Chapter 1
Eyes closed and head tilted back, Charlotte sat on the flattened top of a stone and enjoyed the warm rays of sunshine caressing her skin through the thick canopy of leaves above her. Due to the surrounding trees and the little waterfall that emptied into a natural pool in which she had dipped her feet, the blistering summer heat was kept at bay in this paradisical place.
A quiet burble caused her to return her attention to the pool. Rain resurfaced and after a few powerful strokes, he reached the part of the pool where he could stand. The droplets of water caught in his silver hair reflected the sunshine, making them look like a dozen sparkling diamonds. His breathtaking blue eyes locking with her green ones, he walked towards her. Bare-chested as he was, his muscled torso and wide shoulders already gave a rough idea of the inhuman strength he carried within his body.
“The water doesn’t hold any hidden dangers, and the ground is smooth”, he declared, his voice devoid of any emotion.
Even though their physique resembled that of a strikingly beautiful human, Destructors exhibited more differences than similarities when compared to them. They didn’t openly show their emotions and their thinking was dominated by cold pragmatism, they needed less sleep and were considerably stronger, they healed much faster and they never grew old. All of that came with a horrible price, however: The sheer amount of energy they carried within them exerted a brutal pressure on their bodies and resulted in a constant restlessness that preyed on their minds night and day – so much so that some Destructors eventually turned mad. Once caught in that madness, they laid waste to everything around them, regardless of whether it was an object or a living being. The only way to stop them was to make them see reason again – or to kill them. No Destructor was immune to that impending madness, but they could prevent getting to that point by finding an Anchor, something or someone they could focus all their energy on, something that could calm them and give their lives a true purpose. Rain had chosen Charlotte as his Anchor, making her the first human to ever hold that position.
“You can come in.”
He held out his arm, his hand extended towards her, and Charlotte took it without hesitation. She followed him into the water even though the temperature gave her shivers.
Suddenly, Rain stopped. His eyes started to glow and his hair danced around his face as if tousled by a breeze. Within seconds, the water in the pool began to swirl around with a frightening speed, the sole exception being the very spot they stood in. As fast as the spectacle had started it came to an end. The water held a pleasant warmth now.
“Better?”, Rain asked.
“Much better! Thanks!”
The bathing suit she wore under her knee-length white dress tightly hugged her skin as they ventured deeper and deeper into the pool. It was a garment specifically designed to wear for activities in the water, Rain had told her. He also had claimed it was usually all a woman wore while swimming.
“N-nothing else?”, Charlotte stammered in shock while examining the unfamiliar piece of clothing Rain had handed her.
The “bathing suit”, as he had called it, was essentially bra and underpants combined into one so the abdomen was covered as well. Everything else was exposed. Having grown up in a small human village far outside of the City where the Christian belief was firmly embedded into the people’s daily lives and the word of the bible law, Charlotte’s view of the world was still distinctly shaped by those religious norms. Women should adorn themselves in respectable apparel, with modesty and self-control, the Holy Scripture dictated. This garment, however, was the opposite of respectable and modest.
“No one will disturb us where we are going”, Rain promised her. “No one will see you in this suit but me.”
No man but Rain had ever seen her unclothed, and that’s how it was supposed to be. They might not be officially married – Destructors didn’t marry – but Charlotte considered Rain her husband nevertheless.
“But if it will put you at ease, you might additionally wear a short, thin dress that won’t weigh you down too much.”
When they were about to reach the point where Charlotte’s feet couldn’t touch the ground anymore, she clutched Rain’s hand tighter.
“I will keep you afloat using my abilities until you have learned to do so yourself”, he reassured her.
An instant later, Charlotte felt a soft pressure on her body, as if she was carried by an invisible force. The sensation wasn’t unpleasant, just needed some getting used to.
“Relax”, Rain ordered, his voice the embodiment of calmness. “Try to slightly move your arms and legs, feel the water surrounding us.”
Despite moving around, the invisible force didn’t budge and kept her afloat. Charlotte had never been surrounded by so much water, couldn’t believe she was freely floating in it.
“My body feels so light, like I would be flying”, she whispered in awe.
