Redemption Ch. 07

"The best way to get in is claiming to be Demon hunters it seems," Chameleon said, striding up to stand next to her. "Cyn contacted a few friends we have on Earth and arranged for us to be hired by their agency."

Rayne nodded. Her palms were beginning to sweat so she rubbed them together.

Chameleon frowned and took one of her hands. "I need to regulate a few of your body functions."

Rayne snatched her hand back. "No. I don't want to lose what's left of my humanity. Bad enough I don't have real blood flowing through me."

"Yes," Drakken said making Rayne jump with a start. He seemed to just have appeared right next to her. Gleaming black eyes stared down at Rayne from a pale face framed by a riot of jet-black corkscrew curls. "That is quite a shame. I was looking forward to indulging in a little fresh blood. The dragons won't allow me to sip from them anymore."

"You've got your little meat sippy critters. Sip from them," Remuel grumbled as he passed by pushing another crate on wheels. "At least they won't get unwanted hard-ons."

Cool fingers caressed the exposed nape of her neck making her start again.

"Was this supposed to make you undesirable to the masculine eye?" Drakken asked.

Rayne frowned, rubbing the spot he'd caressed. "No. I just wanted to look different. I don't care whether or not I'm desirable to men."

Drakken smiled, and it was such a seductive grin, she had to look away, feeling uncomfortable.

"It draws the eye to the delicate line of your fragile neck," he said in his low velvety voice. "All the soft white flesh just beckoning to be nipped and kissed."

Rayne strode forward, leaving the chuckling vampire behind. The dragons didn't tease her, nor did the cyborgs. She wished Cyneolle had never called for Drakken's assistance, but unfortunately, unless she wanted to travel for a month before reaching Crimbregeere, they'd need him to speed their transport along.

When Drakken's cold hand gripped her arm, she pulled out a small dagger and aimed for his heart.

He was quick, his other hand gripping her wrist painfully. His fangs were bared and he hissed at her.

"Listen to me, child. You think you're grown up enough to embark on this mission and at the first hint of male aggression, you lose control."

Her knife flew out of her hand and the vampire spun her around until his arms were banded around her middle and his cold breath fanned against her neck. "I could tear out your throat right now and there isn't a thing you could do about it."

"Please," Rayne whispered, bewildered as to why no one was helping her.

"Please? You need to learn to use your feminine wiles to take advantage before it's too late, my dear. Remember that."

He let her go and walked past her into the transport.

"You didn't need to be so rough on her, Drakk," Zakreel murmured with a scowl.

"Fuck off, Blondie," the vampire threw over his shoulder as he strode up the ramp onto the transport.

"He wants to help," Chameleon said coming up next to her again.

Rayne glared at him as she rubbed her bruised wrists. "Help? By molesting me?"

"When we arrive at Crimbregeere Nine you may be embarked upon by more than just Drakken."

Rayne shuddered. What kind of horrible world was she walking into? She had no recollection of ever having been...free.

"You mean just because I'm female, I've got a target on me?"

Chameleon shook his head. "Not because you're female, but because you're small and look defenseless."

She looked down at herself. Every time she had to speak to anyone, she had to look up. There wasn't much she could do about her petite size. As far as she knew, she was fully adult and wouldn't grow anymore.

"It's all about attitude, Rayne. In order to stop being treated like prey you must act like the predator," Chameleon told her.

Aboard the transport, after they'd launched from Alpha 7, she logged into the computer's files and began to download schematics to the cities they'd visit and the possible life forms they'd come across. In the back of her mind, though were Drakken's words. He was right. She needed to stop behaving like a scared mouse.

Crossing her left boot over her right knee, she nibbled on her index fingernail. Her skeleton was fibrous metal alloy. Cyneolle assured her it would pass through any scanner like normal bone, except it was stronger than natural bone. Her nanoblood could enable her to achieve superhuman strength if she became agitated enough. It was like a natural defense system.

She really had nothing to be afraid of. She might be little but she could certainly kick ass.

All was quiet for the first twenty-four hours of the trip. Outside the portholes of the transport, the stars looked like a swirling soup of color. How fast were they going for everything to look like that? Drakken was a Master Guardian, a being who'd developed his telekinetic powers to their maximum. According to Seth, all sentient creation had the ability. Only a handful ever developed them fully.

