by Kyle, Celia
The addition of one hundred and seven more bodies to a crew that already numbered well over one hundred has been a lot for the Queen to take on, so Swipt and I took it upon ourselves to modify the ship’s engineering functions to better accommodate the influx. We’ve altered the life support systems and rerouted the energy cores to not only make sure the Queen stays afloat, but also to ensure the general wellbeing of everyone aboard. Being the daughter of a resort owner, I know all too well that clean, comfortable travelers are happy ones, and the crew’s morale, both Kilgari and human alike, is paramount.
All the hard work and going to bed with my hands dirty every night has made me happier than I could have ever dreamed. Back home on Glimner, my father wanted me to follow in his footsteps and take over the casino one day—despite my protests to the contrary. I’d never wanted that life. Since I was a little girl, all I’d wanted to do is fix things. I’d followed our groundskeepers and electricians, custodians and plumbers around, just to figure out how they kept the place running.
It’d never been my dream to oversee the joint. All I’d ever wanted was to be part of a crew, to make things work, and to fix what breaks. Now I’m doing exactly that. Indeed, my fingernails are so saturated with engine grease I’m not sure I’ll ever get it out.
But my happiness over our current predicament is definitely the exception to the rule. The other women are accepting of it, as we know that whatever the reason we’d been taken and cryo’ed can’t possibly have been a good one, but they miss their old lives. Despite the Kilgari’s hospitality, they want to go home. I might be the only one who doesn’t miss mine at all.
I’d done all I could to show my father I wasn’t the heiress of his dreams, even going so far as going to school to obtain an engineering degree, but he didn’t care. My mother had died giving birth to me and he’d had no other children to leave the casino to, so everything had fallen on my shoulders. It didn’t matter to him at all that I didn’t want it. I’d felt caged for years, stuck in a state of perpetual dread, just waiting to be called up into a life I wasn’t built for or interested in.
Maybe it’s strange, but here, aboard the Queen, I finally feel like I belong somewhere. My friendship with Swipt is a large part of that. He’s as kind as he is handsome and is always making me laugh, but it’s more than that. I feel… safe with him.
When I’m alone at night and my mind is quiet, filled with everything I can’t figure out how to say during the day, I wonder if maybe I’m his jalshagar. Sometimes I even allow myself to hope that I am.
The only thought that makes me doubt myself is that he hasn’t mentioned it yet.
“We now return you to your regular programming,” the news concludes, and I’m brought from my thoughts of him as Fenix Black’s melodic voice rises to an echoing crescendo. I’m just returning my eyes to the screen, wondering how anyone could be blessed with such an amazing talent, when the door to my room bursts open, revealing Swipt in all his hulking, beautifully toned glory. He’s breathing hard and fast, as if he’s run all the way from the bridge at full speed.
His golden eyes, usually so bright and full of laughter, appear stricken with panic. “Ilya! Thank the Precursors I’ve found you. I need you to come with me to the engine room right away. We’ve got a bit of a situation on our hands and you’re the only one I trust to help me get us out of this mess.”
The urgency in his voice leaves no room for questions or debate. I waste no time rising from the bed and taking his outstretched hand. Whether from carelessness or shock at the feel of his skin against mine, the holovid player topples from my lap and crashes unceremoniously to the floor, abruptly cutting off the intro to Fenix’s most popular tune as he pulls me into the corridor.
Fenix will just have to wait. I’ve got a hottie to help.
Chapter Three
Swipt
I don’t even think about what I’m doing.
The moment we leave the room, I reach for Ilya and take her hand in mine. The touch of her skin is maddening. A million volts rush down my spine, my whole body heats, and it feels as I’ve just fallen prisoner to a supernova’s gravity pull. I was half-expecting this to happen, but I can’t say that I was prepared. After all, and as crazy as it may sound, this is the first time I’m actually touching her.
That, of course, is by design.
