thankfully, just arrived.
“Don’t you see they’re not worth all this fuss?” The question Krilis posed was the same one he’d mentioned on their walk to the interrogation chamber. He thought of humans as cattle and nothing more, that much had been made clear. “Look what has had to happen once you became involved in affairs that were not your own. Bosch, a worthy skrammon warrior, was killed.”
“By you!” Kaine shouted as he leaned forward with his fists planted on the table. “You’re the one that is to blame for the death of that traitor.”
“A traitor?” Krilis asked, his voice full of disbelief. He looked at them as if they were the ones who had gone crazy. “Bosch wasn’t a traitor. He was one of the few among us who had the sense to see human females for what they really are.” He cackled, the sound trailing off into a cough that sounded deep in his chest. It took him a moment to catch his breath. “You are all fools.”
“How are we the fools?” Axis asked the question this time as he moved to the table in the corner where he had his tool bag sitting. The elder was obviously completely out of touch with reality, considering the words pouring out of his mouth. Axis figured he most likely wouldn’t need to use the bag of tricks he’d been trained to use, but it wouldn’t hurt to remind Krilis he was prepared if need be. “If anyone is a fool, it is you. You’re the Verge mole that is sitting in cuffs with a blast to the leg.”
“That is your first mistake, young skrammon.” He tossed his white braids back and laughed, slapping his hands against the table he was sitting at as if he’d heard something hilarious. Once he’d calmed down, he let out a deep sigh that crackled in his chest. “I’m not with the Verge, despite what you might think. I only worked with them to procure the females I desired. It was a simple exchange of information. I told them a few things they needed to know, and they gave me the access I needed to buy a few of them on Euphoria. Originally, I was supposed to deal only with the marshal, but the fool owed too much money to Cruum, and he traded the women away to avoid Talis slitting his throat. He’s another fool that had to be dealt with. He was weak and would have told you everything the moment you sat him down.”
Axis was curious how exactly he’d managed to handle the marshal, but there was something more important he needed to find out first. Depending on what details he’d passed on to their former brethren, there could be even more women who were missing that they didn’t know about yet.
“What information did you give the Verge?”
“Just a little here and there,” he answered with a wave of his hand. “They’re a bunch of fools as well. They believe that cloning is still the future, regardless of it already weakening our bloodlines. They desire purity over the wellbeing of Phaeton.” Krilis shook his head. “I may not agree with the Pact, but I do agree that we should use the humans for the continuation of our race. That’s where we differ, you see? You pretend to love humans in an effort to get something that I believe we could, and should, take by force. Why coddle the weak creatures when we can simply bend them to our will? There was never a need for the Pact or negotiations with Earth. Phaeton has the power to take what we want, so why shouldn’t we? We could have already bred hundreds of them by now if you had just listened to me after we found their planet.”
“You proposed slavery,” Kaine bit out, his face red with anger.
Axis couldn’t stop his brows shooting up at the information he was hearing. The fact that Krilis, an elder council member, had suggested they enslave humans was shocking. In truth, he was surprised to find the warrior was still on the council after having made his thoughts known. His statement went against the core beliefs they’d held since their great reckoning decades ago and abolished slavery. Now they worked at keeping a reign on it throughout the galaxy, shutting down any auctions they caught news of.
“I proposed a breeding program that made use of the humans in the most efficient ways possible!”
“By taking away their free will.” Kaine