Alien Invader’s Prey Read online

The huge, fallen dish is still hiding me from that giant of an alien. But it won’t hide me forever. Or even for much longer.

  I look at the dead Forcie. If those well-trained soldiers can’t protect us from the aliens, then I’m sure I can’t. But I’m not going to be massacred without a fight. No chance.

  The screeching noises are still coming intermittently, and there are the occasional bangs still. There must be one or two of our guys still alive and fighting on the other side of the dome. For all I know, they might be winning. There might in fact not be that many aliens left.

  I grab the butt of the dead Forcie’s long gun and pull at it, lifting it clear of his exposed neck.

  It’s big, but I drag it across the sand, hoping that the sound of it scraping along the sand doesn’t travel.

  I take the gun in my hands. Mars has much lower gravity than Earth. Back home, I’d have trouble lifting this thing. Here, I can feel its large mass, but it’s not heavy.

  I wonder if it’s loaded.

  There’s some text etched into its side. Hopefully, they are instructions in how to use it.

  OERLIKON CONTRAVES S20 GPZ Space Cannon 20x128 mm

  Nope. Not even an arrow with “push here to check if loaded” or anything.

  I raise my head once more, as slowly as I’m able.

  The alien is still there. God, he has huge muscles. He’s blue all over, too. A metallic blue that creates a dizzying contrast against all the red here on Mars. His torso is bare, unless that blue is a skin-tight suit of some kind.

  He is gigantic. A gigantic blue alien.

  A gigantic blue target.

  I can’t lift the gun over the edge of the dish, so I poke it through the latticework of metal around what used to be its base. I let the barrel rest on a steel bar.

  Now I can aim.

  But first I have to see what exactly I’m aiming at.

  He’s humanoid, definitely. Two long legs that bulge with power. Two immensely strong arms with sinews and muscles like thick ropes. A head with black fins or strakes instead of hair.

  He’s wearing pants that look more like shorts. They end right above his knees. He’s not even wearing boots. He’s walking barefoot on Mars.

  The dome is twenty feet tall. He’s not much less than half that. In other words, he’s a giant.

  I adjust my aim so the gun isn’t pointing at him. He’s done nothing to harm me. Yet.

  His head whips around, and suddenly I’m looking right into the most beautiful face I’ve ever seen. It’s not quite human. It’s too large for that. But the proportions are just so perfect, the word ‘perfect’ doesn’t do him justice. This is a perfect specimen. Blue or not, huge or not — this is perfect. Beyond perfect. This is beauty on a different scale than anyone on plain old Earth has ever seen. He has the exquisite, perfectly adapted beauty of an apex predator. The menace and deadly danger he radiates just makes him more irresistible. He is a predator in the real sense of the word, the tiger-kills-antelope-on-the-savanna sense.

  The way he’s looking right at me, it’s clear that I’m his prey. And for one heartbeat, I don’t mind that one little bit.

  Despite my fear, despite my preparations to shoot this alien, despite the firefight taking place nearby, my instinctive terror is overcome by the awe and the attraction of that obviously male alien. My stomach gets that surge that you feel whenever you see an achingly attractive person, one you just have to get close to whatever the cost, except many times amplified. I find myself gasping for air at the sheer attraction I feel for him.

  Then he moves, and it shakes me out of my trance. He comes walking with long strides. He’s looking straight at me, and his eyes have a strange light in them, as if they are on fire.

  There’s suddenly silence. The painful noise has stopped and is not starting again. Our Forcies aren’t shooting anymore. And the usual howl from the constant wind blowing through the steel spars of the antenna has been silenced. It has never been this quiet on Mars.

  I don’t mean to. I swear I would never fire a gun at someone, even an alien whom I think might be coming to hurt me.

  But my hands are sweaty. I’m shaking like a leaf. That giant of an invader is right there. His eyes are sparkling at me in a way that has to be threatening.

  And somehow, my finger slips and I pull the trigger.

