Flying in Spaceships with Aliens (Kilbus Lord Book 2)

by Erin Raegan

  “Let’s go,” Jeremy told me, helping me to my feet. “It’s good Bets and Sal didn’t come.”

  Yeah, this would have broken their hearts.

  Just as badly as it had mine.

  Jeremy and Holden wanted to check Abby’s place.

  I didn’t have much hope it looked any better than my home. We were in a more rural area. Abby had lived in the center of town. It would have drawn a lot of attention in the early days of the invasion. But no one could tell Holden no when he begged Killian so distraughtly.

  We took the ship closer and landed just outside of the town.

  And I was right. It didn’t look much better. Entire buildings had been burned away. Some of them were split open from what must have been an earthquake.

  Holden staggered down the road, aimlessly looking at the destruction.

  “She’s not here,” Jeremy said to me. “How could anyone survive this?”

  I shook my head, too shaken to say anything.

  But we came to her apartment one block down from Jaz’s bar. Or what used to be her bar. It was just a pile of rubble now. What had happened to her? To everyone?

  But Abby’s apartment building was still standing. Mostly.

  Holden rushed up the broken and crumbling stairs, not listening to Oren’s warning.

  We had over a dozen of Killian’s guys with us. All of them armed. Holden didn’t care.

  We went at a more sedate pace, stopping outside the apartment doors.

  I went to follow Holden, but Killian stopped me. “No.”

  I looked at him. “What?”

  “You stay.”

  I nodded, too emotionally exhausted to argue.

  Abby wasn’t in there. I knew it. The building was crumbling. The roof had caved in. She used to live on the top floor.

  “She’s not in there,” Jeremy voiced my words.

  “He needs to see for himself,” Killian told us.

  Jeremy scowled at him.

  “He needs to know,” Killian said and looked down at me.

  I blinked at him, not fighting him as he tugged me closer, curling me into his chest.

  We waited. Quietly, patiently.

  Oren eventually went inside after Holden. They didn’t come out for a long time. When they finally did, Holden was pale and shaking.

  “She’s not here, Theo,” he said quietly, pain thickening his words. “She’s not here.”

  “I know,” I choked out, going to him.

  He hugged me. Jeremy pulled us both to his chest.

  “I just thought she’d be here,” Holden choked out.

  None of us said anything.

  It made no sense. Most of the world hadn’t survived the Vitat, and even more of us had died in the war that took place after. That we were alive was a miracle. And in some sick twisted way—that was because we hadn’t been here. We’d been in an underground bunker in the middle of Alaska. The middle of nowhere.

  This town, the people here, they’d been hit hard early on. The evidence was all around us.

  We’d only survived because we’d been taken. Taken and experimented on. Locked in a cage for a year. That had saved us.

  It was an unsettling thought.

  “H-hello?” a quiet voice called.

  We stiffened, pulling away from each other.

  The voice called out again.

  Killian and his crew moved fast, surrounding us in seconds.

  “Who’s there?” Killian called.

  “Who are you?”

  “A friend,” Killian called back.

  The voice was coming from the back of the market. Most of the building was crumbling, but I saw a dark head peeking out from behind an overturned and busted dumpster.

  The head peeked out again and my eyes narrowed. “Marcy?”

  “Theo?”

  “Holy shit,” Jeremy mumbled.

  “Who is Marcy?” Oren asked us.

  “Cheerleader bitch,” Jeremy said, sounding shocked. “I can’t believe she’s alive. Aren’t girls like that the first to go?”

  “Jeremy,” I whispered in shock.

  He shrugged, his eyes haunted.

  I walked around Killian, ignoring his hand on my arm. “Marcy, it’s okay. Come out.”

  “That’s a lot of aliens,” she shot back.

  “They’re okay, I promise.”

  “They look scary.”

  Who was this girl? Not the Marcy I knew. Stuck up, entitled, a bully. This girl was meek, full of terror.

