Electra Rex

By April C. Griffith

FROM EXCITING AUTHOR OF LGBTQ+ ROMANCE APRIL C. GRIFFITH

Electra Rex, self-appointed galaxy's greatest starship captain' and last known human, is going to save humanity or get rich trying!

Electra Rex, the last human in known space, is broke—worse than broke, deeply in debt and out of options. After a desperate, drunken attempt to fix her faltering life, she finds herself in a deeper hole after stealing the most stylish starship she's ever seen, but it comes with a massive lien.

She's left with a fast ship, a nearly indestructible debt-enforcement robot named Letterman watching her every move and a lead on a lucrative job with the mysterious organization known as Bi-MARP, which is set to rebuild Earth on the two-thousand-year anniversary of its destruction.

Across two galaxies, she struggles to stay one step ahead of space pirates and creditors, all while trying to catch the eye of a beautiful, vivacious bisexual clone named Treasure, who was recently rescued from a top-secret university lab run by academic squids.

She succeeds in seducing Treasure—or perhaps it's the other way around—while they run scams to find earthling relics like the original formula for Coca-Cola, a 1968 Volkswagen Beatle, a mostly complete Monopoly board game and a largely accurate, if not small and green, clone of an elephant. All the while, Electra has to hide the fact that Treasure is actually the most valuable item on the Bi-MARP list—a fertile human female.

When the truth of humanity's demise and the goals of Bi-MARP are uncovered, Electra, the galaxy's foremost transgender hero, decides that the riches and fame aren't worth the sacrifices, and she turns on her former employer to rescue Treasure a third time, completing her search for money, what it means to be human without the rest of humanity and, most of all, love.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Pride Publishing
• Release date: Mar 9, 2021
• ISBN: 9781839431098

Book preview

Author

ELECTRA REX

APRIL C. GRIFFITH

Electra Rex

ISBN # 978-1-83943-109-8

©Copyright April C. Griffith 2021

Cover Art by Louisa Maggio ©Copyright March 2021

Interior text design by Claire Siemaszkiewicz

Pride Publishing

This is a work of fiction. All characters, places and events are from the author’s imagination and should not be confused with fact. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, events or places is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any material form, whether by printing, photocopying, scanning or otherwise without the written permission of the publisher, Pride Publishing.

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The author and illustrator have asserted their respective rights under the Copyright Designs and Patents Acts 1988 (as amended) to be identified as the author of this book and illustrator of the artwork.

Published in 2021 by Pride Publishing, United Kingdom.

No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the authors’ rights. Purchase only authorised copies.

Pride Publishing is an imprint of Totally Entwined Group Limited.

If you purchased this book without a cover you should be aware that this book is stolen property. It was reported as unsold and destroyed to the publisher and neither the author nor the publisher has received any payment for this stripped book.

Electra Rex, self-appointed ‘galaxy’s greatest starship captain’ and last known human, is going to save humanity or get rich trying!

Electra Rex, the last human in known space, is broke—worse than broke, deeply in debt and out of options. After a desperate, drunken attempt to fix her faltering life, she finds herself in a deeper hole after stealing the most stylish starship she’s ever seen, but it comes with a massive lien.

She’s left with a fast ship, a nearly indestructible debt-enforcement robot named Letterman watching her every move and a lead on a lucrative job with the mysterious organization known as Bi-MARP, which is set to rebuild Earth on the two-thousand-year anniversary of its destruction.

Across two galaxies, she struggles to stay one step ahead of space pirates and creditors, all while trying to catch the eye of a beautiful, vivacious bisexual clone named Treasure, who was recently rescued from a top-secret university lab run by academic squids.

She succeeds in seducing Treasure—or perhaps it’s the other way around—while they run scams to find earthling relics like the original formula for Coca-Cola, a 1968 Volkswagen Beatle, a mostly complete Monopoly board game and a largely accurate, if not small and green, clone of an elephant. All the while, Electra has to hide the fact that Treasure is actually the most valuable item on the Bi-MARP list—a fertile human female.

