A loud boom sounded from below, and the structure we were standing on vibrated under our feet, then shook, shifting enough that I had to use my Titan claws to hold my position.
“We’re in,” Bantia said. Then I heard nothing but static. Both Ulixes’s and Bantia’s locator beacons disappeared from my sensors.
“Athena? Where is Team One?”
“Unknown. We lost the signal when they entered the compound.”
“Shit.” I glanced down. Way down. “Should we go after them?”
Darius was silent for a few seconds. The beams shifted beneath us again. “We need to get out of here. The whole thing is going to collapse.”
As if the beams were listening to him, a loud series of popping noises sounded from below.
Darius turned to the outer wall and fired a grenade that looked like a cannonball with claws. The sharp arms penetrated the wall several meters below us and stuck like Velcro.
“Take cover!” Darius yelled at me. I turned away from the blast, but there really wasn’t anywhere to go.
Darius’s Titan draped itself over my Titan’s back as the explosion ripped through the enclosed space. “Shielding up, Lily. Full body armor. Now.”
I wasn’t about to argue. Apparently Athena’s artificial intelligence had also decided that was the best course of action, because my canopy was now fully enclosed with Titan armor once more and I was blind except for my sensors.
The beams shuddered, collapsed about a meter, and clumped to a stop at an odd angle. The structure was not going to be standing for long.
“Turn around. We’re going to leap to the shielding wall, slide down with our claws and climb out the hole we just made. Understood?”
I sighed. He was right and I knew it. There was no sense arguing with him. I wanted to go after Bantia and Ulixes, but we could do that more easily from the ground. Blow a new hole in the base and get in there…now that we knew what this damn thing was made of.
I turned to face the back side of the shield doors and leaped forward, catching myself with extended claws that penetrated the metal. With a few adjustments and finger flexing I was sliding down the wall at a nice, smooth pace, my claws cutting through the heavy metal like butter.
If it hadn’t been so dark, I would have felt like a pirate with a knife, riding down the center of a sail. Except maybe I needed a white pirate blouse, tight black leather pants, a nice, tight bustier, and a parrot on my shoulder. Now that would be an adventure.
Darius could be the sexy young stud about to walk the plank, waiting for me to swoop in and save him.
Like that would ever happen. He’d probably dive in the water, wrestle a few sharks, and take over the entire ship.
Maybe then he’d fuck me up against the mast of the ship during a storm. Lightning strikes illuminating the sky. Sea spray landing on his back. A canopy of stars over our heads. The two of us alone and unafraid, ready to cash in all the pirates’ treasure and retire to a tropical island where we would have sex in a hammock, or on the beach—sand be damned—or with me bent over a barstool, buzzed on piña coladas as he filled me from behind.
The bright light coming through the opening Darius’s grenade created was like a flash bomb inside my helmet. Athena adjusted at once, but I was still blinking hard and trying to regain my bearings as I swung my feet out through the opening, then rolled so my Titan’s chest faced the outside of the blast door. I dug my claws back in so I could slide the rest of the way down.
“Status, Athena?” I asked.
“No hostile forces within range.”
Nice. At least I didn’t have to worry about being shot off the wall like a sitting duck. I could have used my boosters to basically fly down, but why waste the energy. I might need them later. Because until we were inside this place, this mission was not over.
Glancing up, I watched as Darius performed an identical maneuver to mine, swinging through the opening, flipping, grabbing onto the exterior with his claws. He was sliding down the wall with me, keeping pace until our Titans’ feet touched solid ground.
“Athena, can we blast a hole here without endangering the others?” I asked.
“Unknown.”
Damn it. I wanted to get in there, but I didn’t want to hurt Bantia or Ulixes if they were directly on the other side of the blast.
Facing the giant door, I turned to my right to count off twenty paces. On the inside, Team One had taken off to my left. Assuming they continued that direction, this should be safe.
“Where are you going?” Darius asked.
