Orion: Star Guardians, Book 1

by Ruby Lionsdrake

  “Oh.”

  Her face had shut down as he spoke, and he had no idea what she was thinking.

  “Uhm, thanks for bringing my phone.” She avoided his eyes as she waved it. “I should get back to the others.”

  She turned toward the door.

  “Juanita,” he blurted, stepping after her.

  He grabbed her arm, wanting to stop her before the door slid open at her approach, but alarm flashed in her eyes, and he let go, jerking his hand back. He didn’t want to scare her. And it distressed him that he could scare her.

  She’d said she trusted him, but had that changed now?

  She stopped and faced him again, and he groped for something to say, something to bring back the brightness in her eyes.

  “Didn’t you want to go on a tour?” It seemed an inane thing to ask after they’d been talking about people’s deaths, but he pushed on, having no other ideas. “To record the ship?”

  “Oh,” she said again, that syllable so flat and hard to read.

  She looked down the corridor, and he could imagine her wrestling with herself, not wanting to spend time with him but wanting to go. That stung, but could he blame her?

  Orion swallowed. “I can ask Treyjon to take you around without me,” he forced himself to say.

  He imagined Treyjon smiling at her, showing her the views out the portholes, and maybe finding a romantic little nook where he could slip an arm around her back and lean in for a kiss.

  She looked up into his eyes, and he forced himself to shove the image aside, to smile and nod to verify what he’d said.

  “I would like to see the ship,” Juanita said, “but…”

  “I’m sorry I’m not as good a man as you thought.” His smile turned sad as he lifted a hand in apology. Or at least that was what he meant to do. Somehow, he ended up brushing his knuckles down her cheek.

  They lingered of their own accord, then traveled to her lips. This might be the only chance he got to touch her. He wanted to memorize the contours of her face.

  He watched her eyes for a sign that she was repulsed, that she wanted him to stop. She was standing still, her lips parted slightly, her gaze locked onto his. What did that mean? That she was too stunned to react?

  He shifted to touching her with his fingers, running his nails lightly along her cheek and to her ear. He pushed a wayward strand of hair back, curling his fingers around her ear and trailing them down her neck to her collarbone. Though he kept holding her gaze, he was aware of how close his hand was to her breasts, how they pushed at the material of that thin blouse, how easy it would be to undo a few of those buttons and see her bare skin.

  He should step away, give her plenty of room to walk away if that was what she wanted. He wasn’t blocking the door. She could go any time.

  But she stepped closer. Her breasts touched his chest, as they had in that corner in engineering. This time, he was the one to freeze. Except for one part of him. His cock swelled, pressing painfully against his trousers.

  She tilted her head back, her lips parting a little more. If that wasn’t a request for a kiss, he didn’t know what was. And he complied, slipping an arm around her waist as he pressed his lips to hers.

  He expected a similar reaction from her, perhaps a gentle pressing of the lips. But maybe she would shove him away in horror, and he would realize he’d been reading her completely wrong.

  Instead, she sucked at his lower lip. His entire body ignited as if he’d been thrown into a volcano.

  He wrapped his other arm around her and kissed her hard. Hard and hungry.

  She stiffened—with surprise?—and put her hands on his chest. To push him away? Gods, he didn’t want to stop, but he started to lower his arms, to let her go.

  But she murmured a protest against his mouth and sucked on his lip again, sending that startling zing of heat through him. She ran her hands over his muscles, feeling their contours through his vest. With a surge of delight, he realized she didn’t want to push him away. She wanted to feel him, to rub him.

  And that felt so achingly good.

  But in the back of his head, he knew they should stop. That guard or Treyjon would appear any second. Yet he shifted his body into hers, so she could feel all of him. She moaned, still rubbing his chest with her hands, exploring it through his fitted vest. She slid her fingers over his hard nipples and paused, her thumb finding the peak of one and moving back and forth over it.

