Reede Read online

  Reede: A Badari Warriors SciFi Romance

  (Sectors New Allies Series Book 9)

  By

  Veronica Scott

  Table of Contents

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  About the Author

  Other Titles by Veronica Scott

  Copyright 2019 by Jean D. Walker

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, places, characters, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned or distributed in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  Cover Art by Fiona Jayde

  DEDICATION

  To my daughters Valerie and Elizabeth, my brother David, and my best friend Daniel for all their encouragement and support!

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Julie C and The E-book Formatting Fairies!

  CHAPTER ONE

  He shuffled into the lab, the shackles at his ankles making it hard to walk efficiently. The force binders holding his wrists behind his back made it impossible for him to kill the Khagrish guards with his talons. The gag shoved between his teeth chafed and prevented his fangs from deploying, not to mention ruining his chances of ripping through an enemy artery. Reede offered no resistance as the wary guards controlled his movements with the neurocontroller, ratcheting the pain levels high enough so even a Badari like him couldn’t think straight enough to attempt an escape.

  The pulse of a stunner tore through him and he crumpled to the floor, unable to fight as his bonds were removed and he was placed on the strange metal structure the lead scientist had constructed for his torture. Tightly restrained in a spread eagle position, he couldn’t do anything but growl deep in his chest as the nervous techs applied the damn sensors everywhere on his naked body, including several spiking deep into his neck and skull. The first day the lead scientist had applied the infernal devices to his cock herself, taking her time about it. He could tell she enjoyed tormenting him but Reede centered his mind and refused to give her the satisfaction of eliciting a reaction from him.

  As a Badari created and raised to manhood in the labs, he’d endured worse torture and more sadistic manhandling in the past. He’d never broken then and he wasn’t going to now.

  After all, this time he was here of his own choice.

  And the day of revenge was coming.

  Thankfully the alien woman who thought she now owned him was gone on a professional business trip today and the tech who took her place trembled and dropped things and evidenced tremendous reluctance to touch Reede’s body at all, much less his most sensitive areas. As she finally backed away, he could tell several of the sensors attached to him were loose or applied too crookedly to provide good readings but it wasn’t his job to help the Khagrish take better data.

  “Are we set to begin?” the security officer asked, standing at a safe distance.

  The tech nodded as she retreated, going to a desk across the room which was laden with consoles displaying the data the Khagrish were collecting from Reede. He watched as she scanned the various readouts and adjusted controls and dials. “Everything’s fine.” Clearing her throat, the Khagrishi smoothed one hand over the yellow crest of hair atop her head, showing only a few random threads of pink which meant she was of an extremely low caste indeed. She spoke more forcefully. “Yes, you can begin bringing in the humans now, one at a time.”

  “I know the drill, Maddumma.” The officer’s voice was bored. “Damn waste of time if you ask me.”

  “You heard Dr. Enishiggama explain her protocol yesterday. She intends to identify the parameters of this urge the animals have exhibited to form pair bonds, find out how to manipulate the mating process and create a new source of specimens grown the biological way.” The tech recited all this as if she was taking a pop quiz in school. “Due to the fact the genetic growth machinery has been rendered useless due to lack of raw material.”

  “I know a better way to uh manipulate the process, much easier and more direct.” The officer made an extremely vulgar motion with his hand at his crotch and his guard force guffawed. “No extra equipment needed.”

  Reede stared at the opposite wall as if he wasn’t paying attention but he was filing away any useful intelligence gleaned from their conversation. His pack had heard hints before that the Khagrish were unable to create more of his kind but he wondered about this issue of raw material. Had the enemy finally exhausted their stock of stolen DNA after 800 years of experiments? Maybe the customer refused to restock the supply once they decided the Badari were a failed experiment. His Alpha could add this bit of gossip to whatever else was already known.

  Once Reede and his quarry were rescued of course.

  The problem being, he had yet to find the human he sought inside this fucking installation. Usually if a Badari was captured these days, he had access to the human population of the lab, but so far Enishiggama had ordered him held separately. Except for this bizarre test she was running.

  Aydarr would pull him out eventually, if the hoped for results were impossible to obtain but Reede knew in his bones the Sectors scout had to be here, inside these walls. I have to find him or her.

  “The samples taken from him before Dr. Enishiggama decided on this more complicated protocol were useless,” the tech said primly, fiddling with the braided tail of hair draped over her shoulder. “Apparently the animals only manifest reproductive aspects in the presence of the woman they regard as their mate. The males can have intercourse with anyone obviously but are sterile. As was intended when the strain was created originally. But of course we now know they can impregnate a human woman under the right conditions. My superior wants data because this is all new and highly unusual.”

