Chapter Twenty-Seven
*Trigger warning: Mentions of vomit due to motion sickness, but no emesis*
Aphrodite stepped out of the shuttle into a hangar of floating levels.
Parking ships sat on orbiting platforms around a massive pillar of a space stations.
All the platforms were covered in a bubble and the floors lit up with sensors.
With every step, she could feel the platform learning the gravity needed to keep her against the floor.
As all the settings around her fluctuated, she felt her breathers whirl to life.
Xexis kept her on his arm, guiding her across the floor to the chute at the end of their platform.
A clear tube ran from the platform to the ring around the station.
She watched as people were ripped up the chute like a waterslide running backwards.
Xexis put her in front of him. Her heart raced as Quagmor lay feet first onto the chute platform.
Then, with no mercy, he was ripped up by his toes.
The pressure shot him through the chute and onto the other side where he stood up without a single moment of hesitation.
Aphrodite was trying not to let it show on her face as she stepped onto the platform.
Buddy cuddled down into her chest underneath her top.
Xexis helped her lay down on her back. No warning.
No heads up. No countdown. The second she was on her back, she was snatched unceremoniously through the tube. I didn’t even have time to scream.
Her world spun as she was shoved out the other side and the pressure tossed her up onto her feet.
Aphrodite flailed with her arms out. Stumbling forward, she had a hand on Quagmor for support.
Vomit pressed against her esophagus. She chewed all the contents, which wasn’t a lot, back.
It had been a mistake to eat on the ship ride over.
Hands engulfed her and pulled her tight into Xexis’ chest. Quagmor took something from his pockets and stuffed it into her hand.
A neon pink cough drop in clear wrapping.
She popped it into her mouth without question.
Probably not wise. Her stomach settled as a thick, chalky flavor coated the back of her throat and traveled down to her stomach.
The flavor wasn’t close to anything she’d ever tasted. It was, however, vaguely cough syrupy.
As it settled and she was able to walk, Quagmor popped one into his own mouth. “Not to worry, Mphronatch, it’s something you’ll adjust to.”
“Please tell me we do not have to do that to get back down to the ship.” She asked to Xexis with desperation.
He gave her the weakest grimace and she bemoaned her future return to the shuttle. Xexis held her close and rubbed her back as they walked after the group. No one else seemed to be half as upset as her stomach. They couldn’t just use, like, stairs? She tried not to pout the whole walk.
The Council station was a long, vertical spike full of spinning sections.
She could see people leaving and coming to the Council in small packs.
Her disgust for the tube was gone as she realized…
she didn’t know half of the species she found.
Hundreds of people were mingling, chatting, walking, reading, laughing in hundreds of different languages.
Her heart hammered as she pulled Buddy out of her chest. He wobbled but eventually rose to the air above her. “There’s so many people here.”
“The Council is vast,” Xnasis sighed dreamily, spreading his arms. Aphrodite spun slowly, absorbing the traffic.
From people who looked like elves of every color with horns, to bees with long legs that wore pants, and even gray aliens like she’d seen in story books.
There were a plethora of sizes and sounds around her.
It buzzed in her chest. We truly weren’t alone in the stars.
She beamed up at Xexis like a child in a candy store. He quirked a brow, “You are pleased.”
“It’s…nothing like what they said meeting other species would be,” she breathed, choking up as she took one last look before they were stuffed in another elevator.
“They kept preaching the universe as this scary place full of beings that would hurt us and yet, here everyone is, just like every other space station I’ve been on. It’s magical.”
Quagmor nudged her with one of his elbows. “Just wait till you see the library.”
He made a rainbow arch with his hands and made a ‘boom’ sound before he chuckled.
Aphrodite dug her fingers into Xexis, bouncing on her toes.
The doors behind them hissed open and they spun to enter the spiral tower of moving rooms and stars.
It was a colosseum of sensors, lights, drones, and papers all flying at different speeds. Her jaw dropped.
She stumbled out of the elevator, hands falling to the railing keeping her from falling into the endless depths of the station.
Trailing up the walkways and rooms, it was like the inside of a clock.
If the clock was made by super high tech.
Brimming, she wheeled to face Xexis. Only, her happiness was short lived.
