“Strip.” The alien led her to another room, a small chamber that was so dark she could barely see inside.

At the entrance, Layla hesitated. She wasn’t even aware of what she was doing until she dug her heels in and stared into the abyss. Who the hell walked straight into a dark room without knowing what was inside, anyway?

“Are all humans this slow to learn?” Her captor’s boot met the back of her ankle, and Layla gasped as she stumbled forward, falling in the darkness, right into the claustrophobic little chamber. Now she couldn’t see a fucking thing. “By now, your obedience should be seamless. Or are you somehow immune to pain?” The Kordolian raked his fingers through her hair and pulled her head up, almost tearing her hair out at the roots. Burning pain crawled over Layla’s scalp. “You reek, human. Take off those filthy garments so I can sanitize you.”

“Fuck you,” Layla muttered in Eskulin.

The collar went off again, wiping her mind of everything except the worst possible agony. Somehow, the more the Kordolian used the collar, the less afraid Layla became.

It’s just pain, she told herself, chanting the mantra over and over again in her head. It won’t kill you. If this thing was doing any real damage, you’d be dead already.

Amidst the haze of her torture, it occurred to Layla that she’d been dealing with physical pain all her life.

The crazy shoes they made her wear for filming.

The fractures she endured when doing real-life stunts.

The bruises she had to conceal with makeup each and every time Damien lost his fucking temper.

The crippling periods that had plagued her month after month, until she had enough money to afford a permanent cure for her endometriosis.

It won’t kill you.

It never had.

If she wasn’t afraid of pain, then he had no control over her, and Layla was pretty sure that he didn’t want to kill her. The Kordolians wanted her alive so they could… study her reproductive anatomy or whatever. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have gone to all the effort of retrieving her and putting the collar around her neck.

Just pain. It’s not going to kill you.

Somehow, that realization made it so much easier to endure.

“You are a stupid creature,” the scientist hissed, his stale breath washing over her. “And I am no longer amused this stupid game. This is starting to become tiresome.” His metal coated hand clamped down on her neck, and he pushed her down against the floor, mashing her cheek into the hard surface. Fuck, he was strong. With his other hand, he began to strip the cabin-jacket from her body. When it proved difficult to remove, he cursed in his own language and started to tear at the thing with his claws.

Layla knew he was using his claws, because they ripped right through the reflective fabric of her jacket, right through her high-tech suit beneath, and right into her skin.

Warm blood trickled down her arms and back. The pain of his vicious scratches was drowned out by the continuous agony of the collar.

He was treating her the way one might treat a wild animal.

Holy fuck.

His entire weight was pressing down on her, and he was heavy. As he tore away shreds of her jacket and the suit underneath, exposing her bare, bloodied skin to the cold, Layla squirmed as hard as she could, ignoring the fear that the skin on her back had been shredded to ribbons.

She couldn’t see a thing.

There was something terribly savage about the way he pushed her down and tore his claws through her skin. It was species against species, one seeking to dominate the other, to inflict pain, humiliate, terrorize. There was a maliciousness about it all, as if he possessed a deep hatred for humans.

He’d turned vicious so quickly.

Irrational. Unpredictable. He was probably insane.

“Keep still,” the Kordolian growled, his voice growing hoarse with frustration. “It is only a sanitation chamber. What the fuck is wrong with you?”

But Layla just couldn’t stomach the thought of stripping down to her bare skin in front of this monster. Something inside her snapped, and all reason went out the window.

She squirmed harder.

Her arms and back became slick with her own blood, and as Layla struggled, she managed to slip out of his grasp.

The Kordolian unleashed a long string of what sounded like curse-words as he slammed her head into the floor once again.

If Layla could see right now, she suspected her vision would be going dark from the blow to her head, but it was pitch-black, and she was guided by feel alone.

One of her arms slipped free of his grasp, and she reached around to the small of her back, where she’d slipped the knife beneath her waistband.

Please be there. Please be there.

Her fingers curled around a familiar hilt.

Yes!

Somehow, she was able to pull the thing out of its sheath.

No longer was she thinking about survival and patience and endurance. Something raw and primal rose up within her, a savage need to inflict violence on the one who held her down.

To make him stop.

Slipping. Squirming. Struggling.

Breathing heavily. Ignoring his curses and the fire-burn of his scratches. Blood everywhere. Warm. Coppery. Hers.

