Initial here to acknowledge that the host planet's environment contains multiple aphrodisiac compounds that will amplify tonic effects.
Initial here to waive Earth legal protections upon crossing the portal threshold.
K.W. K.W. K.W.
Each initial feels like cutting something away. My autonomy. My choices. My future. But Tommy's life hangs in the balance, and I'm the one who put it there. My crusade. My consequences. His death sentence.
“Box twenty-two is about breeding compatibility,” the coordinator says, highlighting something on her tablet. “The serpentine species?—”
“I don't need a biology lesson. Just tell me where to sign.”
She pauses, probably deciding if it's worth the effort to continue. “Initial here.”
K.W.
“Last box acknowledges that the thirty-day survival period begins upon portal entry. The return portal opens at the same coordinates exactly seven hundred and twenty hours later.”
Seven hundred and twenty hours. Thirty days of being hunted by something built to catch me. Thirty days of my body screaming for what wants to breed me. Thirty days to endure so Tommy gets to live.
I sign the last box with enough force to tear through the paper.
The coordinator takes the contract, scans it with her tablet. “Proceed to Medical Bay Three for implant insertion.”
Medical Bay Three is just the old Macy's with surgical equipment. They kept the overhead lighting—harsh fluorescents that make everyone look sick. Four other women wait in plastic chairs. Two cry silently. One stares at nothing. The fourth rocks slightly, whispering what sounds like prayer.
A tech in scrubs that have seen better days calls my name. “Wykoff, Kassandra?”
“Just Kass.”
“This way.”
The surgical chair looks like a dental chair's aggressive cousin. The tech gestures for me to sit, starts pulling out equipment. The neural implant is tiny—maybe rice grain-sized—but the insertion tool looks like something from a horror movie.
“This will hurt,” the tech says, not bothering with bedside manner. “The implant integrates with your brain stem. You'll have a headache for a few hours.”
“Just do it.”
She positions the tool at the base of my skull. “Three, two?—”
Fire. White-hot fire boring into my skull. My hands grip the chair arms hard enough to crack my knuckles. The pain spreads from the insertion point through my entire nervous system, synapses firing in protest as alien tech rewrites my neural pathways.
“Integration successful,” the tech says, already cleaning up. “You'll start understanding basic Vhazian in about an hour. Proceed to Preparation Room Two.”
I stand, head spinning. The implant pulses at the base of my skull, a foreign presence making itself at home. Other women in the waiting room watch me leave. We don't make eye contact. No point in bonding with people you'll never see again.
Preparation Room Two reeks of copper and moss. The smell hits before I even open the door—organic and wrong, nothing that should exist on Earth. Inside, another coordinator waits with a tray of vials.
“Preparation tonic,” she explains, holding up one iridescent green cylinder. “You'll consume this, then proceed immediately to the portal chamber.”
The liquid inside moves wrong, too viscous, catching light that shouldn't exist. I take the vial. It's warm. Slightly pulsing, like it's alive.
“Effects begin within minutes,” the coordinator continues. “Heightened arousal, increased sensitivity, elevated body temperature. These will intensify over the first few hours.”
“Bottoms up.” I unscrew the cap, knock back the contents before I can think about it.
Copper and moss and something else. Something that tastes like sex should taste if sex had a flavor. It burns going down, then spreads warmth through my chest, my stomach, lower. My nipples harden immediately, visible through my thin shirt. Between my legs, wetness begins pooling.
“Fuck.”