When the truth of humanity’s demise and the goals of Bi-MARP are uncovered, Electra, the galaxy’s foremost transgender hero, decides that the riches and fame aren’t worth the sacrifices, and she turns on her former employer to rescue Treasure a third time, completing her search for money, what it means to be human without the rest of humanity and, most of all, love.

Dedication

Thank you, Dr. Cat

Trademark Acknowledgements

The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of the following wordmarks mentioned in this work of fiction:

Volkswagen: Volkswagen of America Inc

Coca-Cola: Coca-Cola Company

Monopoly: Hasbro Inc.

Margaritaville: Jimmy Buffet

Tim Hortons: Restaurant Brands Intnl.

Encyclopedia Britannica: Encyclopaedia Britannica Inc.

Wolverine: Marvel Characters Inc.

Kroehler: Kroehler Corporation

Lane: UFI IP LLC

Make-a-Wish Foundation: Make-a-Wish Foundation Non-Profit Corporation of America

The Matrix: Warner Brothers, Roadshow Entertainment

Dr. Pepper: Dr Pepper/Seven-Up Inc.

The X-Files: Twentieth Television

Lilith Fair: Sarah McLachlan Entertainment Corporation

Yahtzee: Hasbro Inc.

Dickies: W-D Apparel Company LLC

Craftsman: Stanley Black & Decker Inc.

The Three Stooges: Columbia Pictures

Jiffy Pop: Conagra C&S LLC

Playboy: Playboy Enterprises International

Spiderman: Marvel Characters Inc.

MTV: Viacom International Inc.

Baywatch: Freemantlemedia North America Inc.

Formica: The Diller Corporation

IKEA: Ikea Svenska Aktiebolag Corporation

Cheshire Cat: Disney Enterprises Inc.

Werq: S.M.Magassouba, Lazercat, Paul Snax Bonomo

Chapter One

I am the last of my kind, and I suck, Electra mumbled to herself, throwing back another drink. On the first night of a planetary holiday, Electra Rex was drunk, scorned and looking to buy a gun. She couldn’t recall exactly which holiday it was, though, since there were so many. The planet took time off constantly to celebrate a googolplex of different accomplishments, important figures and momentous occasions across hundreds of alien species. It was a wonder anyone did anything but observe holidays. She sat in a window booth, watching ships both large and small land at the valet pad while she waited.

Little of her Embarker pedigree remained after years away from the flotilla. Endless toil and nomadic life marked her people’s existence, even if it didn’t describe her life. She’d lived in an apartment in Authrillia’s largest northern city for more than a year, which should have made her itchy to get back to spacefaring, but she wasn’t. In fact, she wasn’t much of anything. Apathy had settled heavily over her and it had made her careless—at least, more careless than she’d already known herself to be. To pay the bills, she engaged in the least Embarker type of work she could find—being a professional party guest. ‘Come see the last known human woman, drink with her, maybe even…’ But that was over. She’d frittered away too much money on fleeting things, another Embarker no-no. A job meant to replenish her account at the last moment and save her apartment, her precious creature comforts and allow her reckless lifestyle to continue for another month hadn’t paid out. Now she had only the clothes on her back and the cash in her pocket. Enough to buy a gun, she hoped.

She’d given the DJ of the club a copy of Margaritaville, promising a transcendent experience. Jimmy Buffet sang while a dozen different species of aliens attempted to dance on the multi-tiered dance floor to the ancient Earthling music. Electra’s dad had loved Jimmy Buffet. ‘The finest music in the galaxy,’ he’d said. Even with great effort and a good deal of booze in her system, she couldn’t hear what he’d heard. She must not have inherited his ear for classical music. What the hell is a flip-flop anyway?

