7. Uneasy Touchdowns
7
Uneasy Touchdowns
Ki’REMI
K i’Remi did not tolerate unanswered questions, not when they involved his patients.
He leaned into the woman he intended to interrogate within an inch of her truth when one of his junior doctors hurried toward him.
Data pad in hand, concern etched into his features.
‘Commander, please, I need urgent advice on a case.’
Ki’Remi ground his molars together, turning to the young medic.
He was also a teaching surgeon who took his training function earnestly, so he had no choice but to raise his chin to his protegee. ‘Talk to me.’
‘Later, Sable.’
The husky dulcet delivery sent an arc of craving through him as the woman responsible for his mounting frustration slipped through his fingers yet again.
His glare locked on her enticing retreating ass as she took the opportunity to vanish down the corridor.
Curls bouncing, easing past a medical bay door, hips swaying in those damnably form-fitting surgical pants.
He crossed his hands and clenched his fists.
Damn woman.
‘O’Hara, make this quick.’
The junior doctor gulped and rushed through his case concerns.
Parking Elaris aside for now, Ki’Remi aided with the curly scenario, then prowled to his quarters to pack for the flight to Alloria Prime.
By the time he reached the vast rear hold of the Perseus, his irritation devolved into a darker, roiling emotion.
The dreadnought’s expansive lower deck was a controlled frenzy of medical staff, tactical officers, and aircrew personnel prepping for the cruiser’s planetary descent.
The cavernous space housed an array of light flyers and emergency med-vac ships, all primed for rapid deployment.
Issa reigned over it all, at least it appeared that way, given how freakin’ regal she appeared.
Hell, the aura on this woman , Ki’Remi cursed.
She crouched, checking the seals on her supply case, and the Rider let his eyes rest on her for just a moment.
His gaze traveled down the elegant curve of her spine and ass, the way her form moved with effortless control as she lifted a metal valise into the cruiser.
The undertones of her honeyed skin contrasted with the stark white of her uniform, her coiled curls barely restrained in a bun.
Her mouth was full and expressive, often curved in a way that made his jaw clench. She spoke in husky tones as she instructed the med crew.
She had no right to look this good, fokkin ’ sound this sensuous while simultaneously being an immense pain in his ass.
Ki’Remi exhaled, rolling his shoulders.
Focus, Sable.
This was not the time to think about how her citrus-infused lotion permeated the sterile air.
How the warmth of her skin radiated even in the frigid OR, how—
Fokk, this shit.
He stepped into her space, forcing her to turn and look at him.
‘When we return from this mission, I expect a full, in-depth report from you about what I caught in the surgery today.’
Her nebula-starred eyes flickered with an emotion he couldn’t quite name before she sighed.
‘Mr. Meticulous and Pedantic strikes again.’
His lips curled in a snarl.
‘I’m careful with my patients. Most importantly, I walk them through what I plan to do on them and never initiate procedures without their foreknowledge.’
She arched a brow, clearly unimpressed. ‘Bullshit. So you wake them from stasis when an emergency bleed or tear shows up? Then, unpack their symptoms in a bullet-point presentation on the pros and cons of saving their fokkin ’ life?’
Ki’Remi’s nostrils flared. ‘You know what I mean, Elaris.’
‘ Nada , I do not, Sable.’
His patience snapped. His voice dropped, timbred and dangerous. ‘What in Devansi hell did you do to Zera?’
She stared at him, calm. Too unruffled.
‘Was it some voodoo magic shit? Which it appears your distinctive touch is all about?’
‘Voodoo magic shit? That’s a new one.’
He arched a brow. ‘Is it, though? Seems that way. The same goes for the countless other unexplained cases I’ve noted in your files,’ he pressed.
That got her attention.
A flicker of something passed through her eyes, a crack in that composed, unbothered exterior.
‘Did you go through my records?’
‘Damn right, I did.’
She tilted her chin, assessing him.
‘And?’
He took a step closer, voice rough. ‘I detected anomalies. A high number of patients with life-threatening diseases inexplicably healed. Most of them when they were on the edge of losing their lives. Which is giving rise to your wild card reputation on this ship.’
His eyes darkened. ‘What the fokk have you been playing at? Unorthodox methods can kill and maim when misused. Or are you so desperate for stardom you’ll cut corners for it?’
Issa’s lips twitched into something dangerously close to a smirk. ‘Do you have any evidence of any incompetence?’
Ki’Remi’s neural node ran a quick scan over her files.
