Instinct (2 page)

After five hundred years, the Sensers had been summarily tossed out of the domes to “recolonize” Earth for the humans to inhabit. His ancestors had explored and built amazing cities, naming the world Acvaria so that the past would forever be lost. Then the humans came. With them came hate, persecution, and death to the Oracle mothers. Though the Sensers had inhuman strengths and skills, the death of their mothers had severely crippled their numbers. The Sensers then fled, creating their own slice of home on Diameter Twelve, a Senser-made colony off in the center of the main Sylica waters. There his people had prospered, and grown stronger, for nearly a thousand years. Now the humans were able to harm them only if they were silly enough to be caught unaware by fanatics who trained themselves to do nothing but exterminate Sensers.

Xavier hissed again, the past crowding in on him. He could see the night his sister came running into his home, her hair plastered to her face by blood…their parents’ blood. They’d been killed by fanatics for doing nothing more than choosing to take an ill-fated vacation among the humans, something that no Senser was now allowed to do. He could smell the fear on his sister again, feel her pain as she clung to him, sparking flames around them as she lost control of her powers for those few heart-wrenching moments.

Damn them all.

Leia had, in one night, lost everything she was before. She rarely smiled or trusted easily. She rounded up stray animals and people as if, in some way, she saw herself as that. Nothing seemed to settle her or her spirit. As a Fire Senser, that could be dangerous. If she ever lost control of her powers, she could hurt people and herself.

“Xavier,” Oron hissed at him, gripping his arm.

He inhaled deeply, rushing the scents of death and destruction away from him, clearing away the old sense of helplessness that came with them. He hadn’t been able to save his parents. With all his power, with all of his strength, he hadn’t heard their cries and hadn’t been able to get to them. He had just assumed the title of Primus of the Sensers and had begun studying what his father had done before him so that he would step into the shoes easily enough.

When his parents had spoken of a vacation, he thought it was a good idea for his father to get a break. He had led the Sensers for four hundred years, his hair had finally turned gray, and he was nearing the end of his life span. Xavier just hadn’t known exactly where his parents planned to go. If he had, he never would have let them go, never would have had to deal with the pain of their loss or his sister’s fall into near madness. The one thing Xavier could be grateful for was that his parents had mated young and lived long and in love. They had the time to have a full life and see their children grown and on their own, even if they had their children much later on in their lives.

He missed them, Fates knew he did.

“Yes,” he finally answered, eyes closing for a moment.

“I think you should leave here. Your need is too strong, and it seems only an equally strong hate counteracts it. Not exactly auspicious to receiving a good blow job.”

“It will not solve anything. I have to find someone, O.”

“Neither, it seems, shall this place. We’ll find her somewhere else.”

“Oron, I have to find her,” Xavier stated, rubbing his face again, feeling the agitation return.

“We will, my friend, but not here.”

Xavier nodded to his second and turned. That was as far as he got.

Chapter Three

“You will perform tonight, my little Ecstasy Rain, and you will do it well. Do you understand me?”

Locked in her codec unit, Siren could do little more than nod. The mesh titanium suit zipped her into the wall, leaving her swimming in sleeping nanos that would wait for the oxygen to activate. Then she would perform. Then she would become someone else.

She had no choice.

Three years she had been Dirk’s prize jewel. Three years had passed since she had been stolen off the street while others passed by her with their heads down. No one would help a Senser, or who they thought to be one. She thought she had been so careful, thought she had kept hidden her looks with hoods and wraps. She had made so many believe she was some sickly beggar on the street working for what little she could earn.

Someone had noticed her.

She could see the want, the need in Dirk as he watched her. She knew that her exotic slanted eyes, the hazel tint appearing golden in the light, didn’t look human. Nor did her crescent eyelashes that fanned her cheekbones, and her curling mass of hair falling to her waist in a tangled bunch, give her any chance of being recognized for what she really was. Against her chocolate skin, the entire package spoke of something more than human. He licked his lips as he dragged his eyes over her heavy breasts and rounded hips. She could have easily been mistaken for a Feline Senser, and she never knew why that was. She was human through and through.

