by Lynnea Lee
“Wow! This place is beautiful. When you said greenroom, I expected neat little rows of plants under grow lamps, but this is a full-on Garden of Eden.”
“The neat little rows of plants are in the next room over. We only use that method for small plants that can be stacked row upon row, mostly for food production. The greenroom helps filter and maintain our water and air quality.”
Ashe couldn’t believe that this little piece of paradise was hidden away as part of a spacefaring vessel. It wasn’t very large at all, maybe just the size of her bachelor apartment back on Earth, but it was lush and bursting with plant life. The greenroom was cultured in such a way that every nook and cranny was used by different flora, using the plant’s requirement and traits to its advantage. And while the plant species were unfamiliar to Ashe, she recognized the Tallean equivalent of moss and ferns on the ground and bromeliad like organisms clinging to the walls. Every surface was utilized, and none of the light was wasted.
“We use the light of any stars we cross and supplement with artificial light when we have to,” Moira explained. They sat down on a bench to enjoy the tranquility of the lush room.
“Are gardens like this common on all Tallean ships?”
“No, usually heavily armed frigate-class vessels like the Defiant won’t have a greenroom, but the Defiant was custom modified to be the best at what it does.” Pride in the ship shone in Moira’s eyes. “The Defiant has all the firepower of a frigate-class ship but has been modified to run efficiently with a smaller crew. A smaller crew means more room for cargo, which, of course, is what we specialize in. We don’t usually take large volume work, but when we do, the Defiant is strong enough to haul a trailer as well.
The greenroom was Calix’s idea. It’s a mainstay in larger merchant ships or plush, upscale passenger transports. But with a smaller crew, each person’s health, welfare, and comfort becomes more important, so Calix insisted on having this place built. Zey also had the ship’s hull rebuilt in a new composite material that is lighter and stronger. The reduced weight makes the Defiant more maneuverable as well. She really is an amazing ship!”
It was obvious to Ashe that Moira loved the ship and its crew. She thought about the skills she had to offer and was disappointed. It was silly to hope that Zey wanted her to stay with him here; she would just be dead weight eating up their resources. Maybe Reka 5 was a good idea, after all. Moira watched her new friend with concern; she noticed the moment Ashe’s mood swung from wonder to worry.
“I haven’t been a crew on this ship for very long,” Moira began, “but I’ve known Zey for a very long time. My father did him a favor once, and since then, Zey visited our family often. I’ve known him half my life. He’s a good male, an awesome Captain, and a loyal friend. I owe him my father’s life.”
How did Moira know that she was thinking about Zey? Was she that obvious?
“He’s really shaken up about what happened, and he blames himself for not protecting you.”
“It wasn’t his fault! He did everything he could. He kept me safe in the forest. He fought off a stalker for me and even used himself as bait to lead Ulrek’s henchmen away. I chose to go to the camp without a fight, and I was trying to lead you guys to us.”
“I know that. We all know that. But Zey doesn’t see it that way. All he knows is that you are avoiding him, and he thinks it’s because he failed you as a protector.”
Was that what he believed? But he did not fail her! He did everything he could to keep her safe.
“I’m not avoiding him because of that.” She was avoiding him because she was too much of a wimp to face him after what happened. Ashe struggled to get the sentences to form. “There was so much disgust in his eyes when Ulrek was touching me, and I was afraid that Zey wouldn’t be able to look at me again without recalling what happened.”
Moira’s eyes softened. “That must have been horrible for you both. But the best way to get over it is to make some new memories together.” Then, recalling the talk with Sophie, she added, “I know Zey promised to drop you off at Reka 5. But honestly, I doubt that’s going to happen.”
“But how do you know he even wants me on his ship? I mean, I’ve got nothing to offer, no useful skills. And I’m sure not going to pay my way just by warming his bed. It won’t be right!”
