by Elin Wyn
“We’re next,” Zaddik warned, and Sherre resisted the urge to squirm as his arm curled around her tighter. Typing away with his free hand as he prepped the pod, he asked, “Ready?”
Sherre nodded, “Whenever you are,” she said weakly.
Zaddik
Zaddik did not like Sherre’s cramped Earth pod.
Not only was the shaky hands-off technology similar to the terrible design of a Thagzar X-417 slave transport ship, but the sluggish response time had almost thrown Sherre into the controls. Which, he knew, also wouldn’t have even happened if the damn thing wasn’t so small.
“Oh, we’re almost there,” Sherre piped up, leaning over the arm that he had wrapped around her waist to read the screen. He swallowed thickly as he felt the soft weight of her breasts rub against his forearm, imagining, for a moment, the path that her olive skin led from where it dipped down into the V of her tight uniform.
“Zaddik?” Sherre asked, half-turning in his lap to look up at him with her wide brown eyes.
“I’ll land beside Dojan,” he said gruffly, clearing his throat as he made himself focus on the hologram at hand.
“So he’s the one with Willovitch,” she said thoughtfully. “She’s not good with new people, so I had wondered,” she added.
“Dojan can be irritating,” Zaddik grunted. “But he means well.” Dojan Cholsad was a younger recruit from Saros, a planet known for their waters and moons. Zaddik had visited it once, and though he’d found the planet nothing short of a peaceful paradise, it still had the oppressive air of a people in misery. Every citizen of the five planets in the Eiztar Alliance had it, ever since the Thagzars had released the toxin that’d killed their newborns.
It was why Dojan had joined, angry and hateful after his nephew had been delivered dead to his mother’s arm. His sister had never stopped crying, not until she’d killed herself in the bitter month after.
“Hold on,” Zaddik said stiffly, uncurling his fist to wrap his hand around Sherre’s side and anchor her to him properly. If his takeoff was anything to go by, his landing was going to be atrocious.
Sherre simply nodded, her braids bouncing on her shoulders as she hugged his arm to her. He bit his lip as she subconsciously wiggled against him, her plump ass making direct, desirable contact with his groin, and he ground his teeth together in an effort to keep his body from reacting to it.
It was odd how the Earth girl was affecting him. And she was a girl, compared to him. Yet, somehow, she was making him feel things that not even women twice her age with tenfold the experience had been able to inspire within him. Just by sitting in his lap, Zaddik could feel a beating in his chest and a boiling in his blood.
It was startling.
“Is it here?” Sherre asked, leaning forward to stare at the hologram.
“Mhm,” Zaddik nodded, forcing himself to focus on the task at hand. Flicking his fingers over the control pad, he was both surprised and glad to find that he had a considerably less difficult time landing the damn thing. Setting it down just feet from Dojan’s pod, he turned it off and popped the door open before the engines even had a moment to wind down.
“Let’s go,” he said, more than ready to get out of the primitive pod.
“Sure,” Sherre jumped off of his lap, leading the way as she hopped through the pod door. As Zaddik climbed out behind her, he noticed that she seemed to hesitate at the sight of the pods from his own ship.
“Bigger than your Earth pods, aren’t they?” he grinned, crossing his arms as he eyed his own familiar black pods. They were huge, easily double the size of Sherre’s, and comfortably outfitted for two. He was very happy to be boarding them again.
“It’s giant,” Sherre agreed, grinning as she blinked at the lot of them. “Which one is yours?” she asked, venturing forward.
“They’re all the same,” Zaddik shrugged, stepping after her. There were three pods before them, meaning that Dojan and his partner had already left. Kid never could sit still. “But I touched down in that one,” he said, pointing to a pod in the middle.
“Ooh,” Sherre sped up, running over to the ramp. “Is it unlocked?”
“Ah, hold on,” Zaddik called, moving over to place a hand on the side of the ship. The cool metal warmed under his fingertips, but he kept his palm flat, bored in the knowledge that it was simply scanning his fingerprints. He finally stepped back as the door groaned open, rubbing his sweaty palm against his pants as Sherre gasped.