Normally leering over spacecraft cheered her up, which was why she’d selected a window booth near the landing pad. She wasn’t into the functional caravan freighters that comprised Embarker fleets. She liked the chic, silky, beautiful spaceships that focused on form over function. The bleak, unrepentantly crappy mood that had clung to her throughout the day lightened an iota at the arrival of her dream ship in the valet station directly below her window. An oval saucer body, three hundred feet long, sleek and stylish, with three classic fins off the back, it was—it had to be—a Cadillux 1959 Dorado edition. And it was pink, the brightest, most beautiful pearlescent pink trimmed in the shiniest of chrome. Electra stood on her knees on the booth’s bench and pressed her face drunkenly against the glass. She wanted to lick it. She didn’t care that the thought was absurd. That ship was so gorgeous that it deserved to be licked.

The transparent arrival tube extended to the ventral port while a valet-bot lowered onto the dorsal spine above the cockpit that sat directly in the middle of the oval. Electra wanted to see what wondrous creature possessed such a magnificent spaceship. After several agonizing moments, the owner of the ship passed from beneath the edge within the arrival tube and Electra’s elation turned to fury—Weisella. Fucking Weisella. Her need to buy a gun redoubled, not to begin a life of mercenary work—which was the Embarker way after going bust—but for murder, satisfying revenge on the woman who had thoroughly screwed her. The fact that such a heinous, underhanded creature could own such a glorious ship was a crime on par with regicide in Electra’s inebriated mind.

Weisella was a Panaeus, a vaguely humanoid alien species with advanced telekinetic and telepathic powers. She was only a little taller than Electra’s five-and-a-half feet. Her heart-shaped face had two enormous black, almond-shaped eyes, no nose or mouth. Frilled spines replaced what could be called hair. A cluster of five ephemeral tentacles stood in the place of an arm on each side, and instead of legs, she had what looked like a jumbo, curved shrimp tail. Indeed, the only attractive features Electra saw in Weisella were her money and her strangely perfect breasts—three of them across the center of her chest, prominently displayed since Panaeus didn’t wear clothes. Weisella liked jewelry, though, and she was sporting a shiny new metal ring on her tail that was probably just brimming with expensive tech.

Electra’s memory of the night before was fragmented at best. She’d been hired to attend Weisella’s gala for the Panaeus New Year, partially as the spectacle of having a human in attendance and partially as Weisella’s date. Electra didn’t mind the escort portion of the work. Weisella was rich, enchanting, well-traveled and she’d paid extra for the pleasure. Except she hadn’t actually paid. The transfer had bounced back in the morning when Electra had tried to use the money to get the foreclosure lock off her apartment door. The timer on her lien had expired and everything in her apartment had gotten incinerated while she watched through the little glass window on the door. Everything her parents had ever given her, every keepsake from Transition Island, every souvenir she’d collected in her travels was gone in a flash of white fire and a quickly ventilated puff of smoke, all because Weisella had ripped her off.

Electra had done her part. She’d danced, charmed and been better than presentable in her skin-tight Utopalex pants, knee-high go-go boots and a black corset that made the most of what she had. The Panaeus guests had loved her. Weisella had loved her. By every measurement, Electra had performed perfectly. They’d retired to Weisella’s bedroom at the end of the night to continue the festivities. Things hadn’t gone as smoothly behind closed doors. Electra had been intoxicated from drinks, a few drugs she wasn’t familiar with and the high oxygen environment created in the penthouse, plus she’d never slept with a Panaeus before. The swell of Weisella’s backside, what looked like a delightfully curvaceous butt? Nope, that was a nose and ‘Please stop fondling it.’ Okay, the breasts were breasts, right? Close enough. Fondle those, lick them and fall asleep face-first in them. Was that why Weisella had bounced back the payment? Failure to consummate? It was explicitly stated in Electra’s contract that sex was not a guaranteed part of any escort arrangement. It was her prerogative. Besides, she’d tried. There simply weren’t obvious sex organs on a Panaeus—at least none Electra could find in her sloppy groping.

