by S. E. Smith
Ketsia steeled herself for the double agony of leaving and re-entering 3D space. She doubled over, her mouth wrenching open in a silent scream. Razors shredded her skin, hammers smashed her bones, and burning knives pierced her body. Her heart forced its way into her throat with the thought that Jagger could be suffering worse.
And his torture wouldn’t end after a few measly seconds.
Entering the interior shuttle bay presented no problem, since Ketsia had blasted out of the same bay in Banshee not long before. The Ithians weren’t expecting a rescue so quickly—if they were expecting one at all—and Specter’s four heavily armed crewmembers surrounded by a host of armored, hover-tech Coyote attack drones from Specter’s arsenal made for an effective insertion team.
“Find Jagger,” Ketsia instructed Luna, and the little StarDog scampered off at a run, nose to the ground, leading the way through the corridors. One of the oval drones shadowed the little tracker, providing cover. It was Adini who’d suggested bringing the StarDog to ferret out Jagger, now that the data she’d smuggled was safe back on Acumen.
They surprised an Ithian when their group rounded a turn. Pram! He locked eyes with Ketsia and raised his weapon. The drone dropped him with a stunner before she could react.
“I’ll get him,” Taro whispered, pulling a gag and carbon restraints from his gear belt. “Keep going. I’ll catch up.” He knelt to secure the man’s hands.
Two of the drones stayed with Taro while Ket, Drea, and Adini pushed on, following the determined StarDog. Luna suddenly zigged to the right and jumped up to splay her paws against a closed seal.
“Stand back,” Drea warned, and blew the seal with a blast of her kinetic gun.
Ketsia entered the cabin with the team through a cloud of swirling smoke and dust…
To find a towering Rinn standing at his command station with weapon aimed.
“Where’s Dallan?” Ketsia demanded.
Rinn fired, but the energy bursts bounced off the Coyote drone that interceded. The Ithian stared, wide-eyed, before quickly assessing each of the heavily-armed intruders and menacing attack drones. “Who the devil are you?”
“Vengeance,” Drea replied. “Now where is he?”
“Dead,” Rinn snapped. “We blew him out the airlock for his treachery.”
“No,” Ket choked.
Drea stepped forward. “He’s lying. They didn’t have time to learn all they needed to know.”
“Wrong. We got every shred of information we needed from Captain…Navene…Jagger,” Rinn declared. “And then we spaced him.”
Ket sank to her knees. She was too late.
No. No, she couldn’t believe that. She wouldn’t. Rinn was lying. Jagger wouldn’t…
Ketsia straightened, squaring her shoulders to face the Ithian. “What’s my name?”
Rinn glared at her in silence.
“You don’t know.”
“I don’t care.”
“He didn’t tell you. Not yet. He’s still alive.”
Luna had skittered to one side of the room and was turning in tight circles in front of a seal, barking.
Drea took aim at the admiral. “He’s in there?”
“Killing me isn’t going to get you an answer.”
Drea arched one brow. “I don’t need to kill you.” She fired her weapon, and Rinn reeled backward, howling in agony.
Drea held her weapon at low-ready. “Cell stunner. Hurts like Hades, doesn’t it?”
The Ithian’s face gradiated from red to purple. “You’ll pay for that.”
Drea quirked a brow. “Bill me.”
A group of eight Ithians swarmed into the room, weapons drawn, and surrounded them.
Drea pulled Ketsia and Adini closer, and one of the drones generated a plasma shield around them. The guards fired their laze-pistols, but the bolts skittered off the shield.
“Looks like a standoff,” Drea challenged.
“Looks like you’re surrounded,” Rinn countered.
“Wrong,” Taro’s voice came from the entrance behind the Ithians. One spun to fire, but a drone picked him off.
“I believe we have the clear advantage,” Drea announced. “So here are your options. We drop your men in their tracks, or you open that seal.”
Rinn glared at each of them in turn. Then he reached for a device. When four people and five drones took aim, he turned aside and pointed it.
