One Big Bite by Michele Mills
12
Another week passed with his female living in three-oh-four.
Cannibal kept Roxy fed and safe but found it harder to refrain from touching her. Every night he remained fully clothed, with his gloves on and slept on the floor next to her, while his love for her continued to grow.
He stopped in his tracks and set down his axe. Love? Was he in love with Roxy of One? Of course he was. Why else would he spend each diurnal in that tiny workroom, sleeping on the hard floor? She was his Bride and therefore the proximity to her was causing his mind and hearts to catch up with the needs of his long-dormant body.
And each day his female’s anxiety grew. She began to let bits of information drop. He’d learned that she was trying to eventually end up on the planet Salo (for unknown reasons) but she couldn’t get in touch with someone there on the planet who she felt was her contact? He didn’t understand why, if she needed to be on Salo, she came instead to Timbur. Who was she trying to contact? He tried to ask these pertinent questions, but she pursed her lips, not allowing him to try and fix her troubles.
Heavy approached him as they worked in the tunnel. He pushed back his face shield and sat down on a rock. “I think tonight we should stage an intervention for your Bride,” he announced.
Cannibal pushed back his own shield and narrowed his eyes. “What is an intervention?”
“It’s a human term. Lila explained it to me last night. She said that humans sometimes become addicted to substances like synthetic drugs or foods, or actions that are harmful to themselves. The word ‘addiction’ means their mind doesn’t let them stop doing an action that will harm them, therefore they are addicted because they can’t physically stop even though they often want to. And when the friends and family of this being see that the human is reaching a breaking point due to the addiction that could possibly mean the being’s life or death, they perform an “intervention” to try and persuade the human to get help for their addiction. The intervention is typically a group of caring beings going to the human and trying to talk them into accepting help.”
“Who needs an intervention?” Rook asked.
“Cannibal’s Bride needs an intervention.”
“Ah.”
Trunk grimaced, “Addiction sounds like a terrible disease.”
“It is. Thank gods Xylan aren’t afflicted with this strange disease.”
“Right?”
“Did I hear you mention an intervention for Roxy of One?” Scar joined them in the tunnel. “Hmm…Not a bad idea.”
Cannibal suddenly realized the whole crew was standing there. “That’s a terrible idea,” he growled. “First of all she does not have a human disease. And second, we’re not doing anything that would upset my female. We are going to respect her wishes and continue to stay out of this. She has a plan.”
“But does your Bride really have an action plan for getting herself out of the trouble she’s in?” Chief asked from behind him.
“Of course she does.”
They all paused to stare at him.
Chief crossed his arms. “Alright, tell us, what is this plan?”
“She… she has a contact she’s unable to get ahold of.”
“That’s not a plan,” Scar pointed out, “that’s an obstacle. She needs our help but is worried she will cause us harm. This is faulty reasoning. We are Xylan Illibrium Miners. We don’t require protection.”
“I don’t think she has a disease,” Rook muttered. “She just needs our help. We can convince her that we want to keep her safe. That she can trust us with her secret.”
“Hear me out,” Heavy said. “This is how we will perform the intervention. After the end of today’s shift we will all return to the compound and clean up and change into civilian clothes. Then all of us will return to the mine and bring along Leah and Hook, the baby, and Lila too. Our arrival will be less threatening that way.”
“And we can even bring Lila’s two cats. Humans like cats,” Rook threw in.
“Yes, good idea,” Heavy said. “We could bring the cats, too. Then all of us go together into three-oh-four and greet her and say we need to talk to her. Then we let Cannibal speak for us first. You tell her that we’re her family now and remind her she’s part of the Crew. We need for her to tell us why she’s here so we can help her. This is our intervention—we will try and break her from her “addiction” of trying to do this alone. She needs to bring the Fever Brothers into her circle of trust.”
“She’ll just say again that she can’t tell us the truth because she wants to keep us safe.”
“And that’s when I will tell her that time has run out and tomorrow the guards are going to be searching this level,” Scar said.
“They are?”
“Yes.”
Cannibal thought about it for a moment, and strangely, this intervention didn’t sound as bad as he’d first thought.
“This has to end now,” Chief broke in. “Her time is up. She needs to tell us the truth so we can help her.”
“We need to get her out of there,” Hook agreed.
