Page 53 of Barbarian Daddies

“No, I killed him and came to Sapphire City to finish my work and find a cure for the plague. You, of all people, should be on board with that.”

“I don’t need a cure,” she replies bluntly, slowly moving toward me as the humor fades from her voice. “In fact, I’d like all of Sunna’s women to die sooner rather than later so I can repopulate this world with your kind, so that our species may evolve and grow beyond this fucking plague. It’s the only way forward.”

“It’s not. I can develop a cure if you’d just let me. Why go to so much trouble and take women from another planet when you could save the ones you have here?”

“I have the power!” Selina snarls, growing increasingly aggravated. I think I hit a soft spot, and now I’m curious to see how far I can push her. “I decide what happens next! Did you imagine I wasn’t aware of how far I could take things when I first joined the military? You whimpering fool, I knew exactly what I was doing since day one. This right here was always my objective.”

“What do you mean?” I ask, my blood running cold.

“Our astronomers discovered and surveyed Earth long before the plague was released,” she says. “We knew about you and your world—enough to understand that our biological systems were quite similar despite our aesthetic and physical differences. So, when death started knocking on every woman’s door, I already had a plan and the drive to implement it.”

“The plague was released,” I repeat her words.

Selina’s grin widens as she cocks her head to the side. “The cat’s not out of the bag on this one, though. You’ll never live to tell about it.”

“I thought human women were precious,” I blurt out, suddenly aware of where this conversation will end. Selina isn’t hiding anything from me anymore, which means she’s ready to kill me. And judging by the glimmer in her crimson eyes, I’m pretty sure she’s looking forward to it. “You said so yourself.”

“There are billions of you on Earth,” Selina replies. “And you’ve been nothing but a nuisance, Cynthia. I’ve tried to be civil. I even tried to host you here as an esteemed guest, but you decided to spit in my face and steal secret documents, leaving me no choice but to retaliate. And now look at you, sneaking back in to sabotage our public efforts in finding a cure. The people of Sapphire City will hear all about it.”

I shake my head, the greater picture coming into focus with disturbing clarity. If she cannot have me for her breeding program, if she cannot control me, she will kill me and simply bring more of my kind here from Earth to make up for it. I’m dispensable.

“Is this how you promote the greatness of Sunna? Through mass murder and lies, war and misery, propaganda and tricks?” I reply. “How long before someone catches on, Selina?”

“No one has caught on yet,” she says. “Not even my fellow generals. They’re all buying my strategy from top to bottom. Nobody wants a repeat of this shit show another hundred years from now. You have no idea how easy it is to convince people they can evolve and defeat nature itself,”

“It’s beyond unethical.”

“I don’t care. It’s doable!” Selina shoots back. “Nature saw fit to deprive me of my most important attribute, and I am now making sure that if I cannot have children and a family of my own, no true-blooded Sunnaite woman will, either.”

“It’s insane, Selina. The women aren’t to blame for your misfortune.”

“No, but the plague has been my avenging angel, nevertheless. Since day one.”

I think about it for a moment. “Did you have anything to do with it?”

“Oh, no,” she laughs. “But I figured it out. The moment my father told me the truth about my condition, shortly after we burned my mother’s body, I knew. The plague never touched me, and I knew. It made sense, and my father suspected it as well. It didn’t matter to me who did it. Someone did. What mattered was the way in which things began to make sense. My body. The plague. My place in this world. I was destined for greatness, Cynthia, and I have all the power. I worked hard to get to this point, to become the protagonist in my own story. You’re nothing more than a secondary character, and you will not stand in my way.”

“Selina, this is wrong on so many levels. These are real people whose lives you are purposely destroying. Innocent children. Little girls and good women. Everybody else is buying into your bullshit because you’ve given them the impression there’s no better way when you and I both know there is!”

Selina takes another step forward, and I know the men outside will stand idly by as she kills me. It’s what she wants to do, and they follow her orders blindly and foolishly. I don’t know when they all became so automated, so incapable of using their own reasoning to figure out precisely how wrong this whole situation is, but I do know I cannot rely on any of them.

I have to save myself and my unborn child.

“You were deemed useful at first, but you’re just a tad too smart for your own good, Cynthia,” Selina says. “You should’ve just stuck to getting rammed by the Hadana twins.”

“I’m pregnant, Selina. And I think you and I both know not even the Sky Tribe brass will let you kill me given this recent development.”

“No one needs to know.” And there’s that sinister smile again.

To my left, on the edge of a metal table, is a tray loaded with various tools. Among them is a thin-bladed knife. I need to get to it before Selina gets to me. The life growing inside me glows like the core of a sun, beaming through each of my nerve endings and beckoning me to survive. I cannot die here. I cannot allow the truth to be buried, either. Everything Selina has admitted to up to this point barely scratches the surface of something much darker and more complex than I had originally even dared to imagine.

“The Hadana twins and the whole Hadana clan know I’m pregnant. So do our neighbors from across the river,” I tell Selina. “You won’t be able to bury this truth. Not this time.”

“By the time anybody even mentions it, I’ll have a fresh batch of human women ready to be inseminated,” Selina replies. “My transgressions will quickly be forgiven. In the long term, Cynthia, I shall be the winner. I shall be the champion of the Sunnaites. The woman who challenged every tradition and did the unthinkable in order to save her people, to bring them forth into a new era. Stronger. More resilient. Immune to the very plague that destroyed our society. They’ll build cities in my name.”

“My God, you’re fucking delusional,” I scoff.

“And you’re about to die, so you might as well make your peace with it,” she hisses, her claws out and her fangs sparkling sharply as she bares them at me. “I’ve had enough of this nonsense. You’ve had your fun. Now, time to get the fuck out of my way.”

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