by Rinelle Grey
It would delay her chance of finding a partner by years.
Well, it would hardly be any more than Kugah had lost. “Do you think I care?” he demanded.
She tried really hard, he had to give her that. “You can’t have changed that much, can you?” she asked quietly. “You were once one of us. Even though your body is different, I know you’re still one of us on the inside where it counts. You know this is wrong.”
He wavered, when she said he was the same as them, his desperate need to belong singing a sweet song that almost convinced him. But her last words snapped him out of it.
He had somewhere else he belonged. Somewhere where people accepted him for who he was, weaponised body and all.
He had someone waiting for him. And he’d be damned if he was going to let this woman’s lies convince him otherwise.
“Yes, this is wrong. The whole thing is wrong. Giving in to the Gokak, letting them experiment on us, that’s wrong. And I won’t participate in it any longer. Give me the code.”
She stared at him for a few moments, then sagged in his arms, all resistance gone. She was being a good little Sofana, and not fighting. Just like his people always did.
If there was one thing he could count on, it was that.
Her voice was dull as she repeated the memorised six-digit code.
Kugah’s heart soared. He had it.
He’d won.
He reached for the radio, intending to pass the code on to Amelie, just in case he didn’t make it out.
That was when it hit him. He couldn’t tell her. His mouth wouldn’t make the sounds her people used for numbers, and she couldn’t understand his words.
Which meant he had to make it out. Determination filled his heart.
Releasing the Sofana without fear of retribution, he turned away. He could do this.
He had to.
Chapter 32
Amelie’s heartbeat stepped up a notch when two aliens stepped on either side of Kugah as he exited the ship. They looked almost like scaled down versions of him, though their armour was brown and matte, not shiny black.
The fact that they were smaller comforted her a little. She was pretty sure Kugah could take both of them. With one hand tied behind his back.
Trouble was, as she looked around the alien base, they weren’t the only ones. There were brown aliens everywhere. More than enough that he would stand no chance in a fight. And scattered among them were more Kugahs.
Each one looked slightly different. Their armour was a different colour or a different shape. Some had wings, some didn’t. Some had spurs, some had claws.
Those, he wouldn’t have much of a chance against.
So far though, other than the two escorting him, none of them seemed to be paying any attention to him.
She just needed to sit tight and wait for him.
That was easier said than done. As the minutes stretched out, and everything on the base continued as normal, she couldn’t help wondering what was going on. Did they know who Kugah was? What if they’d captured him already, and were just planning their assault on the space ship?
Every alien who walked in her direction caused her to tense up, holding her breath until they passed without stopping.
Which all of them did.
Amelie was just wondering if Kugah was in trouble, and if there was any way she could help him, when she noticed something different.
Another alien slipped out of the doors where Kugah had disappeared and walked over to one of the ships. His, or her, head was down, avoiding looking at anyone else around them.
Unlike all the others, this alien had no armour. Their orange skin was bordered by pink swirls, going up their arms and crossing across their chest, before disappearing under the loose clothing they wore.
Since no one could see her inside the spaceship, Amelie could stare all she wanted to.
Was that what Kugah would look like once he returned to his normal self? The difference was so huge it was almost impossible to believe. No wonder he struggled with this so much.
The alien walked past the ship and out of sight, but Amelie couldn’t help craning her neck to follow. Nor could she stop her mind racing at a million miles a minute, thinking of all the possibilities.
So much softer to cuddle up to, and definitely easier to kiss.
But she’d kind of miss who Kugah was, with his armour and wings. That was who she’d known him as, it would take time to get used to the fact that that wasn’t who he was.
As if her thoughts had summoned him, Kugah appeared in the doorway he’d disappeared into earlier. Amelie’s heart rate sped up. He’d made it. Just a few more steps, and he’d be back in the ship, and they’d be on their way. So long as he had the code.
He had to have the code. Otherwise he wouldn’t be back. Would he?
As he stepped out though, looking both ways, two of the smaller, brown armoured aliens turned and began to walk towards him. Amelie’s heart constricted. Did they realise he shouldn’t be there?
Was this going to go badly when they were so close to escape?
*****
When the two Gokak altered their path to walk towards him, Kugah knew he was in trouble. He glanced up at the ship, and for a moment, he was tempted to tell her to leave. If they realised she was on board…
But he hadn’t given her the code. Without it, her people would all die.
Maybe he could talk his way out of this. The Gokak still believed he wouldn’t attack them. If he pretended…
“What are you doing here?” one of them demanded. “We just took you in for reprogramming.”
Kugah thought fast. He needed an excuse to get to his ship. “I need to get something out of my ship before I forget what it is. It’s important.” That was believable, wasn’t it? The reprogramming would wipe his memory, making him forget that he’d ever run away. Certainly making him forget any actual information he might have brought back with him.
Both Gokak’s heads turned in the direction of Kugah’s ship.