“Whoa, nice!” she exclaimed, her voice fading as she raced inside the pod now that he’d opened the door. Zaddik shook his head at her enthusiasm, more than a little envious of her excitement over the simplest things. Perhaps it was just that he was older, or jaded from a community of misery, but he couldn’t summon even a fraction of her eagerness on a good day. Though, now that he thought about it, today was surprisingly shaping up to be one of those.
Following her up the ramp, Zaddik found Sherre eyeing the controls. He could only guess what she thought of them, and he found that he was more than a little curious to know if she’d ever seen anything like it before.
“The main controls can be transferred to either chair,” he said, motioning to the two plush chairs secured against the back wall. Typically, the pilot would’ve taken his place in the right seat, but Zaddik could not have cared less either way.
“I’ll take this one,” Sherre said happily, dropping into the right armchair. Crossing her legs, she smiled and shared, “On our mothership, I’d always sit here and Jeline would sit to my left. But our chairs were never this comfy!” she said, throwing her arms up as she collapsed against it.
Zaddik averted his eyes, doing his best not to stare at the way that her chest stood out as she arched back. “Well then,” he said, taking his own seat as he hit a switch to close the door. “Let’s get going.”
Sliding the controls over to his side, Zaddik flipped the appropriate switches and moved his foot back as a button rose up off of the floor before him, simultaneously deflating the button that’d been in front of Sherre. He waited to step on it until after it popped up properly, tapping the button lightly while the engine sent the ship into a hover above Peshdushdar’s surface.
“That controls the thrust of the engines?” Sherre asked curiously, tilting her head to look at it.
“Our pods only have one engine, but yes,” he said happily, more than comfortable back behind the familiar controls of his own pod. “I know it’s a bit different from yours,” he added, honestly a little surprised that she’d figured out his controls so quickly. Then again, she did have two prominent braids on her head.
“Actually,” she shared happily, leaning in towards him as he kept them aloft with his foot and ran an engine check with his hands. “It’s very similar to an older mode of transportation that we used to have on Earth.” Placing a tentative hand on the console between them, she offered, “The automobile?”
She asked it like she honestly thought that he would have heard of it before, and he felt more than a little flustered to let her down. “What is that? Some type of ship?” he replied gruffly, trying to cover up his own lack of knowledge with a guess.
“Oh,” she said, leaning back into her own seat. It put her about a foot away from him, and Zaddik felt a ping in his chest at the loss, but kept his eyes on the screen. “Well, it is pretty outdated,” she said, laughing to herself. “But it was also one of our first great achievements in transportation, on Earth. We used to rely on animals to travel great distances, and then bam!” she exclaimed, slapping her hands down upon her knees for emphasis. Zaddik raised an eyebrow. “With the automobile, it took hours to get somewhere, not days. And they all had a pedal,” she said, pointing at his feet. “Very similar to that one there.”
Zaddik wasn’t quite sure what to say to that, though there was one thought in particular that he couldn’t help but blurt out.
“You think my pod is based on primitive technology?” he asked, face blank.
Sherre fro
wned, “Well, I don’t mean…” but then she trailed off, giving him a look. “Wait, what do you mean, ‘your pod?’ Are you saying that mine is—”
“Yes,” Zaddik replied without hesitation.
Well, if Sherre hadn’t been turned toward him before, she was now. With a frown, she pushed herself up and declared, “Our pod ships are the best in the military! I mean, they may not be as up to date as Weapons’ pods,” she added quickly, only to look away like she immediately regretted saying it. Zaddik wanted to follow her as she ducked in embarrassment, but he knew that he had to keep his focus on the controls. She was just so bizarrely genuine, a trait that’d been missing in his company for quite some time.
Blushing, Sherre cleared her throat and said, “But Weapons need them, because of the aggressive missions that they’re always going out on. Scouting parties like mine, on the other hand—”
“You think landing on a Thagzar-infested planet isn’t aggressive?” Zaddik asked honestly, eyes wide. The pod’s system check was finally finishing up, and a flashing green light was urging him to push the thrusters to take off, but his attention was on Sherre. Seriously, was the woman insane?