“She thinks she can find a way to get herself off the planet without our help,” Cannibal said.
“That’s not possible,” Scar groused.
“I’ve tried everything to convince her that she can trust us. I have fed her and spent each night with her…”
“But have you tried introducing her to the cats?” Rook urged. “The cats might be the key.”
“Shut up about the damn cats,” Scar snarled. “We are not bringing human pets into this mine.”
“Hey there’s nothing wrong with—”
“We all want her to perform testing with you,” Cap cut in. “In the last two weeks we can already see a change in you. You’re much calmer. She’s good for you. Imagine how much calmer you’ll be when you’ve gotten her out of that mine and claimed her.”
“True,” his other brothers chorused.
Cannibal blew out a breath. “Alright tonight we will perform the intervention.”
One hourlater emergency sirens started blaring in the mine shaft.
“Everyone out!” Cap shouted.
Cannibal stiffened. “Roxy!” he bellowed.
The Fever Brothers dropped their tools and ran for the mine cage. Cannibal found his Bride standing at the mouth of her cave with a terrified look on her face.
“Cannibal,” she shouted and ran straight for him, bypassing all seven of his brothers. He wore work gloves and grasped her bare hand, pulling her along with them to the mining cage. They were the last two to load and the doors closed behind them. The cage began to carry them up to the main level. All seven of his brothers shifted their stance so that they were equally surrounding his female, ready to offer their bodies as protection if necessary.
“This isn’t shelter in place?” Cap questioned Scar, their crews’ head of security.
“No. We need to get to battle stations to gear up and fight a possible invasion. The Lurks have arrived in orbit with a battleship,” Scar said, tapping on his tablet. “Minecorp is negotiating with them right now. The Lurks have demanded Admin turn over to them a human named Roxy Johnson or they will start bombing headquarters.”
His female whimpered. “I’m Roxy Johnson.”
“We know,” Scar answered.
“Why hasn’t our military blasted these lazhuls from space?” Cap questioned.
“The Lurks figured out that the Xylan military isn’t here at this exact moment to do a routine training exercise.”
His Bride started flailing. “Why does this keep happening? The Xylan military is the ‘superpower’ in the four sectors and the Lurks seem to know their schedule in great detail, enabling them to slip into loopholes.”
Scar glanced at her questioningly. “The Imperial Military won’t put up with this. They will quickly return and there will be hell to pay.”
“But will they be back in time to save us?” she cried. “I need to go back to the cave. That’s where I’ll be safe. You can’t hand me over to the Lurks. You can’t. And it’s not just because I’m scared for my life, there’s another reason.”
“Female, calm down,” Cap admonished. “No one is giving you up to the Lurks, not even Admin. But just in case they use it as a ploy, or the Lurks hack our security and discover the truth, we need to relocate you.”
Cannibal reached out and changed the destination to level 1367.
“Where are we going?” Roxy panted. “The Lurks can’t have me. And it’s not just because I’m afraid for my life,” she repeated, “I am, but it’s because…”
Cannibal squeezed his Bride’s small hand. “Now is the time, female. Tell us so we can help you better.”
She gazed up at him, her eyes filled with terror and then blew out an agitated breath. “The Lurks are here for me because I’m an employee of the Intergalactic Health Organization. I worked for a medical scientist named Aleksandr Petrov as a lab tech on Rigtor Five. And then the Creekans left the outpost and the Lurks were going to invade to take over the Yurds’ territory, and our lab was in the way. Petrov said the whole invasion was really a cover so the Lurk’s could attack the lab. He said what they really wanted was the experimental lifespan health serum he’d invented. The night we were evacuating, Petrov administered his top-secret serum into my body so I could carry it safely to IHO headquarters. I just haven’t figured out how to get it there yet.”
“I heard about Petrov’s death on the vid channels. Why are the Lurks after you in particular?”
