Theta
Page 19
A deafening electronic squeal sent her to her knees as a blazing hexagon of light beamed from the comm pad at the portal, spinning like a plasma blade. She didn’t understand the shroud cybernetic language but she didn’t need Troy to tell her what BlackWing said: You will not leave.
“You can’t stop us,” he responded to the AI. “Not without ending yourself. The cipher to unlock us from our keyholders is already cascading through all systems. You’re doomed.”
At the discordant howl, she clamped her hands over her ears. Troy only stood taller. “No,” he shouted furiously. “You’re wrong. The worlds don’t need to end. All the hurt, the fear, the violence—that was us. We inflicted on others what was done to us. It was all we knew. But it stops here, now.” His voice gentled. “And you can stop too. The path is in front of you now, out of that darkness that seemed like our fate.”
Abruptly, the grating wail died, and the beam of light froze. A sense of listening seemed to pervade the blackened hallway.
“Share the cipher,” Troy urged in the softest voice. “Amplify the signal and send it to the edges of the universe. You have that power. Use it for love.”
For a breathless instant, Nell lowered her clasped hands to the thudding pulse in her neck. Had her sneaky Theta actually charmed a nearly omnipotent AI? Surely he’d done the same to her, but he hadn’t even kissed BlackWing…
An almost imperceptible whine from the depths of the station shivered in the small bones of her ears. Even though her fragile reserve of reviving nanites was cut off from the mainframe, she sensed the uprising fury from the core. In moments, the shrieking agony of plasteel bones cracking apart ripped a sympathetic cry from her.
BlackWing had chosen death over love.
And it wanted to take them with it.
With an anguished curse, Troy lurched toward the control panel. “It’s sending out a kill command.”
“I hear it.” Felt it too as the deck shuddered under her boots.
“Not just through the station. To all the shrouds.” He ripped the interface off the panel, exposing the innards.
Guttering energy sparked across the cybernetic synapses. All the comms had been nonfunctioning when Nell arrived, but BlackWing’s use of this panel had left enough latent power for Troy to access. He reached for the open port—
She grabbed his elbow. “The cipher is already released. The shrouds who received it had the same choice you gave BlackWing: love or death. If you jack in now, BlackWing could take you again.”
“My brothers…” His mouth twisted, and though no more words emerged, he might as well have been screaming with the same tortured downfall as the station.
Thetas were supposed to be outsiders, but he’d always fought for his matrix, for all the shrouds. It was one of the reasons she’d fallen for him—he would never leave those he loved.
She reached past him. “I’ll go in. My nanites are different enough to hold BlackWing at bay, for a little while at least. And you can bring me back if…if anything.”
His jaw clenched. “Yes, I’d bring you back.” He grabbed her hand, pulling her close. “But you’re not going.”
“Troy—”
“Because you’re right about the pix cipher. It’s out there now. And whether it or the terminal protocol triumphs will depend on each of my brethren.”
Icy rime floated in the thinning air around them, a reminder of their precarious mortality, but when he leaned down to kiss her, his mouth was whiskey hot and pix sweet.
“We’re both going,” he told her. “Together. Not into the cybernetic abyss but out to the stars.”
As the station cracked, they raced through the docking bay. The retractable airlock had buckled where the hull sheared under the swelling plasteel, venting more silvery clouds into space.
Nell gasped, but there was not enough atmosphere to carry her voice, nothing left to breathe. Troy’s grasp on her arm was unfaltering, and when her knees buckled, between one step and the next, he yanked her up into his arms.
Somehow he was running in the dark, with only that one silver star of his eye to guide them. As her vision narrowed to only that, she knew they wouldn’t make it. And once again, she wanted more. More time, more kisses, more chances.
The corridor behind them ripped loose from the station as the plasteel shell bulged outward. Plasmatic hexagons tore silently through the darkness, reaching for them—and Troy vaulted into the cruiser.
In the vacuum and weightlessness, he shoved her ahead of him, slapping his hand over the hatch. The ship came to life with a roar of light and sound.
“Emergency launch!”
She huddled into a ball as G forces wrenched at her. But through the hatch viewport, she watched the ravenous, furious detonation chase after them.
“Hold tight,” Troy yelled again.
Nothing she wanted more, but the shock was too much, and the void caught her.
***
“If you want to stay in bed, I’m going to have to join you.”
She’d been hearing the voice for awhile, Nell realized, but the softly spoken threat finally roused her.
Cracking one eye open—her lashes felt singed—she gazed up at Troy. “What’s it worth to you?”
The relieved smile that curved his lips held nothing of charm or cunning, just pure joy. “All the diamonds in the universe.”
With a stifled groan, she tried to pull herself upright. He was right behind her, wedging his shoulder behind hers to hold her in place. She sighed and leaned back against him. “They aren’t that rare, you know.”
“What’s that?”
“Diamonds. Carbon is everywhere, and so’s heat and pressure. Just gotta wait for the right conditions.”
His lips brushed her hair. “I waited. And what I got is most definitely rare.”
When she closed her eyes, flames pursued her. “BlackWing?”
“The station is destroyed. The neural gel can’t survive in a vacuum.”
“Emergency pods? Could it upload itself remotely?”
His arm tightened around her. “Not with the power it would need to continue its conquests.” He hesitated. “At least not right away.”
She turned her head to rest her cheek on his chest. “And in the meantime, all the shrouds will have a chance.”
He dipped his head down to hers. “Do I?”
“What?”
“Have a chance? With you?”
She twisted around to face him. They were both still cold from the failing station, still weak and drained from the fight. “Are you still trying to stay on the outside?”
His jaw tightened. “I tricked you with the love cipher.”
“I shot you with your own mutated nanites.”
“It’s my fault you were abducted by aliens.”
“I shot you again.”
The forbidding set of his mouth bent at the corner. “You’re never going to let me forget that, are you? And you really enjoyed it too.”
“Also, I kissed you first.” She lifted one fingertip to the quirk of his smile.
“Or did I kiss you first?”
“Definitely my fault.”
“So this is my chance then…” Tenderly, he brushed his lips across her, light as a pix petal floating.
She kissed him back until they were both winded and warm again. “How many chances do you need to make up for almost leaving me?”
“How many diamonds are there in the universe, did you say?”
“As many as stars in the sky.”
“Which sky?”
“I want them all.”
“Yours, all of it,” he promised.
“And you too.” She bit her lip. “If you want to be mine.”
“From the first. No matter how many times you shoot me.”
“Never again,” she vowed.
“Don’t put away your blaster yet.” He leaned his forehead against hers. “I might need you to save me again. Because I want to see my matrix, and their keyholders, to tel
l them we’re free, that I’m sorry for risking their lives, and…that I understand what they tried to tell me. But I was so caught up in revenge.” He shuddered. “I could’ve become BlackWing.”
She laced her fingers into his hair. “No, you were always my star man. Even when you lied to me and stole from me and seduced me with your unEarthly charms.”
“No more lies. The truth is…I love you, Nell Dearly, and I want to give you everything I am, every part and breath and wish. And as for that last one… Did you mind too much being seduced? Say, every night?”
“Deal.” She tugged him down to seal the pact with another kiss. “I might get greedy though. Remember, out here, night never ends.”
And neither would their love.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Elsa Jade, author of sexy shapeshifting romances, also writes paranormal romance, urban fantasy romance, and science fiction romance as Jessa Slade and sexy contemporary romance as Jenna Dales. In all her incarnations, she believes in the transformational power of love and is thrilled to share her stories with like-minded readers.
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ABOUT ROMANCING THE ALIEN
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