Dark Nine ❈ Dark Nine Universe Bk1 ❈

Chapter Nine

I returned to my pod and I have a choice to make, to take the ET Key and get off planet – or deal with the Kors on Planet Live.

I had 10,000 habitable planets to choose from, but they would follow my signature through space.

It took at least a few hours to do that kind of trace, however, so I had a head start if I wanted one.

I wait a few hours, in my pod, knowing I made a deal with them that was so... ridiculous... now that I had played it over, again and again in my head.

I'll tell you what, you can have me if one day I wake up in my hide out and you've all managed to sneak in without me noticing. Then I'll capitulate. I'm very good at hiding.

I sweat with embarrassment just replaying the memory.

Now that I had seen them kill, hunt and vanish with speed and silence, I had no choice but to return to Dark Ninth before them. My only two realistic options left were to traverse a landscape I knew so well, that being Earth... or the place they wouldn't expect me to choose, Dark Ninth.

Earthlings would probably kill me for being a Dark Nine.

I had no choice but to choose the risky option and go back to their home planet.

They wouldn't expect that, right?

My aim was clear anyway. I would look around for new information while they were gone, and try not to get eaten by giant spiders or Chonk in the process.

By the time a few hours had passed, if I still didn't feel safe waiting for our next inevitable encounter, I'd leave before they could intercept me.

****

In my first hour on Dark Ninth alone, I've hit the jackpot of new info.

My risk paid off. Not only did I explore all their rooms on the top fourth floor of the prison without them noticing... I explored all the other levels. The third floor had guest rooms and lounges. The second floor had laboratories, it was a workplace and it belongs to one Kor specifically... E.

Venus' floor.

I stay on this level because it's abandoned and full of files.

I spread them out on a damp work bench, where green moss crawls over everything.

Little glow bugs circle around helpfully as I read through the papers I found at the top of the pile.

What I find is an album of the last days of 'feydom', or Fey rule of Dark Ninth.

On one page is a photo of Empress V, named Cinta. She is decked out in a huge dress, with a hood that covers her face, and material that covers her arms and hands... the only visible skin on her face is covered by a metallic bronze mask. Behind her, in chains – crawl the shadowed Kors... they do not look strong, they look weak, underfed, too skinny, only crawling because they look starved near to death.

They are completely subjugated, some look covered in welts and bruises. All around the procession, hundreds of females stand with pregnant bellies, well fed and smiling as they see the Empress strut with her slaves.

When I flick through the album pages, I see many images of Cinta with one Kor in particular, always around, by her side.

Venus. Grey with gold stripes, he looks nothing like he does now; green.

He looks the most fed and most happy, although an ankle chain follows him in every image.

He seems to be working in this very lab most of the time, as vials and vials of... what I think is venom, is being produced, stored and shipped out. Plenty of cabinets are filled to the brim with Kor Venom.