Ding-ding!

And again, in quick succession this time.

Ding-ding-ding-ding-ding!

It is Zann who stays my hand - an act that makes me glare at him.

“It is still early,” he reminds me, casually taking a handful of candies and shoving them in his mouth. “Someone will be along soon, I’m sure.”

“If they are not ready to serve me, they should not be open at this hour,” I growl, just as a bony-looking Sectarix male appears from behind a draped-off area.

“Good morning, gentlemales,” he greets, his antennae twitching. “My name is Yix, how may I serve you today.”

“I need the female who was working at Star Pleasures last night,” I demand, my finger tapping on the counter.

I ignore the scoff I hear coming from my brother behind me.

This ‘Yix’ blinks his huge eyes at me and his mandibles open a little before closing again. “The-… uh… did you happen to know her name, sir?” he asks, picking up a tablet screen before he starts tapping away at it.

Her name?

No, much to my chagrin, I did not learn her name.

The Sectarix looks up at me from over the top of his screen. “Sir, we have lots of human females in stock currently, if you do not know her name-”

“You know who I am speaking of,” I tell him, feeling a prickly heat rise up my body. “There was only one human working in that place last night, and she was branded by this trading company. Get. Me. My. Female.”

Yix pales and starts frantically tapping at his screen while I wait, my jaw clenching so tightly, I think I may shatter some teeth if I don’t get her to safety soon.

“Ah, yes,” he chirps, still tapping away. “Here we are.”

The relief I feel is palpable. She is here, and she will soon be walking away from this level and all its dangers.

And walking straight into the jaws of new ones, a little voice murmurs at the back of my head. I shush the voice, vowing that I will not touch this human - she will simply be under my protection. I activate my wrist comm, readying it to transfer whatever amount of money they deem to charge for that little Goddess of a female.

Yix looks up at me, and I go cold as he says, “I fear she has already been purchased, sir.”

OceanofPDF.com

6

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 6 - Niska

I’m still curled up on my bunk, trying to forget the majority of my horrible shift at the club last night, when Yix comes bustling in.

“I have good news, and bad news, and then some more good news, and some final, possible bad news that I just thought of,” he babbles, his bony, buggy arms gesturing nervously.

Lois sits up from her bunk and stretches. “That’s not really how that saying normally goes, but go on,” she drawls, reaching for the armful of red alien fruit that Yix is silently offering out to all of us. I decline the offer.

“Well,” he starts, handing two fruits to Jaya. “Star Pleasures Club are so pleased with Niska earning over twenty million credits for them last night, that they do not need anyone else to work another shift by means of apology to Master Joolyx.”

“Holy shit!” Lois says, almost spraying her bite of the juicy fruit all over her bunk. She wipes her mouth with the back of her hand as she continues to stare, wide-eyed at me. “What fucked-up kind of shit did they force you to do to earn that?!”

Jaya looks at me with a similarly shocked expression, her hand holding the fruit pausing mid-way to her mouth before it falls back into her lap. “Are you ok, Niska?” she asks in a small voice.

“I’m fine,” I huff, hitching up the horrible, dirty-dishwater-colored, itchy blanket higher over my shoulders as I continue to lay here on my lumpy bed. “I got lucky with some rich patrons is all.”

Rich as in ‘royalty-rich’, I think to myself, remembering the large, horned Prince I’d practically rubbed myself against like a cat in heat. I still don’t know if he’d managed to make good on his promise of disposing of those Yoxxarii, and my nerves spike dangerously high when Yix says his next words.

“The bad news is that someone came into the store today looking to purchase you. They said they saw you at the club last night.”

Oh no.

Oh, no, no, no.

I sit up, feeling the blood drain from my face as I stare at the bug-man. He holds up his tiny, claw-tipped hands before rushing out with, “but all is well! Luckily, they came early, and you know how Mama likes her sleep and will not tolerate being woken. She will probably sleep for a good few hours yet, which is fortuitous, because she would eat me if she overheard what I have done.”

“What does that mean?” Lois asks before I get the chance. “What have you done?”

“It is the good news!” Yix says unhelpfully. Lois, Jaya, and I all stare back at him, hoping he will elaborate. “I lied and told the customer that you have already been purchased!” he blurts before covering his little buggy mouth with his little buggy hands like he can’t believe he said the words out loud.

“You did?” Relief washes over me and I stand, my legs a little wobbly from hardly any sleep as I stumble over to Yix and throw my arms around his bony body. He is taller than I am, like most aliens I’ve encountered, but his frame is slender underneath the swathes of multicolored robes he wears. Yix holds himself stiffly for more than a moment or two before I feel an awkward pat-pat on the top of my head. “Thank you.”

“He was not happy about it, but I managed to convince him,” he says as I pull away and go back to sit on my bunk. All I can picture is those ghostly white Yoxxarii with their pointed teeth and big, pitch-black eyes. I bet they were sorely disappointed to not get their hands on their chosen meal. I’m so grateful to Yix for covering for me, but he’s right. If Mama was around and overheard him lying like that, she’d for sure eat the only one of her husbands that has ever given a damn about any of the humans she sells.

“So,” Jaya starts, pulling her knees up to her chest as she sits beside Lois, “what’s that final bit of bad news you just thought of?”

“Well…” Yix’s antennae start twitching wildly and he makes this little clicking noise, too, “it had occurred to me that since Niska did such a good job collecting large tips for the club, that Master Joolyx may decide to purchase her himself to put her to work permanently.”

Fuck.

I close my eyes and grit my teeth. He’s right. That outcome is likely. Tringa had been super impressed by the amount the Prince had given me when I’d handed my credit collecting orb back to her at the end of the night. But she’d also looked a little concerned too. Maybe she’d come to the conclusion quicker than Yix or I had. When Master Joolyx sees that big deposit in his accounts, he’s going to follow the breadcrumbs as to who got that for him. And, like I’d said to the Prince, he could buy thirty of me for that amount. It would make business sense for him to invest in a worker who might be able to replicate that success.

But I can’t. Not really. It was all that Xaviann and his deep pockets.

Why did he have to pay such a noticeable amount?!

“What should I do?” I hear the words said in my voice without really realizing I’d spoken them out loud. The others blink at me, concern etched so deeply in their expression it guts me a little just to look at them. They don’t know how to get out of this inevitability either.

I can’t go back there. I can’t work at that club every night. That can’t be my life.

“I’ve heard rumor that there’s a bunch of Svevaari vacationing on level twelve,” Yix offers. “Their females are renowned for their love of companion pets. They like dressing them up, and entering them into pet competitions,” he says, his arms moving as he explains. “If I tell them that you are a particularly affectionate human, a highly sought after, top specimen of your species, I might be able to convince one of them to buy you.”