She'd like to learn. Maybe when they returned from their mission she'd ask Seth or Remi to help her...or maybe one of the girls.

Grinning, she closed her eyes and dozed off. Her brain still needed time to rest like a normal humanoid and she'd been awake for over twenty hours.

She dreamt that she lay upon a soft bed, looking out a very large round window. There was a city beyond the window. She could see flickering light in the windows of the buildings around her. Across the street there was a blinking sign that read HOTEL ROHELLO in dull red letters, except the first two and last letters of ROHELLO weren't lit.

HOTEL HELL.

The bed creaked and dipped making her turn her head.

Boy crawled into the bed over her. He was naked and a little damp. She could smell that he'd just bathed, the scent of sweet and salty reminding her of an ocean breeze.

Tribals decorated his biceps, but she couldn't see his face in the dark, just the faint glow of his long, wet, white hair. Rayne smiled as he rolled over to the other side next to the wall and lay on his back.

She could see he had another tattoo around his belly button. It was a sun, etched in sharp black lines. He had more muscle, his arms, chest and thighs packed with lean power. So delicate and beautiful.

Giggling, she snuggled into him as he scrambled to pull on a pair of shorts. When he tried to make sense of a rumpled tunic, she pulled it away from him making him pout in dismay.

Boy reached for it, but she kept it out of his reach, which brought him over her.

His big lavender eyes widened when he realized they were chest to chest. Rayne felt his cock harden against her belly and arched against him. Tentatively he rocked against her, a soft purr emanating from him.

The sound seemed to startle him, making his body stiffen, aside from the cock pressed against her. He gulped loudly.

He was just so sweet and beautiful. His huge violet eyes were lined in black. She suspected permanent ink and his once almost silver lashes were now black, and thick, and long. They almost looked fake, but this close to him, just a hairsbreadth from his lips, she knew they weren't. She stroked away the droplets of water on his cheeks before running the tip of her finger along the point of one of his ears.

His cock twitched and his pupils grew even wider, just leaving a hint of violet around them.

"Um," he began, "I need my t-shirt."

Rayne sighed, "But you look just fine without it."

Movement behind him drew her eye. Boy turned as well.

Lucien was down on his haunches within a sectioned off part of the small room they were in. The floor beneath his feet was tile that was cracked and wet. She watched in fascination as he dipped a white cloth in a round, metal washtub full of soapy water. Raising the cloth, he squeezed it over his head, letting the foamy suds ride down his hair, face, neck, and sinews of his body.

Her mouth went dry as other regions of her anatomy drooled.

He lathered his hair, rubbed his face and neck and every exposed part of him. Rising to his full stature, he soaped his arms and chest.

Rayne's eyes grew round when he caressed his buttocks before going around to grip and wash his cock.

He wasn't being blatant about it. Wasn't remotely acting as if he knew he had an audience and was doing his best to entice. No. He was just simply soaping up that outrageously ripped and toned body. His fingers stroked his cock once, twice, a third time before dipping below to lather his heavy balls, his thighs spreading minutely.

"He's beautiful, isn't he?"

Rayne gulped and turned to look at Boy Rayne. He looked just as entranced as she felt.

As if sensing her stare, he looked back at her.

"This whole living just as buddies is getting really..."

"Hard?" she finished for Boy.

Boy blinked, licked his lips as his gaze dropped to her lips. "Yeah."

She felt him move his hips again, just slightly, as if afraid to let go. She wanted to kiss him so badly. She wanted to kiss Lucien. She wanted them both.

Boy must've seen something in her expression, because he let out a little snarl, and she was sure she saw a flash of sharp teeth before his mouth took hers.

His tongue plunged in and he rolled, taking her with him.

Rayne found herself straddling Boy Rayne and unable to resist, she plunged her fiingers into his hair and kissed him hard.

Boy's cock pressed so firmly between her legs, the shaft wedged itself between the lips of her sex.

She rode the ridge of his shaft, already panting. Moisture flooded her tiny panties. She'd need another bath, but she was going to come...she was so close.

The feel of wet heat engulfing her back made her freeze. Another hard ridge invaded the crack of her ass.

"Isn't this against the rules?" Lucien growled.

No one moved. Rayne just stared at Boy.

"Well," Boy began, "it's not our fault you were there giving us a fucking peep show."

Rayne's eyes bulged. Did Boy just say what she thought she heard?