Back in the village, swimming had been an activity reserved for men, and Charlotte had never dared to question that rule. It had come as a surprise to her when Rain had offered to take her for a swim. That she had never learned it hadn’t shocked or bothered him. Instead, he had offered to teach her – an offer she had happily accepted.
Rain was a very patient teacher and Charlotte quickly gained confidence in the water. By the end of their lesson, all her fear was gone and she even managed to stay afloat on her own for a couple of seconds.
“Well finish here for today”, Rain announced, much earlier than she had anticipated.
“Already?”
“We shouldn’t overdo it.”
Side by side, they got seated on the flat stone Charlotte had observed Rain from earlier. The second she left the water, her hair, skin, and clothes were dried. Rain’s, on the other hand, were still wet and covered in hundreds of droplets. Glittering in the sunshine, they showed off his leanly muscled frame. He truly was a marvelous sight to behold, this Destructor of hers. Her pulse sped up at the memory of the previous night, of his skin shimmering with a fine layer of sweat as he towered over her, pleasuring her until every inch of her burned with lust. It scared her at times, that wild, animalistic desire he evoked in her, making her lose all sanity, all shame.
“Why haven’t you dried yourself?”, Charlotte wondered in an attempt to steer her thoughts in a more chaste direction.
“It feels refreshing.”
He gently grabbed her wrist and placed her hand on his upper arm. His skin was as heated as usual.
“My body temperature is higher than a human’s. I don’t freeze easily.”
Eyes that shifted from a stunning sapphire to a brilliant pastel blue held her prisoner. She knew that gaze, was prepared as he slowly dipped his head, giving her enough time to pull back. She didn’t. Couldn’t. Cheeks blushing, she allowed him to take her lips in a lazy kiss.
“If you keep looking at me like that”, he warned, his tone arctic and his face so close that their breaths mingled, “I won’t be able to restrain myself.”
It was an empty threat. He always gave her a choice, always respected her boundaries, and if she would ask it of him, he would this time as well. She trusted him, more than she had ever trusted anyone.
“What … What if someone will see us?”, Charlotte rasped, fighting to speak through the slamming rush of need that had taken over her body. They were in the middle of a forest, after all!
His head wandered lower, then, she felt his teeth grazing along her neck.
“I won’t allow anyone to disturb us.”
Pressing his torso against hers, he nudged her until she lay caged underneath him, his hand supporting her head so she wouldn’t hurt herself.
"I won’t allow anyone to lay eyes on what is mine alone to savor."
He was possessive, her Destructor, but Charlotte didn't mind – because she, too, held the same rights over him. Rain was hers and hers alone. He wouldn’t allow another woman close, wouldn’t allow another woman to pleasure him – or grant her the joy to be pleasured by him.
A moan escaped her when his fingers started to venture under her dress to teasingly brush along her thigh, and all hesitation was gone. She wanted this, wanted him, and she didn’t care that they were out in the open with nothing but mother nature to shield them from prying eyes.
"Rain."
It was half plea, half command.
In response, he lowered his hip so she could feel his erection against her female core. Another provocation. Another sweet torture. In retaliation, she arced her spine, pressing her breast against his chest to remind him that he wasn’t the only active player in this sensual game. Her reward was a low rumble from his throat.
“Trying to provoke me?”, he dangerously growled. It was a sound barely human. He playfully bit her earlobe.
“You’ll enjoy regretting that.”
Tightly hugging her knees as if that would make her any less naked, Avery crouched on the floor of her grey cell and waited for the inevitable.
“Women are not supposed to be soldiers!”
Shrill, angry spoken words uttered by her mother on the day she had officially joined the military after years of scrutinizing training.
“One day, this goddamn job is going to cost you your life!”
A warning that had proven true in the end. Still, Avery didn’t regret the path she had chosen. She had fought to free humankind from the Destructor’s brutal rule, fought for a future that enabled the generations to come to grow up under the blue sky, feel the wind on their skin, grass under their feet. Sure, she had missed out on chances, had made mistakes along the way, wasn’t a saint by any means – but no one was perfect, right?