“It was a last-ditch effort,” Sherre shrugged easily, crossing her arms to properly fall back into her own seat. “And one made without any intel handy.”
“So it wasn’t a bold move, but a stupid one?” Zaddik surmised, grinning at her. He liked the gentle, eager-to-please Sherre, but this offended, stand-up-for-herself Earthling was just as interesting.
“My captain was doing the best she could,” Sherre scowled.
“Oh,” Zaddik shrugged with a roll of his eyes. “And I suppose it was her idea to enter Torpor Sleep, too?” From the way that Kanthi had explained it, Torpor Sleep was like a sudden hibernation. A bad thing to slip your entire crew under in the midst of a meteor shower, but hell, who was he to judge?
Still, his tone made Sherre gasp indignantly, and she rounded on him as she pointed a finger. “Torpor Sleep has been proven to save lives!” she proclaimed. “It not only forces the pod to run a full medical scan, but it’ll put any potentially injured crew member in a state of calm, keep oxygen levels flowing, and – if needed – put a halt to all bleeding, internal or otherwise.”
Zaddik considered her as he lazily pumped the pedal underfoot, keeping the ship just below the proper readings to successfully break through the planet’s atmosphere and jet out into space. He didn’t want to take off when Sherre was still so obviously angry, her chest heaving as her nostrils flared against her red face. He supposed that she looked ugly like that, and an easy way to distance himself would be to commit such an unflattering expression to memory.
And yet, all he could think about was how astoundingly passionate she was.
“Do you disagree?” she asked, finally dropping her hand. The red flush on her skin seemed to be retreating, though her cheeks were only growing brighter.
She was embarrassed.
“I am sorry,” Zaddik offered, not finding himself capable of doing anything other than apologizing. “It sounds like your captain made the best call that she could.”
That seemed to appease Sherre, if her sagging shoulders and raised eyebrows were anything to go by. “Um, yes,” she said, tucking a flyaway strand of her hair behind her ear as she deflated back into her seat. “She did.”
So, she was also fiercely loyal. Grumbling to himself in an effort to hide his grin, Zaddik mumbled, “I’m glad.”
Sherre
Sherre felt like dying. Like curling into a little ball, and waiting for a black hole to swallow her – and her embarrassment – whole. Unfortunately, the reality of the situation was that she was locked up tight inside of a pod ship with the guy that she’d just made a fool of herself in front of.
Which left her with only two options: silently waiting for the black hole that had a ninety-nine percent probability of never coming, or make a risky attempt at conversation to put the one she’d just botched in the past.
Well, her mother had always said that silence was golden. Not that Sherre had ever really taken that bit of advice to heart.
Staring straight ahead at the curved black wall, Sherre mentally panicked. She still couldn’t believe that she’d yelled at him; Mister I-Like-Your-Braids, Sure-I’ll-Drive-Your-Pod agreeable alien man. He had just been so nice, and she’d bitten his head off the moment that he’d insulted her captain.
Crossing her arms again, Sherre looked pointedly at the floor. If only he hadn’t apologized, then she could’ve gone on fuming about it for another half hour before considering the whole thing even. But no, her friendly teammate had not only taken back what he’d said, but also agreed with her.
Just who the hell were the Eldiriaks, anyway? If nothing else, they were definitely ahead of Earth’s men, if the immature and self-righteous officers that she’d overheard the Captain talking about were anything to go by. Sherre wouldn’t have known; aside from the boy that she’d seen all through academy training, she had never really dated.
“Lift up your arms.”
Sherre glanced sideways at Zaddik before she could stop herself, and she swallowed thickly as she found herself caught by his sharp blue stare.
“Um,” she said, lifting her crossed arms up only slightly as she straightened to speak to him. “You—”
“Watch your elbows,” he cut in, reaching an arm out across the console separating them to urge hers up. It was with the lightest pressure that he placed his fingers on her elbow, but the effect had her blushing.
