Miners of Djaromir: Matrix

by Leora Gonzales

  It was either that or go crazy worrying about Lucy. A worry that continued to grow no matter how much she tried to ignore it. Lucy’s rolled ankle wasn’t worrying her either. The healers who looked to her upon arrival through the final gates had assured them it was a simple sprain. Lucy might be a bit sore, but she’d be putting weight on it in no time—if the annoying Djaromir didn’t insist on carrying her for the rest of the time they were here.

  That was what she was worried about. Rue frowned at the puzzle she was still working on in her head. She still hadn’t been able to figure out what was going on between Lucy and the warlord and it drove her insane. She’d watched them like a hawk the entire time he’d carried Lucy. Not complaining or acting inconvenienced once as they’d walked the long distance to the city. He’d simply held Lucy gently, every now and then adjusting her slightly in his hold.

  They hadn’t talked to each other—or her, for that matter—the entire time. They’d just looked at each other every now and then with googly eyes that made Rue want to upchuck.

  The entire situation made her feel like a third wheel, and that was something she did not like—at all. She’d never felt like that before. Not even when she’d been the actual third wheel, tagging along on a couple of dates that Lucy had with past boyfriends. It hadn’t happened often, but it had happened enough for Rue to no longer be uncomfortable about it.

  On those occasions, Rue hadn’t been completely ignored like today as she’d followed along like a lost puppy. Colby tried to distract her, asking her questions while she’d continued to shoot glares at the pair lost in their own weird little bubble.

  She’d been tempted to tap Lucy on the shoulder and remind her that they weren’t planning on staying, but, since she hadn’t clued her friend in on that part of their plans yet, that wasn’t an option.

  Instead, she made sure to point out how primitive the things were around them when compared to the grandeur of the Phaeton ship that they’d enjoyed on their two-week voyage to Djaromir. Rue knew she could count on Lucy’s squeamishness at “roughing it” to work in her favor. Between them, Rue was the one who didn’t mind forgoing some modern conveniences—and from the look of literally everything around them, this place was far from advanced.

  The glaring difference between the two alien races had become extremely apparent as they’d finally reached the city gate where healers had prepared for their arrival. Unlike the instant treatment the Phaeton’s had given Rue on Phaeton One, Lucy was told her ankle needed to rest and wait to fully heal. Fyeir might be hella pretty, but it was far from the poshness of Phaeton One.

  Once finished with the healers at the entrance of the city, their hosts escorted the volunteers to their rooms to rest. First, she’d gone with Lucy, finding it the ideal time to probe into her friend’s weird behavior around Sparx. Rue nixed the idea, seeing that Lucy looked like she needed the break. Her mayhem-making friend looked beyond exhausted, which meant the interrogation would have to wait, no matter how much she needed the debriefing.

  That had to have been at least two hours ago. She was tired of waiting.

  Letting out a huff, she rolled onto her side and stared at the closed door. Wondering if Lucy was up from her nap yet, she looked at her wrist only to see the Phaeton band instead of her smart watch.

  “You’re not in Kansas anymore,” she mumbled, before about jumping out of her skin when a loud knock sounded on the door.

  “Who is it?” she called out once her heart had crawled down from her throat.

  “Colby,” the voice announced. “May I enter?”

  Rue pushed herself to her feet, figuring she probably should not be sprawled on the floor like a weirdo when he came in.

  No matter how comfortable that damn fur rug was.

  “Come on in,” she called out.

  Rue pushed a few of the pillows over on the couch to make room for her to sit to slip on the boots she’d been given. They weren’t her favorite combat boots, but they formed to fit her feet perfectly and kept her toes super toasty. She wasn’t about to complain. Considering how much time had passed, Rue figured it was most likely time for them to get escorted to the formal welcome the Djaromir had prepared for the volunteers once they’d been given time to refresh.

  “Ms. Salazar,” he greeted with a nod, walking into her small furnished suite.

