Disclaimer: I don't own either the Draka trilogy or Steven Universe, or any of the "surprise" crossovers that will join poor Steven in this nightmare AU. The former is owned by S.M. Stirling, who I affectionately refer to as S&M Stirling. The latter is owned by Rebecca Sugar and the Cartoon Network. I heavily recommend checking them both out. No money was made from this thing.
Note: this is only a one shot inspired by the crazy crossover generator. It likely won't go anywhere beyond this and was primarily written for practice (I got a 7,000 word document containing the rest of this monstrosity). I also invite any SU fans or Draka... Anti-fans to correct me on any lore mistakes I'm inevitably going to make.
Content warning: if you're easily squeamish about blood, gore, violence, sexual themes, then this is not the fic for you. The Draka are very vile and brutish creations and I imagine they would easily turn off a great portion of SU's fanbase. The other crossovers judging from what I've seen, eh I'm guessing 50/50. chance.
No Onions were harmed during the writing of his fic.
Freedom, a magic word
He looked at the stars. Separated from the great void of space by a sleet of industrial grade fiber-glass mined from one of the frontier worlds. The stars twinkled in the dark but it was the void itself that the man related to. Empty and never ending; much like himself, skulking about in self pity from a horrible past. He believed that he had gotten over his experience, that he had recovered by building a new life for himself on this ricky dink station in the middle of Wild Space.
But... He relapsed. It only happened a week ago; he was coming home from another day at Peridots and it hit him. A feeling of loss, betrayal, hopelessness, dehumanization, and most especially: vulnerability. For the next few days, he mostly retreated into his cabin avoiding his co-workers, friends, hell even those he considered family. He was afraid to tell them. To tell them about... About...
He gently pressed his hand to his forehead. He didn't like even thinking about her. A painful memory, from a time of his life filled with nothing but dread and misery. Where every day he was only a word away from the grotesque death his master's adored; you would think with their numbers, the slaves would've overtaken their hated tormentors but they didn't. People would walk by every day experiencing atrocity yet never would even lift a finger to stop it.
It was a daily occurrence for all of them, with the man himself adopting a apathy for the torment of his fellow human being. He knew he had to in order to survive; but to this day it amazed and terrified him that a entire civilization was not only based around, but driven by a caste system maintained by nothing but terror. You couldn't even trust your fellows who would rat you to the "mastah" in a second if they could gain favor in the master's eyes.
But that wasn't the worst. His masters had genetically engineered themselves into living embodiments of their decadent culture; their literal minds needed to dominate their fellow man, and they did so through a twisted control over human pheromones that he was resistive to only because of his mother's genes. He remembered watching entire monstrous orgies happen in the twinkling of a eye, strong men shrinking in primal terror to a little girl. And every time he felt nauseous, as if his head felt bloated and sick.
But he kept quiet. He hid his... Gift, he thanked his mother every night, from his captors. He was too young to be truly desired by their carnal appetites, or at least not by the older ones, so he was able to hide whenever the eldest launched her "parties" when her parents were gone. Many of his fellows were involuntarily bewitched by these women; never him for he was more terrified by their cruelty and twisted sense of morality.
All but for one. One who noticed him scurrying away, one who followed him, one who gained his trust. He admitted many of his secrets to her, trusting this Drakensis as a friend-no, something more. But in the end, he was just a game to her. She toyed with his emotions for a sick amusement, and he snapped her bait hook line and sicker. He was a fool and there was no one to blame but himself.
Damnation for his fellow slaves. Damnation for their masters. Damnation, most of all, for himself. It took for the noble sacrifice of three dear friends for him to see the truth behind that whole putrid excuse for a civilization. He moved his hand to the railing, still feeling his raging headache.
It hurt like hell. So he turned back into his cabin: a rather nice three room with a bedroom, a living room with a built in kitchen, and a restroom. He looked at his living room, a nice couch overlooking what was essentially the interstellar equivalent to television. Usually nothing was on but cringe inducing Ferengi sitcoms or savage Cleon bloodsports.
There was a nice clean table where he had set up a nice ship-in-a-bottle showcasing a Cleon ship. A item that brought upon happier memories, as strange as it sounded. Ha! He remembered the warrior laughing after Steven knocked him on the ground, The welp has some balls after all! Throw him some ale!
He smiled at the memory. One of the first true friends he made. After the nightmare of his homeworld, escaping on a Gem spacecraft long buried and hidden by his own mother, Steven wandered the stars aimlessly in search of a home. Another lost soul like so many others. It was only when he met Kal and Odo in this rustbucket of a space station when he was able to truly settle down.
The man picked up a glass of water and gently sipped on it, swallowing some asprin before setting it down and looking at the pictures on the table. A picture of his mother and father smiling in a photograph, with "hi Steven" written on it. He knew his Dad, one of the best men he ever knew, but he never met his mother. He found these lying in the spacecraft; gently nustled into a handful of cardboard boxes.
Steven also chuckled at his reflection in the water. He looked just like him, his Dad. Long dark hair, brown eyes that remained humorous even now, a stubble that he was trying to grow into a beard. Though unlike him, he had a complete sun tan brought upon from years of hard labor... Well that, and taking frequent vacations to Vulcan. Ah, the stories he could tell about Vulcan but again the pleasant remembrance was overtaken by the brooding dark.
Steven leaned back in the couch. Thinking on about his life. Remembering the day everything changed. When he was just in school, bored out of his mind, staring at the metallic ceiling when the Final War began. The war was just a prologue; four years of squatting in that bunker, his enslavement, two years of toil to the loathed Loud family in that gilded cage, his escape.
He dreamt of his run for freedom infrequently. Running through the woods, the dark all encompassing, jumping at the slightest sound, Steven swearing he heard his former masters chasing in fast pursuit. He swore that he saw terrible things awakened from their dark slumber; silhouettes with whites for eyes watching him flee, canine creatures stalking through the overgrown graveyard observing him, Fish things watching him from the swamp, and it always seemed to go on and on.
Steven always awakened from these nightmares sweating. They always ended with one of the ten catching him; dragging him back to the plantation, always with futile screams and begs for mercy. He admitted that even to this day, he was still afraid of his depraved former masters even though they only inhabited one microscopic system in a vast galaxy filled to the brink with civilizations who would obliterate them in the blink of a eye. And he likely always will be, unfortunately, even after his practice sparring with Kal.
Putting down the water, he grabbed a different bottle lying about. One full of Romulan Ale. A hard drink he frequently sipped whenever he thought this deep into the past. After a shot or two, Steven began to reminisce. Sometimes these moments started with him escaping with the Gem Spacecraft, others when he had started his long run through the dark forest, but today was one of those days.
His mind took him to the very beginning...