wife." Once again hefting the struggling human over his shoulder, Tyr strode toward his quarters, planning to prove his ownership until the human could no longer deny it. And this time, Pet's only relief would come from him.
As soon as Harper's ass hit the bed, he was off it and on the other side, his hand going into the sleeve of his jacket and pulling out a lethal looking shiv. This time he wouldn't go down without a fight. He wasn't going to be any man's fuck toy unless he was the one doing the choosing.
"I had a different lover every night who could argue the fact with you," he goaded, "and I enjoyed it. The way their human hands touched me and made me beg - because I wanted to, I wasn't forced to. You'll never be able to do that to me - you'll have to force me every time - that's if you can take me!"
Harper ignored the almost silent voice of his subconscious telling him that the Nietzschean had already claimed him, that he'd already given in to the captain. It tried to remind him that all his chosen partners had looked or acted like the Kodiak, but he ruthlessly pushed the voice aside. He wouldn't, he couldn't listen, or he'd fall back into being that person he never wanted to be again - owned, controlled, used.
Unfortunately for the human, the Nietzschean could very easily imagine that scene, picture man after man taking his pet. His control snapped, and it was an enraged Alpha who pounced on the young man, contemptuously batting away the knife and twisting so that they ended up on the bed again. Tyr literally ripped Pet's clothes off him, holding him down with one hand while he reached for the lubricant with the other. When he reached down to prepare his slave and found him already slicked, another angrier growl escaped him.
He slammed into the human, taking him fiercely.
Harper screamed with pleasured pain as Tyr claimed him again. His whole body, which had been on the knife's edge of arousal all night due to his trying to slowly wean himself of his addiction, sang to life with a vengeance and demanded that the need it had be slaked.
Moaning gutturally as his body was invaded, violated, driven up and over its normal levels of arousal as his alpha claimed him, Harper couldn't feel his barely healed ribs crack once more; all he could feel was the gentle abrasion of the sheets as they rubbed his dripping cock, the rough glide of the huge cock in his ass, ramming into his prostate over and over, the sharp teeth of the Nietzschean as he bit hard at Harper's nape. Hands fisting into the sheets, Harper's screams turned into mewls of bliss then croaks as his voice gave out due to the longevity of the Nietzschean's claiming.
Only when the human was barely conscious and hanging limply, supported only by his grip and his cock in his ass, did Tyr allow himself to come as well. Feeling that his pet was well claimed, he slumped down, settling over the human to feel his full length against himself. The cry of pain startled him and made him twist to the side.
"What?"
"Hurts," Harper whimpered, his exhaustion making his responses sluggish and uncoordinated as he gingerly wrapped his arms around his abused ribs, curling into a fetal position to protect them from any further abuse.
Frowning suspiciously, Tyr reached for him, pressing lightly on his ribs. Pet's reaction told him instantly that his ribs were broken or, at the very least, cracked. Now, calmer, he inspected the young man carefully, seeing the signs of a beating. "What happened to you?"
"Like you actually care," Harper laughed bitterly. "Why would you? Just leave me alone. You've 'claimed' me again; I smell like you now. Just leave me alone, please?" he begged quietly, hoping that the captain would grant his request and not use him again until he'd had chance to heal once more.
Tyr gripped his chin and forced him to meet his eyes. "What. Happened. To. You?" He enunciated each word slowly and carefully, making it clear that neither of them was going anywhere until the other man answered the question.
"Freya," Harper spat then his eyes rolled up into his head as the fear, the pain, and the complete exhaustion from being fucked into oblivion caught up with him, and he passed out cold.
Though Tyr had suspected it from the moment he'd realized that Pet had been injured, to hear it confirmed sent a chill of rage to curdle his stomach. If Freya had still been in reach, he would have killed her with his bare hands. As it was, all he could do was vow to protect the young man and prevent anything like that from ever happening again. It never occurred to him to wonder why it mattered so much to him.
He arranged Pet carefully, spooning up behind him and draping his arm over the young man's hip, making sure not to put any pressure on the injured ribs. He drew the covers over them both, knowing the other man would need the warmth, and fell asleep.
<>
Harper woke up over 24 hours later, rested but sore, and found himself, surprisingly enough, alone and free. Sitting up gingerly, he ran a hand through his hair then wrinkled his nose at the smell of stale sex that emanated from him.
Knowing better than to move or the captain might end up being pissed, Harper cleared his throat and, feeling a little foolish about speaking into thin air, called out. "Umm, Andromeda?"
