by Missy Lyons
Saber counted ten of them before they stopped coming.
“Ahh, here they are now,” Girvan said smugly. He smiled and folded his arms over his chest.
“You call Darkanians friends?” Ryder couldn’t help spitting with disgust as he said the word. “No wonder you had fleas when you first came aboard.”
“Very funny, but you won’t be laughing when I destroy your ship.” The front Darkanian spoke. His canine mouth twisted with the words that sounded unusually human. His gray ears perked forward, and the hair on his back bristled, making him appear larger than he actually was.
“I want the woman aboard first.”
“Why?”
“She is Ryder and Saber’s mate. It will be the perfect revenge for her to bear my son.”
“Go to hell, Girvan!” Saber grated out. “We left her back on Earth.”
Girvan’s lips quirked up in a half smile. “He’s lying. I know it. I’ve heard them talking. We need to find her, and then you can blow up the ship.”
“Girvan’s testing us, brother. Don’t let him goad you into action.” Saber stepped forward, and Ryder held out his hand to stop him.
Ryder ticked his head to the side and did his best to sound serious, but he was losing his temper. “Did anyone tell you that you look like a trogger crossed with a toadie?”
The lead Darkanian snapped his teeth and yelled, “Attack!”
Immediately the ranks fell apart, and fur met flesh and steel in a whirlwind of action.
Saber stepped to the side and slashed the Darkanians stupid enough to advance on him. While it did nothing against their chests and most of their thick fur, he knew their weaker spots. One sharp end went through an eye and into the brain. The creature yelped in pain, but he died before he fell to the ground. Two others replaced the one creature.
“You killed my brother, Trog. For that you will pay,” a Darkanian snarled. His fur was a dark-chocolate color. His eyes swirled in a bright-yellow color with a deep-black pupil. His eyes narrowed in as he leaped to attack his prey.
Two more were keeping him busy, and he had to bring the sword up to protect his head from the Darkanian above while another slashed his belly from the side. The vest he wore protected his vital organs from being slashed open by the claws, but it left a gash below on his leg.
He stumbled and fell to his knees.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw two more Darkanians leaving with Girvan. “No! Stop them, brother!”
But Saber couldn’t do much of anything. The sheer numbers of Darkanians attacking nearly overwhelmed him. He deftly spun the blade to slash and cut, and they kept their distance, nipping the air and trying to intimidate the warrior. He spun around and slashed the Darkanian trying to sneak up on him.
Ryder clutched his weapon with white knuckles and screamed as he launched a new attack with ferocity that scared those closest to him. “You will not have my mate, Girvan!”
The Darkanians retreated, but both men knew they had not won this battle. They lost their prisoner, and if they didn’t act swiftly, they could lose their mate as well.
Metal clanged against metal, and laughter rang in his ears.
Saber knelt over him and gave him a hand up, but the attackers had already left the area.
* * * *
Lily huddled in the safety of her secret smuggling compartment hoping this ordeal would be over soon. What did she know about surviving an attack from space pirates? This was crazy. Hiding in a hole in the ship and hoping things were going to be okay when she should be out there fighting for her life and the life of her baby just seemed stupid.
The airlock popped opened, and she checked the door. It was slightly ajar. She peered out and saw nothing.
No threats. No pirates. Nothing.
She weighed her choices. Should she go after her lovers? Had the attackers already been defeated? Maybe E.V.E. was telling her things were okay and she could leave now. She didn’t know what to think, but she worried for her warriors. They may be brave and strong, but she couldn’t bear the thought of losing them if they lost the battle.
She didn’t like that they had to fend off space pirates by themselves, and the fear of losing them overwhelmed all common sense. She knew they said to wait for them. She knew they said they would be back, but what if they couldn’t come for her?
“E.V.E.? Is it safe to come out now?” She poked her head into the hallway and asked curiously.
There was no comforting response from E.V.E.
E.V.E. had the uncanny ability to hear her and answer from any part of the ship, so not hearing a response was beginning to frighten her.
What if the pirates had managed to get control of the ship? Her heart dropped in her chest as she crept out of her hidey-hole. “Oh no.”
Lily dusted off her knees and stood up. She moved slowly and carefully on her toes. She hoped to hear something coming before it heard or saw her. It would give her more time to run if she had to, not that there were many safe places to run to in the ship.
She crept from one end of the hallway to the other, and the eerie quiet was unsettling until she reached the stairwell leading to the lower levels. The growls and short barks she heard made her skin crawl. She crouched down and tried to dodge into the nearest doorway. She didn’t know what that noise was, but it wasn’t human, and she was afraid to find out what it was.
A deep male voice carried out of the lower levels, and it instilled fear in her. “I smell a female.”
How could they smell her?
“It’s her, you fool. Go get her.” She heard Girvan’s distinctive voice come from the lower levels, but she didn’t see them yet. It gave her a millisecond to hide or to react. She opened the door to the simulator and entered. It was just a dark room without E.V.E. putting her stamp on everything and changing reality to suit her or the person’s fantasies. This was the same room she had seen a galaxy map and explored.