What she did regret, however, was that she had made the one fatal mistake she had been warned about by her parents, teachers, and superiors over and over again all her life: When you are about to fall into the hands of the enemy, push your fear, selfishness, and pride aside and do what is right before it’s too late. In short: Swallow the red pill and end it yourself before they will do it for you. Before they can get any compromising information out of you that will endanger the whole underground. Boy, oh boy had she royally fucked up that one!
Well, to her defense, there usually was another safety switch to prevent a rebel from being taken into the City for interrogation: A chip embedded into the skin right over the heart. It was programmed to emit a deadly poison once it came close to the City, causing all organs to fail within seconds. The only catch was that said chip had to be replaced every once in a while, and making a new chip tailored to a specific person took about two weeks. Avery’s chip had been taken out four days prior to the fire alarm that had set this whole bloody mess in motion. Lucky her.
Yeah, fate could be a bitch. When she had learned her long-lost cousin Charlotte had been found alive and well, she couldn’t wait to get to know her. They had quickly become friends, which Avery wouldn’t have even dared to hope since she usually didn’t get off with other women very well. What Avery hadn’t known at that point – what no one had known or suspected – was that Charlotte had been brainwashed by the Destructors. They had made her believe she had fallen in love with one of these monsters, that she had been treated well by him. The thought alone was just ridiculous! In the end, she had betrayed her own family to save that beast. Like mother, like daughter – only that Charlotte’s betrayal had resulted in her death and the destruction of their whole base.
If only she hadn’t refused to give Avery her tablet. If only she hadn’t grabbed for the gun. If only she would have had one moment of clarity, of reason. If only …
No. What use was it deliberating all the what ifs? In the end, they both had ended up shooting each other, but the lethal gunshot wound hadn’t been enough to hinder Charlotte from finishing what she had started. Fast forward two weeks and here Avery was, sitting in a barely lit, cold grey cell, bare to the flesh, shaved bald and with an iron collar around her neck, awaiting her execution. She didn’t delude herself into thinking it would be a quick, merciful one, a theory that was supported by the occasional moans and screams of pain that could be heard from the cells around her. Hell, prior to dragging her to this prison, they had even treated her until she had been fully healed, something they surely didn’t do out of the goodness of their hearts. On the contrary, they intended to make her suffer, and to do that, they needed her unscathed to start with a clean slate. Yippee!
As for when her martyrdom was about to start or what exactly awaited her, Avery had been left in the dark. Except for one short interrogation in the hospital, none of those bastards had spoken a single word to her. Whenever she had dared to ask a question, she had been choked, slapped, or – her personal favorite – electrocuted. Really a useful little toy, that collar they had forced on her.
A dull beep reached her ears and the door to her humble lodging opened which didn’t bode well. It hadn’t been opened since she had been thrown in here two days ago, the food served through a flap in the door. A male Destructor filled the doorframe, pinning her with an eerie gaze of darkest yellow.
“Follow me, rebel”, he ordered.
Knowing if she didn’t obey, they would use force on her, and not willing to grant them that satisfaction, she rose to her feet and, covering herself with her hands as good as possible, complied. She was led down a long dark hallway that ended in an underground chamber. Seven wooden poles had been erected in a straight line, each reserved for one prisoner. Except for the pole in the middle, all others already had a human chained to them – bald, naked from head to toe, and some of them barely alive. Their bodies painted a gruesome picture of the ordeal they had already gone through: Missing body parts, ugly bruises, infected wounds and features the embodiment of despair, fear, and agony. None of them said anything, cursed, begged, pleaded. A man let out muffled sobs, a woman who had both her hands chopped off quietly moaned in pain, but the others just stood there and waited. The smell of excrements, sweat, blood, and rotten flesh wrapped around her nose and made her bile rise.
Stay strong. Don’t show them your fear and pain. Don’t give them that satisfaction, Avery told herself over and over again when all she wanted to do was cry and scream.
Once she reached the pole reserved for her, the Destructor that had picked her up chained her with a few trained movements. Arms spread out to either side and her back pressed against the wood, her breasts and genital area were now on display for everyone to see. Biting her lips, she desperately fought the tears that threatened to betray her shame and panic.