The valet-bot guided the Cadillux away after Weisella entered the club a couple of floors beneath Electra’s booth. The little bot was flying the beautiful ship toward the stacks. Not the stacks! That was where someone parked a junker that nobody would want to steal. The stacks were for heaps with so many scratches and dents that a few more might go completely unnoticed. The Cadillux could be scraped, dinged, stolen or breathed on wrong in the stacks. Only the worst kind of philistine would park such a beautiful vessel in the holding pen for pig ships!

"That tight little butt could only belong to the Electra Rex," a gravelly voice sounded behind her.

Electra sat back down and glared at Fizan. Her underworld contact was a Gromphra, essentially an eight-foot-tall cockroach in every despicable sense. Fizan was too large and inflexible to actually sit in the booth, so she stood at the end of the table, inspecting Electra with her dead bug eyes. It wasn’t that Fizan was a particularly vile example of the species—all Gromphra were lecherous and blunt. It was considered a badge of honor to gross out other species—at least, that was what Fizan claimed.

The seemingly transparent shell on the front of Fizan’s torso opened up like a flasher’s raincoat. It was clothing and body armor mixed and wasn’t actually transparent. Within the shell, guns, knives and a dozen other nefarious items were concealed behind the projected image of her chitinous trunk.

See anything you like? Fizan asked.

Electra had enough cash on hand to afford a decent gun. A carbine worked best for mercenary work, although a small pistol would be ideal to assassinate Weisella on a crowded dance floor. Shooting anyone or anything wasn’t really her style, and the reality of what she was doing rolled over her in an unpleasant manner, accompanied by a wave of nausea. Electra scrunched her nose while she considered the weapons until she spied something entirely different.

How much for the ID-clone?

* * * *

Access and time were all Electra needed. The ID-clone could give her the access and Weisella’s party-girl attitude would hopefully provide ample time—enough time for Electra to have a few drinks of her own. The booze would help steel her nerves. Crime wasn’t her thing—at least, not overt crime like grand theft starship. She liked subtle stuff, scams, white lies, a flirty wink that could grab a gift under false pretenses, a hacked communicator to collect a secret or two for later use, but nothing remotely on the scale of what she was about to do.

Desperation and betrayal had driven her to such a state, and potent cocktails containing a dozen or so cerebral inhibitors provided the necessary courage and dulled her higher reasoning. A smile, a bribe and a clever lie cleared the security guard from the maintenance tunnel for the stacks. The bouncer watching the emergency exit that led to the parking pods was flesh and blood—silicon-based, maybe. Electra didn’t recognize his species. He was gray with lots of arms and eyes—and easily charmed, thankfully. She had a single flash charge on her datapad that could have stunned the bouncer, but she needed it to reboot a valet-bot for her plan to have a chance.

The tunnels wobbled with every step. She was nearly to the pod before she realized the wobble was entirely in her head. Her senses were the unstable part of the equation. Over-served or over-ordered—at any rate, she’d shot well past the point of functional, yet she was brave enough to commit a major felony, which was where she’d tried to land. She was a dangerously inebriated woman on the edge, and she was halfway up a ladder toward the beautiful pink Cadillux before she realized how far into her crime she’d actually made it and how far she’d fall if she missed a rung. How many minutes had she just lost falling into a void in her memory? Didn’t matter. The ship was right there.

Wind howled through the stacks, carrying with it the familiar scents of oil, rust and industrial grime, the perfume of decrepit starships. The flotilla she’d been born and raised on had bathed her in that smell from her first breath until she’d abandoned the Embarker lifestyle forever at age thirteen.

The ID-clone scanned the ship and began a search of the galactic net for the proper code. Electra stabilized herself by resting her forehead on the side of the ship while she waited. In her inebriated state, she decided licking the vessel would be okay, even though it wasn’t hers yet. Indulging her initial impulse, she licked the hull in a long, slow, lingering swipe of her tongue…and immediately threw up. The expensive, potent drinks she’d spent the last of her cash on poured through the metal grating of the platform in three massive heaves. She felt better. Licking the ship hadn’t been a terrible idea after all.