  “We won’t hurt you,” Oren called. “Come out.”

  I saw her inch out and my eyes widened. She was so dirty. Head to toe grime. Her clothes old and ratty. And she was thin. So thin. And not in an “I eat salads all day” way. More like emaciated. Her face was gaunt.

  It was a wonder I recognized her at all.

  She shuffled closer to us, her eyes wide and afraid. She couldn’t look away from the aliens.

  “Marcy!” I rushed to her. She flinched away from me and I slowed, carefully coming closer. “What happened to you?”

  She shook her head, trembling. “Why are you here?”

  I opened my mouth, unable to stop looking at her. She had bruises and cuts all over her face and arms. Some of them looked infected. I pulled off my sweater, carefully walking closer to her. She watched my every move as I put the sweater around her shoulders.

  This is what we’d been spared from. This is what the compound and Alaska had spared us from enduring.

  “Are you alone?”

  She shook her head. “No, my sister’s with me.”

  I looked back at the dumpster as another head peeked out. Liza. She was barely sixteen now. I called her name and she came out. She looked a little better than Marcy, but not by much.

  But she wouldn’t come closer to us.

  “I have food,” Oren called. “Water.”

  Marcy and Liza looked at him with a frightening amount of desperation.

  He knelt a few feet from Marcy and offered her a bottle of water.

  “Theo?” she asked.

  “It’s okay,” I whispered, my voice thick. “He’s one of the good guys.”

  Marcy allowed me to help her walk closer to where Oren had left the bottle and backed away. Next to it were two wrapped squares. Likely that nasty alien jelly.

  Marcy carefully picked up the bottle and squares, her fingers clutching them so tightly the alien containers creaked. Then she turned and ran. I watched in shock as she knelt in front of her sister, holding the water to Liza’s lips.

  All of us watched in stunned silence as Marcy made her sister drink every last drop. Then she hand-fed her.

  “Oren,” Killian rumbled.

  Oren nodded and pulled out several more bottles. He slowly walked toward the girls, making sure they heard him well before he reached them. Then Oren—curiously grumpy Oren—gently coaxed Marcy into drinking water herself. Then he hand-fed her.

  “Leave them,” Killian rumbled. “Oren has them.”

  Killian pulled us all back toward the ship. We sat on the ground beside it, where Jeremy and Holden held a quiet conversation. I watched them anxiously as Killian sat beside me.

  “Did you read her?” I asked him.

  Killian looked at me warily.

  “Did you?”

  He nodded, bracing.

  I nodded too. “What happened to her?”

  “A lot of bad things.”

  I blinked away tears. “They looked bad.”

  “Her sister is missing a limb.”

  I gaped at Killian.

  “They both need medical attention. Immediately.”

  “Oren’s bringing them, right?”

  “Yes.”

  I sighed.

  Twenty minutes later, Oren delivered.

  Liza walked beside him, her steps hesitant but sure. Marcy, though, weaved on her feet, clearly exhausted. Oren was holding her up with an arm around her waist.

  I looked at Liza. Her arm was missing. The righ
t sleeve of her shirt was empty from the elbow up. My hand smothered my gasp. How she had survived a wound like that in a world like this was a testament to Marcy’s care for her.

  “Are they gonna be okay?” Jeremy asked Oren.

  Oren’s gaze was filled with fire. He looked at Killian.

  “They’ll be okay,” Killian said for him.

  Holden stood, wringing his hands together. “Marcy?”

  She looked at him, pain and exhaustion lining her face. “Hi, Holden.”

  “Marce, have you seen Abby? Is she hiding out here too?”

  Marcy flinched. It was small, but we all caught it.

  “She could be in Ohio,” Jeremy said, watching his brother with panic. “She could have left a while ago.”

  Marcy looked away from us.

  “Marce? Have you seen her?” Holden pushed.

  She nervously twisted her fingers in front of her.

  “Holden, don’t,” Jeremy nearly begged.