  Images of shoving her back against the wall rushed into his mind even as blood rushed into his aching cock. He would tug down her pants, and she would wrap her legs around him, and he would dive into her, sating the lust surging through his veins.

  “What the—” a voice said from down the corridor.

  Orion flinched and jerked his lips from hers. Treyjon. He’d know the tracker would come, but he’d thought he would hear—

  As Orion turned his head, realization halted the thought midstream. It was Treyjon, yes, but it was also Sage. He stared at Orion, his face flushed red with fury.

  Abruptly, another realization came. That this didn’t look good. He remembered thinking about pushing Juanita back against the wall, but he’d actually done it at some point, and he was locked to her, as if he was forcing her to stay there. And the way her hands were on his chest… Gods, it had to look to them like she’d been trying to shove him away. They didn’t know she’d been rubbing his chest and kissing him back.

  “She…” He didn’t quite know what to say, and that’s all he got out.

  “Ensign Bystrom,” Sage roared.

  Orion leaped back from Juanita. Juanita winced at the roar, embarrassment stamped on her face. Or maybe she thought she’d done something wrong? Gods no, he’d been the one who shouldn’t have—

  The door slid open, and a startled Ensign Bystrom looked out. Juanita ran past him and into the rec room.

  Orion wanted to call after her, but he dared not take a step in that direction. Even though he understood why she’d run from the captain’s ire, he knew it only made the situation look worse.

  The betrayed look that Ensign Bystrom gave him confirmed it.

  Bracing himself, Orion turned back toward Sage. His calm, collected, strategic genius of a brother who was never ruffled, neither in battle nor at the antics of his men, was more furious than Orion had ever seen him.

  “You tell him,” Sage ordered Treyjon. “I’ll fucking kill him if I stay here.”

  It didn’t sound like hyperbole.

  Sage stalked away, his body almost quivering with rage.

  Treyjon stood in the corridor with Cutty’s mean svenkar on a leash. It snarled in Orion’s direction. Treyjon looked like he wanted to do the same, but he spoke instead, his voice cool.

  “We’ve got a problem. The ship has been compromised.”

  12

  Juanita sat on the bench next to Angela, her hands clasped between her legs as she stared down at the deck. The rational part of her knew she should tell the others what she’d learned, the whole Gaia-and-seed-planets thing, and get their opinion on it. But the emotional part of her couldn’t stop thinking about the kiss.

  Orion had flat out told her that he’d murdered an innocent man, and she’d seen him kill other men on that ship, taking some down with his bare hands. Somehow, when she’d been stuck in that corner and terrified of being caught by brutal slavers, she had thought it was all right. He had been on her side. Part of the reason he’d been killing them was to protect her. When it had all been good guys versus bad guys, it had seemed okay.

  But to think that he’d killed some research scientist who’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time… That chilled her. She’d needed to have some time away from him to think about how she felt versus how she should feel. And to reconcile it all.

  That was what she’d intended to do, but then he had touched her cheek, and she’d gone all tingly and putty-like and hadn’t been able to move at all. No, more than that, she had been drawn to him. Nobody like him had ev
er touched her. And nobody’s touch had ever been so electrifying.

  When his lips had brushed hers, all her inhibitions had disappeared, along with all her thoughts of right and wrong. All she’d been able to think about had been how good that felt and how hot and achy her body had grown. She was still wet and throbbing and wishing she’d had time to explore lower than his chest, to tug his pants down and look at the big hard cock she’d felt thrusting into her stomach. No, to more than look at it. She’d wanted to sling her legs around him and thrust him into her over and over until they exploded with pleasure and collapsed in sweaty pools on the deck.

  Juanita rubbed her face with shaking hands. What the hell was going on with her? She never got this obsessed over a man.

  “Are you all right?” Angela asked.

  “Yeah.” Juanita lowered her hands and took a breath, trying to cool her body and pull herself together. She wondered if that Ensign Bystrom had shown anyone where there was a cold shower.