“Keep up.” At my mark, I backed away from the door, lifted my arm, and fired my largest grenade at the door, chest high. I wanted the largest hole possible, and losing half of my blast radius in the rock under the door would be a waste. “Fire in the hole!” I yelled.
Darius’s Titan tackled me to the ground as a giant plume of rock and debris rained down on us from the blast.
“What are you doing?” I yelled.
“Are you insane?” Darius’s voice sounded off. Shaky. “You should have let me do that.”
“Why? Because I’m a girl?”
He growled, the sound one of frustration. “Because you’re mine.”
Two nearby Titan teams ran for our location, then disappeared inside the entrance I’d created. Brilliant. I made the opening, and they beat me inside. “Get off me.”
“You weren’t saying that last night.”
Oh God, I was going to kill him with my bare hands.
“Get. Off.”
“No. We’ve done our job. Ground forces are already on the move.”
I turned my Titan-sized head to see that he spoke the truth. Hundreds of smaller attack units were racing toward us, armed to the teeth, battle cries on their lips. They wore armor exactly like I’d seen when I was playing what I’d once believed was only a video game. The stats on the armor were impressive, and I knew they could take a hit. More than one.
As if on cue, the general’s voice resonated inside my helmet.
“Stand down, Titans. Guard the perimeter. Ground forces are now engaged.” As General Romulus gave a direct order, I didn’t dare disobey it. Not on my first mission as a Titan.
Not when I was so angry with my perfect, sexy, pair-bonded mate that I was seeing red.
One minute I wanted to jump him, the next? Scream at him. And after that? Shit. I just wanted to cry. I was an emotional roller coaster, and I hated every second of it.
Why didn’t Darius trust me to take care of myself? Why did everyone in my life have to treat me like I didn’t know what the hell I was doing? Like a walking mistake? A clutz? An idiot who needed careful advice and tending? I was tired of being treated like a wallflower.
Was this what love was supposed to be? Passion? Caring? Was this putting another’s needs before one’s own? I didn’t think so, but then, I’d never been in love before, so I had no idea how I was supposed to feel.
Did Darius really love me? After so short a time together? He was an alien, but he was still a man. Most of the men I knew on Earth, including my own father, weren’t big on monogamy or commitment in general. Why would an alien be any different?
“You can get off me, Darius. I’m not going to run away.”
Slowly, as if afraid he might startle a scared rabbit, Darius moved his Titan off mine and held out a massive hand to help me to my feet. I took it, not because I couldn’t get up on my own, but because I was too tired to fight with him. The adrenaline that had powered through my body was gone, leaving me to crash and burn to cinders inside my own mind. I didn’t understand any of this, and I hated the fact that I felt so unsure.. Hated that I wasn’t confident of my place in this group of Titans or with Darius. I’d thought I was sure about him, and then he’d been welcomed back, already a Titan. He was keeping secrets from me. Big secrets.
I knew the secrets game, had played that game my whole life, and I hated it.
I hated that Darius was hovering over me like a helicopter paren
t making sure I felt like I couldn’t do anything on my own. Acting like I should be scared when I wasn’t.
This was more real than anything I’d ever done before. Should I be frightened? Because as soon as I’d slipped inside Athena’s huge, powerful frame I’d felt powerful. Strong. Nervous but excited, too. Was that wrong? Was that how Mia and Jamie had felt on their first missions? Sure, I wasn’t excited about the prospect of killing a living being, but I hadn’t been terrified of dying either.
Perhaps I should have been.
Or perhaps I should be more worried about giving my heart to an alien who had no intention of responding in kind.
“Team Seven, cover the entrance. I don’t want any surprises down there.”
“Yes, General.” Darius moved to stand on one side of the blast area, and I stood with my back to the blast door on the other.
We stood in silence, scanning the terrain for enemy Scythe fighters, random enemy attacks. Nothing.
Then a rumble deep in the ground.
