by Ava Ross
With her pulse galloping a thousand miles an hour, she pivoted and shot down the hall again. She hadn’t run since quitting track in high school—damn Janie and her “fat girl” sneers. But Mila had been good. Record sprinter good. While she’d gained some weight since then, her legs had not forgotten how to take her where she wanted to go.
Luck was on her side, because she hit a stairwell at a run and bumped through the door and onto the landing. Not stopping, she went down, taking the steps two at a time. A few floors below, while the aliens clambered above her shouting for her to come back (really?!), she exited the stairwell into another long hall. Partway down the corridor, she found an unlocked door and darted inside, finding an office. Rounding the desk, she dropped to her knees and scooted beneath.
She waited there for what felt like forever before leaving the room, listening until she heard the aliens entering the stairwell and the door banging shut behind them. Using a different stairwell, she crept down multiple flights until reaching a door marked maintenance.
There were lots of nice hidey-holes in maintenance areas. Boiler and electrical rooms felt like home.
Dad had been a high school janitor and, as a kid, Mila had hung out on Saturdays with him after Mom left when Mila was eight. She’d driven away and never looked—or called—back. It wrecked Mila, but her dad stepped up and did everything he could to help get her through it. Some could say it was the best thing that could’ve happened as Mom hadn’t been happy raising a kid. Dad loved her more than all the planets combined. He’d died, and Mila missed him more than a severed limb.
She slunk inside the room and was relieved to find no four-armed, blue-skinned guys waiting for her.
Creeping across the big open surface piled with boxes and weird-looking mechanical devices, she poked through the rubble, trying to find some place safe.
Here, Firefly said from farther inside the room, surprising her. How had he made it here?
You okay, buddy? she said in her mind. I was worried about you.
No fear. Free.
Sort of, if living inside a big tin can could be called freedom. But at least she wasn’t tied, and he wasn’t pinned to the ceiling. Where are you?
A glow ahead pulled her in that direction, toward the back of the room, where she found a pile of wood stacked to the ceiling. She scooted around the side and found a small passage behind.
Here, Firefly said from ahead. Yousss safe.
Safe was a relative term on an alien space station.
Scooting sideways, Mila shimmied through the narrow strip of area between the woodpile and a metal wall. At the end, she found a beat-up door.
Safe.
Firefly’s light faded. He was leaving.
Her eyes stung, but she swiped the wetness from her face. She had no reason to feel sad.
She could handle whatever came next alone.
She opened the door and crept inside a tiny, hidden room.
Two
Kral
When word of an upcoming breeder auction came through the Crakairian Council intel, Kral and Wulf knew the odds of this leading them to Mila and Taylor were slim, but they had to look into it.
After Commander Vork gave them a fully crewed ship, Kral and Wulf followed the lead that took them to the Al’kieern Space Station in the outer Dricad Galaxy.
As they approached in the fully cloaked ship, Kral grunted in satisfaction.
Mila was here. He knew it.
First, his gut never lied. He would stake the leadership of his clan—even his life—on it. But the symbol that had appeared on his palm as they’d arrived in this quadrant confirmed it for him.
Wulf had the same certainty about Taylor, though no symbol had appeared on his palm in confirmation.
“Engage cruise speed,” Kral said in a voice that betrayed nothing, but the fingers of his right hand tapped rhythmically on the command chair’s arm.
An RT34 droid working at the console to his right dipped its head. “Yes, Sir.” The droid spun and its four limbs flew over the dials, tweaking and turning.
While he could do this himself—Kral had asked the lead droid to show him how to operate the ship within minars of stepping onboard—he held himself back. He didn’t have to control everything.
The engines whined, and his belly lurched as he stared through the expansive viewscreen taking up most of the front of the small bridge. Despite traveling five daelas in this vessel, the thought of being trapped within a giant hunk of metal hurtling through the stars wreaked havoc with his mind. A Vikir needed to feel the wind in his naanans, the warm earth beneath his feet. Kral would only be happy when he was roaming free, be it deep within the cave system where he’d played as a youngling or in the treetops where the Vikir had made their homes for thousands of years.
