CHAPTER TEN
For an instant the massive beast seemed to hang in midair, face to face with Arek, who was small and slender against its bulk. Then the mouth with all the horrid teeth snapped on the bloom he held. Arek dropped with the power of the strike, the vine stretching in his grasp, and Mia screamed his name.
"Arek! No—hang on, hang on!"
Then, jack-knifing his powerful legs, Arek kicked out, using the creature's head for leverage. At the same time he jacknifed, leaning to grasp the ball-and-chain hanging from the creature's ear.
As if he had made it happen, the 'mouse' dropped, crashing out of sight, scraping and thudding against the canyon wall as it fell. Its passage echoed the thunder coming from the storm overhead.
Arek swung far out over the canyon, and just when Mia was about to give up hope, he twirled around and came swinging back. He landed on the ground, and dropped to his knees, head down, shoulders heaving with his panting breaths. The ball fell with a jangle to the earth beside him, the silver spangled with raindrops.
Mia slipped to the ground beside him, her eyes filling with tears, sharp and bitter with guilt, and threw her arms around his neck. "Oh, goddess. You're alive. You made it."
He lifted his head and nodded. "I made it."
"I'm sorry," she told him. "I—"
He held up a hand, palm out. "Save it. We need to get back to the ship."
Mia blinked her tears away, and sniffled. "But we—I mean, you killed it. We've finished the challenge."
Her partner lifted his head and tilted it to look at her, still panting. His face was streaked with sweat and a string of slimy sap, his eyes still full of the fury of battle. "You think that was the only creature out there? Think again. Gotta be more of those, not to mention whatever it usually feeds on. It didn't grow those teeth to live on plants. These blooms are just an appetizer."
Mia shot to her feet, and reached down to offer him a hand up. He ignored it, pushing to his feet, already moving. "Let's go."
At that moment, the storm broke, and rain began to pelt down in earnest. Squinting into the warm deluge, Mia followed Arek back through the clearing, and the jungle. And although she slipped several times falling once, and her side ached with her panting breaths, she gritted her teeth and kept up with him.
She staggered up the gangplank after him, and collapsed against the bulkhead, her breaths sobbing in and out. They'd made it back onto the ship alive. But at the price of her self-respect. She'd been nothing but a useless bystander in this challenge.
"Welcome back, Team Starry Night!" Deuce crowed, his voice accompanied by a startling burst of loud, incredibly peppy music. "You have completed your first challenge and won all the points possible!"
"A wave to our audience, Team Starry Night!" the AI encouraged, spybots zinging close to Mia and Arek.
The music played on as Arek gave a haphazard salute, then wiped off his hands with a wet-wipe, and tossed the small pac to Mia. She caught it, and fumbled a wipe out as he took the controls and powered up the ship. Fighting not to pout as the spybots zoomed in on her, Mia managed to stretch her lips in a smile and waggled her fingers for the cameras.
"Take your seat," Arek ordered. "We're getting off-planet while we can."
Relieved to get away from the spycams, Mia sat. Arek powered up the ship, and they lifted off.
Above the cloud cover of the planet, they found themselves facing a phalanx of yellow and black fighters. Squat, ugly craft, they resembled stinging insects, especially with weapons trained on the Starry Night.
Mia wanted to mrrowl in despair. "Steady," Arek said. "They're just making sure we leave."
"How can you tell?"
"They're not firing those massive weapons at us. Deuce?"
"Yes, Captain?"
"We are clear to leave, right?"
"Yes, Captain. As you deduced, the Yestrian warriors are merely here to escort you out of their airspace."
"Great. Initiating take-off sequence now."
Mia worked silently, bringing up the coordinates for a safe takeoff through the single moon and a narrow asteroid belt.
"Where are we headed next, Deuce?" Arek asked.
"Team Starry Night, set your coordinates for another action-packed visit... this one to planet Altaria!" The AI gave the coordinates, and Mia fed them in to the nav system.
