Chapter Seven

“It’s Corso,” Enzo informed him, Declyn gave a small motion telling him to put him through. Corso appeared on the screen his eyes marking him as Thalian even though his build didn’t quite match the others in his battalion.

“Corso, I see you have recovered from our last battle. I do like seeing you well and whole.”

“Declyn, your nothing but Kur’ik scum.”

Declyn growled showing his extending fangs.

“I always wonder to myself why you and I can’t have a civil conversation, then I remember you’re begging me to kill you. Speak fast, or I may grant your wish today.”

“There will come a day when you and I will meet—.”

“I find myself growing bored. Skip the spiel about my entrails decorating your neck and get to the point.”

“You are in violation of Kur’ik Minor’s laws. They have called us to exterminate you like the vermin you are. This is your one warning, surrender and we will do this peacefully and by the book. If you choose not to surrender, then we get to have some fun.”

Declyn stood slowly stretching every muscle as if he weren’t being watched by the alpha of the Thalians. Taking his time he walked to the screen.

“There are times I believe you are hard of hearing and I want you to hear every word. We will not surrender, we will not allow you to have Kur’ik Minor even though their new rules are ridiculous. I will clue you in to what’s happening since I’m that kind of created. Whoever sent those messages to you is not Thalian, and they are not Kur’ik. Someone is playing with both of us. Our best bet may be to ignore them.”

He deliberately turned his back to show just how much he didn’t care which option Corso took and moved back to his chair with a casual elegant grace. There was a chance that he and his people along with the Thalians would die within a planet rotation. He wouldn’t run from that it’s what they were created to do, but he would not casually risk the lives of his battalion, his people because Corso wanted glory.

He turned to flash both fang and blazing eyes before he gave Enzo a small motion to cut trans.

“He wants a fight, and glory, I can see it in his eyes.”

“I agree, I have never seen a Thalian as willing to die as this one. Find out where we are with the transfer of our people.”

“Cole?” Enzo turned on the all com. “Report.”

“Half of the females are back on the ship. The males are waiting to make sure the females are all safely aboard before they transfer.”

“Caden and Xander, did we finish the ship-wide inspection?”

“There are two sections that are still being looked at. One is life support.”

“The other is the ships secondary engine drive.” Xander turned and pulled the schematics. “This will take the longest to verify. It will not be done before we leave the planets orbit.”

“Do what you can.”

“Declyn, what are we missing?” Xander asked.

“Someone is holding him back, but I don’t think he realizes it. We’ve been at war too long for me not to know how he operates. Work on the last two systems I want to leave orbit as soon as all of our crew is on board.” He left the command deck looking for a few minutes of solitude.

*~*~*~*

“Kels you're next.”

“I won’t go without you.”

“Yes, you will.”

They were standing inside a transfer station. Kels was right when she said being transferred to a field beat this any day. The station was devoid of personnel or even travelers going and coming from different worlds.

The inside of the station was done in a flat black, there was no personality or color. That was how all the workspaces were for those who worked this planet. For a minute, she entertained the thought that maybe the world should be destroyed as a wake-up call to the rest of the solar system of what happened when you didn’t treat your employees right.

Immediately the need to turn herself in for cleansing a fancy name for death rode her, but she ignored it. Maybe she was rogue after all, but she was tired of watching her friends die for a war that didn’t matter.

She had taken over working the transfer controls to speed up the transfer of personnel back to the ship.

“I know you're worried.” Amira gave her a small smile.

Of course, she was worried. It had been planet orbits, but her friendship with Amira was all that got her through some days. Being the last of your batch and being labeled defective was something that stuck with you even when all the others finally warmed up and accepted you for who you were.

“If you die I will come after you and pull you out of whatever afterlife you’re in so that I can have the pleasure of killing you myself.”

“I would expect nothing less. I’ll see you on the other side.” She worked the controls and watched Kels disappear along with the other females.

“She’s right you know. You should be on the ship where you will be safe.”

“Not you too. Were you not in the same room with me when I transferred the intel I found?”

“I was there, that doesn’t stop me from wanting you to be safe.”

“I don’t think any of us will be safe. Someone wants us dead.”

“I agree, and if we live, we will have much to answer for.” He pulled her close and wrapped her in his arms before he claimed her lips in a kiss in front of the males who were staring at them.

“Declyn will have no other choice but to kill you.”

“You’re assuming we will live long enough for that to happen.”

That kiss had sealed their fate, one way or the other there would be no going back, and she knew it. She should grieve for the life she may be giving up, but it wasn’t a life.

They fought, they slept, and if they were lucky, they were given food to eat and then they did it again. Her life started when she realized she wanted more than the world around her said she could have. When she looked into Lazzar’s eyes and realized she was more than the sum of her parts. She was more than a killer. When he touched her making her realize she was a female with forbidden emotions and dreams.

She would keep her dreams to herself, there was already enough to have her put to death, but she would hold tight to them. It might be impossible, but right now that was all she had to put her faith into, the impossible.

“Next group take the dais.” His voice was hard. He knew that some of his crew were still too new to understand the desire to want more. They didn’t understand what it felt like to lie alone rotation after rotation, orbit after orbit with nothing but the thought of Thalian blood splashed across your skin to warm you up. They had yet to understand the feeling of watching a friend die and knowing that the only person who would mourn his passing was yourself and you didn’t have time for that because staying alive took your every thought, your every breath.

One day they would want to breathe, to come to a place where the person who greeted them was the one they would fall on their knife for if she was no longer there. They didn’t understand how they would kill faster and better because they had something worth killing for. There was more to life than fighting someone else’s war, but it would take more planet orbits than he might have left to explain it to them.

“Transferring.” Her voice rang out, and he took comfort in the sound of it. He wrapped it around himself like a blanket that he could take with him if Declyn or the controllers chose to put him down. If they didn’t make it out of the planets orbit, he wanted to take every memory of her into the darkness that would call to him.

Amira, to be so cold and then to be graced by the warmth that was her. That was what life was about not the endless fighting to entertain people he would never see with his eyes.

“Transferring.” He watched as the next group of males disappeared.

“You should go in the next group.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Someone will tell our alpha, but if you're already on the ship, I don’t think he’ll have the time to send you back to the planet.”

“What will I do on the ship? Wait in the transfer room to see if you make it? And if you don’t, what then?

“Lazzar.” Her throat moved with the emotions she was trying to hide within her body. All that mattered was that he was safe. She would accept any fate if she knew he would be alive tomorrow.

He placed his hand on top of hers. “Transferring.” His deep voice rang out offering her comfort that could only come from him.

“I won’t live without you. Isn’t this where we first started this conversation?”

She nodded her eyes bright with emotion.

“Two more groups and then we will know if the ship will still accept us on board.”

“Two more groups.” They worked the controls together until they were the only two standing in the transfer station.

Nothing but silence greeted them, and he held her. Whatever happened they would be together.”

“What are you two doing? Get on the dais we don’t have all rotation, leave is officially over.”

“Cole?”

“This is what happens when males and females get together on leave they officially lose their minds. I’m waiting.”

He took Amira’s hand. She was too busy laughing to move. He pulled her to the dais.”

“Transferring.” Cole’s voice rang out strong before the world around them disappeared.