The seconds stretched into minutes and nothing happened. They seemed to wait for something.
Without warning, the ground began to shake and multiple holes appeared in the ceiling, each above one of the poles. The poles were on some sort of platforms, she realized, platforms that were moving upwards – relocating the prisoners into a large, dirty field in the middle of a ginormous round, domelike stadium. Bombarded by hundreds of bright lights, it took Avery a second to make out more details. What looked like yet another grey wall turned out to be stands filled to the brim with thousands of human slaves. Each of them was dressed in simple grey garments, had an iron collar around their neck – and their deadpan gazes fixed on Avery and her fellow prisoners. A concrete ceiling blocked the view of the sky which created a stifling atmosphere. That no one spoke made the whole thing even more surreal.
"These slaves committed a first-degree felony”, a cold voice boomed through the stadium. Four oversized screens mounted to the corners of the arena flickered to life, showing a Destructor solely dressed in black that stood beside the two poles on the far right side of the line. “Thus, befitting the severity of their crime, they will get tortured until death puts an end to their punishment."
So, not only would all those people silently watch her suffering – to maximize her humiliation, it was broadcasted as well and put on a huge screen. Great. Awesome. Who wouldn’t want their gruesome torture and death turned into a spectacle witnessed by thousands of strangers?
“Tuesday, the twelfth of June 2389 at five twenty-three p.m., slave 0439168 attempted to use his Master’s organizer without consent.”
The broadcast zoomed in on a haggard middle-aged man that had a gaping wound where his left eye should have been. His right arm was red and covered in blisters, some nails on his hand were missing and his left foot was twisted outward, probably broken, which was why he tried to put all his weight on his right foot. And all of that because he had dared to touch something that belonged to a Destructor. Those sick motherfuckers!
Avery couldn’t bring herself to inspect his body further, couldn’t bring herself to watch what torment they would put him – and probably her – through today. Hearing the agonized cries and whimpers of the poor man while they did God knows what to him was more than enough to make her skin crawl. Instead, she focused her gaze on the audience, skimmed the sea of unfamiliar faces until she stumbled upon a special seating area.
In the center of the stadium, sticking out between the highest seating rows, was a balcony with a dozen of comfortable-looking chairs. All chairs except for two were empty. Eyes of a deep ocean blue framed by a silver mane bored into her, and though she had never seen the Destructor without heavy shackles and chains wrapped around his body, his face hidden behind an iron mask, the unique hair color left no doubt it was him. The monster Charlotte thought she loved. The Destructor that had razed the base she had called home all her life to the ground. Rain.
Beside him sat another Destructor that was basically a slightly older carbon copy of him. His brother, maybe? Holy shit, there were two of them? He, too, eyed her for a brief moment. Then, an almost bored expression on his face, his eyes continued to scan the rest of the arena.
Features set in stone, Rain continued to meet her gaze without blinking, a mighty king on his throne, bathing in his power. An emotionless psycho to whom a human life mattered as much as the dirt under his shoes. Kian should have never brought him to the base, should have killed him right there in the forest.
“Throughout her thirty-one years of life, this human female from the Areals has partaken in numerous serious felonies against several Destructors including unlawful detention and battery”, the black-clothed Destructor declared when it was finally Avery’s turn. “Furthermore, she was an active member of a rebellious group with the goal to overthrow the government of the five Cities. She was therefore sentenced to seven whippings encompassing twelve lashes. In the unlikely case she should survive the punishment, she will start to serve the City as a slave.”
Seven whippings. How on earth was she supposed to survive seven whippings?
Stubbornly holding the gaze of the monster that was responsible for this nightmare, Avery swore to herself she would make the impossible possible. Defying all odds, she would survive, and then she would search for a way out of this hellhole. Using all the knowledge she had gained during her enslavement, she would rejoin the rebellion and make those motherfuckers pay.
Fisting her hands and clenching her teeth, she waited for the first lash to fall.
You won’t hear me beg and scream. You won’t see me die, she silently vowed. I will survive this, and one day, I will make you pay!