"Course set," she reported. "Twenty galactic standard hours from here at full speed."
"Very well. We'll ask for challenge details in a bit."
Mia nodded. When they were out in space again, she smacked the release on her safety restraints and pushed herself from her seat, feeling like an old woman.
"Don't you want to hear the points we gained?" he asked.
"No," she said quietly. "They're yours. You earned them, not me."
All she wanted was to wash away the stench of the last few hours, and then curl in a ball and forget.
The shower-dry was warm, fragrant with the scent of her favorite body wash. But it was also salty with tears that dripped down Mia's cheeks as she washed the sweat and remnants of the horrid blooms. She felt both exhausted and jittery, her shoulders heavy with an invisible burden.
What was she doing here?
She wished that she was home in her bright, airy apartment on her parents' property in the suburbs of Lyonsgate City. That she'd never heard of the Race, and that she'd never believed that she was fit to enter such a contest.
By the time her hair and skin were dry, her tears had dried as well. But in the holomirror, her eyes were puffy and tinged with pink. She finger-combed her layers of hair forward so a heavy bang partially shielded her eyes, and opened the cryo-cleanser to take out her undies and GSR flight-suit.
She dressed, then dropped the borrowed gaaulites into the cleaning unit, shuddering at the lingering stench on them. Then she washed her hands again. If only she could scrub away the memories of the last few hours the same way.
It was easy to avoid the other occupant of a small cruiser when he disappeared into the lav immediately after she came out.
But when he came back into the cabin, there was nowhere to go.
He joined her in the galley, exuding the fresh odor of a clean, healthy male in his prime. He wore his flightsuit pants, but only a short-sleeved tee over them. It was the color of golden cured grains, and brought out the red highlights in his damp hair. Which waved back from his forehead in a way that emphasized the clean, strong lines of his face, and the masculine beauty of his eyes.
After one look, Mia returned to studying the contents of her bottle of berry cider.
Arek took a long drink of his ale, set his bottle down and sat silently for a long moment before speaking. "We survived an encounter with a deadly wild beast on a strange planet, with minimal weapons and no intel," he said. "Other than being angry as all hells at the idiots who set us up for death by trampling, I think we have reason to celebrate."
"You have reason," she said, moving her bottle in a tight circle on the table. "I was no help at all." He'd been right about her—she was a liability. He should ask for another partner.
"Hey, hey," he said. "Mia, you act as if you failed. You did everything I asked—and more importantly, you stayed alive."
She looked up, shocked by his acceptance of her behavior. "But you had to stop the beast, all on your own! That's not teamwork."
His gaze holding hers, he shook his head. "Listen—I've been through battles of many kinds, against all kinds of enemies. When I set out with my platoon, I have a plan. But things never go quite according to that plan. We still have to think on the fly. At times, it works out perfectly, but sometimes the whole plan goes to skrog shit. You think I've reacted well every time?" He snorted. "Hells, no. And I've learned not to expect it of myself, or of my warriors. So why a civilian like yourself would expect that of yourself, I don't get."
"But... I'm Tygean."
He smirked. "Which means you're supposed to be good at everything?"
She flushed. Okay, maybe that had sounded a tiny bit arrogant. "I suppose so. Also, I've spent my life trying to live up to my older brother."
"Yeah? Who's he?"
"Commander Tryon Jag, of Jag Navigations. He's quite famous in our part of the galaxy." When Arek shook his head, she went on. "LodeStar Corporation? The space cruise ship Orion?"
"LodeStar I've heard of," Arek said. "So your brother's a big deal, huh? Is that why you're in the Race, to show you're just as tough?"
"Partly," she admitted. "But mostly I just wanted to do something—to have an adventure all my own. And I thought, after learning all I could about the Race, that this would be my chance. Travel, have fun, play an outrageous game, make new friends..."