  “Didn’t I already explain how weird it made me feel when you called me that?” she asked before giving in to an involuntary shiver. “It reminds me of my mean Aunt Marisol, may she rest in peace—most likely in Hell.” The last bit was said under her breath.

  “What was that?” Colby asked, a curious look on his face.

  “Nothing,” she answered with a shake of her head, figuring now was not the time to unload stories of her crazy aunt on the poor unsuspecting alien.

  She didn’t want to scare him off women or anything.

  Hiking a thumb over her shoulder, she gestured vaguely in the direction of the bathroom she’d scoped out earlier. “I just need to use the restroom really quick, and then we can go next door for Lucy. If she isn’t up already, I should wake her anyways. She always feels like poop when her nap runs too late in the day.”

  “About that,” Colby interrupted before clearing his throat. “The plans have changed slightly. I will be taking you to the dining halls alone. Lucy will not be coming with us.”

  Rue froze in her tracks where she’d started to turn away.

  “What do you mean? What’s going on?” she sputtered, immediately drawing the worst conclusions possible with the little information she had. “She wasn’t feeling good earlier, but she was just tired, right? Your healer guys said everything was fine after they checked her over.” Rue rubbed her forehead and began talking to herself. “I knew this was a bad idea—”

  “I apologize,” Colby said, capturing her attention. He gestured to the couch she’d been sitting on moments before. “Please sit. I did not mean to alarm you. Although Lucy will not be able to attend the formal introduction, it is no longer necessary in her case. She will, however, be indisposed for a short time before rejoining the group.”

  “But—”

  “Do not worry though,” he continued without letting her get in a word edgewise. “Warlord Sparx has things well under control.”

  “What the hell are you babbling about?” Rue plopped down onto the couch she’d been herded back onto. She was completely confused. “What do you mean Sparx has things under control? What does he have to do with anything?”

  “He’s with Lucy now,” Colby answered, reaching out to grab her arm when she shot off the couch to move past him. “You cannot see her. At least, not yet.”

  “But—why? If she’s sick or hurt then she needs me,” Rue insisted, her heart rate rising the longer she was corralled by Colby.

  She knew Lucy hadn’t been feeling like her normal self, but she didn’t realize she was sick, sick. The thought that her friend needed her, and she’d been next door this entire time, made her feel awful.

  “Will she be okay?” she asked, her stomach in her throat at the thought of the woman she considered her platonic life partner not being okay.

  “Well…” Colby’s expression faltered, ratcheting up her worry even more.

  “Well what?” she asked, sitting on the edge of her seat as her brain came up with the craziest answers possible. What if Lucy had some new alien-human hybrid space disease and was now patient zero? “How bad is it? She’s not growing anything weird, right?” she asked, a mental image of the gross creature from The Thing filling her head. “There aren’t…tentacles are there? I mean, I’d still love her because she’s my best friend and all, but tentacles freak me out.”

  “Huh?” Colby drew back at her question, his eyes wide. “What does that even mean? I—I—growing anything weird? What would even cause that to—” He looked up at the ceiling. “I told him I didn’t want to be the one to tell you, but he insisted.”

  “Colby,” Rue interrupted, her to
ne creepily calm, considering the chaos she was containing inside. “I have no idea what’s going on, and I’m about to freak the fuck out.” She paused to take a deep breath in before letting it out slowly. “If you don’t want that to happen, I suggest you tell me what the hell is happening, and you do it quickly.”

  Colby opened his mouth as if he were about to spill the beans before snapping it closed again.

  “Just tell me if she’s okay or not,” she asked, her fingers digging anxiously into the throw pillow next to her. With the way Lucy had been acting, plus how accident-prone she was all on her own—well, it made Rue more than just a bit anxious. “What’s going on? Why can’t I see her? Why is your warlord with her?”

  The questions were rapid fire, shooting out of her mouth as her heart pounded in her chest with the possible answers—most of them worst-case scenario.

  “Please tell me,” she practically begged. “I’ve watched out for her since we were kids. We’ve been friends so long, we’re more like sisters than anything, and I just need to know that she’s okay.”