  The officer swaggered close to Reede and he wished he could get even one hand free. He’d demonstrate the incredible efficiency of the lethal talons he’d been given by his creators and rip the man open from neck to crotch. He’d done it before.

  Eyeing Reede, the Khagrish laughed and said, “Why not simply clone them and be done with it? Maybe the good scientist gets off on her experiment, eh?”

  “Cloning is always a possibility but she prefers to solve the scientific mystery.” The tech sniffed. “We’re wasting time. I have a quota of subjects to get through so bring me the first batch.”

  Reede waited as the guards departed amidst a flurry of more crude jokes. The tech pulled out a handheld from the deep pocket in her green lab coat and sat back to read.

  A wall came down between the apparatus where Reede was restrained and the tech. He assumed she could see through it with vids, but the human women wouldn’t know the encounter was were being watched and he couldn’t tell them, since he was gagged. A door opened and a woman in the beige prison jumpsuit was thrust into the room. Her eyes widened when she saw him and she hugged the wall, averting her gaze fearfully. Reede sighed to himself. Another long day ahead and the odds aren’t too good the one person we’re after is female and will be shown to me.

  He prayed to the goddess none of the women he’d see today would be a potential mate. He had a job to do and this was not how he wanted to meet
his mate.

  Fallyn Damara, lieutenant in the Sectors Recon & Scout Forces, sat on the flimsy cot built into the wall of the cell where she’d been held for the past week—if her tally of scratches on the wall was to be believed—and watched as yet another group of human women marched past under guard. The first few days she’d been here, she was woozy from the crash landing and she wasn’t sure the meds and injects her captors had forced on her were actually helpful. She’d been too weak to resist and fortunately no one had even tried to interrogate her. Other than bringing her tasteless food and sludgy nutrient drinks, the guards pretty much ignored her since releasing her from the medlab and transferring her to the cell.

  Fallyn evidently had special status since the enemy didn’t mix her in with the rest of the human population which was obviously being held here. Too bad, because she’d have given a lot to learn more about what kind of mess she’d literally fallen into. The guards spoke Basic to her but her high grade military hypno implants translated their own language for her, although she didn’t let on she understood. Nothing particularly useful had been said in her hearing though.

  So what in the seven hells was going on?

  The first time a string of obviously frightened women had been taken past her cell, Fallyn had been worried for them, but the entire group returned some time later and seemed unharmed. She’d stood beside the force barrier at the front of cell and tried to get their attention but the guards reprimanded her with the damn pain bracelet. Fallyn lifted her right arm and studied the black band on her wrist. On occasion flickers of red danced ominously inside the bracelet material. She’d awakened several days after the crash with it already on her arm and the guards had been only too eager to demonstrate its primary use as a tool of discipline.

  Fallyn had a high pain threshold but the bracelet went past that in a heartbeat and she’d been writhing on the floor, screaming.

  So if the guards told her to jump, she’d definitely ask how high.

  She wished she could grab a sidearm but the unpleasant guards were efficient and gave her no opportunity. Fallyn had tried tapping on the walls, to see if there might be someone imprisoned on the other side willing to communicate but had no luck. She’d prowled the cell in search of escape routes or potential weapons and again nothing.

  I found out the fate of the lost colony or maybe the crews and passengers of the lost ships. Not that it’ll do much good. And how did any of these prisoners manage to send a fastlink signal to the Sectors?

  There were no answers and it looked like she might be doomed to join the ranks of the mysteriously vanished, considering her ship had crashed and her captain killed. She couldn’t hope to be ignored forever. Her captors must have an agenda involving her.

  Two guards came by, one stopping in midstep as if struck by a thought. Fallyn stayed slumped against the wall in an attitude of unconcern but she listened intently.

  “What about this one?” The first guard gestured in her direction.

  “She’s a special prisoner. Waiting for pickup by the main security detachment at central. I guess the death of Commander Parryfilmunn at the hands of the escaped animals must have messed things up. He was supposed to be the answer to all the security problems and now no one knows what to do over there since he died.”

  “Well she’s human and she’s female so she’s covered under our orders.” The second man sounded impatient. “Do you want to explain to Dr. Enishiggama why we left her out of whatever crazy test the old red hair is running now?”

  “Not especially, no. She’s terrifying when she gets upset. One of the worst I’ve ever seen in fact and I’ve been stationed at more of these so-called science centers over the years than you can imagine. But the pay beats anything I could earn on the Home World so I shut up and stick it out.”

  “I hear you. So, we taking this one with the next group or not?”

  The guards studied her and Fallyn watched them, keeping her face blank. Being out of the cell could mean opportunity. She was trained to resist and escape the enemy whenever possible. Of course she’d only practiced those skills in simulations.