With no discernable movement of the ship, it transitioned out of the high speed they’d traveled at for three daelas and slowed to a bare crawl. Stars that had blurred past for what felt like a lifetime became fixed. They winked, playing tricks with his mind.
“Heille,” Wulf hissed.
Kral’s breath caught and, as he released the air, the orbiting Al’kieern space station crept out from behind Yarris, a C-grade planet that provided resources for the station. The Al’kieern had set up orbit here to develop and settle the planet below.
The size of a mountain, the station appeared impenetrable, indestructible. How the heille was he going to force the Al’kieern commander to do what he asked?
The intel the Crakairian Council had received suggested the kidnapped women were being held on the station and would be auctioned off soon. After that, it was anyone’s guess where they’d be taken.
“Should we remain cloaked, Sir?” the RT34 droid asked in a mechanical voice, not turning away from the console where it worked.
“Yes. I would like to maintain the element of surprise,” Kral said.
“Very good, Sir.”
Unable to sit still, Kral left the chair. His right leg spasmed, and he rubbed the area that had never correctly healed. Ten yaros old, his home had caught fire, and his father had urged him through an open window, saving Kral’s life. The fall had fractured his leg in three places, but he’d lived. Unlike his parents.
Thankfully, Kral’s beloved Aunt Riella had nursed him back to health. He was eternally grateful she’d survived the illness.
Within months of his father’s death, he’d taken over the role as leader of their clan.
Pain slashed through him as the memory resurfaced. While his aunt had been kind, doing what she could to replace his lost family, he missed his parents. He’d die rather than lose someone he cared for again.
Suppressing his groan of discomfort, he walked back and forth across the front of the small bridge, his boots creating uneven thuds on the floor tiles. He refused to broadcast the agony tightening around his leg like a steel band, even to his fellow Vikir and friend, Wulf.
“Scan the station,” Kral bit out, hating that his voice came out harsh. But pain shot through the top of his leg like a bolt of lightning. Thankfully, the droids wouldn’t care that he snapped. But Kral prided himself on being kind to others at all times, so he softened his voice. “See if you can isolate a woman from the others on the station.”
“I will, Sir,” the droid said.
Wulf, standing beside Kral, gnashed his teeth. “They are here.”
If Kral’s gut was wrong, if Mila and Taylor were not on board the station, Kral was confident he’d find others equally in need of rescue inside. Trafficking might be forbidden per an interstellar treaty, but that didn’t stop some species from transporting kidnapped beings to locations like this station in the outer reaches of the galaxy. Some races ignored the rules when a profit could be made.
“A ship.” Wulf pointed to a speck easing away from the left of the space station. “It is small.” His gaze met Kral’s. “A shuttle, do you think?”
“Two lifeforms on board,” a droid said. Its mechanical digits flew
across the dual screens in front of it. When it glanced at Kral and Wulf, the weight of its attention made Kral’s heart stall before slamming double time. “One human female and one…I cannot discern who or what the other being is, other than it is not human.”
“Have humans made it this far into the quadrant?” Wulf asked. “Could it be someone else?”
“They have not,” the droid said. “All mates other than subjects Mila Theresa Dunkirk and Taylor Nina Willis are accounted for. A simple species, Earth does not possess ships capable of reaching this deep within the galaxy.”
“Engage the windlerdrive force field and pull the craft into our bay,” Wulf said. He leaned forward, and tendons stood out starkly on his neck. “It must be one of our mates leaving the station, Kral. There is a chance whoever is onboard is helping her, but we must assume the being is stealing her. We must do something.”
At Kral’s nod, the droid worked on the console a minar before turning to Wulf and Kral. “Our windlerdrive engagement has been blocked.”