“They’ve wanted this serum for years for themselves. The Lurks are well known for their medical industry, they manufacture the med labs which are highly profitable for them. The serum would be in direct competition with the med labs. They want the serum so they can have the patent and be able to sell it to the entire four sectors for a hefty price. Basically, it would only be available to the wealthy, sort of like the fanciest med labs. Only the wealthy have personal ones and everyone else uses public med labs they pay for, when they can afford it, or they go without. The IHO wants what Petrov wanted, what I want too—for this serum to be eventually mass produced and distributed to the poor as well as the wealthy. For that to happen it needs to be handed over to the IHO in their secured labs on Salo. The Lurks can’t get there, the Gravians are too powerful. The Lurks arrived at Omega 9, where our team was staying after the evac and demanded we submit to med scans before we were allowed to transfer to Creeka Minor. I managed to transport from Omega 9 to Timbur in order to hide from the Lurks. They want me so they can remove the serum from my dead body and replicate it in their labs. Inside of me is the only remaining serum. Petrov destroyed all the other data and when his ship exploded in the Swirl it took the other variant too.”
A growl rumbled in Cannibal’s chest.
“You’ve been living here, hiding from the Lurks so they can’t have this serum? How did they find you here?”
“I don’t know, I thought I’d been so careful. I was afraid this would happen though. I think there’s a mole amongst Petrov’s former lab team.”
“Do you still have your IHO tablet?” Scar asked.
“Yes. But I left it behind in the workroom of the cave.”
“Good. Because I’m certain that was the weak link. They tracked you with it.”
“But I didn’t communicate with the IHO, I’ve only used it to do research.”
“It doesn’t matter. They use it as a locator. They must’ve lost your signal, though, when you entered the mine, but they at least got our last location.”
The lift stopped.
“We’ve created a fall-back position in the mine. This is a level that is still under construction,” Cap said. “You and Cannibal are being dropped off at 1367, the rest of us will continue to ground level so Admin thinks the whole crew has arrived and they won’t notice Cannibal’s absence. There is a separate exit in that level. You can get out that way.”
Cannibal grabbed his Bride’s hand with his own gloved claw and ran into the mine. There were no lights here. No workroom or generators. There were only a few boxes of equipment. As they approached the Illibrium glowed brighter in the walls around them and as they passed by it again dimmed. This caused the immediate section of tunnel they moved through to temporarily light up and then return to darkness behind them.
“How do you know where we are going?”
“We are going into the back of the shaft. There is an opening that only we have found. We did not share this with the techs or any of the other crews. We’ve kept this escape for ourselves as a fall back in case we are ever ambushed.”
“By an animal? An invasion?”
His lips thinned. “No, by our own co-workers.”
And then the ground cracked underneath them.
Roxy screamed as they fell for a very long time. They hit a layer of wood and he thought they’d hit the bottom, but then it shattered under them, and they were again falling. Gorzan had her in his arms and he made sure she was on top of him. When they hit bottom he would be underneath, keeping her safe. He would never allow his Bride to be injured. Hook had survived a similar hardship with his Bride. Leah had publicly told the story many times of how his brother had grabbed her as their lift begun a freefall and how he’d had her on top of him when they’d hit bottom. Each time she told the story with pride Hook flushed and remained quiet. But Gorzan had always secretly admired his brother’s dedication to his Bride and Gorzan would do the same for Roxy.
Eventually they were alone in a dark pit and he knew immediately that his gloves had been blown off. Because her hand was now clasping her bare hand and it was between their bodies. And the point of contact was shooting currents of possession and need through his entire body.
Somehow his tablet was still attached to his uniform and it was blaring another red alert. Roxy’s eyes blinked open. “Oh wow,” she said, noting her placement on top of him. She turned her head and reached out to tap on the screen.
“It’s all over,” Scar said through the comm, “the Lurks have been stopped by the Imperial Military. The mine is safe and the red alert is off. Well, everyone is still running around like crazy down here but—”
“Scar, there’s a problem,” his Bride rasped. “We both fell, for a really long time. I’m okay, but Cannibal is hurt, bad. He’s cut and bleeding and I’m pretty certain he has broken bones. We need to get him out of here and to a med lab.”
“She is mine,” Cannibal snarled. “Roxy is my Bride. My Be’Ih.”
“And I grabbed his bare claw while we fell,” his Bride admitted. “So now he’s…and I think I also feel…”
Cannibal threw back his head and let out a thunderous roar of possession.
“Oh hell,” Scar said. “Let him claim you first, then we’ll get him medical attention.”
“Roxy? Roxy, get out of there,” Lila shouted through the tablet screen. “The chase has started.”