"Peep show?" Lucien asked with a hint of amusement.

She tried to turn to look at him, but his hands suddenly gripped her wrists tight, trapping her against Boy Rayne.

A shiver of excitement raced up her spine, and her heart began to pound harder. Lucien pressed harder against her making her gasp.

Boy gulped, but forged on, one brow raised, his eyes glinting defiantly. ""Yeah, you were polishing that pole so long for a minute there I thought you were going to start spouting poetry to it."

Rayne resisted the urge to laugh hysterically, but her eyes were still wide as saucers and her heart was galloping furiously at the feel of one cock wedged against her pussy and another in the crack of her rump.

Lucien stifled a chuckle. "And that turned you both on?"

He pressed against her, pushing her farther into Boy.

Boy Rayne whimpered, arched and rolled his hips too.

"Did daddy get his two brats horny?"Lucien growled in his deep sexy voice.

Rayne swallowed and blinked, rewinding what he'd just said in her mind. Daddy?

They see-sawed against her and she arched and writhed against them, wondering if what they were doing was...right. It felt right. She tried to move her hands, but Lucien held her tight, the heavy weight of his body pinning her against Boy. She was trapped in this erotic sandwich, a mere toy between two aroused males, her legs spread, her body more than ready and willing to be fucked.

Rayne sucked in a harsh breath and let a moan escape.

Boy leaned forward to nip and lick at her neck, at the same time, Lucien dipped his head and stuck his tongue in her ear.

Rayne whimpered, closing her eyes tight until she saw stars.

She would have moaned, probably begged them to rip her tiny panties off and plunge into her, but Lucien slid his hand over her mouth and nose, effectively sealing both off. She felt the strength in his body, in the fingers that gripped the lower half of her face almost brutally. Her lungs burned for air. Her lust ratcheted higher.

"Don't scream," he whispered in her ear.

Confused, she blinked in the dark. That was when she noticed what was peering in through the window. A four-horned devil with a grinning mouth full of needle-like blackened teeth.

Rayne awakened with a startled whoop, her eyes automatically going to the tiny porthole to the left of her seat.

The stars were no longer swimming and smearing in streaks. Glittering points of light filled the black void visible through the glass.

Her heart was still pounding as she looked around the darkened interior of the transport.

The weredragons were asleep in the seats across from her, but Cyneolle was fully awake in the seat right in front of her. His head was cocked to the side, peering curiously at her.

"You were having a nightmare," he stated.

"I was," she admitted.

Cyneolle remained silent a while, watching her. "Do you think it may have been a warning vibration from the future?"

Rayne blinked. "A vision?" She frowned. Could such a thing be possible? There were so many theories; alternate realities, parallel universes, multiple dimensions, and such. For all any of them new, they could very well be the figment of some bored housewife's imagination. Nothing more than words on a page. "I don't know, Cyn." The more she thought about her dream the fuzzier the details became. "I was in a very small room, lying on a bed."

"Describe the room to me."

Rayne thought hard. "It was dark, but I know it was small."

"A bedroom?"

Rayne shook her head. "Not really. I think I saw a food prep station a few feet away. The bed was low to the floor, against a wall and there was another wall at the end of it that sectioned off a bathing area."

"What else do you remember?"

"The window. It was very big and round. Outside there was a city, very tall buildings, but it was dark. Like instead of lighting similar to what we have here, every window was lit with candles."

"Or glow stones."

"Glow stones?"

Cyn nodded. "Some civilizations use glow stones to economize their use of energy. The stones are charged with sunlight. They can glow for up to five hours."

"I recall Boy Rayne and Lucien in the room with me."

Her face grew hot when she remembered what they'd been doing in bed. "Crimbregeere has glow stones?"

"No. Earth does and only in its poorest sectors."

"That might explain the size of the dwelling." She bit her lip, deep in thought and suddenly gasped. "Hotel Hell. There was a hotel almost in front of the building we were in."

Cyn frowned. "I can feed the name into our data base to see if there is such a hotel on Earth."

"Wait. The name was actually Ro..." Rayne stopped and drew her fingers through her short hair. "Hotel Rohello?" she groaned. "Now I'm not sure."

"It doesn't matter. I will search for any hotel with names that include the letters H-E-L-L."

He was about to turn away, but she gripped his forearm.

