The room remained silent for long moments while Crimson gazed out into the darkness of space before a female voice came over the captain’s spark’s comm.

  “Amelia?”

  Amelia pressed the button on her comm and replied, “Amelia here. What’s up, Rosie?”

  “I’m sorry, I know you’re busy, but Faith is in need of a feed and she won’t take the bottle you left.”

  Amelia looked flustered for a moment. “Okay, thank you, Rosie. I—”

  Hover stepped forward and interrupted Amelia by whispering something to her and then zapped from the room.

  “Hover is on his way. I’ll talk to you later, Rosie. Thank you.”

  A few moments later Hover was back with a wailing Faith in his arms.

  “The younglings can handle zapping?” Coil whispered to Teclis in surprise.

  “It would seem so,” Teclis replied.

  When the human females had been found and rescued and a few of them had been transported, it was discovered that most of them didn’t handle it very well. They either became unaware or were reduced to an episode of sickness.

  Amelia quickly scooped Faith out of Hover’s arms, thanking him profusely. The babe settled a little and then more so when Amelia cooed to her. Amelia looked around, her sight settling on a chair. She walked over to it and sat down.

  Teclis watched, fascinated, as Amelia withdrew one of her breasts very discreetly, so as not to show her whole bosom, from the top of her gown and pressed the youngling to it. The babe quickly went quiet, and all that could be heard was the sound of tiny suckles. It was the first time he’d seen anything like it. Gracian females didn’t produce this milk in their breasts after a youngling was born. All Gracians were fed energy through their iungos.

  Teclis glanced at Crimson when she turned around and walked over to Amelia and Faith. Automatic thoughts of Crimson with a babe pressed to her bosom flickered through his mind, leaving him breathless. Since being with Coil, Teclis hadn’t really thought about having a youngling. But now, as he watched Crimson gazing down at Faith, his mind went into overdrive.

  “Oh, isn’t she lovely? How old?” Crimson sat beside their captain’s spark in another chair Hover placed next to Amelia.

  Teclis and Coil stood unmoving and quietly listened to their conversation while Amelia fed her youngling. Crimson seemed to relax more as time went by. When she held Faith in her arms for a brief moment, her face softened, love instantly showing. A conflict of emotions Teclis had never felt before ran through his body and his mind. His cock was hard and uncomfortable in his newly acquired uniform. His heart wanted Crimson to look upon him with the love she showed for the infant.

  But sadness crept in when Teclis thought of never seeing Coil or being with him again. Could he choose between Coil and Crimson? Would he want his lover to? No, Teclis was all but ready to zap from the room with his broken heart in his hands.

  Things changed quickly when Trian zapped into medical. Crimson’s expression changed to one of both awareness and fear. Teclis wanted to go over to her, pull her into his arms, and protect her from their captain. But instead, he grabbed hold of Coil’s arm, halting his lover and friend from doing just that. Trian, however, hadn’t missed that step Coil had taken toward the small group, and he glanced over at them both with a questioning look.

  Coil dropped his gaze to the floor whereas Teclis glanced from his captain to Crimson and then to Coil, hoping he was getting the message across that Crimson was Coil’s spark. Finally resting his gaze back onto Trian, Teclis watched his captain give an infinitesimal nod, indicating he understood what Teclis was saying without words.

  “Hey,” Amelia said, breaking the silence. “Our daughter decided she wanted to meet Crimson.”

  “Decided? How did she do that?” Trian asked. “She does not speak yet.”

  “She got hungry, silly, and wanted her mummy’s milk instead of that nasty bottle, so she met Crimson too.” Amelia cooed down at her sleeping babe before looking back up at her spark. “By the way, this is Crimson.”

  “Hello, Crimson.” Trian bowed his head a touch in recognition. “I’m sorry you have found yourself in a strange situation, but as I’m sure Amelia has informed you, we could not heal you well enough on the island for you to remain alive, so we had to bring you here.”

  Crimson nodded, tears forming in her eyes.

  “Do you remember how you came to be in the water and were injured as you were?”