No patient fatalities.
Not a single one.
He hated that she was right.
His fingers flexed, curled, and then uncurled.
It didn’t matter. It was still suspect.
She turned, walking off before he could fire another question at her.
The woman was impossible.
As she moved toward the light cruiser, Ki’Remi prowled after her, his mind running through every report, log, and damn case file attached to her name.
She had never lost one subject.
Not one.
It was inconceivable.
Even the best surgeons had failures, from biological anomalies to unforeseen complications and dire fates.
No one walked through a surgical career without loss.
Yet Issa Elaris had none.
It didn’t sit right, and Ki’Remi hated things that didn’t hit perfectly.
He caught up to her as she and the four-person med crew loaded Zera onto the cruiser’s rear deck in a hover chair.
Ki’Remi joined them, giving Issa a curt nod and the rest a slight upturn of his lips.
They clapped him on his back.
They were acquainted, off the back of previous medical missions they served on together. From numerous mercy flights and emergency airlifts before the Perseus, all across Pegasi.
Lieutenant Caz ‘Klash’ Vallen was their light cruiser pilot, a tall, rangy, red-headed Rhesian with a ruddy, freckled face.
The man was, at times, reckless, too cocky for his good.
Nonetheless, the bastard could fly through a collapsing war zone with his eyes closed and still land a bird in one piece.
‘Gotta start this baby up.’
He jogged past them and took the stars to the bridge two at a time to warm up the engines.
The lead evacuation paramedic was Vek ‘Bear’ Drayen, an Edenite specializing in heavy extraction and defensive support.
He was a walking fortress with a bad temper and a worse sense of humor. However, when the bullets flew, he’d carry your sorry ass out of the fire, no questions asked.
Galician Medic Juno ‘Ghost’ Takisia was a triage Specialist and Combat EMT.
The woman was dark as night, stunning, silent as death, fast as hell, and hella precise.
Her partner was Riva ‘Steel’ Karros, a bio-stabilization and AI-assisted half-human and part-machine from Falasia.
Fully unshakable, Riva never flinched, hesitated, and sure as Hades never let anyone die on her watch.
Zera was still groggy from surgery, but she gave him a broad smile from her reclined hover chair. ‘ Sante , doctor.’
He nodded and returned the grin with a quirk on his lips. ‘You were all drama in theater, young woman. Continue this way, and you’ll win a galactic acting award.’
His teasing rumble set her off, and she laughed as he checked her vitals, his eyes flicking over the data streams on the chair’s display.
Stable. Healing. Heart-wall intact.
Whatever magic Elaris had woven over it was holding, though his skepticism still ran high.
‘Sable, we’re lifting off.’
At the husky intone, he gritted his teeth and sliced his eyes to Issa’s, raking them over her face.
‘ Sante ,’ he growled.
He turned to the medic team, arms crossed. ‘Listen up. We’re in and out, no detours, no heroics. We drop, deliver Zera, assess the situation, and return to the Perseus Prime without any unnecessary complications. Allorian terrain is unstable, the warring tribes are unpredictable, and we don’t know who else is watching. Klash, keep us light and fast. Ghost, Steel, Bear, you know the drill. If things go sideways, we extract and dust off. Issa, you ensure Zera is stable and watch her vitals while I monitor her heart. Move out.’
‘Ay captain,’ Issa called out.
He sucked his teeth, turned from her, and strode into the outer deck, pushing Zera’s hover bed confront of him.
His squad and his fellow surgeon followed.
Handing over Zera to Juno, he found a crash couch and strapped in.
He caught Issa and the crew doing the same, securing Zera’s transport.
The pilot’s voice echoed through the comms as the cruiser’s engines growled to life.
The docking clamps released, sending a brief shudder through the metal flooring as the vessel disengaged from the massive dreadnought’s hold.
Perseus Prime loomed above them as they moved from beneath the translucent steel canopy of the floating titan of medical salvation.
Ki’Remi glanced at it, appreciating its sleek black-and-gold hull glinting under the system’s twin suns.
Below them, Alloria stretched out like a jewel, its silver-dusted mountains merging with endless sapphire plains, the ancient jungle curling like vines across the planet’s equatorial belt.
The Sableman canted his eyes to the view.
Still, all he beheld in his mind was one enticing woman with a lopsided smile on her sensuous lips and those dancing astral bright eyes.
Fokk me.
Issa Elaris was one hell of a walking anomaly, and he intended to unravel all of her.
The descent was smooth.