  - - -

  I wake up maybe a couple of seconds later. The echoes of the bang are still reverberating from the domes around us, and my ears are ringing.

  The gun is on the ground, and so am I. Flat on my back on something that feels sharp and painful at my lower back and butt. The air smells of fireworks again, just stronger. My shoulder hurts and my hands hurt.

  The kick from that gun knocked me out cold.

  I scramble to my feet, then cry out at the pain in my lower back. I fell onto part of the collapsed comms tower, and a broken steel wire pierced me.

  But I immediately forget my pain. Because the alien is right in front of me, and this time there’s no dish between us.

  He’s not looking at me. He’s looking at his shoulder, where there’s a small red patch.

  He swipes one large, blue finger across it and holds it up, frowning at it. There’s a little bit of deep red fluid at the end of it.

  Looks like I hit him.

  He calmly looks down at the gun on the ground, then focuses on me. His eyes shoot flames, and I feel a strong urge to cower.

  No. I feel a strong urge to run. The fear is instinctive.

  I spin around and sprint away as fast as I can. I don’t care which direction, as long as it is away from the alien. I aim for the horizon and try to not care too much about the stabbing pain in my back and the upper part of my butt. That frayed steel wire was long enough to have penetrated into the muscle.

  But I can’t think about that now. I have to run. And I run as fast as I can in this low gravity. My steps are longer, but my gait is weird because it takes me so long to land with each step.

  Yeah. Like an antelope running from a tiger on the savanna.

  He’s running, too. I can hear his soft steps behind me on the Martian gravel. Slow steps, but he’s coming closer very, very fast.

  He’s the tiger. He’s the predator.

  Any second now he will pounce on me.

  I speed up even more, feeling the piercing pain in my butt with each long step.

  I’m the antelope.

  I am prey.

  3

  - Brox -

  The human female runs. She runs! From me!

  She has to know it’s hopeless. A total waste of effort. Even if I am wounded. She’s so much smaller than me, her legs shorter than mine. And she’s running straight for those distant hills, away from the settlement. If there were any traps she was expecting to trigger, they wouldn’t be out there, away from the alien structures.

  No, she’s running from instinct. And I can enjoy the hunt.

  Her shape is strange. She’s small, certainly. But her proportions are good. So feminine, I don’t need to confirm that this is in fact a female. She obviously is. Those hips that make her running less efficient than if they were narrower. That full chest that I got a glimpse at before she turned and ran. That soft-looking face with those big eyes. Yes, this is a mammal so female it’s almost a caricature.

  Her movements are desperate as she tries to flee in this low gravity, which I can see she’s not adapted to. No, she comes from another world, or she would be taller and lighter than this. Still, there’s an elegance to her that makes me to chase her a little slower than I otherwise would. I enjoy this chase. It’s so rare that I’m able to indulge in something like this.

  I can’t get over how feminine she is. I feel the first twitches at my crotch. She may be small. But she’s a sentient female of the standard configuration. And I’m a larger male. I can do with her whatever I want.

  Usually, on the rare occasion when I confront a female sentient in a war or anywhere else, they just cower. And that takes all the
joy out of it. I usually don’t even bother.

  But this one is running. First she shoots me. Then she runs.

  She might be spirited. She might give me resistance.

  My crotch twitches hard at the prospect.

  I reach out with one hand and grab her upper arm, making her spin around and trip. I hold her upright and lift her off her little feet, stopping her progress.

  Then I’m looking at her face. Her skin is pale and her eyes big and dark. Her breath is quick and panicked as she looks up at me with a fetching red tone on her cheeks. The classic prey behavior is so strong that I can feel my ancient inner being come to life with an urge to bite her throat out, but I force it down. This is not prey to be eaten. This is prey to enjoy in other ways.

  She has no disfiguring strangeness to her, except the head, which is covered by dark strands, extremely thin and fine. There must be tens of thousands of them, like a strange, alien fur. It’s very thick.