I was stricken the first time I laid my eyes on her, and I didn’t want to break the spell by touching her. What if I touched her only to find out she isn’t my jalshagar? According to the old traditions, the moment you kiss your fated mate, every single cell in your body responds accordingly, and I wasn’t ready to break the illusion. Sure, to have her hand in mine isn’t the same thing as kissing her, but there’s no denying the way my body reacts.
I have to make a conscious effort to keep my wits about me as we navigate through the endless maze of corridors inside the Ancestral Queen, her tiny hand tucked in mine. The simple warmth of her skin is enough to make my heart pump boiling blood through my veins, and every single thought I have swirls in my head like a paper kite during a thunderstorm.
It’s hell to focus, but I do it anyway. After all, an IHC warship ready to blow us into a million little pieces is a great mental energizer. Yeah, sure, it feels nice to be with Ilya, but that doesn’t change the fact that we’re minutes away from being boarded by IHC soldiers and potentially ending up on the wrong side of an airlock.
Calm down, you idiot, I think. She might not be your mate. You’re just wired on adrenaline.
“What is going on?” Ilya’s soft voice is enough to pierce through the fog that settled on my mind. Still dragging her after me, I look back at her over my shoulder. Her blue eyes send a shiver up my spine, and I tighten my fingers around hers.
Focus, you idiot, I admonish myself.
“There’s an IHC warship on our tail,” I tell her, breaking eye contact with her as we squeeze ourselves past two Kilgari mechanics performing maintenance on one of the air filters. They follow us with their gaze, probably surprised to see the ship’s pilot in such a hurry, but I don’t pay them any heed. “They’re fifteen minutes away from our position, and they want to board. These guys are looking for the Frontier’s cargo.”
“Oh,” she mutters, processing what I’ve just told her. “Shit.”
“Yeah, that’s the word I’d use,” I say. “We gotta get the hell out of the sector, but we need to mask the phase inducers so that—”
“So that they don’t see that we’re revving up the engines,” she cuts me off. Now with purpose fueling her, she goes from walking hurriedly to straight up running. It doesn’t take long before she’s dragging me toward the engine room. The moment we find it, she punches the panel that forces the doors open and then inputs the access codes. Usually, only the senior engineers and commanding officers aboard a ship have the access codes to the engine room, but Ilya’s expertise as a greaser girl has earned her that right pretty fast—only a few days after she came aboard.
When the doors slide open, Ilya rushes into the room and grabs one of the power tools attached to a service box on the wall. Without saying a word, she walks toward the massive dual-block engine and starts removing bolt after bolt so she can access the main wiring.
“All right,” I start to say, “we need to bypass the jumpstart mechanism since the engine won’t recognize the phase inducers after we mask them, and then we—”
She stops what she’s doing and then turns around so she’s facing me. “No offense, but I know how to mask a power transfer without blowing up an engine,” she tells me, the confidence in her voice somehow making her even more attractive. I don’t even know how that’s possible, but here we are. “Now, help me with these panels.”
With that, she tosses the power tool toward me and I grab it mid-air. Mimicking what she was doing, I remove more of the panels as Ilya connects her datapad to the main wiring. An array of lights, sensors, and readout dashboards take over her screen.
“Swipt, come in,”
Solair’s voice comes out of my comms unit. “What’s your status? The Prestige has sped up. They’re less than eight minutes away now.” He sounds calm and collected, but I can feel the tension in his voice. If the IHC warship has decided to speed up, that means they’re playing it safe. The bastards want to get the drop on us, probably afraid we’re planning an escape.
Well, they’re right.
“We’re doing it,” I reply, holding the small communication unit in front of my mouth. “Ilya, how much longer?”
“It’ll take as long as it takes,” she replies without even looking at me, her hands switching between her datapad and the wiring. She’s moving fast, her movements so precise and calculated I believe she’d be able to do this blindfolded. I just hope her expertise will translate into timely results, or else we’re all fucked.
