Disclaimer: Still applies.

See previous chapter for notes.

Rhade woke up hungry and cranky but not quite as jittery as he had been. But he was still visibly bothered by his surroundings, and when he began to pace again, Dylan didn't say a word.

Rhade said, "Thanks…you know, for the massage."

"Let me know if you want another one."

"I think I'll be okay." The easiness from before swiftly turned back to deliberate coolness and the need for space.
Dylan ate bread as Rhade continued to pace. He suddenly stopped when they heard Beka's voice crackle over his communication device.

"You there, guys?"

"Yes. Do you know where 'there' is yet?" Dylan asked.

"Working on it. Now, we're going to lose this transmission in about seconds. Do you know anything that'll help us?"

Rhade said, "Polyplautinol. That runs their generator. I think if you shut it down, we can get out."

Harper's voice came to them, then. "Where the hell are they getting polyplaut on this godforsaken continent?"

"Raiding nearby settlements. That's all we know."

Harper said, "Who knows what a generator that powerful will do if we shut it down."

"Explode?" Beka said.

"No. But I'm betting it circulates their oxygen too. I gotta tell you, you'd be so much better off finding an alternate means of—"

The crackle told them they were gone again, and Rhade cursed the silence.

"Well, that's comforting," Dylan said sarcastically.

"Harper will get us out."

"I think we need a new plan."

"We've exhausted all the plans we have. We just have to wait for Harper to take down the generator. We have to be ready when he does."

Dylan started to speak, but he heard the sound of footsteps. A woman he recognized as the leader advanced toward their cell. At first he thought maybe she had heard their transmission, but she was clearly only interested in one thing: Rhade.

She looked only at him, saying, "I've chosen you, and you will be for me only. None of the others."

After a long pause during which he stared her down, Rhade asked, "And him?"

"He will be for whoever wants him." Her eyes were not exactly cold, just set on a task she saw as inevitable. It was obvious she had chosen Rhade not simply because he was more physically imposing than Dylan but also because she genuinely found him more attractive. Perhaps she saw that he shared her forceful personality.

Rhade shook his head, resolutely, matching her coldness. "That's an unwise decision."

"Oh?"

"He is unsuitable for your purposes. He's inferior, a genetic mistake. He will only breed more weak men. On our homeworld, he's not even allowed to procreate. He is only around for strategy and to help us remember our ancient philosophy. I can see that you have no shortage of brains. Would you have weak men among you, or more like me?"

She eyed Dylan closely, so he dare not look to see if he could identify even the slightest trace of a smirk on Rhade's face. He was sure there wasn't one, but he was not sure how much of what Rhade said was what he believed.

The woman said, "I will have to deliberate over what you've said." With that, she turned and was gone again.

"What in the hell was that?" Dylan said.

"She bought it."

"No, what was that bullshit about me being inferior?"

"Me saving you from becoming a sex slave."

"You should be worried about yourself."

"You heard her. She's going to keep me all to herself. She'll let me go when she gets what she wants. But you'll never leave."

"That's crazy. Who says she won't want to have nine or ten little bastard Neitzscheans? Who says she won't kill you when it's all over?"

"I've never had a woman that dissatisfied with me."

"This isn't funny."

He snorted. "Of course it is. It's absolutely morbid and beyond bizarre. We have no idea what they're going to do. But at least I bought us and Harper some time."

"By telling them that I'm essentially a eunuch, shunned and mocked by my own people."

"It was the best thing I could come up with."

"I'm so glad that's how you see me."

Rhade started to speak, but he left his mouth hanging open. He closed it, finally, retreating to his corner and sitting down with a thud. Quietly, he said, "I was trying to be smart. I thought if I confused them, we'd get more time. I thought it would be a little suspicious to lie and talk about myself that way—as you delight in pointing out, I'm rather conceited by your standards; she wouldn't buy it for a second. I was just trying to save you, okay?"

"No," Dylan said. "You're right. It obviously bought you some time, anyway. Apparently, serving me up to the others isn't her first priority. But I think she was going to take you away just then."

"I know." He suddenly began to fidget again, but this time he didn't bother to hide the fear in his eyes.

"What?"

"Nothing."

"Rhade?"

"What if I've just convinced them that you're worthless as a man?"

"Okay. Wasn't that the point?"

"Yeah."

But he still didn't look calm. Dylan said, "Rhade?"

He whispered, "What if that was the only thing keeping you alive?"