  “Lemee goh, yoo mahnster!” She makes adorable, thin noises with her mouth. With her free hand the human female bangs at my chest, making a little fist. Yes, indeed she is spirited, this one.

  But business first. I take the official marker strip out of my pocket and attach it around her neck, marking her as the Trophy. A little light on the strip flashes in orange as it identifies this object as a human female, alive and in working order. Then the light turns to a steady red. My Trophy is Approved and First, as deemed by the referee.

  Bleep and I have won this Match against the Glup. First to land and invade, First to secure a trophy.

  Technically, I can now let this Trophy go to meet whatever alien fate awaits her. But I’m bothered by the possibility of the referee being bribed again. This is a new referee, of course. But I want him to know that I’m watching very carefully. I want him to see that the strip is still on the Trophy for a good while after the Match has been settled. I’m taking no chances here.

  And of course, I intend to make use of my privileges with this Trophy.

  She’s kicking me now, writhing and sprattling like a newly caught sics in a net. Except this prey is warm, radiating heat from all over her.

  She smells wonderful. Fear and anger and sweat from her run. The scent of prey.

  And… yes, that can’t be anything else. There’s arousal in her.

  My crotch is now swelling so much, I fear my roomy pants might rip.

  This is truly a great day. Both victory and conquest.

  I slide one finger between the marker strip and the Trophy’s neck and lead her back to the ship.

  - - -

  “So that’s the Trophy,” Bleep says coldly when I bring my catch inside the ship. “And you brought it home.”

  I set the human down on the floor and quickly tie her in place with a string. She can move around, but not escape or get to any of the sensitive equipment in here. “I won’t be cheated again. That light starts flashing once more, we’re going straight to the referee’s homeworld and laying waste to it.”

  “No referee will cheat us again,” Bleep chirps. “Not after what you did to the first one. I think you know that.”

  “Better safe than sorry,” I reply and look down on the human woman. So alluring...

  “I think this is a case of better drained than horny,” the little robot states. “Either there’s a railgun in your pants, or you’re really glad to see her.”

  I give the drone a glance that would make any living being recoil in terror. “Don’t you have something to do? Elsewhere, perhaps?”

  “Oh, I do. Don’t worry. I have no desire to see this,” Bleep says, unmoved. That’s probably why we work so well together. She’s artificial and thus impervious to the prey/predator dynamic.

  She flies one quick circuit around the Trophy, scanning. “She’s injured. Might want to look at that. Will you need to know her language? No, right? Just ‘wham, bam, now get out of my ship’?”

  “Give me her language,” I growl. “Then be gone.”

  Bleep transmits the human’s language to my brain in mysterious ways that she has explained to me, but which I can never remember or even care about.

  “Her language contains the word ‘please’. I thought yours did, too. I must have been mistaken.” The little point of light zooms out of the lounge and somehow manages to slam the door behind it. It’s quite a feat, considering that’s a sliding door, fully automated.

  Excitement rises in me.

  I’m alone with my prey.

  4

  - Althea -

  This is just too weird. My mind is spinning to catch up with what the hell is happening.

  I’m inside what looks so much like a flying saucer it really can’t be anything else. That alien monster didn’t kill me, but he did catch me and put some kind of dog collar around my neck.

  There was a flying point of light that I think talked before it left the room.

  And the gravity is much higher here than out on the surface. This feels much more like it does on Earth. That in itself is plainly ludicrous.

  I must be unconscious and this has to be some kind of feverish fantasy. But the gigantic, blue alien standing over me is so fucking intense, it just has to be real. Except that huge bulge in his pants. That can’t be what I think it is.

  He squats down and stares at me with eyes that shine in every color I’ve heard of. They’re like distant stars when you look at them on a cold, clear night. Just twinkling and sparkling. They fill my whole consciousness.

  “Who are you?” I manage.

  He doesn’t reply, just reaches down to me, grabs my jumpsuit with both hands, and then just rips the whole garment off me. That’s a rip-free, super-sturdy fabric that Space Colonies paid a lot of money for. Now it’s just rags in his hands.