“Huh, just a couple more minutes, Cap’n.” Clicking the comms unit off, I strap it to my belt and then kneel beside Ilya. She has already removed the phase inducers from inside the panels, long blocks of circuitry encased in a blueish electronics gel, and is now reprogramming them with her datapad. “All right, what do you need me to do?”
“I need you to be quiet,” she mutters under her breath, blowing a stray lock of auburn hair away from her face. Her eyebrows are knitted together, and her expression is one of deep focus. “How much longer do we have?”
“Four minutes now,” I reply, a lone bead of sweat rolling down the side of my face. As if on cue, my comms unit comes alive once more, Solair’s voice and a healthy dose of static exploding into the room.
“Where’s my damn engines?” Solair barks, no longer sounding calm. His words are fraught with tension, and I can already imagine him pacing the length of the bridge, looking over everyone’s shoulders as he tries to digest the information on every terminal. “The bastards have requested us to start the docking procedure, Swipt. What the fuck are you two doing down here?”
“Just a couple more minutes, sir,” I reply, Solair’s harsh tone making me slip into formality. “We’re getting there.”
“What does he think we’re doing down here?” Ilya whispers, frowning. “Making out?” Suddenly, a bright spark bursts out from one of the phase inducers, and Ilya instinctively takes her hand off the block. “Goddamnit.”
“What? Is it working?”
“No, wait,” she mutters. “I just have to…” She trails off, retreating into a focused silence, and then taps her datapad a couple more times. Exhaling sharply, she starts placing the phase inducers back into their compartments and connecting the wiring to the engine. I follow her lead, working as fast as I can, and we manage to get it done in less than thirty seconds. Not bad.
“It’s done,” I say into my comms unit. “Start prepping the Ancestral Queen for superluminal speed. I’m on my way there.”
“Do we still have time?” Ilya asks me, wiping the sweat off her brow. Even though she sounded confident while she was working, now she’s turned pale, her hands trembling slightly. “What happens now?”
“Now we get to the bridge,” I tell her. “And we buckle up.”
Chapter Four
Ilya
“That power transfer was perfect.” Running toward the bridge at full speed, Swipt still finds the time to look at me and smile.
My insides clench as I look into his eyes, and my knees grow weak. That’s probably the adrenaline doing its work—after all, time is running short, and we’re not exactly in the clear.
“I like power transfers,” I tell him, forcing a pale smile onto my lips. “I’m not too shabby at it. I’ll show you one of these days.” Only when the words slip out from between my lips do I realize the stupidity in what I’ve just said. “I mean, I’m talking about the mechanics of it. I know you’re good at it too, but…”
I shut up before I continue babbling like an idiot. I just wanted to talk about engines, so why the hell does it sound like I’m talking about the mechanics of something else entirely? It seems like whenever I’m standing next to Swipt my brain refuses to cooperate.
“I’m pretty decent at power transfers too,” he tells me, and warm blood rushes up to my cheeks. His delivery is dead pan, but I can’t shake the feeling that neither of us is talking about engines or phase inducers. “If we survive this, I’ll show you a trick or two.”
“Can’t wait.” The words claw their way up my throat before I can stop them, and I have to make a conscious effort not to smack my forehead. Why the hell can’t I control my own thoughts? The idea of having Swipt teach me about the “mechanics of a power transfer” is enough to make my head spin.
The mechanics of a bedroom power transfer, my inner voice says. Now that’s the right kind of engineering. Gritting my teeth, I make a mental vow not to say anything else until we reach the bridge. I’ve spent so much time crawling in dark compartments, fixing engines and faulty wiring, that my mind has learned to have a constant chatter with itself to compensate for the lack of actual conversation.
“How much time do we have left?” Swipt asks as we burst onto the bridge. Everyone’s on edge, every single Kilgari sitting at a terminal shouting out the data on their screen while Solair fires a dozen different orders in rapid succession.