The ID-clone popped open a moment later and Electra retrieved the ID, which was now a perfect copy to identify her as Weisella, for most purposes. All the money she was owed from the party, the boob massage and the betrayal, yeah, the ship would barely cover what was due after a job mostly well done.

This area is off limits, ma’am, a valet-bot blorped from behind her. It was little more than a floating ball with four long bracket arms and a blue, glowing triangle for a face. If you’d like your vehicle, you need to show your ID at the entrance and I will retrieve it.

Don’t ‘ma’am’ me in your bleepy-blorpy voice, Electra slurred. She flipped her datapad around to face the bot and hit buttons until the scramble flash went off, accidentally taking her own picture at the same time. The valet-bot spun erratically and rebooted.

Can I retrieve your ship for you, ma’am? the valet-bot asked convivially.

I would like that very much, yes, and sorry about calling your voice bleepy-blorpy, Electra said, providing the bot with the new Weisella fake ID.

The valet-bot happily retrieved, scanned and returned the offered ID, along with the starship’s keys. Have a splendid rest of the night, Weisella, the valet-bot declared before floating back down to its cradle.

I’m really good at crime, she declared to nobody in particular.

Electra climbed into the ship, closed the door behind her and took a deep, luxuriating breath of the grandest ship she’d ever set foot in. Once she hacked the onboard computer, the Cadillux would be hers and she could take her talents all over the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies. She’d wake up to a better life and an epic hangover after she made her getaway.

Chapter Two

Wake up, you little sneak, a familiar voice echoed through the bedroom.

Silk sheets, pillows the size of land speeders… Why would Electra ever want to wake up? She pried one eye open to make sure she wasn’t dreaming. Yep, it was the master bedroom on the Cadillux. She’d stolen it. She’d really stolen it and flown to…somewhere. She’d figure that part out after coffee. Space was big and empty. Hopefully her drunk self from the night before had found a nice spot to bunk down.

Weisella, how did you get this number? Electra joked as she stretched leisurely in her giant, new bed.

It truly is unfortunate you were the one to steal my ship, Weisella said.

Steal? Yours? I have no idea what you’re talking about, Electra said. This ship is registered to the one and only Electra Rex—a payment and healthy apology for a jilted contractor. Very generous of you.

Didn’t the security coding seem simplistic to you? Weisella asked.

Electra bit her lower lip. She didn’t remember. Blacking out wasn’t uncommon for her when she over-indulged. She was a waif of a thing and had an Embarker’s pitiful tolerance for any and all intoxicants. She rolled across the bed and hit the display button on the nightstand. The room was completely white, too white to even look at any of it directly with a hangover, now that she was seeing things clearly. It was like sleeping inside a light bulb. She might have to make some changes.

A holographic display of Weisella popped up at the foot of the bed.

There you are, sweetness, Weisella said.

The coding seemed…

You don’t remember.

Not exactly.

Because you were too drunk.

Not too drunk to get away with it. Electra laughed, immediately regretting it as the noise echoed painfully through the room and the inside of her head.

The ship has a twenty-fold lien on it, Weisella said. All of my debts, including the bounced payment to you and the party you took part in? It all transferred to you when you swapped the title.

Electra’s head swam. If she had anything left in her stomach, she assumed it would be on its way out of her mouth. Twenty-fold on a ship the size and value of the Cadillux would be an astounding amount of money, more than Electra could reasonably be expected to comprehend in her hungover state.

Fuck you, she managed to grumble.

I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean for it to be you, Weisella said. Speaking of fucking, I’ve been looking up stuff on the galactic net, and I think I’ve figured out how we might… You know. Feel like taking pity on a broke girl and giving me a freebie?

You’ve got to be kidding me. Electra reached for the display button.

Wait! I learned the swell on your lower back isn’t your nose, Weisella said. I could… She waggled a few of her tentacles.

Electra hit the button, ending the call. Ew, no, she said to the dead feed.

Debt was an Embarker’s worst nightmare. Never owe. The motto was plastered on almost every wall, inscribed at the front of every book and was even used