Women of Steel 3: Frozen Daiquiri Camille Anthony All rights reserved. Copyright ©2005 Camille Anthony No part of this e-book may be reproduced or shared by any electronic or mechanical means, including but not limited to printing, file sharing, and email, without prior written permission from Changeling Press LLC. ISBN (10): 1-59596-148-8 ISBN (13): 978-1-59596-148-8 Formats Available: HTML, Adobe PDF, MobiPocket, Microsoft Reader Publisher: Changeling Press LLC PO Box 1561 Shepherdstown, WV 25443-1561 www.ChangelingPress.com Editor: Crystal Esau Cover Artist: Bryan Keller This e-book file contains sexually explicit scenes and adult language which some may find offensive and which is not appropriate for a young audience. Changeling Press E-Books are for sale to adults, only, as defined by the laws of the country in which you made your purchase. Please store your files wisely, where they cannot be accessed by under-aged readers. Chapter One Awakened to Captivity “How… long …” Damn, is that my voice? She cleared her throat and tried again. “Hel-lo?” Why are scratchy, hoarse sounds the only ones I can make? “She’s awake! Quick, go fetch Mason! Tell her the general spoke. Hurry up!” A gentle hand slipped under her neck, lifted her head. Blessedly cool, wet water dribbled down her parched throat. The delicious liquid spread out in every direction; dampening her organs and revitalizing her mouth and tongue. Suddenly, she was ravenous for more. Snatching the cup from the hovering presence, she lifted it to her mouth in a death grip, greedily guzzling the precious fluid. She swallowed as fast as she could, before the people surrounding her managed to pry the cup out of her resisting fingers. What were they doing? Why were they being so cruel? Can’t they see I’m dying of thirst ? “More!” Damn it, there she was, croaking again ! “Easy, General… you don’t want to drink too fast. Your stomach can’t handle it. You’ll just throw it back up and that would be worse than not drinking at all.” She wanted to argue with the calm voice of reason, but already she could feel the water settling in a cold, heavy puddle at the bottom of her gut. When she tightened her stomach muscles, the liquid sloshed and rolled, making a gurgling sound she could hear through the wall of her skin. Sweat broke out on her forehead. Queasiness roiled in her belly, and she tried not to swallow as her mouth filled with saliva. She knew the signs… fought them. Her stomach muscles tightened in protest. A moan squeezed through her folded lips. “Uh, oh, I think she’s about to…” With a low groan, she flung herself over the side of the bed, gagging. All the water she’d ingested spewed out, mixed with bile. Thank the Weaver of the Matrix, there was nothing else in her stomach to bring up. “… hurl!” Wearily, she lay back, panting and feeling sick to her stomach. She hated puking with a passion. On top of that, she still craved water like a kraken craved blood, but she dared not try putting something else down her queasy belly now. It would only come right back up. “General, I want you to take a small sip of water.” She turned her head away from the cup that presented itself at her lips, refusing the possibility of a second round of nausea. She heard a smothered laugh. Her head snapped around. Teeth bared, she glared into the faces of the three women surrounding her. Not one of them betrayed by expression or glance which one of them had been insane enough to mock her pain. “I don’t want you to swallow it, sir. I can imagine how upset your tummy must be feeling about now. Just swish it around in your mouth and then spit it out in this bowl.” She stared at the speaker. Paula Mason, a corporal in the Planetary Repulsion Force. A crony of her mother’s, Paula was a woman she trusted. The tall older woman was thin as a rail and black as midnight. Close-cropped nappy curls rioted over her head, the fluffy gray mass resembling pristine bolls of cotton. Her spare frame didn’t have an ounce of fat on it, but her breasts still rode high and pert, as firm as those of a nineteen-year-old. She, like all the women she’d seen, was naked. Nodding to indicate her reluctant agreement, Daiq accepted the water, swished and spat on command. Her mouth did feel better for it. She worked her jaw a bit, loosening it in preparation of doing some major talking. “I’m weak as a kitten. I know I was injured, but not that badly. Have I been sick?” Mason nodded. “We all have been. There’s a nasty alien bug in the water. Two of us died before the Scarth came in and inoculated us. After that, none became as ill as you. You’ve been on the verge of death several times. Even with the vaccine, your weakened system almost lost the war.” “How long have I been out of it?” she asked, again. Mason sighed. “You were