“I know how you feel. Sidas and even the rest of the crew don’t mind if I just stay on board to keep him happy, but I insist on making myself useful. There’s always something to do on the ship, and I’ve learned many new skills.
Before I joined the Defiant, they ordered supplies when they ran out, and no one really had an idea of what they had in the stores. I took a thorough inventory of all our supplies, including food, medical, and even weapons and ammunition. I then took it upon myself to keep the ship properly supplied throughout our travels.
Shortly after I joined the crew, we ran out of soap for the cleansing units. At the same time, most of the clothing decontaminators needed repair, and they kept forgetting to order the right parts. We had just started a long journey through a pretty much empty portion of space. It was horrible! Several months stuck in close quarters with a dozen unwashed sweaty males, wearing the same unwashed dirty clothes, the place reeked! We had to air the ship out for a good fortnight to get rid of the smell.”
Ashe had to giggle at Moira’s enthusiastic recounting of the story.
“I also found out that I’m a pretty good shot. Sidas would never have let me be a part of your rescue team otherwise. Calix is a great teacher. He’ll be happy to teach you to shoot. You’ll make yourself useful. Zey wants you here, on this ship, with him. I know him. He cares about you a lot. And he’s one male that’s used to always getting his way.” Then with a playful jab of her elbow, “Besides, you aren’t planning on leaving me here to deal with a dozen testosterone-filled blockheads alone, are you?”
Ashe grinned. Maybe things will work out after all.
Zey looked absentmindedly at the star charts his navigator left on his desk. He didn’t see any of the stars and planets, or the proposed flight path, all he could think about was Ashe. She had yet to see him since getting on his ship, choosing instead to stay in the infirmary for both night cycles. He was sure it was because he had failed to fulfill his promise to protect her on Vosthea. As a result, Ashe would choose to stay on Reka 5 when they arrived.
Thinking about leaving her at the colony to start a new life, possibly with another male, drove him a bit insane. He wanted her for himself. He needed to convince her to give him another chance to prove himself a worthy male.
A buzz rang from the onboard comm unit, and he hit the button to answer the transmission. It was his navigator asking about the proposed new route. They had detected a wayward Dominion ship in their original path, and his navigator had suggested the change. It would require leading the other ship through a small asteroid field, a mildly dangerous endeavor that would also allow the new human pilots and navigators to get some practice. Captain Walker had already agreed to the plan, deciding that the risks were worth the experience. Zey gave the go-ahead.
His thoughts turned sullenly back to Ashe. He missed her. He wanted the feel of her lush body against his. He needed to hear her voice, even if it was to call him an asshole. He missed her company. Frustrated, he pounded his fist into his desk, rattling everything on it.
The onboard comm rang again. Who the fuck was it this time? He hit the button again violently.
“Zey, it’s Calix. I’m down in the training room. I just finished showing our ambassador from the Second Chance our training simulators. I thought we could demo some of our hand to hand skills.”
Maybe some regimented violence would get Ashe off his mind. “I’m on my way.”
Nothing would get Ashe out of his mind, he decided. Calix and Zey were usually pretty well matched when it came to hand to hand combat. They trained and practiced together often, and it was common for them to take turns winning the fights.
But throughout the demonstration, Zey’s mind kept wandering to his unresolved issue with Ashe, and as a result, Calix pinned him all five rounds. After the demo, Calix took the human male off to the mess hall while Zey decided to use the training simulator to keep his mind occupied.
The simulator offered a multitude of scenarios, from realistic missions to ones of pure fantasy. Want a simple retrieval mission? There was a sim for that. Want to slay a mythical beast and rescue a fair maiden? There was a sim for that too. Want to join a friend? There were team missions as well. AI teammates were also available should you need them.
Zey donned the sensor embedded suit, strapped on the faux weapons, and entered the simulator. He took a look at his choices. His usual search and destroy mission just didn’t appeal. He scrolled down the list, and one mission caught his eye. One he usually would never have chosen.
