NSFW Art

Got some artwork done, and I'm sending it via the newsletter for those of you that aren't part of the group on facebook! It's Jack's Clan, if you want to know! Also, I thought I'd share a super secret first look at chapter one for all you subscribers!! (It's unedited, so be kind)

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Chapter 1

The merc was crouched in the mud, rubbing it over his body in frantic movements, his head constantly jerking up to stare in different directions. I smiled. I was watching him from a distance, hidden in the underbrush, and enjoying the show. He’d put up a good fight. Set traps. Slept in trees. And now he was trying to mask his scent with the muck of the swamp. None of it had worked. Had I been less angry, less stir crazy, it might have. But he’d come on a bad week. Pity.

Ara’Ama was a gray wasteland filled with behemoth trees the color of ash and zero wildlife to hunt.  Which left me to hunt the only thing I could. Rakis’s scouts. Their flesh wasn’t as tasty as the Sharks, but it was made all the sweeter by my rage.

His little mercenary troop was better than the others Rakis had sent before. They’d come better equipped this time. Brought more men for the slaughter. Oh, they’d arrived cocky enough at first. Eager, like big game hunters, full of confidence in their skills. Big bad mercenaries against one little female. They hadn’t been told. Had come unprepared for the monster. Idiots.

When their transport had landed and the thirty mercs descended the ramp I’d been deep in the Archive, standing vigil over my sick family and crew. Anu had pinged a warning about their arrival and I’d smiled. Had anyone seen that smile, they’d have filled their pants. I was in a particularly nasty mood, having stared at my silent, still mate under the glass of the medical pod for the past few weeks, and the simmering rage that was ever present just below the service of my skin bubbled up to the forefront of my mind.

I wanted to kill something. Needed to kill something.  So the merc's arrival was perfect timing.  It was usually storming on my ancient homeworld, and this week had been no exception. My prey had set up camp in the middle of a deluge. Wind tried to toss around their hoverbike things, and they’d had to stake them to the ground with chains.

I’d stalked their camp, unseen in the murk of the storm. I didn’t usually play with my food, but the one who’d hired them had pissed me off so bad I was having a hard time focusing on anything else other than that special way bones crunched when you broke them.  So satisfying!

I howled at night to keep them on edge and awake. Cut their chains and clawed through their plastic tents. Picked off one or two that went to take a piss alone in the woods. Left their torn bodies behind for the others to find. Harried and terrified them until they’d broken and ran after three days.

I’d run them down like a rabbit to a dog. Ripped them apart. The woods had echoed with their screams and my snarls. Until there was only one. One I was currently stalking.  This one was smarter than the others. Finding the swamp and jumping in, rolling around in the muck to mask his scent from me was a stroke of genius. It really was such a shame that I’d seen him do it.

Scurry,  little snack. Scurry.

The other’s hadn’t been hard to take down. Two had begged. Unfortunately, all my goodwill had been used up when my mate almost died. For the second time. I’d left pieces of them scattered all over for the next wave of would be killers that Rakis sent. I was all about that shock factor, after all.  Maybe I should have let some live to carry the news back to their master’s that only death waited for them here. But, nah. Endless entertainment if they kept coming, and an outlet for all my roiling emotions! Win, win.  Bonus points for the great exercise all this running and stalking was turning out to be. When Ohem woke up, I was gonna be extra special fit…for, ya know, reasons.  Reasons involving his cock that I missed so much. God! And his laugh. And the way he looked at me. Supported me. Held me up when I felt like falling down.

I hadn’t been paying attention to the spiral my emotions were doing and when I snapped out of it, the lone survivor was in my hands, his head at an impossible angle.

Damnit! I’d snapped his fucking neck! When did that happen? Probably in the little rage flare thinking about Ohem’s cock always caused. Whoops.

“Sorry, my guy! But hey! At least your death was quick. Think of it like a reward for evading for longer than an hour!” I said to his corpse, and  tossed his body into the swamp and turned to head back to the Archive.

This planet was depressing as all hell. Just dead space and endless gray jungle. Ghix had been scolding me lately via comms for the “unnecessary slaughter” of enemy scouts. Blah, blah, blah. Everyone on the Solus should be admiring my ability to bring color back to Ara’Ama! Look at all the bright splashes of red! It was damn near festive. My ancestors would be so proud!

See, look at that. Right there! A bright flash of stark white bone surrounded by the deep red black of old blood. How nice. I was sprucing up the place.

“Unnecessary slaughter, my ass.” I snorted and descended the stairs of the Archive, through the door and jumped on the lift for the ride down to the room filled with sleeping people.