  Crimson frowned for a moment, her eyes glazing over as if she were trying to reach for that memory. Then her cheeks flushed a deep pink and she let out a small gasp. Teclis watched her hands fist and her tiny, bare toes curl.

  “I don’t feel so well,” she whispered.

  Hover was at her side in a flash and scanning her. The medic glanced between Trian, Amelia, and then Teclis and Coil.

  “It’s the mating heat,” he informed everybody before stepping back a touch.

  “What’s going on?” Crimson asked, worry etching her face.

  Amelia stood and carefully handed Faith to Trian. She grabbed Crimson’s hand and tugged her toward the room they’d not long vacated.

  “Where are you taking her?” Trian asked.

  “She needs to know. I’ll take her back to the room for some privacy. Give us a moment.” Amelia said it more to Teclis and Coil than to anyone else. “Hover, please join us,” Amelia requested, and the trio disappeared behind the closed door.

  Teclis almost groaned; he couldn’t see her once again, and he had no idea what was being said. Not only that, seeing her as the mating heat began, he felt useless once more.

  No! He mentally shook his head. He shouldn’t feel this way. Crimson wasn’t his to help. It would be Coil that would be there for her. His sudden possessive thoughts were abandoned when Coil lurched toward the door.

  “Why would they hide her from me again?” Coil growled low.

  Teclis clasped a hand around Coil’s bicep in a punishing hold. A heart-wrenching thought seeped through Teclis’s brain. I will never feel Coil’s skin any more under my palm. I will never get to caress his body, never feel his muscles bunch underneath me. Never feel…

  “Teclis. Coil,” Trian said as his suspicious eyes met Teclis’s and then Coil’s.

  “Yes, sir.” Teclis stood straight but was unable to cross his arm over his chest in respect of his captain, being he was still holding onto Coil.

  Coil hadn’t answered, he just stood staring at the closed door, looking ready to pounce at any moment.

  “She is his then?” Trian nodded toward Coil.

  Teclis nodded, the thought breaking pieces of his heart away yet again. “I think so, yes. When she was lifted from the water and placed in his arms, he felt something.”

  “But you two…” Trian motioned between the two warriors.

  Teclis frowned. Did the captain know? If so, would it be in some report somewhere? Had he told other captains or fellow Gracians?

  “Don’t look like that, warrior. Take that frown off your face.” Trian shook his head. “We knew that both of you had your iungos and you share a close relationship, but it wasn’t until we came across the humans and their same-sex relationships that Hover and I put the information together and guessed you two were closer than any other warriors—well, some at least. Let me put it this way, you are not unique.”

  Teclis’s heart skipped a beat. He and Coil weren’t the only ones?

  “There are others?” Teclis asked in shock.

  Trian smiled. “It would seem so. But you pair are the first that I’ve spoken to about it.”

  “But…” Teclis wasn’t sure what to say. “Nobody has ever indicated… I’ve… We’ve…” Words became fragmented, unable to be put together in a sentence in Tec’s mind. He couldn’t make sense of anything.

  “Hover and I went over the ship’s medical records after our first assumptions. We believe there are about twenty other couples like you and Coil on the Gemorph. It would seem our species’ genealogy has yet again changed, adjusting since the reduction of our female births.”

  Teclis knew his face was one of shock. Not only did his captain and medic know about him and Coil, but there were others like them aboard the Gemorph?

  “We also think being Crimson has two iungos, that she may be both of your sparks.”

  Teclis suddenly had the urge to sit down, but Coil turned to look at both him and the captain, his face breaking out in a goofy smile.

  “I was so worried I might have to give you up,” Coil uttered, twisting around to face Teclis. “I felt like my heart was breaking apart.”

  Teclis turned his attention back to his captain. “Why haven’t you or Hover said anything before?”

  “About you and Coil, or the others?” Trian smiled. “It wasn’t our place. If your relationship had affected your work, then perhaps something might have been said, but what goes on behind closed doors…” Trian left the sentence hanging and shrugged his shoulders.