The Ravager-Class medical cruiser cut through Alloria Prime’s dense atmosphere with calculated precision, its stabilizers adjusting for minor turbulence.
Inside, the cabin was eerily calm, the kind of quiet that felt unnatural, and for some reason, the Rider’s hackles rose.
He sat rigid in his chair, scanning the readings in his neural HUD, his fingers tapping against the armrest, unable to relax.
Klash, in his usual loose-limbed arrogance, piloted with one hand, the other lazily flicking through the ship’s sensory displays.
‘All clear,’ Klash muttered. ‘This’ll be a sweet-ass, easy touchdown—’
The screech of klaxons cut him off.
Red emergency lights bathed the cabin in a sickly glow as the ship jolted violently.
The vessel’s warning bells blared in deafening succession, screens flashing.
HOSTILE LOCK DETECTED.
Zera screamed from her hover bed as an alarm siren squawked over their comms.
‘The fokk ?’ Ki’Remi snarled, pushing off his seat as the cruiser pitched sideways.
A massive shadow loomed ahead, materializing from the nothingness of deep space and inserting itself into the planet’s atmosphere with an earsplitting bass-laden boom.
He stared at it, disbelieving.
Twas a hulking warship, its obsidian hull gleaming under the planet’s sun as it de-cloaked, cutting off their path.
Shaped like a behemoth, it was rugged, jagged, and cruel, with no markings or transponders.
Weapons fire erupted.
‘Incoming!’ Klash shouted, banking hard to the right.
The medic ship rolled, and the impact of the first rail gun round hit the hull like the fist of a god.
Metal shrieked and groaned as the blast tore through the upper deck.
Their craft shuddered, and the pressure alarms screamed.
Smoke and sparks burst from the central panel as they spiraled down at impossible speeds.
Rounds ripped through the structure above their heads, massive energy bolts in an unrelenting pattern.
The enemy wasn’t playing.
They weren’t striving to force a surrender.
They were trying to erase them or at least cripple them to the point they crash-landed.
Klash fought the controls, his jaw clenched. ‘What the hell kind of firepower is that?!’
Ki’Remi staggered to the viewscreen as another round slammed into the Ravager-Class cruiser, flinging the crew forward into their seats.
His neural HUD flashed red across his vision. Hull integrity was dropping fast.
‘The fokkin ’ Allorians have none of this tech,’ he ground out, eyes locking on the attacking warship in full display.
The vessel was monstrous, sleek, and bristling with energy rail guns he’d never seen and designed for one purpose. Absolute annihilation.
A quiet presence appeared beside him.
Issa.
Ki’Remi glanced at her, and his stomach twisted.
She was pale. Too ashen.
Eyes glazed and fixed in horror at the view outside the reinforced plex glass.
‘They’re not Allorians,’ she whispered.
His gut turned to steel. She knew . ‘Who the fokk are they, Elaris?’
Before she could respond, the ship lurched sideways, another blast tearing through the hull.
They both clutched at the drop-down restraints that released from the ceiling, but still, the impact was brutal.
Klash grunted, head thrown back, then slammed forward, snapping against the console.
He slumped forward, unmoving.
‘Pilot’s down!’ Ghost barked from behind.
Ki’Remi didn’t hesitate.
He surged forward, shoved Klash out of the chair, and slid into the controls.
His hands moved with surgical precision, calculated and exact, rerouting thruster output, stabilizing the descent with pinpoint accuracy.
‘Crash couches everyone, Strap in, HUDs up,’ he called, keeping his rasp calm while tapping a button on his seat so the impact belts folded over his chest.
He banked left hard, rolling them as another rail gun round screamed past.
The enemy gunship kept pace, firing at the engines.
Which shifted Ki’Remi’s assessment.
Whoever the hell they were, they didn’t want them dead. They wanted them grounded.
This meant they wanted something or someone on this ship.
He risked a glance at Issa, strapped in and helmeted in the co-pilot seat. Her hands worked fast, sending him telemetry from the console.
He sucked his teeth, then jerked his head back to the view of the planet, his gut roiling.
‘ Fokk ! Brace,’ Ki’Remi growled. ‘We’re going down.’
The jungle below rushed up to meet them.
He engaged rear thrusters at the last second, breaking the free fall just enough before impact.
The vessel hit the canopy, tearing through massive trees, leaves, and branches, shattering against the hull.
Metal screeched, and engines sputtered.
With a flash, the world went white.
Then black.
And still.