Ohem’s backstabbing, soon to be dead, brother Rakis was mobilizing his armada for expansion into the territories of sovereign planets that stood outside the Unity’s body of government. He had been running propaganda videos for weeks, telling the Unity citizens that these planets had conspired with Ohem to overthrow the Unity Council and take over. I didn’t know if it was working, and I didn’t really care.

What a petty little tyrant Rakis was turning out to be. I mean, he was an alien! From this super advanced civilization! Shouldn’t he be above power grabbing and conquering? If I wasn’t so fucking mad about Ohem and my girls, I’d be disappointed in him.  Also, what a bunch of cowards, using a virus to do their dirty work! We figured before Vero and his soldiers had all died from the airborne virus on Ara’Ama, Rakis had probably secured himself a sample.  Why else would he send them here? They wouldn’t have known the Archive was behind the big metal door. Hell they probably thought it was more storage shit. And either way, the Archive door  wasn’t accessible and all the other ruins on the planet were basic things.

Rakis had been after the virus for sure, and he’d gotten it. The scouts and mercs were just to double check that we’d all died here. With no survivors coming back with a tale to tell, you’d think he’d stop sending them.  What an asshole.  I was going to rip his spine out of his body and mount it on my bedroom wall so I could look at it while Ohem fucked me. Ultimate revenge!

The lift stopped at the bottom floor and I crossed the wide space to the far wall and through the single door. Inside were the pods, in neat rows, shining under the white lights. I checked each one before continuing into my bathroom to start the shower.  It was a fancy thing, at least fifteen feet in height, and the ceiling was all holes that created that perfect rainshower effect. It was one of the only things in the Ara’Ama Archive that was natural looking, giving the effect that you were standing in a cave of gray stone, being rained on by hot water. Soft lighting that came from nowhere, or at least it seemed that way, made the whole experience spa-like.  The stone that made up the floors and walls were heated. Hot showers always helped. That’s what the schedule was. Kill overly eager, stupid ass mercs, relax in the fancy shower, read up on my history stored in the Archive database, talk to Sam, and stare at vitals all day.

I took my time in the shower, watching with amusement at the way the water ran red for so long, before getting out to towel off. I got dressed in more Solus red shirts and pants, and   took my seat at the small table next to my bed. A quick scan and a single click pulled up the Rijitera histories.  It was going to be an all nighter. I was keyed up from the hunt and sleep wouldn’t come easily.  Ah well, guess the nightmares would just have to wait.  I could always sleep later. Then my PTS and I could throw a little party together. Night sweats included. Good times.  Looking forward to it.

I had started in the beginning of my people’s history, purposely avoiding the end. I was angry enough already without reading first hand accounts of the virus killing billions, of the betrayal by At’ens. My people being brought low, and nearly destroyed, by a huge, oily fucking cowered who couldn’t even be bothered to go to war with the Rijitera like a true warrior, would probably tip me over the edge right now. And there weren't anymore mercs to tear apart as an outlet. Not yet anyways.

There should be a rage room in the Archive. Filled with Rakis shaped mannequins I could kill over and over again. Or maybe Rakis busts I could smash with a big hammer. Oh, I wonder if Anu could provide me with a flamethrower? Burning Rakis alive sounded like a hell of a time. Rage room. Yeah, that was a freaking great idea! I could destroy shit and scream at the top of my lungs. Surely a super advanced AI could build me one, right?

“Anu!”

You do not have to scream for me, Rijitera.

I didn’t know if AI’s could sigh in exasperation, but that tone said she was. Mission accomplished. I’d annoyed the fancy computer system! Ha! Take that, Patty. I was totally more annoying than her. She owed me money! We’d taken a bet back  on the Solus before she got sick, about who could drive the unflappable Dr. Ghix more insane. Who was the more annoying person? Me or her? Well, I won. Dr. Ghix was nothing compared to an emotionless computer!

I couldn’t wait to tell her all about it. Smiling, I glanced at her pod and the smile died. Mood killer, seeing her in a coma. Rage room. Needed one, stat.

I cleared my throat.  “Anu, can you build me a room with random things to destroy? Preferably Rakis shaped things. It’s going to need to be a damn near indestructible room, because I’m going to let my insanity out for a few hours to play.”

There was a long pause before she answered me and I felt like cackling like a crazy person. I’d broken the AI!

I will have to study on this.  It is an odd request.

I started laughing, it had a definite edge of madness to it to my ears and I should be concerned, but that had never stopped me before! A little madness added spice to a person.

“You do that, Anu. I want that room.” The laughter had lifted my mood enough to start reading again. Right, history.  Study now, kill fake Rakis later.