They were very quiet for a while as Dylan thought through the logic of their situation. Of course, the logic kept breaking each time he glanced at Rhade and saw how freaked out he was. Like Dylan, he was concentrating on their situation, but his eyes seemed like empty, hollow places now, and he would sometimes glance at Dylan with the guiltiest look on his face.

"I'm sorry, you know," he said.

"For what?"

"I'm just sorry. I wasn't thinking clearly."

"If I'd've thought of it, I'd've said the same thing. You did just fine."

"But it was for the wrong reasons."

"What?"

"Nevermind."

"Okay," Dylan said.

"I'm not trying to hide things from you. It's just…complicated."

"Okay."

Angrily, he said, "I should be able to get us out of this."

"As should I."

"I cannot believe I'm caught up in more manipulated sex."

"What?"

"This is what you do when you're Neitzschean. You procreate."

"But you're not exactly typical, are you?"

"What do you mean?" he snapped.

"You've been away from your people. But surely there's some technique you haven't forgotten, some charm you have stored away. Maybe you can convince her—"

"That's it!" Rhade rose. "Charm. You have to make her want to have sex with you."

"Great."

"It won't be that hard."

"No?"

"I'm actually surprised she believed those things I said about you. I've seen you charm your share of women."

"But not under this much duress."

"Just…I don't know." He ran a hand through his hair and said, rather sheepishly, "Make sure she sees your ass."

He was appreciating the subtleties of catching Rhade off guard and seeing him smile, but he still found the words to ask, "What?"

"It's a nice one. According to Beka. And Trance. And any woman I've ever heard speak about you. And give her that smoldering captain look, the one that says you're the strong, silent type and you can conquer the world."

"I didn't know I had a look like that."

"I think it's your natural expression." He smiled. "When you're not smirking like you are now."

"And what will you do?"

In an absolutely serious tone, he said, "Try to look as unappealing as possible."

Dylan just snorted. Who in the hell was he kidding?

When the girl came to bring them more food and water, she was nervous again.

"They will come for you soon. What did you say to Charity?"

They quickly recounted their bad idea about Dylan's unsuitability. The girl frowned, but she frowned even more when they told them their solution to the problem.

"No. No, no. They will not like that. It will only anger them. Charity will see it as a challenge." She now spoke directly to Rhade, transfixed momentarily by his face in the same way so many women and not a few men found themselves lost there. "She doesn't really care if he will be suitable for the rest of us. She is only worried about you. Besides, she needs both of you—the more new, tall men the better. Believe me, you are both superior to any man we have here."

"Then we just wait?"

"There's nothing you can do."

Dylan's eyes narrowed. The girl was refusing to look either of them in the eyes now. He said, "They've done this before."

"Yes."

"And?"

"Once you've impregnated enough women, they will send you on a raid. If you go, you will probably die. If you refuse, they will kill you."
"You're sure?"

"Very," she said.

Rhade asked her, "How do you put up with this?"

"I have no choice. I know why they do it."

"But you'd never…" Dylan asked.

In a quiet, far-off voice, she said, "Once. My son was stillborn. I did have a tall brother, just a few inches shorter than you, but he too died in the raids. The raids are the problem, not the stature of the men in the colony. But I swore I would never take advantage of a man again, even if I must bear only short, frail children."

Dylan said, "What's your name? I'd like to know who was on my side."

"Hope."

"Well, Hope, I'm Dylan Hunt and this is Telemachus Rhade," he said. "If worse comes to worse, I can promise you will not be forcing me, okay?"

She smiled a very sad smile, shaking her head. Rhade added, "That would go for me too, if I wasn't, you know…"

"Thank you."

Dylan said, "If you see this as wrong, why don't they?"

"They do, sometimes, but they feel they have no choice. We are also a superstitious people. When we are gifted with outsiders, we feel that they must take advantage."

"Doesn't anything make a man unsuitable?"

She laughed, covering her mouth with her sleeve. "There is nothing you could do to make them believe anything other than the fates sent you to give them strong, virile sons."

She got up to leave, and they slumped back down into their customary positions on opposite walls. She was almost around the corner when she quickly retraced her steps back to the force field. "There is one thing…one thing that might make you unsuitable."

Then they saw her head jerk and they heard what she heard: footsteps. She looked Rhade in the eyes and said, "Men who only want to lie with men. It is a threat to us. They will not want you for sex, then. They wouldn't even want your dead bodies in this colony. You will most likely walk out unharmed."