Mission Objective: Bring the female to the final destination before time runs out.
Mission Details: Female must not be harmed. Female is unarmed and helpless. Enemies are well-armed. Mission must be completed within one galactic hour.
Mission Terrain: city limits/space/wilderness
The mission reminded him of his recent experience with Ashe. Zey selected the mission and, despite his better judgment, chose the most challenging difficulty available. With determination in his eyes and thoughts of Ashe in his heart, he took a deep breath as the mission loaded.
After leaving the greenroom, Moira took Ashe to the training room to check out the facilities. They watched two male crew members spar in the fighting ring. The males wore special covers on their feet to avoid seriously damaging each other with their talons. Instead, the foot covering had some sort of chalk where the claw would be to mark the opponent. Ashe was fascinated with the way the two males fought. No wonder Zey was so quick and strong!
The training room also had a training simulator that Ashe understood to work like virtual reality. The trainee or trainees went into the simulator in groups up to four, though some preferred to train on their own. The trainees wore special outfits with embedded sensors that detected their movements and used special weapons and gear that sent feedback to the processor. The trainees then chose a mission from the list. The idea intrigued Ashe, but the simulator was occupied when they got there. She made a mental note to check it out at another time.
“Sometimes, a male will hog the simulator for hours,” Moira explained apologetically. “Why don’t I show you the climbing wall.”
“A climbing wall? But the ceiling couldn’t be more than what, eleven or twelve feet!” Then Ashe realized that imperial measurement probably meant nothing to Moira.
“You’ll see!”
Moira led her a few short steps to the wall across from the entrance to the simulator. The ground below the wall was thickly cushioned. She opened a panel on the side Ashe had not noticed before. The panel lit up. Moira explained that it was a control for the climbing wall and showed Ashe how to adjust the difficulty. She had Ashe stand in front of the wall and chose the easiest level. A series of handholds and textured formed on the wall in front of her.
“Go ahead,” Moira encouraged. “As you climb, the wall will move you down, so you are always only ever halfway up the wall. It will keep giving you more handholds.”
Ashe started up the wall. The climb started out easy enough. Then she was stuck. She tried to shift her weight over to one foot to see if she could reach a handhold that seemed just out of reach and lost her grip. She fell the few short feet down the wall and onto the mat below. Determined, she got back on the wall, putting her hands and feet into the same places a before. This time, a textured portion of the wall lit up along with a small ledge she had not noticed previously. The wall was giving her a hint!
“I put the tutorial option on so it will give you tips and tricks. The first time, it will show you what it thinks might help you. The second time, it will give you verbal instruction. The more you climb, the more the wall will get to know your body. You are smaller than the rest of us, so the walls might give you advice that won’t work at first because of your shorter arms and legs, but it will learn and revise the strategy.”
“This is so cool!” Ashe analyzed the lit up portion of the wall and thought hard. The textured portion was slightly higher than the current location of her feet and off to the right. The handhold was also off to the right but much higher. Then she got it. She transferred both hands to the handhold that her right hand was hanging off of, then she put her left foot where her right foot was. Then she placed her right foot on the textured portion and heaved up with her arms as she used her right foot to grip the textured wall and propel herself upwards to grab the glowing handhold.
“Yes!” She did it! First lesson learned: look beyond the handholds.
A beeping noise sounded from Moira’s portable comm unit. “I need to get back to the infirmary. Can I leave you here?”
“No problem,” said Ashe. “I’ll find my way back when I’m done.”
She spared one hand to quickly wave goodbye to her friend and turned her focus back on the climbing wall. Ashe thought of the rock face that she had tried to climb on Vosthea in an attempt to escape the hungry stalker. If she was a more capable climber, the stalker would never have gotten to her. If she had been more capable in general, she would not have slowed Zey down so much. She needed to get stronger, fitter, so that she wouldn’t be such a burden should they ever be in a similar situation. Zey had promised to protect her, but she needed to do her part as well. With determination in her eyes and thoughts of Zey in her heart, she took a deep breath and continued climbing.