  Faith stirred in Trian’s arms. He looked down at his daughter and raised a finger, placing it in her tiny hand. Teclis watched in fascination as Faith’s fingers clasped around her pater’s huge digit without opening her eyes or stirring any more. Trian watched his daughter sleep with such love in his eyes, Teclis had the sudden urge to feel and see the same with his own youngling.

  Raising his gaze, Trian regarded both Teclis and Coil for a few moments before speaking. “You are considerably calm considering you have yet to be allowed to touch your spark, Teclis.”

  “Only on the surface, sir,” he replied. “If you could see how and what I am feeling inside, it isn’t pretty.”

  Trian nodded. “I remember it all too well.” The captain looked down at his daughter briefly before meeting Teclis’s gaze again. “I’m going to take my leave. I know you will take care of your spark, but be aware that as word gets around that you both share the same female, you will be the gossip of the ships for a while. I suspect that those other male couples that are like you might also step into the light and seek answers to questions that only the two of you will have the answer to.” Trian paused a moment before speaking again. “Be aware that human females do not adjust as fast as our female Gracians to the instant pairing. They aren’t…” Trian hesitated, seemingly to find the words he sought. “…as sexually permissive as we are.” Trian didn’t wait for them to reply. “I will take my leave, warriors. I would offer the normal Gracian greeting, potest solum unum…” A phrase that meant there can only be one. “…but in your cases, I suppose it’s null and void, as the humans say.” The captain shrugged again before he lowered his gaze to his daughter once more and zapped from the room.

  “She is ours? Both of ours?” Coil stood once more staring at the door of the room where Crimson was speaking to Amelia and Hover. Teclis released his lover’s arm, more than aware he now wanted Crimson as much as Coil did.

  “And there are others like us,” Teclis said in the same awed tone as Coil’s. Teclis frowned though, something bothering him. “But why did I not feel my energy leave me and enter Crimson like you did?”

  “Probably because you were freezing,” Coil said, turning his swirling, burgundy eyes to Tec’s.

  Teclis smiled, glad to see his lover’s Gracian eyes. He’d missed them when they wore their contacts. He hummed in agreement; he had been bloody freezing.

  “Which reminds me,” he said, suddenly remembering his thigh. He winced as he rubbed a hand over his thigh in an absentminded manner. “I still haven’t had this leg looked at yet, and I have a feeling we will need our energy if she is to accept us.”

  When he’d dressed before he’d run a healing wand over the hand-sized gash, but he knew from the feeling of his waning energy that his leg still needed more treatment. Before he could move, the door he and Coil had been keeping an eye on opened.

  “Pin your ears back,” Crimson said, stomping out of the room. “I don’t want no alien mate! Let alone two! No man in fact! I didn’t ask for this.”

  Teclis shared a look with Coil. Pin your ears back? Coil mouthed. Teclis shrugged before turning his gaze back to the small, angry female. It was clear that she was not at all happy about the news she’d just received. What were they going to do now?

  Chapter 5

  As Teclis watched Crimson his heart sank. She didn’t want them. What now?

  Actually, he knew the answer to that question—it meant certain death for both him and Coil. Even though he and Coil had shared, and would continue to share, their energy, it would still keep building inside of them because of Crimson. Their minds may understand that they had another spark that didn’t want them, but their bodies wouldn’t. Unless Crimson accepted them as mates, eventually they would flare and die. But they couldn’t force her to accept them.

  He glanced over at Coil briefly before turning his gaze back to Crimson.

  “Christ!” Crimson ran her hands through her long, red locks, exasperation on her face. “I’ve just had the fuck beaten out of me for leaving a man I didn’t want, and now this…”

  “I know,” Amelia said calmly, following Crimson.

  Crimson turned toward the window and gazed out. She lay her forehead against the glass and closed her eyes briefly before opening them.

  “Do I have to sleep with them? What exactly does my body need to stop this…this mating heat?” Crimson asked, still staring out into space.