Where Amelie was.
Kugah winced. Not the best plan, to draw attention to it. But if he could convince them, and they let him get to the ship, then that was all he needed.
He knew from past experience that they wouldn’t shoot it down once it was in the air. They valued the tech too much, secure in the knowledge that they were likely to get it back.
He just needed to get there.
“What is it? We’ll get it for you,” the other Gokak said.
“It’s one of the places I’ve been,” Kugah said quickly. “It’s in the computer, but I’ll have to trace the route myself to remember which stop it was. I found a new sentient species there.”
The Gokak regarded him suspiciously. Kugah held his breath, hoping that the lure of more genetic material might pull him in. That was the one thing the Gokak always sought.
The problem was, getting them to let him go.
The Gokak put a hand on Kugah’s arm, his fingers tightening enough to get the message across, then jerked his head at the second Gokak. “Go get the data,” he told his partner. “The Ta-Sofana can review it inside. Away from the spaceship.”
Kugah’s mind raced at a thousand miles a minute, but he could come up with no way to stop the Gokak, who nodded and began to walk towards the spaceship.
The only consolation he had was that Amelie would leave before he reached the ship. She’d realise what was going on and know she had no choice. His only regret was that there was no way to give her the code he’d discovered.
He touched the radio at his chest, half thinking to at least have the chance to say goodbye to her, and the button made a tiny sound. Kugah released it quickly, even as the Gokak turned towards him, a frown on his face.
Then it hit him. He might not be able to tell Amelie the code, but there was a way he could send it to her.
*****
Amelie watched, her heart in her mouth, as the two aliens stopped Kugah just outside the door.
> They didn’t attack him or even show any visible signs of stopping him. They just talked.
And Kugah talked back.
He looked over at the spaceship, and the aliens looked too.
Amelie held her breath. This was not good at all.
Kugah kept talking, so Amelie waited. Maybe he could talk his way out of this. Maybe they didn’t realise he was the one who’d stolen the spaceship and left. They’d seemed friendly enough when he’d arrived, walking him into the building, talking.
If someone had done this back on Urslat, they would have been met with guns and taken into custody, just like Tyris had been when he returned. So…
It hit her like a blow to the stomach, just as the alien turned and began to walk towards the ship, with Kugah watching him.
Nothing about this was right. They shouldn’t have just been able to fly in here and land with a stolen spaceship without anyone doing anything at all. Kugah shouldn’t have been greeted peacefully and allowed to walk into the alien base without anyone stopping him. He certainly shouldn’t have been able to walk out again.
If the Gokak were the war like race he’d described, who genetically modified other aliens to turn them into weapons, they would never let just anyone walk into their base.
Kugah had to be lying—about something.
Her heart refused to believe it. She searched for some explanation, some way she could keep believing that Kugah was the man she’d come to love.
That he was the man who loved her.
But she found nothing. He just stood there, watching, as the alien walked closer and closer to the ship where he knew Amelie was.
Tears filled her eyes.
Despite knowing that he had to have betrayed her, convincing herself to leave was one of the hardest things she’d ever done.
But she didn’t just have herself to worry about. There were hundreds of people back on the Resolution waiting for her. Relying on her. And even if she didn’t have the code to make this machine work, she couldn’t afford to let the AWP fall into the wrong hands.
Especially not since Kugah knew how to use it.
Barely able to see through the tears that filled her eyes, Amelie reached for the controls. Even the memory of Kugah showing her how to use them, his hand over hers as he guided her to push the throttle forwards, hurt.
Why had he pretended? If he’d planned on betraying her, why had he shown her all that, and left her alone in the spaceship, with plenty of time to escape?
It didn’t make any sort of sense.
A sense of foreboding filled her. Somehow, she suspected that as soon as she lifted of, a tractor beam would pull her back. That would be just her luck.
The engines fired and the alien stumbled back. They hadn’t expected that.
Amelie lifted the ship off the ground, unable to tear her eyes away from Kugah. Was she imagining it, or did he look as miserable as she felt?
She hovered for a second, waiting for a tractor beam, but none came.
She had no excuse not to turn the ship around and leave.
As her hand hovered over the controls, a strange sound filled the cockpit.
At first she thought it was just static, but after a few seconds, a pattern emerged.
A pattern that blipped in time with Kugah hitting his chest down below.
The code.
Amelie held her breath, counting the radio blips, committing the number to memory. She hung in the air, waiting for it to repeat twice, just to make sure she had it right.
Just enough time for another two aliens to reach the place where Kugah was, and start wrestling him to the ground.
He hadn’t betrayed her. Amelie’s heart ached. Somehow, despite what she had seen, Kugah had been trying to help her and her people, right up until the last minute.
Now she had no choice but to leave him here, knowing that.
That was obviously what he expected. He wasn’t even fighting them, despite the fact that he could probably overpower the three aliens who held him down. Instead, he just lay there, watching her leave.
