Outcast

THE CAT STAR CHRONICLES

L ynx was only seventeen when he was taken prisoner in the war that destroyed his planet. Slated to be executed, he and the other members of his unit were instead sold into slavery. Thrown into the hold of a ship with no food and very little water, the new slaves were smuggled halfway across the galaxy to a slave auction on a distant world.

Dragged onto the auction block, the terrified boy almost wished he'd been killed. To be bought and sold like an animal was unheard of on his own planet of Zetith, where the world had been green and beautiful and the people were free. On this planet, whose name he never knew, he was sold to a trader who then sold him to someone else.

Stowed in the hold of yet another ship, exhaustion outweighed his fear, and Lynx fell asleep on the journey, only to be rudely awakened by two men. As one held him down, a flexible tube was painfully injected into the soft skin of the inner side of his left upper arm.

"Take that out, and you die," he was told, then was given a drink and left alone again in the darkness.

Lynx lay sobbing with fear and pain and hunger. Even war had not terrified him like this. He had no idea where he was, or where he was going, and he believed that death would have been preferable to the life he now faced. He felt completely and utterly alone. Not knowing if the journey lasted for days or weeks, he lost all track of time and was fed at odd intervals, which served to disorient him that much more.

At last, the ship landed, and the bright glare nearly blinded Lynx as he was pulled into the harsh sunlight by his captors, who marched him down a dusty street and into a large palatial building.

"Pretty, isn't he?" the ugly, harsh-voiced man remarked to his cohort as they stripped Lynx of his bonds and his clothing.

"He'll fit right in!" the other man laughed. Unlocking a large, ornate door, he pushed Lynx inside.

"You're their slave now," he said with a nod. "You do whatever they tell you."

The light inside was much brighter than the corridor through which Lynx had been brought, and it took a moment for his eyes to adjust as the scent of perfume wafted forward and curled into his sensitive nose. Green was the first color he saw: lush, tropical plants growing in profusion. Then he saw the women — scores of them, all beautiful, and all as naked as he was himself. They smelled of desire, and, despite his fear, that desire aroused him instantly.

Not knowing what to do, Lynx simply stood by the door but was beginning to feel somewhat relieved by what he saw. Being the slave of women wouldn't be so bad; he was fairly certain they wouldn't beat or torture him. But Lynx had never understood women. Most of the time, he felt intimidated by them — never knowing what to say or do — and had remained alone in the background while his friends found lovers. Granted, he was young, but the concept of enticement was something that Zetithian males generally grasped at an early age; Lynx, however, was mystified.

As he stood there waiting, the women ignored him at first, but his erection eventually elicited a few stares, and soon he was being touched by several soft hands — hands which soon found his hard cock and played in the fluid which had begun to ooze from the scalloped edges of the wide corona on the head. Lynx gasped as they fondled him before pulling him down onto the soft cushions on the floor. He'd never felt such pleasure before in his life. Then one of the women licked him, savoring his fluids until her body contracted in a powerful orgasm. Then another tasted him, and another, and another. He had the same effect on all of them, and they marveled at his attractive feline features and his sexual prowess.

He was the slave of other slaves, and he did whatever they asked, though his own needs were never considered. Not even given food of his own, to survive he had to scavenge what he could from what the women left behind. If they ever felt the need to punish him, they made sure that there was nothing left for him. When they finally gave him permission to eat, they laughed at the way he wolfed down his food.

Still, it was easy at first, for he was young and his sexual desires were at their peak. Day after day he fucked them, fed them, licked them, and massaged them. He catered to their needs and overheard their conversations, but more than anything, they craved his body, for he affected them in a way that no other man had ever done.

He was both lover and slave to each of them, who were, in turn, the slaves of a man who owned far more women than he could possibly service.

At first, Lynx didn't understand their language very well, but as he learned, he discovered that the women's greatest fear seemed to be that of bearing his child. Whenever one of them discovered her pregnancy, he saw the terror in her eyes as the others reassured her that Lynx couldn't possibly be the father. This puzzled him greatly, for he could never understand why having his child was such a horrible thing — or why they never did — but he heard it constantly, and his heart grew bitter. They would take what pleasure he could give them but wanted nothing more; not his children, and certainly not his love.

And so, for many years he lived with them, at first only watching as their children were born, then later assisting with the births and caring for the children. He liked the babies and never held it against them that they weren't his own. He could never understand why none of the children ever resembled him, though he'd had intercourse with each and every one of their mothers. After a while, he came to realize that he must have been unable to father children, and this weakened his self-esteem even further.

His sleep was seldom undisturbed, for there was always a woman seeking his attention — whether it was to bring her food or to make love to her — and before long, it all began to seem the same to him. What he had initially considered to be a blessing now became a curse. The sound of female voices began to grate on his nerves, and the constant bickering among them irritated him almost to the point of screaming. There was no respite, no time to himself; they were always there, always demanding his undivided attention and the sexual gratification he could give them.

