Her Brutal Alien (Alien Overlords)

“Please…”

“You,” Tusk growls, “are a bad little human.”

“Please…” I whimper again. “I did what I had to do. I couldn’t do anything else.”

He stops and stares at me with those bright eyes of his. “Say that again.”

“Please…”

“No. The last two sentences.”

I stammer as I try to remember what I said. It wasn't anything particularly clever. “I did what I had to do? I couldn't do anything else?”

He lets me go.

“Of course,” he says. “I have been distracted by the persistent illusion of choice.”

I look around to see if someone knows what he is talking about. Nobody seems to be any the wiser.

He extends a clawed finger and taps the tip of my nose with it ever so gently. “You were here. You did assassinate the would-be bride. But you have no recollection of it. You were a tool. You had… no… choice!”

He finishes the sentence with a pleased and growling flourish.

“I…”

“It all makes sense now. The scent I followed to your house, your awful husband who was likely nothing more than a korabi in a human suit. Someone who wanted Krush to be removed from the throne.”

“Rath!” Krush barks the name as if Rath is the answer to every question that ever existed.

It is Rath’s turn to lose his temper. He glows vermillion and speaks with a voice barely below a shout. “Not me, you absolute idiot. I’ve never wanted anything other than you on the damn throne. Neither has Tyvian. Neither has Tusk. You have nothing but allies, you spoiled moron.”

“You ambushed me and stole my throne. You attacked me in the streets of my own city. You hurt me.”

"Yes. Well. That was all part of the plan.”

"The plan to what!?”

“The plan to make you want to be king. It worked slightly too well.”

“Oh yes. Brilliant plan. My mate is gone, my baby is gone. You’ve put the only heir to the throne at risk of being killed by any random…”

“Your baby never went anywhere,” Tusk says, waving his hand dismissively. “Tyvian took them both to the human suite.”

“What?"

“Are we truly surprised in this world of scams, schemes, and lies?”

“I suppose not. Unshackle me and bring me my family. I will let yours live, Tusk. We will rebuild. I am done battling my destiny.”

“If I unshackle you, and you immediately or eventually attack any one of the royal council, I assure you that the consequences will not be the short-term removal of your infant. The nobles are in agreement. Public sentiment is behind them. A new royal line is on the cusp of creation. Do not waste this last opportunity, Krush. It is your last.”

“I understand, Tusk. I am not as stupid as I may seem. I have been battled and bested twice. I know a third time is fated to be my last.”

Tusk turns to him with a skeptical brow. “I do not trust your sudden appearance of rationality, but I cannot keep you tied up forever, brat king.”

“Brat king," Lyric smirks.

The mood is lifting. Tensions which seemed insurmountable before we first sat down for this meal have somehow melted away.

So many things have been resolved. It seems I was at the center of much of this chaos, an unwilling and unaware participant in a game of twisted alien politics.

I don't know what to believe, about them or even about myself. I stand there, feeling numb as a tableau of forgiveness and redemption and reunification plays out before me. Tyvian appears with Jax and the baby, they embrace Krush, who cries royal golden tears of relief.

I thought I had done something to influence these affairs, but I was just another pawn in Tusk’s play. I wonder if I have made a single choice about a single thing since I first opened my eyes, or if I have always been the puppet of greater forces, imagining myself to be making decisions, when in truth my options were limited to a single path winding through the world, one marked for me, and me alone.

"I love you so much. I missed you so much.” Krush and Jax are sobbing into one another’s arms with great welling heaves of emotion. The baby is making vague infant noises. It is only a week or so old. It does not understand anything very much.

I feel a certain kinship with that little thing. I too, have absolutely no idea what is going on. Much like him, I don’t know who or what I am.

“And now,” Tusk says, dropping his massive, clawed hand lightly on my shoulder. “To deal with you.”

A tremor runs through me. I do not want to be dealt with. I do not want to learn that the gnawing guilt I have always carried at the center of me actually means something. I assumed everybody felt this way, and maybe they do. But maybe in my case, it means something more.