*****

I clicked the holo screen with a fingertip and it collapsed into the table. My eyes felt like they were full of sand and I rubbed them with the heel of my palm, sitting back in my chair with a groan. I’d been reading my people’s history to pass the endless time spent alone watching over the sick. It was all interesting, but reading for hours on end was making me stiff. I rose from my seat, walking over to Ohem’s pod to check his vitals Anu had displayed on the glass lid. They were all strong.

It was reassuring to see, and I silently thanked Anu for the hundredth time. Having a super advanced AI, while still super creepy, was pretty handy. She helped to make the entirely dead planet feel less desolate and alone. I’d come to rely on her random interruptions of the silence, especially after the deaths.

I’d lost six crew members in the weeks since we’d put them in stasis. I’d had to bury them on the surface with just myself to give some pitiful funeral rites over their lonely graves on a planet far from their homes because it was too much of a risk to send their bodies to the Solus until we knew for sure the vaccine had started working on the crew. . A simmering rage was just below the service of my skin at the injustice of it.

The other’s seemed to be recovering well enough, and it was the only thing keeping me sane at the moment. I drifted over to Patty’s pod. It had sealed her under glass a week ago. Anu had said it was to protect her new skin. Her skin had patches of iridescent green texture, similar to the scale of a small lizard, on her wrists and knuckles. Anu said it would be on her other joints as well. There was some on her neck and a few shimmering dots on her face, like green freckles. It was beautiful. Her hair had taken on a golden glow, no longer just plain brown. Her skin seemed tanner, too, like she’d spent weeks out in the sun, rather than underground.

Her vitals looked good so I turned to check on Callie. She looked pretty much the same, a little thinner and I’d noticed what looked like a sharp fang caught on her lower lip the other day. I was afraid to touch them so I hadn’t gotten a closer look. Anu had said I could, but some irrational part of me thought that if I did, they’d get worse. All the pods had the glass lids down, some were necessary, but most were because I’d asked; that way I wasn’t tempted to reach out to take a hand in mine. I tapped the lid of Callie’s pod to display her vitals before checking on Rema and Aga.

Aga looked like he would wake up at any second, mad as all hell for displaying any kind of weakness,  but poor Rema had lost a lot of feathers on his beautiful wings. The tannish brown feathers that remained looked dull and ready to molt. His skin was still paler than normal, but his vitals showed he was recovering well. I sighed, continuing to check the rest until I was sure I wasn’t going to lose anyone. I’d been obsessively checking on them since Leera had died.

The poor crew member who’d still been semi conscious when we’d brought them to the medical bay had stuck with me. I’d told her everything was going to be okay. It had ended up being a lie.

Her death had left a hollow pit inside me. Ghix had said her traditional prayers over my link after I’d buried her. I'd recorded a video for her parents telling them what had happened, probably the hardest thing I’d ever done, so that they’d know their daughter had been brave up until the end. Ghix had sent it to them with the promise that we’d taken proper care of her body. We couldn’t risk taking her back to her family. Not until the vaccine was proven to work beyond a shadow of a doubt.

Her scared face was permanently burned into my brain. She kept appearing in my nightmares, weepy and accusatory.  I couldn’t lose another person. It would break me. I’d never felt so helpless in my life. No amount of strength was going to save anyone in this room. I wished Sam could be here with me, she understood the medical jargon much better than I did and the talks through our links wasn’t the same as a face to face conversation.

I stretched with my hands over my head, back cracking, and went to the little counter that held my coffee cubes and the water heater. I’d been surprised to learn the “coffee” we were drinking was a compressed powder form of a root found on Stellios. Add it to boiled water, and viola! Coffee. Ghix had accused me of lying when I’d told him our coffee came from a berry grown on a tree that was dried and then roasted.

Touching the glass container to heat the water, I dropped the cube in my cup and started loading my plate with food. The Solus had made several supply drops with their automated drones. I couldn’t hunt here since all the wildlife died out thousands of years ago. It was on my list of shit I wanted to change for my people. Weirdly, none of their food needed to be cooled for any kind of longevity or freshness. Not even the meat. So I had all this produce, meat, eggs, and fruits just stacked neatly in labeled metal containers sitting on the counter. I didn’t ask how they preserved their stuff. I really didn’t think I wanted to know.

Here is the artwork! I love how scary Ohem's face is! Jack's grimance at the pleasure pain! OHHHH chills! This is BEYOND consensual, so don't take the gritted teeth look on Jack's face to think she's not enjoying it! Our Jacky girl loves when Ohem gets all primal on her!