“What was that?” I asked.
“I don’t know.” Darius and I crouched in a defensive posture, weapons ready. “General, there is a ground disturbance.”
“Copy that. Resolution’s sensors are picking it up. Hold your position.”
“Holding position.”
I didn’t say a word, but I had a bad feeling. A really bad feeling.
The rumbling increased until the ground shook like an earthquake.
A moment later Bantia burst through the wall, ground troops running at full speed behind her. She stood at the opening, urging the smaller forces to greater speed.
“Move! Move! Move!”
“What’s happening?” I asked.
“It’s a trap. The whole fucking thing is empty. But there’s enough explosive down there to make a crater out of the whole area. Get out of here!”
Reaching behind me, I buried my claws in the metal wall and pulled, peeling the opening wider bit by bit, relieved when I saw there was enough room for even one more soldier to squeeze through. “More!” I yelled.
Darius followed suit as Bantia joined me in peeling back the shielding. We weren’t doing much, but if we saved even a handful of lives, it would be worth it.
“Where’s Ulixes?” Darius asked.
Bantia answered between grunts as we tugged together. “Bringing up the rear, of course. As usual.” There was frustration and worry in her tone, but admiration as well. Trust that he would be all right. And I missed those touches in Darius’s prior rantings at me all the more.
“How long do we have?” I asked.
“I don’t know. Not long.”
Shuttles were doing touch-and-goes on the ground near us, hovering just low enough for the evacuating troops to leap onboard. The moment they were full, they soared away, another waiting to take its place.
I lost count of the troops as they poured out of the wall, running at full speed. Finally Ulixes appeared.
“Clear.”
“Thank Vega,” Bantia said. “Let’s get out of here.”
Turning together, we all ran for the nearest shuttle large enough to hold our Titan frames. Darius paced behind me, but I wasn’t going to waste energy yelling at him to hurry. My bad feeling had gone from mild anxiety to full-blown panic attack. We had to get out of here.
Now.
The first blast knocked me to my knees. The shock wave lifted my Titan and threw me into the cliff wall more than twenty meters away.
I slid down to slump on the rocky ground. I hurt, but everything seemed to be intact.
I looked up and winced, threw my arms up to protect my Titan’s chest as chunks of rock and twisted metal fell from the sky to bury me alive.
7
Darius, Battleship Resolution, Medical Station
* * *
“Where is she? Let me see her. Now.” Lily. My pair bond was hurt, and she was here. Somewhere.
“She’s in surgery, sir. You need to calm down and have a seat.” The placating, soothing voice of the medical officer had the opposite effect. I wasn’t calm. I couldn’t do this. Not again.
“Give me a fucking sterile suit. I don’t care what I have to do. I have to get in there.”
The large male officer frowned, clearly out of patience. “You need medical attention yourself, Starfighter. You are covered in sweat and dust, you have blood on your face, and you will do nothing but scare the medical team. So get your ass in that room.” He pointed to a medical treatment room a few paces away marked with the number four. “Get on the exam table and shut the fuck up before I call security.”
Well, this was a battleship, not a civilian hospital. And this medical officer was no low-ranking idiot but a captain. Probably a fully trained physician as well as a soldier. He wasn’t going to budge.
The faster I got my own wounds taken care of, the sooner I could get to Lily.
I walked into the exam room, and the door slid closed behind us, the reflective surface activating to give us privacy as he ran a medical scan.
“Two broken ribs. Second-degree burns on the neck and left hand. A bit of bruising. You’ll be fine.” He gave me the reassurance even as he held a treatment injector to the burned area on the side of my neck. With a quick movement of his hand, the injection activated. The medication flowed into my flesh. It burned like acid, but I didn’t say a word.
“This should take care of any residual bruising as well as speed healing of the burns. I am going to recommend you remain off duty for the next two days.”
“Are we done here?” Lily. I had to get to Lily.
