Chapter 6 Deck the Halls with Plasma Fire
Deck the Halls with Plasma Fire
Ober
The distress signal cuts through hyperspace like a blade, and every enhanced sense I possess screams danger before my conscious mind can process the words.
“Mayday, mayday, this is OOPS convoy Winter Supply, we are under attack—” The transmission dissolves into static and plasma fire, but not before I catch the terror in the pilot’s voice. Young. Probably their first run to the outer rim.
“PIP, plot intercept course,” Noomi orders, already moving toward the weapon controls before catching herself. Right. No weapons. Because my brilliant, reformed partner decided that good intentions were more important than staying alive.
“Noomi,” I start, my tail lashing with the need to hunt, to protect, to tear apart whatever’s threatening innocents. “If it’s Krax—”
“Then we help them anyway.” Her voice is steel wrapped in determination, and the way she says it—like she’d rather die than abandon people who need her—makes every territorial instinct I possess roar to life. “I won’t let him destroy more families.”
Mine. The thought pulses through me with primal certainty. This woman, this magnificent creature who’d fly into hell itself to deliver Christmas presents, belongs to me in ways that have nothing to do with possession and everything to do with recognition. She’s my match, my equal, my—
“Dropping out of hyperspace in thirty seconds,” PIP announces. “Fair warning: long-range scans show three hostile vessels and multiple debris fields. This is going to be unpleasant.”
The Wandering Star shudders back into normal space, and the sight that greets us makes my claws extend involuntarily.
The OOPS convoy—five courier ships laden with mixed cargo—is scattered across space like broken toys.
Two of them are badly damaged, atmosphere venting in thin streams while emergency systems struggle to maintain life support.
One ship lists heavily to starboard, its engines dark but hull intact.
The two undamaged ships are running for their lives, pursued by Krax’s elegant killers—three interceptors in perfect formation, with a fourth ship hanging back like a predator watching its pack hunt.
“Those bastards,” Noomi breathes, her hands flying over the controls with deadly precision. “They’re not trying to capture anything. They’re just causing maximum damage.”
I can smell her rage, sharp and clean and absolutely lethal. This is the woman I fell in love with—not the sweet courier who delivers hope to lonely families, but the brilliant predator who’d burn down the galaxy to protect what she cares about.
“Contact the survivors,” I growl, keying my comm to the OOPS emergency frequency. “OOPS vessels, this is Captain Kraine aboard Wandering Star. We’re moving to assist.”
“Captain Kraine?” The voice that responds is young, female, and barely controlled panic.
“Sir, this is Courier Strava aboard Lucky Strike. They came out of nowhere—just started firing. No demands, no warnings. We’ve got families’ Christmas packages mixed in with medical supplies. They’re destroying everything!”
The anguish in her voice makes something violent unfurl in my chest. These aren’t just military targets or criminal shipments.
These are supplies for isolated colonies, medicine for the sick, and yes—Christmas packages from families who scraped together shipping fees to send love across impossible distances.
And Krax is destroying them to get to us.
“Strava, what’s your cargo status?” Noomi asks, her voice carrying the calm authority that used to make me forget she was barely five and a half feet of human fury.
“Mixed shipment, ma’am. Medical supplies for three colonies, emergency food stores, and about a hundred Christmas packages.
If we lose these...” Her voice cracks. “Some of these kids won’t get anything.
Their parents spent everything they had on shipping fees just to get something to them for Christmas. ”
“You won’t lose them.” The promise comes out as a snarl, weighted with two years of hunting and the growing certainty that I’d tear through a dozen ships to keep that promise. “Noomi, I need you to—”
“I know.” And suddenly we’re moving like we used to, two minds in perfect synchronization. She takes the helm while I handle targeting, her piloting complementing my tactical thinking in ways that make my alien instincts purr with satisfaction.
We’re good together. Devastatingly, brilliantly good.
“Shadowhawk, you’re up,” I growl into my comm. “Four hostiles—three interceptors and a command vessel hanging back. Focus on the interceptors. I want that command ship to see what happens when they target Christmas.”
“Copy that, Captain.” Kex’s gravelly voice carries grim satisfaction. “Been itching for some target practice.”
The first of Krax’s interceptors—a sleek killer built for speed over defense—never sees the Shadowhawk coming. My crew brings her in from the sensor shadow while I coordinate targeting data from the Wandering Star, Noomi’s piloting giving us perfect firing solutions.