Their gazes met, and he nodded. "Didn't count on Octiron being willing to toss you under the tatt to keep their audience glued to the holovid, hmm?"
She shuddered, and took another drink of cider. "No. Goddess, I've never—never been so terrified in my whole life as I was facing that beast. And then you nearly fell... and I couldn't help you."
His brows lowered, and he gave her a look. "'Nearly fell'? Princess, at no time was I in danger of falling. I had a solid grip on that vine. And you saw me kick off the beast's head, and jump back onto the ledge." He shook his head. "'Nearly fell', my Gorglon granny."
Mia concentrated on the level of cider in her bottle, smiling despite herself. "Okay. Got it. You were in control at all times."
He nodded, and drained his ale, then crushed the bottle in his fist. "Right. And don't forget it... kitten."
"What did you just call me?" she slammed her own bottle down on the table, ignoring the drops of sweet cider that splashed over her hand. She glared across the table at the Aurelian, who regarded her with a bland look on his hard, handsome face, his green eyes narrowed.
Waiting for her to lose her temper again, so he could lord it over her again. She guessed their moment of empathy was over.
She shot out of her seat. "I have better things to do than argue with you... Commander Earknocky."
With a toss of her hair, she turned on her heel and marched away. Okay, it was only five steps to the cockpit and the nav station, but walking away from him was quite satisfying.
Until he followed her and dropped into the captain's chair. Arms akimbo, he clasped his hands behind his head and stretched his long legs over into her space. "Good choice of activities, kitten. Give me our coordinates, hmm?"
"Get them yourself, oh great warrior." But she wanted to know where they were too. Because there was something... something nudging at her awareness, like someone bumping her through the distance. Her nostrils twitched, her eyes narrowing.
She brought up the nav vid and examined the path ahead. And there they were.
"What is that?" he asked, pointing at a rough line of small objects ahead of them.
Mia's heart gave a hard thump. "That's an asteroid belt."
He sat up straight. "Can we go around it?"
With a few lightning moves, she examined their path and trajectory. "No," she said. "We can't. It's too big, and we're too close. We must go through the middle."
* * *
"... did," the AI answered, his voice so faint they could hardly hear it. "You didn't respond."
"Merde," Mia mumbled, already reaching for the second set of controls. She was shaking, adrenaline flooding her veins. "His volume has fluctuated again. Arek, give me the controls. I'll have to take us through this on manual."
He already had his hands on his joystick. "You? I'm the experienced pilot."
She nearly drew back, deferring to him. Instead, she took a breath and nodded, setting her jaw. "Yes, me. Can you feel them?"
"Feel what?" he demanded.
"Can you feel the asteroids out there? Because I can. And thus, I can take us through them." At least, she was fairly certain she could. If she was wrong... they were space rubble.
"This is what your brother does," Arek said. His gaze flicked to the holovid of the asteroid belt, which was rapidly growing larger, and back to examine her face. Then he nodded abruptly, and took his hand from the joystick. "Very well. You have the controls."
Her heart stopped and then raced ahead. For a moment she froze, gazing unseeingly ahead at space outside, and the glimmer of dark shapes floating ahead in the blackness of space. What if she was wrong, what if she couldn't do this? What if she killed them both?
"You have the controls," Arek repeated, his voice sharp.
Mia straightened in her seat as if he'd prodded her. She nodded crisply. "Yes. I have the controls. I have this."
And she did, she discovered. They shot toward the outer rim of the belt, a huge asteroid looming in their path. It was silvery, with edges sharp as razors that glittered in the light of a nearby moon. It poked at her consciousness, a nearly painful press against her Tyger senses, warning her to stay away, or the cruiser and she and Arek would be torn to bits on its wicked spines.
Fear flooding her, Mia jerked the joystick, and the cruiser veered widely, nearly striking another chunk of sharp rock. Her senses were screaming at her to turn and flee. But she couldn't, it was too late.