  Colby let out a gust of air but stayed silent for a moment before giving her a nod.

  “Lucy is fine—or at least she will be. The reason she will be missing the formal introduction is because, for her, it is no longer necessary. As we speak, she’s in the throes of her first mating heat.”

  “Mating what?” she rasped, her chest hurting as if the air had been sucked from it suddenly. A ringing filled her ears as she tried to process what he said. Gulping in air, she shook her head. “No. That doesn’t make sense. None of this is real.”

  “None of what is real?” Colby asked, lowering to his haunches so he was eye level where she was sitting. “Rue? Can you explain what you meant?”

  Rue picked up the pillow next to her and hugged it hard to her chest, panic filling the cavity at the idea that she might have been wrong.

  “None of this is real,” she repeated, unable to consider the alternative. “It can’t be.”

  “I still don’t understand.”

  “You guys have tricked her or something,” she accused, pointing her finger at his nose. “Where is she? Is she still next door or have you moved her into your weird alien sex dungeon? That’s what we’re here for after all, right?””

  “Sex dungeon?” he sputtered. “I’m not sure—”

  “Lucy!” Rue yelled, her voice loud enough that the sound echoed in the room.

  “Please calm down—”

  “Don’t tell me to calm down!” Rue roared. Making a split decision, Rue swung her arm—and the pillow she’d been holding—with every ounce of strength in her body.

  Colby, completely unprepared for the pillow that was aimed directly at his face, only stayed upright for a second before he fell over.

  Hard.

  Before he ever made contact with the rug she’d been fondling earlier, Rue was up and on her feet. Racing for the door, it was only a matter of seconds before she’d barged into Lucy’s room at top speed and slid to a halt.

  Her heart practically stopped at what she saw.

  “Step away from the Goose!” she yelled, putting her arms up in the general ‘I know karate’ pose—which she was pretty sure only managed to emphasize the fact that she truly didn’t know karate at all.

  Rue just hoped the half-naked warlord in bed with her bestie didn’t call her bluff.

  Chapter Nine

  “I still don’t know about this,” Rue repeated for what seemed like the millionth time yet unable to stop the words from coming out.

  “And I still can’t believe you clobbered poor Colby,” Lucy shot back, her eyebrows raised as she tried to hide a smile.

  “With a pillow,” she said, emphasizing the word “pillow.” “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, if I had known that hitting him was going to get me this much flak, I would have done it harder. Gotten more bang for my buck.”

  “Oh stop,” Lucy snickered, bumping her shoulder into Rue’s where they sat in the dining hall. “C’mon now. Don’t give me that look.”

  “What look?” she asked, already knowing exactly what look she was being called on.

  “The kicked puppy dog look that you pull out whenever you try to talk me into changing my mind.” Lucy let out a sigh, shaking her head. “That’s not going to work this time.”

  “Sorry, I didn’t mean—” Rue covered her face with her hands, her elbows on the tabletop. “I just…this wasn’t what I had planned.”

  Lucy shrugged, her smile genuinely happy. Her eyes sparkled with a happiness that Rue usually only saw at Christmastime—or when they had volunteered to hand feed orphaned puppies at the humane society.

  “Well, maybe you should have let me in on your little plan,” Lucy teased before turning to look at Sparx where he was sitting just a little bit down the long wooden table. The space between the pair wasn’t much, but it was more than Rue had seen the past few days that the pair had been dealing with the Djaromir mating heat.

  “You would never have gone through with it,” Rue pointed out, knowing her friend was too honest to have followed through with the idea of signing up just for the money.

  “Yeah,” Lucy agreed with a nod. “In that case, I’m glad you didn’t tell me then. If we hadn’t signed up, I wouldn’t have Sparx.” She looked back at Sparx where he watched her, making googly eyes of his own and letting out an exaggerated sigh.

  Fighting the temptation to roll her eyes, Rue instead shot a dagger-like glare toward Sparx the moment Lucy looked away. When his eyes narrowed in return, Lucy turned around and eyed her suspiciously.