  I found my feet moving back. Away from Marcy’s twisting fingers. Away from the pity in her eyes. Away from the way Liza cried.

  My feet backed me away, away. Then I was met with force.

  “I don’t want to hear,” I told Killian in a whisper. “Don’t let me hear.”

  He pulled me back, his hands coming up over my ears.

  But it was too late—I saw her mouth move. Read the words on her lips.

  She’s dead.

  She’s dead.

  She’s dead.

  Not even Killian could block my wails from reaching my ears.

  Grief

  Kil

  I watched her rage. A beautiful broken mess.

  “I didn’t want to know!” she screamed.

  “You didn’t even want to look!” Holden screamed back. “We had to beg you to get him to bring us here!”

  “I didn’t want to know!” she screamed back, throwing everything in her path at him.

  “Why, Theo? Why didn’t you want to know? We left her here!”

  “No!” She raged, beating her little fists into Holden’s chest, shoving him back.

  “We did! We just left her here all alone!”

  “No!” she bellowed through anguished cries. “They took us from her! They took us from everything!”

  “Please,” Jeremy pleaded with them both, “stop this!”

  “Your brother did this to her!” Holden roared. “Noah did this to her. I would have been here. I could have saved her!”

  “You would have died too,” Jeremy shouted back. “We all would have.”

  I watched them from a short distance. Here if she needed me, but allowing her this outlet for her pain.

  Oren had taken the injured humans aboard, no doubt administering the medical care they desperately needed.

  The human couldn’t have known what her words would do to my Theo. Theo had been suppressing her fear and worry for her Abby and her home for so long that she hadn’t even recognized it for what it was. She’d thought herself indifferent.

  But not my Theo. She was just so very good at hiding from herself.

  She’d suspected Abby’s death but couldn’t bear to have it confirmed. She suspected the annihilation of her home but didn’t want to face it. Yet another way in which I’d failed her. I never should have allowed this.

  “The boy won’t calm any time soon,” Jareth murmured from my side.

  “No,” I agreed. “He will need to be restrained.”

  For his own safety.

  I sympathized with him. He was in pain like my Theo. I could not bear the thought of feeling that pain. Just the mere chance Theo could have been lost to me in such a way was nearly crippling.

  And she’d come so close. Too close.

  I had almost given up. With no sign of her, I had started to think the worst.

  I sickened myself.

  “Go for the boy. His brother will follow. I have Theo.”

  Jareth nodded. As one, we moved when Theo landed blow after blow on Holden, her rage bottled inside her fists. She needed to inflict pain and Holden needed to feel it. But they would hurt themselves if I allowed this to carry on any longer.

  Jareth and Leo together restrained the boy, his brother watching in horror. I grabbed my little Theo, holding her tightly as she kicked and clawed at me. It took far too long, but eventually she gave in, trading her anger for mourning. She cried against me, now clawing to get closer. I held her, my own eyes aching witnessing her despair.

  “We were going to run,” Jeremy mumbled listlessly as he watched his brother wail and curse. “We were going to look for her then run. We didn’t want to leave our home.”

  “Why?” I asked, soothing Theo with a palm at her back.

  Jeremy shrugged dully. “I can’t remember anymore.”

  “You are all each other has now,” I told the human. “You must remain together.”

  “Yeah.” He sniffed, wiping his wet face. “I know.”

  They may have run, but I would have dragged them back. My Theo did not deserve their abandonment.

  Humans were far too afraid of their new uncertain future. Too much death. But where they were headed was a new beginning. One of hope and life. That was nothing to fear.

  Onboard, I held her as we returned to the warship in the stars. Theo cried. Furiously. Her body bucking and trembling from the effort.

  The two human females watched her and Holden with wide, regretful eyes. Oren soothed them and turned their attention away.

  When we docked on the warship, I allowed everyone else to disembark. Oren would take the humans to the medical bay. Leo hopefully would take Holden somewhere he could release his anguish in a more productive way.