Her heart hammered in her chest and nearly stopped when she heard the door open. In the silhouette of the doorway she saw a beast that looked like a werewolf. It was not human but not exactly a full animal. It stood up on its rear legs, but it looked like it would be just as comfortable on all fours. A long canine mouth had razor-sharp teeth, and its lips curled back in a snarl.
Lily gasped in alarm.
What the hell was she thinking when she left the relative safety of her secret compartment?
“I smell you. Come out, come out wherever you are,” its hoarse voice demanded.
Lily scrambled against the wall, and she saw the thing in the doorway smile as it saw her movements. Its muscles bunched before it pounced. It leapt across the room, and in a second had managed to come within inches of her but did not touch her.
She felt the creature’s hot breath on her skin, and a drop of saliva landed on her shoulder. She squeaked out in her alarm, and the creature laughed. It sounded almost…human.
“That’s enough, Ramsey. Take her back to the ship before we leave this rat’s nest.” Girvan was there in the doorway, and she was never so relieved to see him in her entire life.
The creature grabbed her by the arm and lifted her to her feet. “Come on you!”
Its furry paw cut into her arm, but she tried to keep her fear and pain to herself. If they hurt her, what would it matter if she couldn’t see her lovers again? “Where are Ryder and Saber?”
“It doesn’t matter. They will be dead in a few more minutes,” Girvan replied.
“No wait!” Her fear escalated to panic. “You can’t do this!”
“It’s already done.” Her captor stopped when she dug her feet into the ground, but then Girvan ordered the beast. “Restrain her.”
The beast shrugged and picked her up in his arms without any trouble at all.
Lily’s fists pounded on his back uselessly. She kicked and screamed, and it didn’t even seem to slow him down. Girvan just laughed.
“When Saber finds out you are trying to take off with me, he’s going to k
ill you, Girvan.” She swept her hair back out of her eyes.
“You think I care what your mates think?” He laughed.
“You’ll care when you are dead,” she warned.
Girvan continued his forward progress and ignored her. She bit her teeth into Ramsey’s ear, and her captor didn’t let go, but he did swat at her tush. She was about as irritating to him as a fly. “Stop that.”
A metal blade flew through the air and pierced the eye of Ramsey. He slumped to the floor, and she was elated when she heard the voice of her rescuer, Saber. “Dead men don’t care.”
She saw Saber and Ryder and ran to her rescuers. She felt the hot pursuit of the beast men, but then Girvan screamed out, “Let her go, you fools. They’ll all be dead in a few minutes.”
The beasts scrambled back to pick up their fallen men and followed Girvan and the others.
They headed down the hallway toward the airlock and back to their ship. Now that they had Girvan, they had won.
She didn’t stop running until she was safely in Ryder’s arms. He hugged her close to him, but he kept the other arm firmly on his weapon. He watched the space pirates retreat, but he wasn’t happy from the look on his face.
She was elated to be in his arms again after she thought she may never see him again. She didn’t understand why he would be anything but happy, but then she raised her hands to touch his face and they were covered in blood. His blood. “You’re hurt!”
He briefly looked at the wound on his thighs, and then his eyes met hers in amusement. “Yes, but I’ll be all right.”
“We have to get you somewhere we can clean this up and bandage your wounds.” She was concerned how he would blow off such a deep wound. The gash looked like it was two inches deep.
“There’s no time. We have to get to an escape pod. They plan to blow up the ship as soon as he gets back to his own.” Ryder grimaced before lowering his double bladed sword.
“I’ll get a backup of E.V.E. and meet you there.” Saber patted his brother on the back and made his way to the brig.
“Let’s go, Lily.” Ryder put his arm around her shoulders, and they walked toward their joint bedroom. They passed the door, and she noticed his efforts to maintain a walk were not as smooth as they could be. If he had any nerve endings at all, his wound caused him pain even if he didn’t show it. She only noticed his slight limp because she watched him closely from the side. The second door to the left had a red warning label on it, and she had never gone in there before. He paused long enough to open the door and got in the fairly small space.
He saw the blank expression on her face and answered her unspoken question. “There are no luxuries or frills on the escape pod. They are only meant for survival situations.”
“What is that?” Lily pointed to a lifeless shell that looked like a person hunched over the seat.
“That’s E.V.E.’s mainframe. She uses it when we are on our planet.”
“So she can walk around? Like a real person. That’s crazy.”
“It’s convenient. The cyborg shell works to protect her computerized brain from the natural disturbances on my planet. If she stayed, she wouldn’t be functioning as easily.”
Lily stepped inside the small pod but continued staring at E.V.E.’s body. Nothing moved, but the person looked as if it could come to life at any second with soft, blue, realistic skin looked and dark-blue hair that curtained her face. Lily shuddered. “It’s freaky and makes me feel like I am next to a dead person.”
“She will be fully functioning once Saber uploads her program to the cyborg.”
“This ship is so tiny. Will we be able to make it home with this? Do we have enough fuel?”
He smiled at her briefly before slipping into the cockpit of the ship. “Absolutely. It’s only a day’s journey from here. We have everything we need, just not a whole lot of space. It just won’t be very comfortable.”