Desperation granted her an impossible burst of strength. Adrenaline surging. Heart pounding. Hatred burning through her like wildfire, giving her the power to twist around and thrust, even as his claws raked across her face.

The blade went somewhere. Met something hard. Didn’t stick. Flew out of her fucking hand.

Oh shit.

Her heart sank.

Layla couldn’t see a thing, but she knew she’d missed. She hadn’t stuck him in the heart the way she’d intended to, and now her only weapon was lost in the darkness.

The strength drained from her body, and she went limp.

God, he’s so heavy.

The Kordolian was on top of her, crushing her, his blood spilling all over her, and somehow she knew it was his blood, because it was thick and sticky and smelled bitter.

What color is it?

Darkness hid everything.

Wait… blood?

“You fucking human bitch,” he hissed in Universal, before crying out in his native tongue.

She felt one of his arms move… he seemed to be reaching for his neck, but she couldn’t quite tell.

His breathing grew shallow and rapid. Blood trickled over Layla’s cheek, and she couldn’t tell whether it was hers or his until it trickled over her lips. She tasted vile bitterness. His blood!

The alien’s breathing grew shallower, his movements weaker. He rolled off her, and she heard clumsy, staggering footsteps in the darkness, as if he were trying to get to his feet.

He stumbled and fell.

Layla seized the chance and shuffled backward out of the dark chamber, wanting to get as far away from him as possible. She maneuvered herself back into the main chamber, where the dim blue light allowed her to see.

Thank the fucking stars that stupid pain collar wasn’t going off anymore, but she was bleeding all over, from her back to her arms, and her broken rib hurt something fierce.

Lying on her back, she propped herself up on her elbows, sucking in air in great, heaving gasps as she tried to calm down and take stock of her situation.

It was eerily quiet.

The mad Kordolian’s jagged breathing no longer reached her ears. All Layla heard was the faint hum of machinery in the background.

“Uggh.” Suddenly, a specter emerged from the darkness. The Kordolian lurched toward her, holding one hand against his neck. Black blood streamed from underneath his fingers, staining his white robes.

Layla froze. Somehow, her wild, desperate thrust had managed to slash his neck. He was bleeding from his carotid artery—or whatever the Kordolian equivalent was—and there was lots of blood.

Still, he kept coming, swaying from side to side, reaching toward her like a fucking zombie, his face made all the more terrifying because of the dark metal fibers that wove beneath his silver skin. There was a pallor in his face now; his skin had gone from lustrous silver to ashen grey.

The scientist tried to shout, but his voice came out as a hoarse whisper. Battling the pain that racked her body from head to toe, Layla rose to her feet and tried to run, but the best she could do was hobble across the room in slow motion, her bare feet covered in sticky blood.

She didn’t look back, didn’t care what the monster behind her was doing. She just wanted to get away.

Madness.

In the space of a few minutes, she’d gone from terrified captive to cornered animal.

Thud.

She heard him fall. He gasped and wheezed, uttering something malevolent in his native tongue.

Then, nothing.

Is he… dead?

She risked a glance over her shoulder. The Kordolian lay on his back, unmoving, his white robes drenched in blood. His metal arm was outstretched, his claws extended.

Blank, sightless eyes stared back at her, the yellow of his irises appearing weirdly intense against his lifeless face.

Dead.

She’d killed him.

All the strength drained out of her limbs, leaving Layla feeling utterly exhausted. She dropped to her knees, trembling.

Holy hell. What have I done?

She’d just killed a guy, and yet she felt nothing. No remorse, no shock, no fear. She was just numb… and cold, tired, and all alone.

Was this Enki character ever going to come and take her away? A great sense of weariness swept over her, and Layla closed her eyes, fantasizing about a moment that would never come.

This relentless nightmare… it just went on and on and on, and she was fucking sick of it.

Stop feeling sorry for yourself, idiot. Move your ass or you’re dead.

She’d just killed a Kordolian scientist in his own lab. A high-ranking scientist, judging from the way he’d ordered that hateful Captain Pradon around. Sooner or later, someone was going to come looking for him. Surely he had assistants or subordinates to run around and do the mundane tasks for him… although Layla had got the distinct impression he’d enjoyed manhandling her.

Creep.

She wasn’t sorry she’d killed him. Not one single bit. But now she had to figure out how to hide, because she thought she could hear voices. Angry ones.

Fuck.

Kordolians weren’t known for being merciful. When they saw what she’d done, they would probably kill her.