Kral and Wulf’s eyes met. There would be no pulling the other craft into their boarding bay. Unless they could somehow intercept it, the human woman onboard could be in grave danger.
Lines stood out sharply on Wulf’s face. “I will go after her.” His back tightened. “If it is Mila, I will protect her with my life until she can be brought home to Crakair and formally introduced to you. I…I will not fail you.”
Orphaned as a youngling, no family had offered Wulf a permanent home. From the age of ten yaros, he’d been fed and housed by whoever needed him for one task or another, handed around until he’d fully grown. After that, he’d joined their clan’s guard, rising to the highest level of the ranks before he hit twenty-five yaros. He was Kral’s best friend and one of the few males he trusted.
Kral braced his palms on Wulf’s shoulders. “I will pursue our original plan with the station and if I locate Taylor there, I will keep her safe.”
Wulf’s steely gaze met Kral’s, and he dipped his chin forward. “We will be victorious.”
“We will.” Certainty rang out in Kral’s voice, because he knew… He wasn’t sure how, but he was convinced Mila was still onboard the station and the human in the shuttle was Taylor. As Wulf pivoted and strode to the back of the bridge, Kral called out. “Travel with safety and stealth, my friend.”
Wulf grunted. “Until our paths cross again.”
Three
Mila
On what she believed was her seventh day on the space station, Mila scooted down the hall in the lower passages of the glued-together hunk of scrap metal she now called home.
A creak and a shudder made her pause and press her body back against the wall. A quick peek back showed she was alone, but the blue guys had to be getting desperate. After all, they had an auction to run, and she was a big-ticket item.
Tonight, she was searching the highest level of the space station, determined to find Taylor and Lily. She’d started at the bottom and worked her way up, canvassing a few floors each time she ventured out of her hidey-hole in the back of the maintenance room. Shaped like two funnels with the big ends connected in the middle, she’d found the middle floor of the space station the longest and the others gradually shorter. She was living in something that vaguely resembled a globe. Or a death star.
Bad analogy right there.
As fear hitched up her spine like the odd centipede-like creatures she’d tiptoed around while investigating the basement levels, she poked her head into every nook and cranny she found. So far, she’d found no evidence of her friends, but that didn’t mean they weren’t locked away somewhere on the station.
She’d seen a hell of a lot of aliens. Their noose was getting tighter, and she worried they’d find her hidey-hole in the basement.
Mila had somehow remained free so far, but she might as well be stuck in a cell. She’d found no way off the station other than small spaceships parked on a docking level she had no clue how to drive.
She’d lost all hope of ever reaching Crakair or meeting Kral, which made her sad when she thought too hard about it. Would he look for her or write her off and move on to a new match? The idea shouldn’t bother her; they hadn’t even met. Yet she wanted to rip out the Earth girl’s hair at the thought. Stupid to be jealous about a guy she might have hated on sight.
You didn’t hate him in the vid…
He’d been kind, smart, and hot. Extra hot with his upper body dressed in furs that revealed mountains of muscles all over his arms and shoulders. He’d also worn snug, black leather pants that hugged the important parts. Yum.
But no more mooning about Kral. She needed to find her friends. Despite needing to search the final level of the space station, Mila knew in her heart Lily and Tay weren’t on this rumbling hunk of scrap metal with her. This was confirmed when she reached the end of the hall.
A bang behind her sent her skittering around a corner. She ducked into a room and waited behind a pile of wooden boxes while what sounded like a pack of blue aliens stomped by. Had they seen her? If so, would they find her? She trembled, scared out of her mind. How had she evaded them for three days?
Once the sounds of their footsteps died down and she’d waited to the count of one thousand, she carefully opened the door and listened. When she heard nothing, she left the room.
She hurried to the stairwell on light feet and scurried down to the kitchen level, pausing partway down the hall by a window to peer out.
The sun had passed beyond the biggest planet, and darkness had exploded in the sky left behind. The planet didn’t resemble anything she’d ever seen before, with deep blue land masses and a lot of water. Would she ever know what the surface was like or would she grow old and die on the space station, hiding from the Al’kieern for the rest of her life?