“Not quite.” A second injection followed, this time over my broken ribs. The ache I’d been feeling for the last hour faded at once but was quickly replaced with sharp, stabbing agony that lasted several minutes. When it was over, he held the scanner over my ribs again. “Excellent. Your bones are healthy. The breaks have healed.”
“Great.” My forehead was covered in sweat. I’d had my bones patched before, but that didn’t make it hurt less.
“Yes. I’m prepared to release you from my care. However, you will not be allowed anywhere near your pair bond in your current condition.”
“What condition?”
“You’re filthy. Clean yourself up, Starfighter. I don’t care how in love with you she is; even she won’t want to touch you until you take a shower.”
I stood and walked to see my reflection in the large sliding door. The sight that greeted me was not pleasant. My hair was spiked and grimy. My skin was streaked with paler lines where sweat had created a map through the dust on my face. I probably smelled as bad as I looked.
Damn Vega and every other star. He was right. I could not go to Lily like this.
Waving my hand in front of the door’s release scanner, I waited impatiently, shoving through before it had opened even halfway.
“You’re welcome!” The medical officer’s voice followed me down the corridor, but he was laughing. In fact, I would probably be the laughingstock of the entire battleship in the next few hours. Nothing men liked better than to give one another a hard time for falling in love.
And I wasn’t just in love. I was obsessed. Possessive. Protective. I wanted to lock Lily in our bedroom and never let her out. Keep her naked and sated and safe.
If she’d allow me. Which, based on her reactions during this last mission, was going to be a tough sell. Even if I couldn’t keep a fellow Starfighter out of battle, I could protect her. Move in first in the most dangerous situations. Do everything possible to keep her out of the line of fire.
Whether she liked it or not.
I was not going to lose another person I loved on the battlefield. Never again. And if that made Lily angry, then so be it. I could deal with my woman’s anger. In fact, I would keep her so well pleasured, so in love with me that she would accept my faults, my need to keep her safe. Every time she raged, I would soothe her with pleasure.
Starting now.
Lily, Medical Station, Surgic
al Recovery
* * *
The anesthesia wore off as if someone had snapped their fingers. One second I was unconscious, the next I was wide awake in a hospital bed of some kind. Taking stock of my situation, I moved bit by bit, testing things out. My leg was sore, and I had a slight headache, but that seemed to be the worst of it.
I sat up, ready to find out what the hell had happened to me.
I remembered being buried in Athena, tons of rock piling on top of my Titan, every alarm and sensor blaring at me that we were in trouble. The sound of Darius yelling my name. Long minutes of darkness when I was completely alone.
And pain. Mindless, staggering pain.
In my leg.
Lifting the sheet covering me, I looked at the leg in question and frowned. There was a transparent bandage covering half of my thigh. No stitches. No blood. Just a weirdly large, sticky bandage that I could see my skin through. It looked fine. Maybe I’d been dreaming.
I wiggled my toes. Flexed my foot. Bent my knee. Tried to lift my leg.
“Damn it!” That hurt.
“Don’t move yet. The bone isn’t completely healed and won’t be for several more hours.” A doctor or nurse or medic, I had no idea which, walked around the foot of my bed with a scanner of some kind, reading data I couldn’t see.
“Hours?”
She looked up, and I was struck by the brightness of her pale gray eyes. “Yes, the femur is a very large bone in human anatomy, and yours was snapped in three places.”
“Three places?” I felt like a fool repeating everything she said, but I was trying to figure out how a broken bone could heal in just a few hours.
“Yes. Are you in pain?”
I thought for a moment. “Only when I try to move it.”
“Excellent. That will improve as the bone continues to mend. By tomorrow morning you should be fully healed.”
“How is that possible?”
“We surgically implanted osteobots along the breaks. They will rebuild your bone.” She patted me on the ankle. “Don’t worry, the diaphysis will actually be stronger than it was before.”
Elite Starfighter: Starfighter Training Academy - Game 3 Page 5