The seal opened.
In a small room beyond, a dark-haired man slumped forward in a chair, his hands carbon-bonded behind him. Ketsia rushed to him. “Jag!”
The man stirred. Tried to raise his head. Blood dripped from his nose, his eyes were blackened, his flightsuit torn to tattered shreds along with the flesh beneath it.
Drea turned and fired her weapon at each of the Ithians, dropping them all. “Payback,” she growled. “They’ll live.”
Jagger managed to open one swollen eye when Ketsia tenderly cradled his face. “Ket. You came back?”
“Damned right I did.”
He shook his head in dismay. “You shouldn’t have.”
Ket gingerly cupped his face in her hands. “I didn’t come alone.”
A uniformed officer stepped up behind Ketsia. “She brought reinforcements,” the woman said in a voice Jagger knew only too well.
“Drea.” Gods, was he dreaming? Was he dead?
“That’s right, Flyboy.”
“How…?” That was question number one in a list of about five thousand that were backlogged in the heavy fog inside his head.
“As it happened,” Drea said, “I was with Jaeo on Acumen when Ketsia came blasting out of DEDspace. Alone.”
“You brought her back.”
“She made one damned convincing argument.”
Jagger blinked and tried to refocus on Ketsia. “I owe you.”
“Big time,” she agreed.
Her words went straight to his heart and did a lap or two inside. He gave his best shot at a jaunty smile, split lip and all. “I know how you can be when you set your mind on something.”
Ket drew a lase-blade to cut his bonds then slid her arms around his shoulders, tugging him into a tender embrace, her warm breath fanning over his neck. With what little strength he had left, he squeezed her back, yielding to bow his head against her shoulder.
He was pretty sure everyone present got the communique that their bond was much deeper than casual allies. Drea included.
He didn’t care.
Ket was the one who mattered now.
Drea cleared her throat. “You two about done with your reunion?”
Jagger’s eyes cut to Drea before settling back on Ketsia’s beautiful, food-for-the-starving face. “Not by a long shot,” he said, and leaned forward to kiss Ket—with meaning—in front of Drea and the whole uneasy, shuffling group.
“Time to evac,” Taro said quietly. “Let’s get to Specter and close out this happy ending before these rogues wake up.”
Epilogue
Five Weeks Later
Carduwan Fifth Fleet Command Center
Talstar Station
Ketsia smiled as Jaeo—Ambassador Gant—shook the hand of the newly appointed commanding officer of Meritorious.
Jagger.
“Congratulations,” Jaeo said. “Well earned and deserved.”
“Thank you, Your Excellency.”
“Oh, come now. Let’s dispense with the formalities. You did me—all of us—a great service in seeing that the data got through safely.” Jaeo turned his head to look at Ketsia. “As well as the sacrifices you made for your passenger.”
Ketsia tensed. She suspected her adopted father knew they were more than comrades-in-arms. She just wasn’t sure if he suspected it had gone as far as comrades-in-bed. And she didn’t know how he’d react when he found out.
If he found out.
Or if it even mattered now.
After a brief recovery on Acumen, a few short days in which she and Jagger had spent nearly every waking mome
nt together, he’d returned to Talstar and all communication had stopped.
They’d talked about a lot of things before he’d left—their pasts, their time together in the Rift—but never the future. When the Fifth Fleet summoned him home, he’d exited her life as quickly as he’d entered it. As if he’d never been part of it at all.
At Admiral Kareek’s invitation, she’d arrived with Ambassador and Mrs. Gant for the Command ceremony yesterday, but this was the closest she’d gotten to Jagger.
Maybe he really was the cold, aloof, unreachable Jagger she’d once believed him to be. Her heart didn’t want to accept that, but why else would he stay away?
“It seems,” Jaeo said, tilting his head to rub a hand over his neck, “I have a small problem and could use your help, Captain.”
Jagger’s gaze flicked to her before boldly meeting the ambassador’s eyes. “What would the problem be, sir?”