  “You look shaky. Like something happened. That man didn’t do anything to you, did he?”

  “No,” Juanita said more vehemently than she intended. “No,” she added more softly when Angela raised her eyebrows.

  Why hadn’t she made that clear when the captain had shown up?

  All she’d been thinking about was herself, that he would believe she was some kind of slut for throwing herself at a man she barely knew while in the middle of a public corridor. It hadn’t been until she’d been back inside the rec room that she’d realized the rage in the captain’s eyes had been for Orion and that he must have misunderstood… everything.

  Juanita rubbed her face again. She felt intimidated by Captain Sagitta, but she would have to find a way to talk to him, to inform him that Orion hadn’t done anything that she hadn’t wanted. Even if she shouldn’t have wanted it.

  She cringed at the idea of confessing to wanting to be kissed by someone the captain had condemned as a murderer, but damn it, Orion had been trying to help. It was horrible that an innocent man had been killed, but it wasn’t Orion’s fault. If he hadn’t killed those people, he might not have gotten the shields down so the Star Guardian ship could rescue everyone. And if he hadn’t chanced across Juanita and Tala and protected them in engineering, they might have been rediscovered by the slavers and taken back to the cell for that asshole to maul.

  “It’s not his fault,” Juanita muttered and stood up.

  She couldn’t wait. She had to set the captain straight right away.

  “Uh, what’s not?” Angela asked.

  Tala looked at her with a concerned expression.

  “I have to talk to the captain.”

  “About the fact that we’re heading away from Earth instead of toward it?” Tala asked. “I’d like to have a discussion with him about that too. But he’s not here.”

  Ensign Bystrom wasn’t there, either. He was presumably standing guard again from outside the door. Maybe the order had been given to provide the women with privacy.

  “There’s got to be a comm thingie of some kind, right?” Juanita looked toward the walls and tables.

  “Comm what?” Tala asked.

  “Communications,” Angela said. “Even I know that.”

  “I’m sorry I’m not a science fiction aficionado,” Tala said. “My mom didn’t have any of those kinds of books around the house when I was growing up, and my brother was into… other things. I do remember reading Darna comic books at my grandfather’s house.”

  “Who’s Darna?” Angela asked.

  “A Filipino comics superhero who could fly and had super strength, kind of like Wonder Woman,” Juanita answered, frowning when she didn’t see anything that looked like a comm unit or panel. Did they all just talk on their wristwatches?

  “You’ve read about Darna?” Tala blinked. “Usually, nobody in the US has heard of those comics.”

  “Please, I’ve read comics from all over the world. There were Darna TV shows, too, you know.”

  “Just think if you’d put some of your energy into studying useful things,” Tala said dryly.

  “God, you sound like my mom.” Juanita frowned at her. Tala barely knew her. What gave her the right to deliver lectures?

  “The wisdom of elders.”

  “Maybe if you’d spent less time studying useful things, you’d be enjoying the vocation you’d chosen instead of retired from doctoring at thirty-five and trying to figure out what to do with yourself.”

  Tala had never explained why she’d come up to Flagstaff to volunteer at the animal shelter, so Juanita was making some guesses, but from the startled, and then indignant expression that took over Tala’s face, she had a feeling she was close with her guess.

  “The vocation wasn’t the problem,” Tala said coolly.

  Juanita lifted her hands in apology. She didn’t want to fight with her only true allies here. She’d just been lashing out because Tala had… well, she’d started it.

  “What was?” Angela asked.

  “This isn’t the place to talk about it.”

  “Oh? Where is the place?”

  “Somewhere with alcohol.”

  “Maybe we can put in a request,” Juanita said. “They can bring it whenever they get around to bringing our food.”

  Angela moaned and grabbed her stomach. “Don’t remind me. We probably would have at least been fed on the other ship. You can’t sell scrawny, malnourished people into slavery, can you?”