Dirk had not believed her. He took her in moments, knocking her out with a tranquilizer and wrapping her in a CU while so many of her own kind had looked on, watched as he bundled her away and took away what little existence she had left. They hadn’t tried to help her. She knew they wouldn’t, but the pain of their betrayal didn’t hurt any less. One would think that after surviving an apocalypse, humans would have changed their inherent fear of what they didn’t understand. They never had.

She knew the stories. They all did. They’d grown up hearing about the frightful creatures that had acted like gods and told the humans that they had protected them for years. She’d learned about the Sensers and their power to traverse a polluted and toxic land after the asteroid had struck and bring back food and materials the humans had barely survived on. Her looks had taken her from school shortly after puberty. She’d had to go into hiding from those who would have killed her because of what they thought she was. The only kindness she had been shown was by her family, who turned their backs, but didn’t turn her in. They’d known that she wasn’t a Senser, but what could they do? Her very presence could have gotten them all killed. She’d walked away, in pain, just as they had. She could not fault them for that. They’d also had to deal with the quickly fading financial legacy of her father, who’d died before she was even born. They’d had enough on their plates. As Dirk’s captive, they were safe. That was all that mattered.

Minutes had blurred with hours, hours into days, and days into nothingness as she became his puppet, victim to his nanos that made her body do things she would have never imagined, made her want things she could barely stomach. When the lights came on, she would always be his best.

“I have never displeased you,” she hissed then as he stroked a flat nipple through her suit.

“No, little one, and you will not do so tonight,” he added, gripping the nipple with a cruel twist, “or it shall be your last.”

She didn’t doubt him. Bile rose in her throat, but she swallowed against it. She refused to let him see the pain he caused, the disgust she felt for him. She watched him with a narrow gaze, snarling at him in anger. He chuckled at her display and released her.

“Get her ready.”

She held her breath as a large droid stepped up and disengaged her CU. She slid from the suit to the floor, the oxygen waking the nanos that slithered into her flesh. In seconds she was panting, nipples swollen, eyes dilated, and clit throbbing. She wanted—oh, how she wanted. She could hear her music pulsing in the background as her body curled with desire. This was when Siren, who she really was, disappeared, and all that remained was Ecstasy Rain. This was when she couldn’t even remember who she was or where she had been. For a space in time, she could forget her plight and revel in the fantasy she created.

With cold hands, the droid attached her uniform, the frigid metal strips covering and lifting her nipples. Another strip trailed down her stomach to attach to the part that covered only her clit. The slit of her pussy and ass was bare for all to see. Even with that coldness against her, she ached and withered to get some relief. But until she had pleased enough, the metal would not melt to give her the release she craved. Dirk’s own personal meter of her worth. Each patron wore colored armbands to denote how much they were prepared to spend on entertainment. The metal would warm, bringing pleasure, until she earned enough, and then it would burn away, driving her to climax until she was weak.

“Now dance,” Dirk hissed as the droid pushed her to the edge of the stage.

“Yes, dance,” she whispered to herself.

The music rolled over her, the interior of the club gone dark for her performance. The smoke from cigars curled in the garish red lights like a filmy dance partner. She crawled on all fours toward it, watching with haze-filled eyes. It swirled around her like a lover. The darkness always helped, always made it easier to believe who she was, to hide from the fact that a large part of her preferred the existence of Ecstasy Rain over her hidden, scared life. Here she was free, here she was more, and here she was sex on wheels.

She pushed her knees farther apart and tossed her hair over one shoulder. Slowly she undulated her body back, whining her hips to the floor. Moaning, she rubbed her hands over her sides, up over her breasts and neck to pull her hair to a messy knot at the top of her head.

“Yes, come on,” she whispered. She watched those sitting closer to the stage, their white bands denoting a thousand credits to spend.

You first.