injured during the last minutes of the engagement. The Scarth carried you on board and dumped you among my group. We calculate we’ve been prisoners for more than a year. You were in their infirmary for most of that time. They just gave you back what seems a few weeks ago. It’s hard to keep track of time when the world you’re on doesn’t have twenty-four hour days.” “Our watches?” That gray head shook no. “Something about these caverns… Our batteries went haywire shortly after we arrived. Besides, the Scarth gathered up all our technological gadgets. We’ve been counting sunrises -- the ones we could see -- and sunsets. There’ve been entirely too many to keep track of. It didn’t help that the Scarth kept us in total darkness for the first segment of time after our arrival. We had no way of knowing how much time had elapsed.” “The other officers… where are they?” “I’m afraid you’re looking at the only remaining one, sir.” Mason sighed. “I don’t know about the other enclaves, but we had over three hundred prisoners in this camp at the beginning. The Scarth have systematically removed groups of women until we are down to slightly over two hundred.” Daiq frowned. “What are they doing with them? What do the women say when they return?” “Not one has ever returned. We have no way of knowing if they are dead or serving in another capacity. I suspect they are being used as lab rats. The Scarth have to be trying to find out as much about us as the folks back home are striving to discover about them.” Chewing on her bottom lip, Daiq considered the implications. “They’re not dead. It’s a psychological tactic -- leaves us guessing and demoralized. But I’m betting your hunch about them being guinea pigs is on the money. When did the first snatch take place?” “Right after everyone fell sick from the water.” “And before the inoculations?” “Yes. How could you know that?” Daiq snorted. “They discovered we’re not the same, despite nominal outward appearances. That bug in the water harming us like that probably threw them for a loop. They had to scramble to avert disaster.” She lowered her eyebrows. “Never think for a moment that we are here by accident. They need us for something. It’s our job to find out what that something is.” Sitting up, she threw off the covers and gingerly came to her feet. She swayed a bit before finding her balance. Once secure, she tottered over to the makeshift mirror -- a slab of wall evened and glossed by some force of nature shaping and molding its surface until it was a smooth, reflective surface. She peered at the wavering outline of her form, marveling at the changes a year had made. Always tall and spare, Daiq now appeared gaunt and emaciated. She’d never had abundant curves. Now, her breasts and hips seemed to have melted away. Her black hair was longer than she liked to wear it, the unruly curls frothing below her shoulders. She’d take care of that ASAP. Only her cool gray gaze remained familiar. Too big for her starved face, her mirrored eyes stared back with an aloof expression that had earned her the nickname Frozen Daiquiri. Her people thought she didn’t know what they called her behind her back. On the contrary… she not only knew of the title, she actively endorsed it. Emotion had no place in war. She’d found it had no place at all in her life. Daiq had been raised in a household that lived by strict Amazon rules. Her adult beliefs were shaped by her childhood memories. In Thalassic’s home, all the males were treated kindly, but definitely kept in their secondary place. Men were for pleasuring and, when the time was right, the fathering of daughters. They were too gentle for the brutal business of war. Daiq’s followers thought her cold because she never took a lover. Lovers were for peacetime and leisure, not to be indulged in during conflict. She knew better than to mix business with pleasure… Dissatisfied with what she’d seen, Daiq turned away and retreated back to bed. She looked as bad as she felt. There was no way anyone with sense would follow her lead while she appeared half dead, with one foot on a slimy banana peel. With a dejected sigh, Daiq crawled up on the soft material that made up her makeshift mattress and collapsed. She was still too weak. The first thing she had to do was regain her strength. “I’m going to take a nap. I want you to gather everyone whose rank is higher than an ensign. Don’t let me sleep past two hours. When I wake up, we’ll have a planning meeting.” The three women saluted. “I’ll see it done, General,” Mason promised. Her black face shone with militaristic zeal. “May I say how glad I am to have you on the mend and in command, again? We need better leadership than I’ve been providing.” One of the fem protested Paula’s h...
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