“The Banshee, actually.”
Ket took her lower lip in her teeth. Did he suspect something had happened between them?
Jagger, looking very sober, replied, “I don’t get your meaning.”
“It seems the ship needs a new home. With Spirit’s final refitting to serve the House of Planets nearly complete, Banshee lost her berth. My brother’s museum pieces have all been moved to the Historical Archives on LaGuardia, but the only way they could accommodate his original prototype is to clip her wings, as it were. She’d be reduced to a static display and never fly again.”
“They can’t do that!” Jagger said quickly, with Ketsia echoing his distress. Banshee was too special to become a shell of her former self. And the vessel clearly meant as much to Jagger now as it meant to her.
“I agree. That’s why I spoke to Admiral Kareek. He agreed a craft as noteworthy as Banshee should be preserved, so he’s arranged a berth for the ship here at Talstar’s museum. These young cadets coming through the academy,” Jaeo nodded to a group milling near the refreshments, “should have an opportunity to see her. To know what she represents. Maybe even be granted a cruise as a special incentive. I agreed on one condition: that you take ownership of the vessel. Oversee her complete restoration. Keep her in good flying order.”
“You’re offering Banshee…to me?”
“Consider her a bonus for job very well done.”
He glanced at Ketsia. “Sir. You’re serious?”
Jaeo reached out to grip his shoulder. “Banshee is yours, Jagger.” Ket started when her guardian’s keen eyes found hers. “But I think perhaps you two have some other important matters to work out, so I’ll let you talk in private.”
Jagger watched Jaeo saunter over to Lonna’s side, before his unreadable gaze settled on Ketsia. She took an uncertain step closer. Jagger had an impressive new ship to command and a full set of responsibilities to fulfill. It seemed he had no room for her in his life now.
“You look beautiful,” he said quietly.
“I could say the same for you.” Ketsia took in Jagger’s perfectly turned-out dress uniform and his handsome, now-healed face. “I’d hoped to talk…before now.”
He gave a slight nod. “I had to sort some things out.” He bowed his head. “When I told you I didn’t deserve you, I really meant it.”
“You’re wrong.” She glanced out the port at the magnificent new battleship docked there. “But I guess you have everything you want now.”
“Ket…” His eyes grew more solemn.
“It’s all right. I get it.” She pulled in and exhaled a quiet breath. “This is your life now. This is what you do.”
“I owe you an explanation. I shouldn’t have gone quiet like I did, but…well, you’re right. This is my life.” He paused, set his teeth on edge, glanced toward the spot where Jaeo and Lonna were chatting. “I’d have so little to offer you. I’ll be deployed for most of the next three calendars. Now that the House of Planets has declared the rogues a threat and dissolved the Compact, the Fleet will have a major undertaking bringing the renegades to heel. If we tried to make a go of it, well…we wouldn’t see much of each other. How would that be fair to you?”
She gave a small shrug. “It wouldn’t matter, Jag. It wouldn’t change how I feel. It’s just distance…just time…”
“Good answer,” he said softly. He reached out to take her hand in a gentle hold. “Ket, I don’t know quite how to say this…”
Ket’s heart fled her body, looking for safer shores. Looking for somewhere to land where it wouldn’t break. How had she fallen so hard for a man who didn’t—or couldn’t—love her back?
“Because I’ve never given a woman a ring before,” he finished.
Ket blinked. “You…?”
He drew his other hand from his pocket, and held out a small, black satin box. “Ketsia…I’d like to offer you this First Promise ring. If you accept, it means we’re both committing to making a future together. No matter the obstacles.”
He released her hand to open the box, revealing a shining gold band set with a Nebula Opal, the stone alive with swirling clouds of color.
“Oh!” Ket gasped, before meeting his eyes. “It looks like the Rift.”
A corner of his mouth turned up. “That’s why I chose it. Because we can see in it whatever we want to see.”
“Just like our future?”