  “Yeah, bring her. No harm done if she wasn’t supposed to be included. The animal’s not reacting to any of them anyway.”

  Fallyn kept her excitement from showing in her face or her demeanor as the guards opened a gap in the force barrier and gestured for her to join them. One stood with his neurocontroller aimed at her while the other put her wrists into force binders behind her back, quelling any hope she’d had of attacking them. If she could get her hands on a weapon…

  With the guards, she walked further down the corridor, past a few empty cells and then stopped in front of a large space full of humans.

  Pushing her against the wall, the guard yelled, “Next ten females, in order of your number, assemble on the muster line. All others will retreat to the cots.”

  Fallyn watched with interest as the prisoners obeyed. She was surprised the group didn’t try to attack the Khagrish, since there were only two guards, but the captives behaved quite passively. One or two mustered up the strength to glare at the enemy but no one made a move as the ten women left the cell one at a time through a narrow gap in the force barrier, were put into restraints like the ones on Fallyn and assembled into a line.

  “Where are you from?” she whispered to the woman next to her.

  The other prisoner stared. “Taken off a ship, the Galaxy Cluster Swan. Most of us here are from the same ship. And you? I haven’t seen you in here before.”

  “I was working a freighter.” She lied. Maybe the aliens knew who and what she was but no reason to admit it. Prisoners had been known to betray others for special treatment and her active duty military status was no one’s business. “Where are we going, do you know?”

  With a shrug, the woman shook her head. “Another experiment. Sometimes you get lucky and it’s nothing too bad. Sometimes you get luckier and die and this nightmare is over.”

  “No talking!” The guard aimed his neurocontroller at them both and Fallyn fell to her knees as the intense pain streaked from the bracelet on her wrist to her brain, striking her nerves like an ice pick to the skull. She fought against her heaving stomach and staggered to her feet as the punishment ended.

  The other woman remained on the floor. The guard gave her a second burst of the nerve twisting pain and she screamed loud and long. He dragged her to her feet. “Walk or die. Talk and die. Do you understand, human?”

  She cowered away from him as Fallyn said, “It’s my fault. I haven’t seen any of my own people since you brought me here so I took a chance and talked to her. Please don’t punish her anymore.”

  The second guard addressed his partner in their own tongue. “Both women have to be presented to the animal so stop playing with the damn neurocontroller and let’s get this over with.”

  The line of women shuffled forward under the watchful gaze of the guards, moving through a succession of corridors until they stopped, waiting in a queue to enter a door up ahead. Fallyn was puzzled as she watched the women ahead of her enter the room one at a time and then emerge a few minutes later. Most acted dazed, one laughed, another was in hysterics and the Khagrish in charge made sure they didn’t speak to the others who had yet to enter. What mattered most to Fallyn was none of the women seemed to be in worse physical condition after undergoing whatever was done in the room.

  When it finally came her turn, the guard in charge grabbed her by the elbow, removed the force binders and shoved her across the threshold as the door closed practically on her heels. Fallyn stared in utter disbelief.

  Reede’s shoulders ached and his circulation was impaired from having been restrained on the metal rack for so long, but he’d had far worse treatment at the hands of the Khagrish. At least no one was actively poking or prodding him and no one was talking about dissection. He wondered how many more hours this deranged experiment would run today.

  When the door opened for the hundredth or maybe the th
ousandth time—he’d lost count—he kept his eyes fixed firmly on the wall above the portal. He refused to interact in any way and held tight to his determination not to give his tormenters the slightest satisfaction.

  This time though an enticing perfume wafted across the room to his nose, a lovely distillation of womanly scent and an oddly floral note, although he was sure whoever had been thrown into the room hadn’t had any access to anything but industrial strength toiletries since arriving at the facility. There was nothing sweet or perfumed available in the labs. Certainly not delicate flowers. He clenched his fists. Not now. This can’t be happening. He’d heard the mated males in the pack talk about how the human woman who was their mate had a unique scent, a spicy or floral note or both, evidently a gift from the goddess to the man alerting him to pay attention. No one else detected the same perfume, if it even existed at all.

  There’d been speculation the captivating scent was pheromones, detectable only to one Badari in each case. Or a form of psychic link, mind to mind of the future mates. He hadn’t paid much attention to the discussion, not anticipating ever having a mate, but now was a completely different matter.

  His body tightened and pulled against the restraints and the sensors despite his best efforts to remain neutral. Reede felt his priorities changing inexorably in the presence of the woman who was his potential mate. The mission no longer came first. Desperately he recited the steps contained in a long and boring technical manual under his breath, trying to distract himself from the wave of desire sending all the blood in his body to his groin.