She slipped into the seat beside him and buckled up her harness.
A window revealed the deep black of space, and several nearby planets were large and obviously close by.
Saber came running to the ship, and the doors swung shut behind him. He had a small, silver box in his hands, and he inserted it into the back of the cyborg. He took the remaining seat, and the engine turned on with a low hum. “It will just take her a few minutes to download into her new body.”
“I don’t care what you say. A robot walking around in a real body is freaky.”
“Technology is always advancing no matter what planet you live on. You’ll get used to it in time, sweet Lily,” Ryder said.
She frowned, knowing arguing was pointless, but she didn’t believe she would ever get used to artificial life-forms.
“Let’s get the hell out of here.” Saber locked his harness and sat back in his seat.
Ryder flipped the switch, and the escape pod launched from the larger vessel. He flipped some switches and turned on the afterburners, sending them hurtling from the two larger ships and their captors. “You don’t have to tell me twice.”
“Won’t the pirates come after us?” Lily asked in a soft voice.
“I think we’ll have time to get away. They set a bomb on the ship which means they have to get off and out just as quickly or they risk getting blown up, too. I doubt they will bother to come after us.”
“Booting up E.V.E. in safe mode now,” Saber replied from the copilot’s seat. He had all his attention on the clone’s body. “She’ll help us navigate home safely.”
They rocketed toward the second closest planet. The land on the planet was a deep red and the water was a navy blue that Lily recognized as Cimera. It was Saber and Ryder’s home planet.
“As if we need the help at this point.” Ryder huffed.
“Don’t kid yourselves, warriors. Your mother would kill you if you managed to lose me and the ship,” E.V.E.’s voice dripped sarcasm.
“I’ve never been happier to hear your voice, E.V.E. I am so happy you made it on board.” Lily sighed.
A massive explosion made everyone’s head turn in the cabin to witness the ship they had just left being blown to bits.
“Damn pirates.” Ryder rolled his eyes and sighed. “That was an expensive trip.”
“Mom may still kill us yet,” Saber added with a grin.
“No she won’t, brother.”
“Why not?” Lily asked, blinking away the shock. She had been on that ship only a few minutes ago. If she was still there, she’d be dead. She was happy to be alive, and yet she didn’t know why they weren’t more upset. The ship had to be an expensive loss.
“We found our soul mate,” Ryder answered.
“She would love you as she loves us.” Saber rested his hand over her stomach. “She’ll be happy because she knows you are carrying her first grandchild.”
Chapter Nine:
Far From Home
When Ryder had told her the escape pod had no frills, he wasn’t kidding.
The bumpy landing left Lily’s nerves shot. She held onto the safety grips for all she was worth as the little pod flipped and bounced over the alien terrain before finally skidded to a stop nose deep in soft, red dirt.
“Everybody okay?” Saber was the first to break the silence.
Lily unfastened her fingers from the arms of her chair and tried to steady her breathing. Her body shook as badly as her voice. “I can’t believe we didn’t die.”
“The crash bags inflated and insulated us during the landing. We’ve been through a lot worse than that.” Ryder chuckled before unbuckling his harness. “We’re safely on the ground now.”
“I don’t think I could handle anything more.” Lily shivered. The hatch opened, and natural sunlight poured into the ship. Lily put her arms up over her eyes to protect them from the bright sun but squinted her eyes to see.
Saber was out the hatch first. She climbed behind him and stood in the doorframe. He reached up to put his arms around her waist. He easily lifted her to the rocky ground.
Ryder said, “It’s okay, E.V.E. We’ll get you all fixed up and rebooted as soon as we get you home.”
The entire ship powered down and went dark inside. E.V.E. followed their progression slowly.
“Nobody’s forgetting you, E.V.E.,” Saber said softly.
Saber swept Lily up in a powerful, knee-knocking kiss that curled her toes and left her insides swirling with emotion. She melted against him as the waves of desire took over her natural reaction. “Don’t ever disobey me again, Lily. When I tell you to stay put, you stay put. I hate to think about what nearly happened up there. That we nearly lost you…I just can’t stop kicking myself.”
Lily’s foggy mind cleared. After a few moments she realized he was talking about the fight they just escaped with their lives.
“Don’t chastise the girl too much. She’ll be safer on our home planet than anywhere else,” Ryder said gruffly.
As soon as Saber was done, Ryder tore her from his arms and kissed her again. She felt breathless, dizzy with the feelings they left her with. The kiss was a celebration and a promise of their future together. The passion he unfurled inside of her stretching like a hungry lion.
She felt elated and bubbling over with happiness to be there together held safely in their arms.
She squinted when she saw something really large coming from the mountains. It was large enough to be an airplane, but it appeared to be living with large, flapping wings. It could have been a bird, but Lily had never seen any bird that large before. Lily pointed and stared at the sky. Two more followed closely behind the first forming a V shape in the air. “What is that?”
Saber smiled. “It’s a blue dragon squad. My father must be coming to welcome us home and meet our mate.”