Dylan watched her round the corner and then he looked at Rhade, whose eyes were wide as saucers. The girls' footsteps retreating in one direction were drowned out by the sounds of several heels clacking toward them from the other end of the tunnel.

Dylan said, "What do we do?"

Rhade grabbed him by the shoulders and gave him that gaze that transfixed people: "Just trust me."

"Okay."

The leader was no longer in her fatigues but instead was wrapped in a blue cloak. Her three minions carried with them a pallet, food, and water.

She said, "You must be sufficiently hungry now. Will you come to me?"

Rhade said, "No."

"And why not? Am I not attractive?"

"Certainly."

"You know that this is inevitable. You know I will have you. Be resolved to it. You are doing a good thing for us. You will be the father of a race of warriors."

"If you say so." Dylan found himself a little confused watching Rhade. Why wasn't he at least accepting of this fate? It couldn't be all that different from what his biology had always told him to do.
She said to Rhade, "You are difficult, but that can be a good quality in a man."

Then two of the minions trained small laser pistols at them. The leader motioned for the third to take down the force field, and she did, and the leader stepped into their space.

One of the minions approached Dylan and grabbed him by the arm.
"I prefer that he stay," Rhade said forcefully.

"Why?" the leader said.

"I have a difficult time maintaining arousal without a man to look at."

She drew back from him instantly, but she soon began to scowl. "You're lying."

Rhade's voice was strong but tinged with lust. "He's my lover." Rhade's gaze drifted to him for a moment, and if Dylan hadn't known better, he'd have believed he was Rhade's lover. "That's why I didn't want you to give him to your women. I am very possessive. I will have sex with you, but only if he can stay right here where I can see him."

She stepped very close to him. "This is a ruse to keep him safe. I am not stupid. You lie very well with your mouth. But bodies don't lie. You are not an abomination. You will prove it."

"If you wish."

Rhade approached Dylan where he was leaned into the wall of the tunnel, and he kissed his neck first in order to whisper in his ear: "However far they make me take this, I won't hurt you. Tell me now if you'd rather comply with them than do this."

For Rhade's benefit as much as the spectators, Dylan said, "I am only yours."

So Rhade pressed into him and kissed him hard, as if they were sealing some pact of trust that had been unresolved until then. Dylan gasped into Rhade's mouth when he felt Rhade harden. Rhade gasped too, probably because he hadn't expected Dylan's body to respond in kind. Their kissing became deeper and slower, and he could feel Rhade's fingers probe the back of his neck, slowly massaging much like he had been massaged hours before. Hungrily, Dylan slipped his tongue into his mouth, and Rhade responded aggressively, thrusting his tongue in return as if it were a shadow of what he wanted to be doing with his body. Rhade began to rock his erection into Dylan's, groaning loudly for the benefit of their audience. Dylan was so caught up in the feel of such strong arms around him that he didn't care how miserably hot he was or how they were both covered in sweat or how four strange women were watching. It was like everything around him was quiet except the buzzing in his own brain, and he felt something practically radiating from Rhade. It was not unlike the steady but determined way he stood up to the leader: protective and possessive. And it wasn't faked.

Dylan began to unbutton Rhade's pants, but Rhade suddenly pulled his mouth away. The quiet they had felt enveloping them wasn't normal. He looked up at the three minions, who were quite unnerved.

One said, "What's going on?"

The leader said, "I've only heard that silence once, when I was a child. The generator is failing. Go at once and help the others to get out."
"But what about the men?"

She practically shouted at them, and it sounded so loud in the quiet. "Can't you see they're not natural! They must not lay a hand on us." She ran out into the corridor, saying, "Go down there and take the first fork you find. You will find a hatch soon enough. Never return."

The lights were beginning to fail, so they hastily grabbed their things and headed in the direction they'd been pointed, running all the way. They saw the hatch in the dim light, but it was pitch black before they managed to get through it, Dylan boosting Rhade through, and Rhade pulling him up and out into the somewhat cooler desert air and the bright sun.

The adrenaline and exertion had begun to effect them, so they didn't talk but simply stood there, breathing hard and hoping their erections were gone before Beka came to rescue them. Once they were on the Maru, leaving the planet behind, they thought about Hope, but they knew she would likely not have come with them anyway.