The hologram appeared in front of him. "You look better. And thanks to the nanobots, you're completely healed. Would you like something to eat?" She glanced away momentarily. "The captain is on his way, but you should have time for a shower before he gets here, if you like."
Harper bolted out of bed, not caring that he was naked. "Oh shit, did you tell him I was awake? Oh god, I don't, I mean, Jesus!" Diving into the bathroom, Harper threw himself under the shower and quickly scrubbed himself raw, until at last he felt he was clean enough to come out.
Bolting out of the shower and ignoring the hologram for the moment, Harper looked around, muttering under his breath. "Clothes, need clothes, where can I find clothes?"
Tyr arrived as he was frantically rummaging around the room, and the captain had to smile at the sight. "In the closet and the bottom two drawers. I think you'll be able to tell which are yours and which are mine."
Rommie spoke up finally. "Of course I told him you were awake. He left orders that I do so, and he is the captain."
Harper spared a glare at the AI as he dove back under the covers, trying to cover himself up from the appreciative eyes of the captain. "Do you mind?" he snarled. "It's bad enough you have to do... that to me; do you have to ogle me too?"
Shaking his head at the oddities of humans - after all, he'd fucked the other man and now he was concerned about showing his naked body? - Tyr returned to the outer room. "Hurry up, Pet. I'm hungry, and you need food."
Rommie watched Harper. "You know, if you want him to stop calling you that, you're going to have to tell him your name, Harper. He won't ask again."
"Why would I want to do that?" Harper groused as he reemerged from beneath the covers and grabbed a pair of pants, leather of course, and some weird mesh muscle shirt, almost like a cloth version of Tyr's chain mail.
"Because I can see you react every time he calls you Pet. But by your public refusal to tell him your name, you've made it impossible for him to ask anyone else. You have to tell him."
"How long does it take to dress?" The irritated yell came from the outer room.
"I hate being called 'Pet', I really do," Harper groused as he looked down at what he was wearing. "And I look like a Nietzschean fucktoy." Sighing, the young man walked out into the outer room.
With a dejected sigh Harper slunk over to the table where the captain sat and slouched down onto the chair across from the huge man. "Okay, I'm here, now what?"
"Now you eat. Even with nanobots, much of the healing still has to come from you. You need the energy." Tyr showed every likelihood of feeding the younger man if he didn't eat on his own.
His eyes ran over the clothes approvingly, admiring how they displayed Pet's body. It was unfortunate that he would have to be extremely careful of him for a few days until his ribs were fully healed.
"Do you like going around bullying people?" Harper groused as he picked up a fork and began to move the food around the plate. "What if I'm not hungry and don't want to eat? You gonna hold me down and force the stuff down my throat?"
"If necessary." The Nietzschean regarded him serenely before picking up his own fork and digging in. No Nietzschean would ever turn down food, not knowing where he might find his next meal.
"You need it, and you will have it, Pet."
"Harper," the young man whispered sullenly.
Eyebrows rising in surprise, Tyr stared for a moment. He'd begun to wonder if the human would ever relent on this point. Remembering that the ship's avatar had been in the room when he left, he realized she must have said something.
"You need it, and you will have it, Harper."
"What I need are my friends and my freedom; will I ever have that?" Harper asked, looking directly at the Nietzschean with world-weary eyes, already knowing the answer.
"Never mind, stupid question. I'm your 'pet'." Lowering his eyes to his plate, Harper began to half-heartedly eat a few bites of what was set out before him.
Tyr sighed. He wasn't ready to confront any of these issues. "I'm sorry," he offered, one of the few times in his life he'd ever said those words, though Harper couldn't know that.
Harper said nothing, just continued to eat small bites of food, forcing himself to swallow until he was sure if he ate another bite he'd bring it all back up. It was hard to eat when your throat was closed from tears that refused to be shed.
Pushing himself away from the table, Harper didn't even look at the older man. "I'm tired now." Walking into the bedroom, he lay at the foot of the bed, his place in his master's home, and tried to let the numbness that had helped him survive in the past freeze over his aching heart.
Frowning, Tyr followed Harper into the bedroom and sat down beside him. He placed one hand on his shoulder, trying to ignore the way he flinched away. Not knowing what to do, he stood up and left.
Once in the outer room, he spoke to Andromeda again. "Try
to talk to him. And bring the purple girl to keep him company. From what
I've seen of her, no human could remain depressed in her company." Shaking
his head, Tyr returned to the bridge.