His bitterness grew, and his exhaustion was never-ending. As time went on, his erections began to diminish, becoming infrequent before finally ceasing altogether. Then one day, three men marched into the harem, seized Lynx, and dragged him out to be resold. He heard some of the women laughing, and, knowing that they must have complained about his impotence, any feelings he might have had for them turned to dust.

Marched naked to the auction block, Lynx was sold again, but this time, his companions were all male, which was a welcome change. The men might have been rough and crude, but they were undemanding, and Lynx slept well for the first time in many years. His new owner, a just man who didn't believe in slavery, told Lynx that after five years of service, he would be freed. Seeing hope for the first time since he was enslaved, Lynx put in his time, working hard and learning what the men could teach him, after which he was freed. He stayed on for several more years, working in the diamond mines and saving his pay, for he had heard of a new colony on a planet called Terra Minor where he could be his own master and live out the remainder of his days in peaceful solitude.

Peace and quiet were the things he longed for most of all, but to find that peace, Lynx needed money, so he saved his own and watched as other men gambled away their pay or wasted it on the favors of women. As a free man, Lynx saw women and could smell their desire, but he was never aroused by them, and he avoided them whenever he could, for, having been used and betrayed by women, he now despised them all.

But their voices still haunted his dreams, and he would wake up in a cold sweat with the sound of their laughter echoing through his mind as he was dragged away — not one of them even whispering good-bye.

T he day before L ynx came, B onnie cut her hair. Not artfully or with any skill whatsoever; just pulled it away from her scalp and kept right on cutting until it was no longer than the width of her fingers. As a result, she could easily have passed for a boy, but her pregnant belly was there to give her away. She'd been told many times that her hair was beautiful — blonde and shining like spun gold, as Drummond always said — but she no longer had any use for it. It only attracted attention — unwanted male attention — and all she wanted was to be invisible. Men were all liars, cheats, and scoundrels, and she had no more use for them than she did for her hair. As a farmer, her style of dress did nothing to attract notice, either — just sturdy boots, rugged trousers, and a pullover shirt.

She didn't even own a dress.

The young apple trees blossoming in the orchard were there to remind her that one bad apple didn't spoil the whole bunch, but she was having a very difficult time convincing herself that there was such a thing as a decent, honest, moral man.

Unfortunately, a man was what she needed — moral or otherwise — which was why she'd advertised for a hired hand at the immigration office in the spaceport at Nimbaza. The mines weren't hiring, so anyone coming there in hope of finding work would be sent her way. At least, that was the plan. Drummond, head of the regional immigration office, had been skeptical.

"Don't know how long it will take," Drummond had said, scratching his bearded chin. "Could be months now that word's gotten out about the mines."

"I don't care," Bonnie said grimly. "I need help, and I'll need it even more after the baby comes. Just send me whoever you get."

"Not particular about the species, then?" he asked. "Not many Terrans come here to work in the mines, you know — well, not many good ones, anyway." Drummond was Terran himself, as were many of the planet's inhabitants, but the miners were a hodgepodge of species from throughout the quadrant.

"I don't care what they are as long as they're willing to work!" Bonnie declared. "I can't pay much at first, but it'll be a place to live and food to eat for anyone who shows up and would rather stay here than get back on the cruiser."

There were laws about that on Terra Minor, enacted in an effort to keep the riffraff of the galaxy at bay, though it wasn't completely foolproof. Any immigrant either had to have money to buy land or start a business, or had to have a job within a week of their arrival, otherwise they were deported — and the authorities had some highly effective means of enforcing that law. They electronically tagged anyone who landed and could then track them no matter where they tried to hide — and since the tags were deeply embedded in the skull, they were nearly impossible to remove. Some had tried, of course, though they usually wound up dead as a result. Sylor hadn't cared for the idea — the reason for which was perfectly clear to Bonnie now — but she hadn't objected to the implants herself. After all, she wasn't the one who'd absconded with money stolen from a pregnant girlfriend.

The trackers would have caught up with him and returned her money quickly enough — if she'd ever bothered to report it. Bonnie thought it was callous of Sylor to leave her in such a way, but he had worked hard helping her build the place, so if he wanted to leave and take the ready cash, she couldn't very well say no. The part that stuck in her craw was the way he'd done it. No note, no good-bye, just gone one morning, taking his clothes and all the money they'd saved, along with anything portable that had any value at all — which, unfortunately, included her grandmother's engagement ring. That ring was the only thing Bonnie had left of what she'd inherited, the bulk of the estate having gone to pay for the land and the farming equipment. He took the good speeder, too, leaving her with the relic out in the equipment shed that didn't work half the time, along with a mortgage on the house.

It couldn't be said that Sylor hadn't worked for the money he'd taken; he'd helped her build a house, fences, and the big shed — though it was prefabricated and hadn't taken nearly as much work as the house — and he'd helped her plant the crops. He'd captured their herd of enocks, too, running down each one in the speeder, throwing a net over it, and hauling it back to the corral he'd built. He hadn't seemed to mind the work when it was all new and exciting — and capturing enocks was more exciting than most things — but, as it turned out, the daily grind of rural life just wasn't his cup of tea.