  Hover took a tiny step forward and answered her questions. “When two mates meet, and energy is transferred for the first time, it starts off a succession of things. First, for the female, her DNA gets slightly changed to accept the male’s energy instead of her parents’, or in your case, grow an iungo…or two.” He mumbled the last bit. “As for the male, he starts producing more energy to help aid his new spark.”

  “So why the mating heat? Why do I have to sleep with them? Can’t they just transfer this energy to me?” Crimson turned around to look at Hover and Amelia, her face filled with pain.

  “The mating heat aids both parties in getting to know each other intimately. Your body, at the moment, needs your sparks’ sperm to help level out your hormones.”

  “So get them to jizz in a pot and insert it.” Crimson frowned and waved her hands toward Tec and Coil.

  Teclis didn’t like that idea at all. Jizz in a pot? He’d rather have his hands on his female’s body instead of around his own shaft. He wanted to spread his seed inside of her, not deposit it in a pot! Looking briefly toward Coil, he saw his friend’s lip was slightly curled up, showing he didn’t like that idea either.

  Amelia chuckled and glanced at Teclis and Coil before returning her gaze to Crimson. She whispered something into Crimson’s ear, causing Crimson’s eyes to widen and look toward him and Coil. Whatever Amelia was saying to Crimson caused his spark’s cheeks to blush the deepest of reds. Teclis could only imagine what was going on in her sweet mind to cause that.

  “That won’t work, I’m afraid,” Hover said, causing both females’ attentions to turn back to him. “Everything in a Gracian’s body is tied to their energy. If our seed is expelled, it quickly dies, unless of course, it is aided in the female’s body and by her spark’s energy, which is transferred during sex.”

  Crimson sighed. “So, no matter what, we…” She gestured toward Teclis and Coil again. “Have to do the dirty while they electrocute me, or I suffer and they die?” She suddenly looked even more frustrated, although the pink tinge to her cheeks remained.

  “It’s not all bad,” Amelia stated. “The sex is awesome, and you get two!”

  Crimson turned back to the window, sighing.

  Amelia placed a hand on Crimson’s shoulder. “Hover can give you a light sedative that will calm the effects of the mating heat. We aren’t suggesting you jump into bed with your mates, just talk with them for a while. Get to know them. While you’re here on this ship, you will be safe. Luke will never get to you—”

  “And these warriors won’t ever treat me the way he did. Blah, blah, blah. I know, I heard you.” Crimson sighed, twisting around to face everyone again. “It’s not just the fact I don’t want another man just yet, it’s also that I can’t even remember how I ended up in the water. What if he intended to kill me? What if he starts on another woman and does the same to her? I couldn’t live with myself. He’s still out there, Amelia. I may be safe here on this bloody alien ship but…” Her words trailed off, and she exhaled heavily again.

  Coil stepped forward, stopping once he was within a few feet of Crimson. “We can find him for you and make sure he harms no other female ever again.”

  Crimson turned around and raised her head to look up at Coil. She frowned. “What, kill him? Dispose of his body with your alien ray guns? What justice is that? And who are you?” Before Coil could answer, she added, “And bloody hell, you lot make me feel a right midget even more. Now I know what those little people feel like!”

  “I know, right?” Amelia giggled.

  Crimson looked toward Amelia and then around the room and started laughing herself. Teclis watched with slight amusement as the two human females carried on laughing until they were both holding their stomachs.

  * * * *

  It felt good to laugh. So good Crimson continued until her sides hurt and even more so after that. Visions of the oompa loompas in Charlie’s chocolate factory and the little people in The Wizard of Oz filled her mind with her face on them. She felt so tiny being amongst these huge alien men. She wondered briefly if their women were just as tall.

  When she opened her tear-filled eyes to look around her, it made her laugh even more. All the men in the room were staring at her and Amelia with a mixture of worried and amused looks on their faces. She could almost hear their thoughts. What’s so funny? Are these women bonkers? Is it contagious?

  “These… Oh my God… They look….” She couldn’t speak, say what she wanted to, because she kept laughing so much. Seeing the looks on the men’s faces had made it even worse. The medic, Hover, was scanning the pair of them with such a worried expression, he must think they were close to dying or something.