  The door slid open, and Juanita turned, hoping for the captain. Or Orion. She worried he had been punished or even put in a cell.

  What entered startled her so much that she sat down on the bench. Hard.

  Something that looked like a six-foot-tall pile of rocks walked—no, rolled—no, shuffled through the doorway, somehow squeezing its broad base together to fit. It didn’t have legs, at least not that were visible, but maybe they were underneath the boulder-like lower half of its body. A thin appendage somewhere between a tentacle and an arm extended from the side of its upper half and gripped what might have been a remote control, or maybe that was some kind of handheld tractor beam generator? Because a large tray with covered plates floated before the creature. Or was it a person? An alien? Or maybe it could be a strange-looking robot.

  “Greetings, human women,” a rumbling voice came out of a speaker dangling on its… Juanita decided to call that a chest. Could a boulder stacked atop other boulders have a chest? The topmost boulder could be considered a head, and there were some orifices that might be the equivalent of ears, eyes, and a mouth, but they mostly looked like holes. “At the captain’s behest, I have prepared and brought meals for you. The ship is without a cook right now, but I am versed in dietary preferences and food preparation requirements for all manner of species.”

  The slender whip-like arm twitched, one of four digits tapping a button on the handheld device. The tray lowered onto one of the tables.

  “Are you an alien?” Angela blurted.

  “An alien?” The creature’s voice sounded quite indignant. “I am Lieutenant Commander Craukakos Korta, an Alabaster. That being the name humans have given my species. Our name for ourselves is, computer, do not translate this.” Indecipherable syllables, if one could call them that, followed. It sounded like rocks grinding and banging together. “Resume translating. We, as you might imagine, consider humans to be aliens. Not much different from the Zi’i, in truth.”

  “Are you… a servant?” Angela asked, walking toward the alien. Actually, she was walking around the alien and toward the stack of plates.

  “A servant? I should say not!” The alien—Korta, Juanita reminded herself—rotated so that its side was toward them. A tattoo, just like those inked on the Star Guardians’ forearms, stamped its rocky skin, if skin was the right term. Hull? Outer layer? Crust? “I am the science and forensics officer on the ship, and I am seventh in command.”

  “Out of how many?” Tala murmured.

  Juanita smiled, though she knew there were m
ore than seven people aboard. She’d seen more than that tramping around in combat armor on the slaver ship.

  “Currently, there are forty-six crew members on the Falcon 8,” Korta said. “I am the only Alabaster on this ship. In fact, I may be the only Alabaster among the Star Guardian forces. Most of my people are homebodies and prefer to study science, mathematics, and music from the safety of our own world.”

  “Music?” Juanita couldn’t imagine what kind of music ambulatory rock piles would make. Something involving a lot of percussion instruments.

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean to offend,” Angela said, now standing by the tray. “It just seemed kind of menial to have to feed us. Can we take these? Are they for us?”

  A few more curious—and hungry—women were ambling toward the table.

  “Menial, indeed,” Korta said, “but I am perceptive and read the captain’s face. He is concerned about libidinous overtures on the part of his men, and wishes not to tempt them. Humans are so strange with their mating urges and practices. As if mitosis isn’t the most logical way to procreate. There is no need for mating and the foolishness that comes with competing for mates. If you wish to vary the traits of your offspring, though there is little need when perfection has already been achieved, you can simply tinker with the genetic material.”

  Angela looked blankly at Tala.

  “Don’t look at me,” Tala said. “I’ve never heard of anything larger than a cell reproducing via mitosis.”

  “How unsophisticated. Yes, human woman. That food is for you to eat.”

  “Thank you, ah, Crau…Craw…”

  “Korta is sufficient.” The boulder-creature moved toward the exit.

  Juanita was tempted to drop to the deck to see how it moved—maybe, like a centipede, it had tons of tiny legs underneath its body. But she had more pressing matters on her mind. “Korta, I need to see the captain. Can you allow me to communicate with him?”