  And I’m naked. Underwear? Not a thing on a planet with so little water we need it all for drinking. We can’t spare any for doing laundry. The jumpsuit handles everything and never gets dirty.

  I cover myself with my hands.

  “Oh no, little female,” the alien says in English that’s correct but heavily accented. “We can’t have you hiding.”

  Then he snaps the rope he tied me with, grabs me around my waist, and lifts me like I’m a wayward puppy. No more than a ragdoll.

  "Hey, put me down!" I protest as the interior of the alien ship is suddenly upside down.

  No, I am upside down. That's even worse. And I'm high up, uncomfortably high. I uselessly kick into empty air.

  "Stay calm," the alien growls with a voice so deep I swear I can hear some glass objects in here start ringing in resonance. "I am dealing with you."

  I'm feeling a little rattled, myself. "The fuck you will! Set me the fuck down right fucking now or there will be fucking hell to pay!"

  It's hard to sound angry when you're being held upside down naked.

  "Stay calm, female." The huge alien turns me this way and that, effortlessly handling my not insignificant bulk.

  I feel like a stripped Barbie doll being studied from all angles by some curious boy.

  "What the fuck do you think you're doing!" I scream as he holds me still and my legs flop down and to the sides. As far as I can tell, he's taking a long, leisurely look at my crotch.

  "I am examining you," he growls. "But soon I will be disciplining you if you don't stop struggling."

  "I don't need to be examined, you damn pervert!"

  "You should modify your tone in the presence of a larger male. And you should obey. Both as a smaller female and as prey."

  The breath catches in my throat. Prey. He sees me as prey. It's not just my instinct. It's his as well.

  "I'm not prey," I wheeze.

  He shifts his grip on me. "You have injuries on your rear aspect."

  When he mentions it, I do feel a dull throbbing from my butt and lower back where I fell onto the steel wire. I doubt it's a good sign. "Then take me back to the base so I can get treatment."

  He adjusts his grip again, and now he's cradling my l
egs and my waist in his arms, holding me the way you'd hold a gigantic burrito you were about to eat from the middle.

  Then he lifts me to his mouth.

  Fuck! He's going to take a bite out of my ass!

  "Aaaiiiiyeeeee!" I screech in a terrible panic, writhing and kicking as best I can, but he holds me securely.

  But his fangs don't bite into me. Instead, his warm mouth is right on the place I feel the throbbing and the pain, and a soft, soothing warmth is spreading around that whole area.

  The throbbing stops and I relax, just a little. It actually feels really good. Like being massaged with many soft, little fingers with perfect pressure and lots of oil. He's moving something around there, dangerously close to my very special parts.

  "What are you doing back there?" I ask, just so he doesn't think I'm okay with this. "Pervert," I add for good measure.

  There's no reply, except for a soft sucking and licking sound.

  It feels really good. Is that his tongue he's using on my skin there? If so, that has to be one sensational tongue, because it feels like the skin at my lower back and butt is tingling in a very pleasant way, sending tiny little shivers up my spine.

  He moves his mouth around a little, probably to catch all my injuries. If that's what he's doing. Shit, maybe he's just inserted some kind of numbing substance and is eating my flesh after all!

  I twist to get a look at what he's doing, but as far as I can tell, there's no blood around his lips and he's not chewing.

  He takes his mouth off me for a little moment. "Stay still! I'm healing your injuries."

  I relax a little bit. He wouldn't have to lie about it. There's nothing I could do, anyway, even if he were secretly eating me, ass first.

  He moves his mouth around a little, going lower on my butt.

  And then his tongue or whatever slides against my pussy, and I buck hard in his arms.

  "What the fuck?"

  He just growls with his mouth still on me. It's as clear a 'shut up' as I've ever heard.

  And it just continues. I don't think he does it on purpose. But something keeps lapping against my pussy lips, and I can't help getting into it a little. It just feels so freaking good in my whole pelvic region.