  But I stayed with my Theo. I held her through every last one of her tears. I would have held her through all she’d shed since I’d seen her last if I’d been there. But I wasn’t and that was of my own making.

  After she finally relaxed, her face as wet as my shirt, I stood with her in my arms and walked from the ship.

  “Don’t take me to them,” she said, her voice hoarse, into the skin of my neck. “I don’t want to see anyone.”

  “I’m not letting you go,” I assured her. A promise. I would keep her by my side as long as she allowed it.

  I took her to my quarters. Where I’d wanted her since the moment I found her again. On the way, I dismissed everyone, not allowing them to see her in such pain, then I carried her to my bed.

  She was so small lying there.

  Vulnerable.

  I peeled my wet shirt from my chest and tossed it away before easing her hard boots from her feet, then mine. I climbed in beside her and held her to me. Truly held her in a way that I had longed to do for so long.

  She did not push me away.

  Lust and Anger

  Theo

  I slept for days.

  I woke enough for Killian to force me to eat and bathe myself, then I went back to sleep. It was the only time I could escape my grief.

  On the first night, I vaguely heard Killian arguing with Noah and Sal, both of them trying to take me back to my room.

  I remembered Sal holding me for a little while, then both of them leaving.

  Then there was Bets combing my hair and crying with me.

  Crying for Abby. Crying for our home. For everyone and everything that had been ripped away from us.

  I also heard Killian arguing in the other room with a multitude of voices. Some of them from a screen, some of them on the ship. A lot of the time with Oren.

  I heard enough to know Killian wasn’t supposed to leave Earth. He was supposed to stay and help round up the survivors. He’d shouted at the arguers. Those who disapproved of him leaving. He wasn’t pulling back all of the Kilbus but he was clear when he told them he wasn’t staying. Some guy named Chyn had even come to our rooms to bark at Killian, but he was staying with Earth in Killian’s place.

  Earth wasn’t abandoned, but he wasn’t letting me travel to our new home without him. He
told all of them this plainly. Their shock was palpable.

  I knew enough that we had now left Earth behind. We were floating in space. Traveling to our new home. I should feel bad. I knew it. I’d inadvertently taken away Killian from the rest of the world. But I didn’t think he would have left if there weren’t others to take his place.

  And I had a hard time caring about much of anything these days.

  Anything that wasn’t Killian.

  I cared when he crawled into bed with me at night. When he rambled on and on about his life as the Kilbus Lord. His life before taking over his race and molding them into the pirates they now were.

  I was mesmerized by his stories. The danger and excitement. All the worlds and stars he’d traveled. They pulled me from despair and sent me off into exciting dreams.

  His arms around me were a comfort.

  It wouldn’t last. It couldn’t. There were too many lies between us now. Too many secrets that would keep us apart. But for now, I just didn’t care.

  He was the old Killian. The charming and exciting, caring Killian I had grown to nearly love.

  I’d missed him. I could admit that to myself.

  “What are you thinking so hard about?” he asked me from the doorway.

  I rolled to my back, looking at him from down my prone body. “You don’t know?”

  He shook his head. “I told you I would not.”

  “You also said you couldn’t help yourself.”

  “I’m working on it.”

  “How’s it going?”

  Killian smirked. “Not well.”

  I smiled back. My cheeks ached with the effort. It had been a while.

  “It’s late,” he said, moving into the room.

  “How can you tell?” We were in space.

  Killian shrugged. “Internal clock.”

  “And a real one?” I asked.

  He nodded back out into the main room of his quarters. Much more opulent than mine. Decorated. Lived in.

  “You’ve barely touched your food,” he admonished.

  “I was still stuffed from earlier.” Killian gave me far better food than Oren did.

  “Are you hungry now?”

  “No.”

  He moved my tray from the table beside the bed and took it out of the room. Killian’s bed was in a cubby like mine, but it was huge. Bigger than a king-size bed.