  “What?” she asked innocently as if she weren’t just a little pleased at tormenting her bestie’s new man. Despite her initially major reservations, Rue could see how much Sparx adored her Goose.

  It took a few days, but she was coming to terms with everything.

  Everything. The Djaromir mating heat was not only real, it had also snatched her best friend away from her. Lucy was so in love she could barely see straight and was now mated to the big guy in charge. Her future was here with him, something that Rue didn’t begrudge her, regardless of how heavy her heart felt at the idea of leaving her bestie. She couldn’t imagine never getting to hug her again, and it broke her heart even to think about it.

  “What are you thinking right now?” Lucy asked, breaking into Rue’s thoughts.

  “That I don’t want to go home without you,” Rue answered, unable to contain her biggest worry. “What am I going to do, Goose? I mean, we’ve been living together since we graduated. I know it sounds weird, but I never thought about a future where one of us got married and had to leave. I guess maybe I figured we would live in a compound or something...” Rue sniffed, blinking quickly to keep her eyes from spilling over. “I just kind of expected to always have you there.”

  “Same,” Lucy agreed with a determined nod. “Which is why we’re going to find you a hottie of your own.”

  “Gah!” Rue groaned, dropping her head back to stare up at the carved ceiling. “You keep saying that, but honestly, Goose…I’m worried. Can’t I just stay here and live like a spinster?”

  “Whining and hiding doesn’t fix our problems,” Lucy replied in a motherly tone before giving her a smack on the shoulder. “The volunteer agreement was very clear that anyone not mated after the trial period has to go back, and I don’t want to be a negative Nancy, but time’s ticking.”

  “I know,” she grumbled. “And I appreciate Sparx offering to figure out a way delay me being shipped back if I don’t find my own mate, but—”

  “You want to stay, right?” Lucy interrupted, her tone similar to the one she’d use to speak to a child.

  Slow, clear, and patient.

  “Yes.” Rue nodded, letting out a breath. She scanned the room, trying to get into the mindset needed to go manhunting but fell short, considering none of the men stood out in her opinion. She’d already met half of the miners of Fyeir and been disappointed. Despite the deadline, Rue wasn’t kee
n on crossing out the other half of her list of suitors just yet. She had a sinking feeling today was going to be no different than before. Her self-confidence wasn’t prepared for another round of disappointment. Each time she met a new male and nothing happened, it was a solid blow to her self-esteem. It sucked being one of the only unclaimed females left on a planet of males who were desperate enough to have potential brides shipped to them across the galaxy. The rejection, even if they had no control over it, stung with every meeting.

  “I’m just not feeling it, Goose. Everyone has been so…”

  “So what?”

  “Blah,” she answered with disappointment. “They’ve been nice and all, but they’re starting to look the same. No chemistry, no zing, nothing. And, I’m pretty sure the feeling is mutual, since none of them have thrown me over their shoulder and taken me back to their cave.”

  “This entire city is a cave,” Lucy said, rolling her eyes. “You’re seriously telling me that surrounded by gorgeous, buff miners…you can’t muster the energy to get excited about one of them?”

  “Don’t be pissy with me! I’m trying my hardest to mingle, but it’s like some of them are avoiding me. I think Colby told them what I did,” Rue said, keeping her voice down as her eyes glanced about for the man whom she felt reminded her of an annoying brother. “A few of them seemed scared of me. Do you think he’s told them I’m difficult or something?”

  Lucy snorted, obviously trying to suppress a laugh but failing miserably.

  “I’m sorry,” she giggled, covering her mouth. “I’m not laughing at you—”

  “You’re laughing with me,” Rue finished dryly. “I’m trying to be serious here, Goose. I think Colby has all of them scared or something. He’s clamjammed me, I just know it. None of them will talk to me, and when they do, they act like I’m the alien here.”

  “You are the alien here, Rue.” Lucy reached over and gripped her hand. “They haven’t been around women in years. Sparx said they have only four females living within this city and they’re all much older. This is all new to them. I’m sure they’re simply nervous.”