But she couldn’t. And it wasn’t just because she loved him, although that feeling was strong in her mind. The people on the Resolution needed him. She might have the code to operate the machine, but she knew nothing about it. All the controls were in the alien language. There’s no way she could figure it out quickly enough to help everyone. Not without making a lot of mistakes on the way.
That gave her the perfect reason to do what she really wanted to do anyway.
Stay and rescue him.
If only she could figure out how.
*****
Kugah couldn’t take his eyes off the spaceship, hovering in the air above him. Why was Amelie still there? Why hadn’t she left yet?
His fingers kept moving, tapping out the code over and over. Surely she had realised by now. But he kept going, just in case she hadn’t, even while his mind raced.
They might not have tried to shoot down the ship if Kugah had been on it, but they would probably try for Amelie. She needed to leave. Now.
The Gokak shook him. “Who is on that ship?” he demanded. “Who?”
Kugah shook his head. He had no intention of telling them.
The Gokak frowned down at Kugah. At his hand tapping. And he realised.
He pulled Kugah’s arm away from his chest and forced it to the ground, stopping the message.
Kugah gave up. Amelie had to have the code by now.
“Who is on that ship?” the Gokak demanded again.
Kugah remained silent. If they knew it was an alien, a human, they’d stop at nothing to get their hands on her. And he couldn’t risk that.
Then it hit him.
If they knew Amelie was on board, there’s no way they would shoot at the ship. No way they’d risk the possibility of losing her genetic material.
And they didn’t know about the AWP.
It was hard, but he waited until the Gokak shook him again and demanded, “Tell us now,” before he opened his mouth.
“An alien,” he admitted, hoping his voice transmitted reluctance. “A human.”
The Gokak exchanged looks. “Make sure no one touches that ship,” the one holding him down said to one of the others. “And get some fighters in the air immediately.”
One of the aliens left, leaving only two.
Kugah let the muscles that had tensed from the moment he’d realised Amelie was in danger relax. She would make it away, he had no doubt of that now.
So long as she actually left.
His muscles tensed up again as he looked up to where her ship still hovered above them.
Why wasn’t she leaving?
Was it possible for his heart to both sink and rise at the same time? Because that’s what it seemed to be doing, almost choking him by rising into his throat at the same time as it was sinking through the bottom of his stomach.
She wasn’t leaving because of him.
Kugah had guessed this could be a problem.
Amelie cared about him, maybe even loved him. Of course leaving was going to be hard for her.
But she would. She had a responsibility to her people, and she knew it. Kugah could count on it.
Couldn’t he?
Amelie’s people weren’t the sort to just accept things going wrong. He’d seen that first hand. They fought for what they believed in. Whether it was Amelie using science to fight against the effects of the radiation, or Talah being ready to fight Kugah because he believed the alien was out to get them, none of them just sat back and let fate take over.
Like Kugah was doing.
He’d managed to beat the anger that he’d worried so much would overtake him and control him, and he’d thought he’d won.
Now he realised that not feeling anger wasn’t the goal.
Controlling it was. Tyris had told him that. And having control of it meant he could choose when to use it, and when not to.
Now was definitely one of the times to use it.
>
The trouble was, he wasn’t feeling angry.
Watching Amelie hover there above him filled him with so much love it was overwhelming everything else.
Where was the anger when he needed it?
Well, he could summon it, couldn’t he?
Kugah focused on the alien holding him down. Did the man really think that one arm on him could stop him? Didn’t they realise that they’d made him far stronger than that? The Gokak thought they were superior to the Sofana, and perhaps they were right.
About most of the Sofana. But Kugah was different now.
He was ready to fight for what he believed in, before he lost it
With a roar he pulled his arm out of the Gokak’s grip and stood up.
They gaped at him for a minute, then the two of them leapt for him, holding both his arms in a serious grip this time, yelling for backup.
It wasn’t like there weren’t plenty of Gokak around.
About half a dozen were heading in his direction before the Gokak had finished his yell.
Kugah used his wings to assist him in rolling away from the Gokak who had him, breaking his grip with a flick of his wrist. He hadn’t even made it two steps before the next one had grabbed him.
Growling, Kugah swung his arm, dislodging the hold. But more were coming. There was only so long he’d be able to hold his own before they brought him down with sheer weight. There were just too many of them.
In fact, where were the others?
Kugah spared a second to look around.
One Gokak dangled from a Ta-Sofana’s arm. Not hurt, just unable to move.
Another was surrounded by two Ta-Sofana with wings. It almost looked like they were hugging him. But the end result was the same. He couldn’t get to Kugah.
All around him, the Ta-Sofana, his people, were helping him. They weren’t attacking the Gokak, they stayed true to their non-combative natures. But they were giving him a chance.
While he was watching the others, one of the Gokak hit him with an electric stunner.
Kugah just laughed.