Her heavy sigh bled out, leaving a white sheen of fog on the window. Turning, she slunk down the hall and into the kitchen. As usual, the cooking droids continued to work without glancing her way. She couldn’t tell if they didn’t see her or they didn’t care. As long as she didn’t pop their soufflés—or whatever they were cooking—they left her alone.
She snatched a hunk of what she’d decided to call bread off the counter and sank her teeth into it, chewing and swallowing fast. It didn’t taste the same. Nothing here tasted the same, but it was food. No matter how much she stuffed into her mouth during her nightly trips to the kitchen, she could never satisfy her howling belly.
The chef droids baked their version of bread daily, and the warm, chalky-doughy goodness dropped onto her stomach with the same comforting feeling of her weighted blanket back on Earth.
Opening the ice cooler, she pawed around and snagged two small blocks of what looked like a sweet potato but tasted enough like cheese she could pretend. She stuffed them into her loose top, loose because it would fit a bigger alien who had left it behind in a corner of the maintenance room.
She missed food that tasted familiar. She missed her friends. Most of all, she missed her home on Earth. Dad might be gone, but she’d still had a job. Friends. A purpose other than survival.
After closing the fridge, she stood on her tiptoes, looking around for fruit. There! Over by the far wall, they’d set out a bowl filled with more of the red globes she’d stolen and eaten yesterday. She had no idea what they were, but they tasted like a combination of pears and watermelon. Easing around the droids bustling through the kitchen, she worked her way to the fruit where she stuffed her pockets with as many pieces as she could hold.
She’d added a loaf of bread to her shirt when a whimper made her come to a shuddering halt. Her gaze was drawn to a cage she hadn’t seen before, tucked in the corner of the room.
Oh, no. Absolutely no fuckin’ way.
She scurried in that direction as a droid turned toward the cage holding a butcher knife. A four-armed, lavender-furred monkey-like creature cowered in the corner of the cage, wrenching on the bars, trying to get free.
Its panicked gaze
met hers, and it scrambled backward, dragging its right hind leg. Snapping at the droid, it plastered itself against the back of the cage.
Mila stormed forward and snatched the knife from the droid’s grip, then chucked it toward the far wall. It impaled itself in the surface and quivered, remaining in place. If she ever escaped the space station, she could consider a job as a magician. They were good at throwing knives, right?
She shoved the droid to the side and stooped down in front of the cage door. Fiddling with the latch, she unlocked it and swung it open.
“Come on, sweetie,” she said, holding out her arms to the purple monkey. “We’re outta here.”
The alien creature leaped forward and wrapped all four arms around her neck. “Chee-chee-chee!” it said.
“Sure thing. Chee to you, too.” Mila gurgled and hoped her airway would remain open. But the creature—who she might as well call Chee-chee—was frightened; it made sense it would cling to the only lifeline in town. Besides, it could barely walk on what she suspected was a broken back leg. As a physical therapist, she’d worked with her share of patients with fractured limbs.
The monkey’s arms loosened, but it still hung on while she straightened. As she pivoted to escape the kitchen, one of the cooking droids struggled to pull the knife from the wall. Another peered into the cage as if it expected the monkey to hop back in and say kill me, please.
Mila snatched a big knife from the rack near the bread. She’d add it to her collection in her hidey-hole. She raced to the door to the hall and poked her head out to make sure no Al’kieern lurked in the hallway. Finding it empty, she raced down to the end of the long corridor.
The monkey leaped from her arms and hobbled back down the hall. It scurried around a corner and disappeared from view.
“Chee-chee, come back.” Mila’s body sagged. So much for helping her new friend. For one second, she’d started to believe she’d have someone to talk to while she splinted his leg. He would have been someone she could fight for, someone who’d help her feel less alone—a feeling that had haunted her since her dad died.