“Target locked,” Kex announces. “Fire.”
The plasma bolt from my ship catches the interceptor amidships, and it comes apart like tissue paper in a solar wind. No survivors. No escape pods. Just the clean death that beings who target children’s Christmas presents deserve.
“One down,” Noomi says, her voice carrying grim satisfaction. “Three to go.”
The remaining interceptors have noticed us now, abandoning their pursuit of the fleeing couriers to deal with the new threat. The command vessel—sleeker, more heavily armored—begins a tactical withdrawal. Smart. Krax isn’t risking himself when he can watch us fight his subordinates.
“They’re trying to box us in,” I observe, watching their approach vectors with predatory appreciation. “Standard hunter-killer pattern.”
“Good thing we wrote the book on breaking those.” Noomi’s smile is sharp enough to cut vacuum, and the way she looks at me—like I’m still the most dangerous thing in her universe—makes my blood sing. “Remember the Krassarian Gambit?”
Heat shoots through my veins at the memory. The most dangerous maneuver in our arsenal, requiring perfect trust and split-second timing. We’d used it exactly once, during a raid on a corporate convoy that had gone sideways. Nearly killed us both.
It had also led to the most intense celebration of our lives afterward, tangled together in our quarters while adrenaline and victory and pure, animal need made us forget everything but each other.
“I remember,” I say, my voice rougher than intended. “You sure you want to try it in a ship with no shield boosters? Or are you just showing off for me again?”
“Maybe I like the way you look at me when I do something impossible.” Her hands dance over the controls with the fluid grace that used to make me want to worship every inch of her skin, and I catch the spike of arousal in her scent. “Besides, I trust you.”
Those three words hit like a plasma cannon to the chest. She trusts me. After everything I’ve done, every boundary I’ve crossed, every choice that’s driven her away—she still trusts me to keep her alive when it matters.
“On my mark,” I growl into the comm, coordinating with the Shadowhawk’s targeting systems. “Kex, you take the one on our starboard. We’ll handle the port side with pure piloting.”
“Understood, Captain. Standing by.”
“Three... two... one... mark!”
The Wandering Star rolls inverted and dives toward the approaching ships, using their own formation against them.
They expect us to break off, to choose one target and commit.
Instead, Noomi threads the needle between them while the Shadowhawk takes out the starboard target with surgical precision, and we use our momentum to ram the port ship’s engine section with our reinforced bow.
“Now that’s what I call threading the needle,” I growl, admiration thick in my voice. “Remind me why I ever let you out of my sight?”
“Because I’m too dangerous to cage,” she purrs back, and the sound goes straight to parts of me that have nothing to do with tactical appreciation. “Besides, you always did like watching me work.”
Both hostile ships die within seconds of each other, one torn apart by plasma fire, the other crippled and drifting. The combat high singing through my veins mingles with something deeper, more primal—the way she moves in battle, deadly and graceful and absolutely magnificent.
“Hostile vessels eliminated,” I announce, satisfaction rumbling through my voice like a purr. “OOPS convoy, you’re clear to resume course.”
“Just like old times,” Noomi murmurs, low enough that only my enhanced hearing catches it. But I do catch it, along with the way her pulse is still elevated from our shared adrenaline rush.
“Captain Kraine, Courier Jaxson—thank you.” Strava’s voice is thick with gratitude and something that might be hero worship. “I don’t know how you moved like that. It was like watching poetry.”
“Deadly poetry,” I correct with dark amusement, catching the way Noomi’s lips curve in response. “We’ve had practice.”
“Three years of practice,” Noomi adds, and there’s something loaded in the way she says it. Something that makes me remember exactly how we used to practice—in combat, in flight, in bed, learning each other’s rhythms until we moved like one organism with two bodies.
“Just doing our job,” she continues, but I catch the way her scent spikes with pride. She’s always loved being good at what she does, and watching her remember exactly how deadly she can be is doing things to my self-control that have nothing to do with tactical appreciation.
“What’s your next stop?” I ask Strava, trying to focus on the mission instead of the way Noomi’s pulse is elevated from our shared combat high.
“Titan’s Drift mining colony. Christmas delivery run for the families there. We lost...” Her voice wavers. “We lost three ships, Captain. Sixty families won’t be getting their packages.”