After the excitement was over—and the two men endured their taunts and hailed the crew as their saviors without divulging how they really got free—Rhade disappeared, and Dylan waited only long enough to bathe before he hunted him down. It wasn't hard to find him.

He stepped into the hydroponics lab and saw that Rhade was also clean and in fresh clothing. "Are we not going to talk about this?" he asked him.

"What's there to say?"

"Um, I don't know what you felt back there, but..."

"Just forget it." This was cold Rhade again, with a bitterness in his voice that he couldn't quite cover.

"I don't think that's possible."

"Try."

"Why?"

"Because we both know that wasn't what you want."

"Are you sure of that? Have you known me to ever be that…passionate with anybody?"
"They were threatening your life. Besides, I don't know what you do when you want someone."

"Well, I certainly don't sneak around the Andromeda to avoid them and whine to Trance about it."

He almost slammed his hand down on the counter but he stopped. "She told you that?"

"She didn't have to. I know when I've been kissed by someone who wants to kiss me. And I think you know it too."
At that, Rhade's expression softened into a confused smile. "But you've never…"

"Well, you've never either."
"I thought that after my ancestor…"
"You're not him. Believe me. I figured that out a long time ago. But I just didn't realize any of this until today. I'm a little slow."

"I'm beginning to see that." Taking a deep breath, his face relaxed finally. He said, "You know, you're half of why I was so claustrophobic in that damn tunnel."

"And your claustrophobia is more than half of why I finally figured out just how nice it could be to put my hands on you."
"So that backrub was to seduce me."

"No. I think it was to seduce me."

Rhade smiled and said, "Look, about how I've been acting..."

"It's okay. I get it, finally. I can't believe I never even suspected."

"That's makes two of us."

Rhade didn't say any more, so Dylan said, "Okay, so not to be bossy or anything, but are you going to kiss me again, or do I have to take you out on a dangerous mission for that?"

Rhade shook his head and laughed, a nice sound to Dylan's ears because it was so rare and so rarely joyful and not sarcastic. Rhade practically attacked Dylan, pinning him against the counter, and they were both quickly hard again, trying to touch each other with every square inch of their bodies. Rhade was aggressive at first, like Dylan knew he would be, but then he slowed down and he was the same man who had called him lover earlier. His lips slid carefully over Dylan's before he let his tongue explore his lips and then his mouth. He sucked on Dylan's lower lip for a moment, finally moving his mouth to his neck. He said, "You smell really nice."
"It's amazing what soap and water will do."

"Do you know how difficult it was to lie about you, to call you inferior?"

Pulling back to look in his eyes, Dylan said, "It wasn't a total lie. You said I was a philosopher, a brain. Does it really bother you so much that I'm…"

"Idealistic? Foolish? Overly Cerebral? No. Does it bother you that I'm just a big, stupid enforcer?" At those last words, Rhade had moved his lips to his ear, and he was now slowly tracing the outline of his ear with his tongue. His hips were grinding into his own, and it was making it hard for him to form coherent thoughts.

"You have a brain, and you use it well, and I appreciate having it thinking on my side…But if you don't stop that, I'm going to forget you have anything other than a mouth and a dick."

"You peeked when I was pissing before, didn't you?"

"Didn't you?"

"Yes. And I want you to know I'm also completely enamored with your body. I mean, I appreciate your mind because it's part of who you are, but your mind's not—"

He groaned as Dylan cut him off with a kiss. They groped at each other for a moment, and as Rhade's hand was sliding over Dylan's crotch, Dylan stopped him, holding him by the arm and pushing him back.

Rhade said, "What?"

"Do you really want to screw me in the hydroponics lab?"

He turned to leave, to pull the other man behind him, but Rhade threw his arms around him from behind. In a low, seductive tone, he said, "I don't care. I'll even let you screw me if you want."

"That's"—he sharply took in a breath as Rhade pulled his ass back into his hips—"exactly what I think we should do, but I'd rather not have an audience again."

Rhade growled into his shoulder. "Do you know how damn difficult it has been to seduce you, Captain Hunt?"

"Especially because you never tried."

"It's only because you're such a prude."

Dylan twisted around in Rhade's arms, and he slid his hand down Rhade's stomach and past the waistband of his pants, lightly brushing his erection. Quietly, but right in his ear, Dylan said, "Do you want to stand here and call me a prude, or do you want to come and have your view of me redefined?"

Rhade followed him out into the corridor. "I don't think you know how many views of you I already have in my head. And so few of them with any clothing."

-end-