“So, do you think it’s going to work?” Calix asked his friend’s mate when she strolled into the mess hall and sat down at his table.
Moira shrugged noncommittally. “How long has he been in there?”
“Almost three hours,” Calix answered. “They better work things out with each other soon. He’s been moping around since we left Vosthea. It’s affecting his judgment and performance. I pinned him five times in a row! We can’t afford this while we are still in the Dominion’s crosshairs.”
Moira nodded agreement. When it came to her friend’s happiness, she wasn’t afraid to pull some strings.
Chapter 13
Zey threw his helmet down in frustration. He had tried three times to complete the mission, and each time, the female was either captured by the enemies or killed. To make matters worse, they were very close to their destination each time, and each time he had lost for a different reason.
The first time, they had been ambushed within sight of their objective. The second time, his attention was completely on avoiding and destroying the enemy forces, and as such, he did not pay enough attention to the female. He had set a trap for the enemy but had failed to warn her about it. He had called out an alarm too late, and he watched the female trigger his carefully set trap destroying them both. This last time was the most infuriating. He started the mission by being overly protective, and the female had not responded well. By the midpoint of the mission, he spent more time arguing with her than fighting the enemy. Eventually, she had stomped off in a huff and was promptly captured.
He had gone into the mission thinking of Ashe. But this AI female was not Ashe. Ashe would have fought alongside him, no matter how hopeless, during the ambush, rather than be useless dead weight. Ashe would have figured out the trap he was setting and avoided it without the need to explicitly tell her not to trigger it. And lastly, Ashe would not have acted as illogical and emotional as the third AI, especially in the face of danger. She had shown herself to be logical and resourceful by hiding the comm unit in the leaf litter at Ulrek’s camp.
He felt it almost immediately when he exited the simulator. Even before he saw Ashe’s little figure perched on the climbing wall, he felt her presence. She was wearing her tight stretchy pants, which had been cut extra short on the thighs. In her current position, it hiked up at the back to show jus
t a glimpse of her rounded bottom. The sight was remarkably sexy, and he experienced a surge of angry jealousy at the thought that she could belong to another male.
Zey couldn’t help the sudden need that gripped him. Fuck Reka 5. He’d be damned if he ever let another male have her. Mine! Ashe was his. There would be violence and bloodshed wherever she went in this galaxy; he would just need to do a better job protecting her.
She turned her head at the sound of the simulator door, and their eyes met. Her hand paused mid-reach, the motion aborted. Instead, she started down the wall. Zey couldn’t wait for her to make her way down. He was good and done waiting for her to come to him. He, the infamous Zeylum of the Defiant, the dreaded pirate of the skies, held the reputation of taking and claiming what he wanted. And by the Stars, he wanted her.
He walked purposefully to her, reached up, and plucked her off the faux rock face as if she weighed no more than a child. He turned her around and wrapped his arms around her, holding him to her with her feet dangling a good foot off the ground. He didn’t give her a chance to protest. She had been avoiding him. He was sure that given the chance, she would push him away and demand he let her go. Instead, to his surprise, she wrapped her arms and legs around him and buried her face into his neck.
“Zey, I—” she began.
Here it was, she was going to tell him she planned on staying at Reka 5. No! Zey interrupted her before the words came out.
“No, stop. Don’t even try to tell me you are leaving. You are staying on the Defiant with me. You are mine.” His words were firm, his eyes serious. Then with a softer tone, “I will strive to be a better protector for you.”
“I—,” Ashe tried again.
“You are mine,” he repeated. “I know there are things about me that aren’t great selling points. I’m arrogant, stubborn, a bit reckless, and my reputation precedes me. I can’t change who or what I am, but I treasure you. I love you with every part of my being, the good and the bad. You are my mate. You better get used to it because you are stuck with me.”