A spark, warm and bursting, sent tingles running through her from where he’d touched her arm all the way up to her chest. She’d never experienced anything like it before, and it made her jump, breaking their contact immediately. Still, the effects were lasting, and she rubbed a hand over her elbow to calm herself, still caught in Zaddik’s blue stare.
“Um,” Sherre blurted out, trying to think of something to say that would explain her reaction. Dropping her eyes to her lap, she cleared her throat and raised her arms up high above her head, and asked, “Is this good?”
A moment passed, and it was with a hesitant glance his way that Sherre caught Zaddik blinking owlishly to himself before turning back to the controls.
“Yes,” he said roughly, his voice taking on that gruff rumble that it seemed to fall into every time that he became confused or uncomfortable. Sherre hoped that she wasn’t the cause of it, but she knew, realistically, that she had to be. “Perfect,” he grumbled, clicking a button.
Suddenly, a flash of black jetted out over her lap, and with a whirr of noise from the console, something tightened over her legs, strapping her in.
“A belt?” Sherre breathed, her hands frozen in shock above her.
“A safety harness,” Zaddik said reassuringly, though there was still a bit of a rumble to his voice. Sherre frowned, nodding as she stared down at the strip of black cinched over her lap. “An automatic feature,” he continued, “Set to activate when the ship is about to depart.”
“Oh,” Sherre said, glancing over at his lap to see that he, too, had a seatbelt. She opened her mouth to further compare his pod to the late automobile, but one look at his face had her blurting out a different statement entirely. “So,” she said quickly, “We’re departing?”
With a grin, Zaddik flicked a switch and pressed his foot against the floor pedal. “Say goodbye to Peshdushdar,” he growled, obviously glad to be rid of the desert wasteland.
“Bye,” Sherre said under her breath, leaning forward as she stared intently at the large screen spanning across the wall in front of them. Maybe she could make out a Thagzar in the display before they left the planet, and she could finally see just what the Captain had been talking about.
“Hold on,” Zaddik warned, and he floored the pedal, forcing Sherre to grip her armrests to keep from falling flat against her chair back. Instead, she stayed on the edge of her seat, mirroring Zaddik as he bent over his workstation. She watched as he skillfully w
orked the controls and set the thrusters, obviously at peace in his element.
Sherre had been wondering how powerful an alien one-engine pod would be compared to her usual three-engine ship, but she needn’t have worried. With a final roar of the pod’s underbelly that made her feet shake and her knuckles whiten, the landscape depicted on the screen’s hologram jumped ahead as they charged through the sky, blasting through the planet’s atmosphere into open space.
It wasn’t nearly as jerky as Zaddik’s takeoff had been in her own pod, but rather a smooth ascent that could’ve only been achieved by an experienced pilot with steady hands. She could only guess how different the two pods’ controls were from one another by the way that Zaddik handled them, especially since all of his were absolutely foreign to her.
As the hologram flattened out to reveal the open expansion of space with only the occasional spaceport a few warps away, Zaddik eased off the controls and relaxed in his seat. Sherre followed suit, no longer caught up in the hopeful game of seeing a live Thagzar on the screen, and sprawled out as much as the harness would allow her.
“Finally,” Zaddik muttered to himself, and Sherre noticed a drop in his shoulders as he stared at the screen, almost as if he’d been holding in a breath the whole time.
“Feel better out in the arms of open space?” Sherre asked brightly, quoting a line that Jeline had used often on their tour.
“Yes,” Zaddik agreed with a sigh. Grinning, he half-turned to look at her, and said, “Something like that.”
Sherre was relieved to hear his voice fall back into the lighthearted tone that he’d spoken to her with when they’d first met, and she smiled in kind. “How long have—”
A loud beep cut her off. It was coming from the screen, and Zaddik leaned forward with a small frown already taking over his relaxed expression. Keeping his hands at the ready just above his controls, he watched as the hologram on the screen suddenly shut off, and an unsettling sound of static buzzed around them.