And this time, Arek was depending on her to get them through this. They weren't facing a rampaging beast that he could outwit and outrun. They faced space itself, just as merciless in its silence.
But space was facing a Tygress—and this was what her people did best, better than even the most powerful, feared warrior in their galaxy, like Arek. She had this.
She loosened her grip on the joystick, and nudged it the other way. Just... enough, yes, there.
Mia dove the cruiser through the gap between the two chunks of asteroid, then under another, took them up over a small chunk, and found herself facing the biggest obstacle of all.
Two chunks floated together, a huge barrier to space beyond. They must have been the hard, molten core of the former star, for they were huge, and no time to go around, over or under.
The only way ahead was through. Which is where Mia took them. Sliding to one side, over a razor-sharp spine, then dropping and shooting through a narrow gap, into a tunnel no less suffocatingly tight because it was open above and below. She ducked them to the left to avoid one last spine, and they were through, sailing out into open space.
Slowly, she let go of the joystick, and then flopped back in her seat, her eyes closing. She was panting, she realized, as if she'd been running hard again. Merde, she was going to need another showerdry.
"I don't know whether to kiss you, or smack your ass for nearly killing us," her partner said, his deep voice a husky growl of sound. "Fuck. Me. That was intense as flying under enemy fire."
Her eyes jerked open. "You try smacking any part of me, Earknocky, and I'll claw your face. Then we'll see how handsome you are."
His eyes narrowed. Slowly, holding her gaze, he tapped the button to open his restraints. Then he rose, took one step and bent over her. His big hands on the arms of her seat, he leaned close. His eyes glittered in his hard face.
Mia looked up at Arek, her senses still flooded with relief, and something else... excitement at his nearness. She couldn't help the urge to sniff him, draw in his scent, and savor his warmth. He was like a heat unit, giving off enough heat to warm the surrounding area. Of course he'd just completed a daring physical challenge, then run back to the ship. She was feeling quite flushed, herself.
Which had nothing to do with him looming over her, as if deciding whether to take a bite. More likely wanting to reprimand her again. She frowned at him. "What?"
He surveyed her for another moment, then slowly shook his head. "It will wait."
Straightening, he moved away, leaving Mia staring after him. No, she wasn't disappointed. He was just annoying, that was all. Riling her up and then just ignoring her.
With a toss of her head, she turned her attention back to the nav com. Space ahead was clear for a long way. Not a meteor shower, black hole or dead star to be found. Good, that was good. She'd focus on their current good fortune, then. And not on how they'd both nearly died twice today.
Because she may have pretended that piloting them through that asteroid belt had been easy because of her race—but the truth was, she'd also been very lucky. And she might not want to admit that to Arek, but only an absolute fool refused to admit the truth to oneself. And she hoped she wasn't an absolute fool... she was certainly some kind of fool.
She'd thought this race would be a light-hearted adventure, not the life-and-death contest it truly was. Right now, if she could go home—even to face the censure of her parents and brother—she'd do it
Except... she took a look around her. Taking in the nav com that she had worked hard to learn the skills to operate. Taking in the sleek cockpit, and the cabin behind her. Taking in the tall, irritating but handsome, and extremely skilled warrior who was her partner, who now crouched across the cabin, doing something with their body armor. And remembering that she and he had made it through the first, and surely the most dangerous of the three race challenges. That she'd now done something, experienced something that no one she knew had. Not her friends, her parents, or even her older brother, with all his experience in space travel.
A tiny smile curved up her lips. She sat up straighter in the nav chair, and straightened her shoulders.
"Deuce," she said. "What points did we receive for completing the first challenge?"
Arek did not look up from his task, but she saw a smile curve up the near side of his lean face. With a toss of her hair, Mia focused on the view of space outside their craft. Two could play at ignoring.
"Team Starry Night," Deuce announced, "Having accomplished Task One, without injury to yourselves or to your craft, you have achieved all points possible for the challenge."