"Cyn?" She wasn't sure she knew how to ask him this, but she felt very confused.

"Do you have another detail from your dream?"

"Well, actually, there was a devil looking in through the window, but..."

She stalled and huffed in frustration.

"But?" Cyn prodded, his blue-green eyes almost glowing in the dim light of the transport.

"Lucien. In the dream he held me down. Held my wrists hard and at one point he covered my mouth and nose with his hand. I couldn't speak or breathe." Her face flamed hotter and the pounding in her heart echoed between her legs.

"It aroused you," Cyn finished for her.

Rayne swallowed, looking away as she ran her hands through her short dark locks. "It's absurd. I don't know how feeling restrained like that...why I should feel...it's just wrong."

"Why?"

Rayne's gaze flew back to his. Cyn was known to feel no lust whatsoever. His question surprised her.

"Why what?"

Cyn's head tipped to the side. "Why is your arousal at being restrained wrong?"

"I..." Rayne floundered. "Well..." She huffed out a harsh breath and pouted at him. "Because it just is."

He looked at her, eyes assessing. "You are small. As a female, it should come as a natural instinct to find a mate that can protect you as well as sire stronger specimens for your species. A male that shows you his strength as well as his virility would cause your body to react. I see nothing wrong in that as long as you are not harmed and are of a like mind to his display of masculine prowess."

Rayne clenched her fists. "I'm not looking for mate."

He straightened, thick shoulders back, face blank. "Perhaps. I suggest you turn off your body's reproductive instincts as I have. Then you will feel nothing."

Rayne gaped at him. "You turned off...why?"

Cyn remained silent. Something moved behind his eyes. A brief flash of emotion, but it was gone in the blink of an eye. "I am cyborg," he stated flatly, "I have no need to reproduce what I am." He turned, effectively ending the conversation.

She frowned at the back of his head and was about to continue questioning him when Drakken emerged from the pilot's cabin.

"Cyn, take over. Rhydiam Nine has a sun similar to Earth's. I want to be fully asleep when we get there. I hate being conscious when my body reacts to the radiation blast of a yellow star."

Drakken strode off to the back of the transport without so much as glancing her way. Cyn rose from his seat.

"How does his body react to yellow stars?" Rayne asked.

Cyn paused just inside the doorway to the piloting cabin and turned to her again. "He dies," was his succinct reply just before closing the door between the pilot's cabin and the lounge area.

*******

Boy Rayne remained aboard the transport with the reapers, Natanael, Amadashiel, Abdiel, and Eriel. Ashriel and the other Alpha Angels convened aboard the second transport along with Ashriel. She'd been asleep when they arrived on Crimbregeere. It was Eriel who'd awakened her when he slipped completely naked into bed with her to nap. He was nonchalant about it, didn't try to touch her or anything. The reaper just bounced into the bed, turned to his side, spreading his wings behind him with a sigh, and closed his eyes.

After Lucien's violent reaction the day-cycle before, she was reluctant to incite his wrath again.

Natanael told her Lucien had spent the night down in the transport's cargo hold—shit-faced drunk.

She still had no clue as to what she'd say to him when she saw him again.

Boy felt shy about facing him, but she needn't have worried because he'd already left their transport the second they landed in Crimbregeere's spaceport.

Boy peered out the porthole of the transport and was amazed at the number of strange alien beings walking about. She hadn't seen this many species wandering about together since her arena fighting days.

There were many Lizdracs and Gruesh. She even saw a Nepturian with his aquatic ring nestled around its neck. This species still breathed under water and needed the water ring around their gills to survive.

The sense of warmth at her back made her turn.

Abdiel peered over her shoulder at the conglomeration of creatures outside.

The reaper's hair reached a little past his shoulders, soft, loose, spiral curls of bright gold making a striking contrast against his blue-black wings.

"Ash said for us to remain here until they come for us," Abdiel informed her. He didn't look too happy.

"Is it dangerous for us out there?" Boy asked.

Abdiel shrugged. "For some of us. I know I'm wanted."

Boy frowned. "Why?"

Abdiel's light grey eyes locked with Boy's. His lips kicked up to one side. "I left Seraphia over a year ago. I'm not supposed to stay away for so long without permission."

Boy blinked at him. "Well, do you want to go back?"

Abdiel sighed. "No. I want to stay with Devon and the others aboard Alpha 7."