He was staring down the walkway with bristling rage.
She could see it in the way his pincers clenched and unclenched.
“Xnasis!” Xexis hissed, snatching his brother by the arm. “What is Reevar doing here? He is supposed to be home and resting.”
“I sent him ahead.” Xnasis ripped his arm from his brother’s grip. “Watch your tone.”
“I am Kannatch. Hunters are my domain.” Xexis bristled, his skin turning a dark green.
“And the security of our people is mine. Find your place, Xexis.” He nodded toward Aphrodite before scowling at Xexis.
They spoke in Vrozian, fast and angry. Spitting words like daggers back and forth, Aphrodite glanced at Quagmor for translation.
He shook his head, glancing away. Her heart sank.
Wait, no! Why? She was under the impression she was greeted, loved, and wanted by the crown prince.
Why were her mate and his brother snarling at each other.
It stopped when Reevar slipped out of the crowd he hid in and slid between her and the brothers. “Kannatch, I volunteered.”
“I can keep my mate safe,” Xexis spat.
“Fqa was under your protection as well, Kannatch.” Xnasis turned the air into frozen tension.
Aphrodite was a stone statue, staring at her mate.
Xexis’ shoulders tensed and his face twisted in pure rage.
Yet, she could see it. The light tremble in his clenched fists.
The shame in his pincers flattening against his mouth.
The sharp inhale through his nose. Aphrodite stepped forward.
All three men jerked to stare at her. She put a gentle hand to one of Xexis’ biceps and gazed up at him tenderly.
As he relaxed, she looked between the others.
“I appreciate the concern for my safety, but I am quite capable of protecting myself as well. As I assume Reevar told you, it was my intel who told him how to kill Fqa when he was possessed.”
“Mphronatch, no one is saying you are less than any hunter,” Xnasis bowed his head softly. “But your government has done much worse for less.”
Oh, like I don’t fucking know that. Her lips fell into a thin line. “I would know best, I’ve been living under their control my whole life. If they were going to hurt me, they wouldn’t do it at the door to the elevators. Public execution is an archaic practice. They’re more subtle.”
“How would they do it?” Reevar interjected with a raised brow muscle.
She exhaled slowly, gazing out across the Council floors. There were too many people to count, coming and going across platforms. The words fell out of her lips. “They’d find a way to get me away from everyone, to disarm me, make me unable to fight back, then they’d do it quietly.”
“Let’s not get too ahead of ourselves,” Quagmor laughed, waving his hands near them. “No one’s saying the humans would assassinate the Mphronatch for a simple misunderstanding.”
Except, that’s exactly what Xnasis and Reevar were saying.
It seemed between last night’s merriment and arriving at the Council station, Aphrodite’s life became delicate.
She wasn’t sure how Xnasis came to that conclusion, but she appreciated the effort.
Turning to face her mate, she stroked his arm sweetly.
“Let’s get this over with? Then we can go home. ”
“Yes,” Xexis and Xnasis met eye to eye and nodded, “Let’s.”
The group wound down an escalator and descended into the Council station.
Her skin was covered in goosebumps. She watched every movement around her.
Typing onto her data pad without letting her eyes look at the text box, she spoke to Buddy.
Someone is trying to kill me. Keep a clear exit and ensure you track movement.
Buddy chirped but did not speak back. His orange beam scanned over the group once before he bobbed at her shoulder.
The cool touch of his metal against the thin fabric over her shoulders was comforting.
Aphrodite kept her shoulders back. The humans wouldn’t try something this silly.
But she knew better than to hope they would back down.
Humans are resilient, they’re stubborn, they refuse to back down.
If she’d slighted her own government, she wasn’t sure what they’d do.
Or what they were willing to do to keep her from spilling secrets.
They passed through another bubble barrier that glowed green with each person that passed through it.
The escalator ended on a flat, sparkling chrome platform.
She glanced up at the sensors along the edge of the film, seeing it scanning above and below.
Another identification tactic. If this were a more pleasant visit she would try to steal that idea for Buddy.
Identification scanners would be helpful on a hunt.
Xexis leaned into her, and breathed in her ear, “My mate, you are safe.”