“One minute,” Solair says, relief washing over his face as he sees us walk in. “They’ve already started their approach toward us. I had to start the docking protocol so they wouldn’t suspect anything.” Turning around, Solair then focus on me, his imposing stature and long horns making me feel as if I’m a tenth of his size. “Are you sure the phase inducers have been masked correctly? We can’t afford to screw this up. If they detect a power surge they’re going to—”
“She’s done it perfectly,” Swipt replies before I can speak. He gives me one quick smile, and then darts toward the center of the bridge. Standing behind the pilot’s chair, he taps Lokyer on the shoulder; without saying a word, the navigation officer jumps out from the chair and offers Swipt the controls.
“All right, let’s have some fun,” he says, now more confident than he was a few minutes ago. Like a true pilot, he shines best whenever he’s sitting behind the controls of a ship. His confidence is contagious. As I join the rest of the crew and strap myself to a seat, I can’t stop myself from believing everything’s going to be all right. Just as long as Swipt is piloting the ship, there’s no way the IHC warship is catching up to us.
“Drives are at full power. Engine is ready,” he announces, never looking away from his screen. He flicks a couple of switches on his terminal, and then looks at one of the screens by his side. “The warship is twenty seconds away from touchdown, but they’re maintaining thrust. They have no idea our engines are ready to go. Permission to make these bastards eat space dust?”
“Permission granted,” Solair says. “Get us the hell out of here.”
“Hang tight,” Swipt mutters, more to himself than to the rest of us, and then he lays his hands on the controls. The moment he does it, the G force intensifies until it feels like I have a brickhouse sitting on top of my chest. I’m pushed back against my seat, it gets harder to breath, and my brain feels like it’s been thrown inside a blender. I have to make a conscious effort to keep my eyes open, an attempt at remaining conscious.
“We’ve entered superluminal speed and the Prestige has fired her torpedoes,” I hear Swipt shout, his voice coming at me as if he were standing on the other side of the galaxy. “Torpedoes incoming.” Before I even have the time to process the meaning behind his words, he banks the ship starboard, the straps on my seat digging into my shoulders hard enough to almost dislocate them.
“Evasive maneuvers,” Grantian says, adding his voice to the chorus of officers shouting status updates.
“Brace for impact,” Swipt shouts once more, and this time I detect a note of panic in his voice. I look at him to see the muscles on his shoulders and neck bulging under the effort he’s putting in, his biceps straining against the fabric of his shirt, and my mouth goes dry as I notice the anxiety
etched on his face. He tries to swerve the ship once more, but it’s impossible to avoid being hit by at least one of the torpedoes.
Gripping the armrests on my seat, I look at the screen in front of me and watch as Swipt guides our ship through a volley of torpedoes coming our way. He twists and turns the ship as it increases its superluminal speed and we almost make it, until one torpedo grazes the hull. Without a direct impact, it takes some time for it to detonate, but when it does the lights on the bridge immediately start flickering.
“Status report,” Solair bellows.
“We’ve been hit,” one Kilgari sitting behind me replies. “No major structural damage, but we’re losing power.” He doesn’t need to say a word more for me to know that the engine has been affected by the detonation. Without even thinking of the consequences that come with not being strapped in during high-G maneuvers, I take my seatbelt off and jump out of the seat.
Standing behind Swipt, I narrow my eyes and look at his screen, doing my best to think straight while having a scrambled brain inside my skull. Eventually, though, the data on his screen makes sense.
“Disconnect the auxiliary drives,” I tell him, “and divert the rest of the power through the main ones. We might fry them, but at least it’ll give the engine a good kick. It should be enough to keep some distance between us and the Prestige.”
Swipt doesn’t say a word, nor does he look back at me.
Instead, he just trusts what I’ve told him and acts without thinking. Tapping his screen a couple of times, he diverts the power to the main drives and the lights on the bridge immediately stop flickering.
“You just saved our collective asses, Ilya,” he says past gritted teeth, his eyes never leaving his screen.
“Thank me later,” I mutter, a sinking feeling in my stomach as I look at the radar. “These guys are not giving up.”