Whining again, she whipped to her feet, stepping forward with each twirl of her hips until she reached the front of the stairs. She bent over, flicking her hair again, twisting into a painful turn, showing a glimpse of herself, and then dropped quickly to the floor into a split. Looking over her shoulder, she bounced, licking her lips as the pleasure spiked over her clit. She moaned as she felt the sting of warmth the metal gave her as men passed their wrists in front of the discreet readers, paying her.

She turned away, letting her head fall back until her hair caressed the top of her ass, bouncing harder. She heard the soft clicking of the reader, felt the jabs of pleasure at her clit until the metal grew cold again.

Next one.

She rolled then to her back, signaling silently for her pole to extend. As it slowly rose from the floor, she let her legs loop loosely around it until it was halfway up. She tightened then, allowing momentum to lift her off the floor. With sultry eyes, she looked for another John to please. Several at a table off in the corner wore gold bands, denoting a hundred thousand.

You’re next.

She lifted her upper body to the pole, beckoning them to come closer. They came like puppies to her call. She ground against the pole, lifting up and down on it as she watched them.

“Are you this big?” she mouthed to them, shivering and moaning. She saw one gulp, and she smiled at him.

Gotcha.

She leaned back, still gripping the pole with her legs as he came closer, and wrapped her arms around his neck. She rubbed her hand down her front, snaking her fingers past her crying clit to the soaked slit below. She dipped her fingers in and bowed her back as she hissed at the man.

“Do you want to taste?” she whispered to him.

He nodded, sweat dotting the top of his lip. “Please,” he urged.

Slowly she pulled her fingers away from her, letting the others see the moisture before bringing them to the man’s lips. He sucked greedily at her fingers, and again the reader beeped happily. She held on, the darts of pleasure pulling her taut as she moaned. She undulated, letting the man suck away as her climax hovered closer and closer to the edge, so close she could nearly taste it.

Please
, she cried to herself.

She let go of the man, nearly crying as the metal grew cold again. They were maxed out. She pushed backward on the pole, letting her legs meet until she was sitting sideways, and slowly spun.

Where are you now?

Chapter Four

Xavier could barely breathe. She was astounding, exquisite. Everything about her was perfectly tuned to his desires. The cool slant to her eyes denoted her as a Feline Senser, like him. He felt his cock, already full to bursting, strain harder to be closer to her. Pre-come leaked out the tip, fanning the burning. He had to bite back the groan that filled his throat. He could taste her on the air. She was like ambrosia mixed with a heavy dose of aphrodisiac. Her hips would cradle him nicely, and he couldn’t wait to feel all that hair against his skin. He would give her so much pleasure she would pass out. He would show her, with every lash of his tongue and every stroke of his cock, just what a gift she was to him.

Shit, I’m harder than a rock
, he thought, growling.

“Xavier?” Oron inquired behind him, worried at his frozen stance.

Even then Xavier could not turn away from her. He would have her. He
had
to have her. He could feel his Jag stretching inside, its tail twitching with awareness. He could feel the snarl building deep inside him with each breath. His mate was close. So close. And she
dared
to touch another man!

“A purple band, O, now.”

“Xav—”

“Now, O!”

Oron moved away quickly, and Xavier waited for the minutes to tick by until he returned. Purple armbands denoted five hundred thousand spent in the club, and also marked him for a private viewing of the dancer it was purchased for. He’d seen the man licking from her fingers, and everything in him called to kill the man, rip him to pieces with his bare hands, and haul her away from this place. Only Oron’s restraining hand stopped him. This was her job, one that she wouldn’t be doing any longer. She would not sense him the way he did her until he had her by himself. Now he would have her, and she would not get away.

She was his.

The pleasure that zinged through him was more than he could have imagined. He could scent her in the air, the moisture of her pussy swelling in the club, and she moaned her pleasure. He knew the dancing metals were made to pleasure the dancers as they worked in order to drive them to greater feats for more money. Intellectually, he could understand what she was doing. His Jag, however, who had been reveling in her scent, rolling around under his skin, had torn at his cage with reckless abandon. She wouldn’t be able to continue working here a minute longer. His Jag wouldn’t accept it, and neither would he.