He lifted the ring free and held it between his thumb and forefinger. “If you’ll still have me.”
“You think,” Ketsia answered softly, “that I’d ever have anyone else?”
Jag shifted closer.
A flash of black and white came scampering across the deck, and Ket bent to catch her. “Luna!” The little StarDog scrambled up to her shoulders, chattering.
“She refused be left out of these negotiations,” Jaeo said, closing the door to Luna’s crate and straightening. He gave a wave of his hand. “Carry on.”
Ketsia smiled and raised her chin. “Captain, I accept your First Promise with one condition. It has to come with a Last Promise as part of the set.”
He broke into a wide smile and gave her a jaunty nod. “That’s my plan.”
Ketsia laughed as the little StarDog jumped from her shoulder to Jagger’s to coo in his ear while he slipped the ring onto her finger.
“We’ll find a way to make this work, Ket.”
“I know we will.” She cupped Jagger’s clean-cut cheek in her palm before reaching up to stroke the StarDog’s head. “And Luna says she wouldn’t have it any other way.”
Jagger pulled her into his arms and kissed her soundly while the little StarDog looked on, chittering happily.
When first asked back to pen a story for this collection, I was stumped. Did I have another Pets+Space idea in me? Turns out, I did. The brash Captain Jagger and the enchanting Ketsia were always destined to share a star-crossed adventure, I just hadn’t realized a feisty little dog-cat-weasel-mongoose would charm her way into the mix. Courting Disaster is a sequel to both Inherit the Stars and StarDog.
Taro’s “longer story for another time” (StarDog) is a free bonus via Instafreebie (link below). I hope these StarDogs and their human sidekicks will be perfect guides into the Inherited Stars universe.
Also by Laurie A. Green
StarDog (free on Instafreebie)
Inherit the Stars
Farewell Andromeda
About the Author
Laurie A. Green is a three-time RWA Golden Heart® finalist, an award-winning author, and a science fiction romance enthusiast who founded the SFR Brigade community of writers, which is now over 1,000 members strong.
She confesses to being an Andromeda Galaxy groupie and would someday love to own a vacation home on Mars or Titan. She's enthused to be a part of this wonderful anthology mash-up of two of her favorite things--pets and space.
Her family includes her husband, David, five dogs, three cats and several horses, all who reside on a ranch in beautiful New Mexico. A former military budget director and reserve state trooper, she now spends her time writing, networ
king, researching, enjoying the Southwestern lifestyle and, naturally, stargazing and daydreaming about other worlds.
www.laurieagreen.com/
Sensate
A Novella in the Alien Attachments Series
By
Sabine Priestley
About Sensate
Marco Dar’s position as an Earth Protector means he spends an incredible amount of time alone in space. His only company is with the talkative com unit. It isn’t until he stops at the Galaxy Spinner restaurant that he discovers his com has become sentient – and it wants a physical form!
Dr. Zara Mancini hasn’t seen Marco Dar in over eleven years. As far as she is concerned, that still isn’t long enough. When Marco approaches her with an unusual request, she is torn between her fascination with the project, and wanting to leave him eating her space dust.
Marco is quickly falling all over again for Zara’s beautiful smile and gorgeous lips. Young and foolish, he sabotaged their relationship years ago. Now he has a second chance. Can he convince Zara to help his AI, and prove to her that he is a different man?
One
“Was that a joke?” Marco Dar eyed his com unit.
“I felt it had an element of humor. Was I mistaken?”
“No, it was damn funny.”
“Then why did you make the inquiry? I don’t understand.”
Was he really having a conversation with his com unit? Given that he was alone on the transporter, that would be affirmative. Too long solo in space. Good thing they would be on Aires soon. “I’m just surprised you’re developing a sense of humor.”
“I believe it has to do with the Earth’s internet. When you gave me access, it was...how should I say...transformative.”
The nav system chimed, and his com reported a moment later. “We have the approach vector and dock assignment from the Aires spaceport.”