Chapter 15
She laid there. Crying. Screaming. Hand outstretched. They were closing in. Closer. Closer. Too many blasters. Too many of them.
There had to be a way out. An escape. I looked and looked. Walls of metal. Rust. Blood. Her blood, pooling around her leg. Skin ruptured. She couldn’t run. We couldn’t run.
“What are you doing…” Her eyes, wide, terrified, crying. She reached for me. “Ethin!”
Don’t say that name. Don’t say that fucking name.
“Ethin!”
“Don’t!” I flew out of bed, hit my head on the top bunk, and plummeted. “Fuck off!”
There I lay, a hand on my throbbing head, trying to breathe. I scratched over the heart racing too loud. My skin cracked and bled under my furious nails while her voice wouldn’t stop. Never actually stopped.
I rolled out of bed, blood dripping from the wounds. Using the tissues from the desk, I wiped the mess away and opened the commlink’s self-facing camera. The bastard left far too many marks. I had to throw on the turtleneck option for our uniforms.
My chest burned from the cuts, so I went to the med bay.
Tareik, the senior medical officer, was in there, as gelatinous as ever.
Flureds, they were called, though most of us called them squishies because they were just that.
A moving and talking, without a mouth, waist-high blob of gelatin that couldn’t be shot, cut, burned, or crushed.
And they were entirely peaceful, practically incapable of violence.
I wouldn’t be surprised if they blew up for saying a bad word.
“Ah, Private Katlan, are you in need of healing?” Tareik slithered past the cradle, a slightly bent capsule not so dissimilar from the droid’s charging stations.
The cradle connected to the floor at the back of the room.
The interior dipped low enough for a body to be laid in there and for the regenerative liquid to drape over the user.
They would lie for minutes or hours, depending on the severity, and be pieced back together.
I had been in one a few times, and the experience was always less than ideal.
Felt claustrophobic and, if you were conscious, incredibly invasive.
“A quick spray for this should do.” I held up my shirt.
Tareik went for a canister on the shelf. Afterward, I returned to the communal area where Arana sat with Lilea and Iylene. Zavir and Ryker were nowhere to be found. I messaged them. Both were patrolling the energy shield. As expected, we weren’t entirely off duty.
“Lucky!” Arana gestured for me to join them.
Lilea looked over her shoulder. Their eyes weren’t similar in the slightest, but I saw Her.
“I’m heading out.” I gave a half-hearted wave and left the habitat.
I wasn’t the only one outside. Roys gave us permission not to wear our exoskins within the energy shield, although he recommended we keep them near.
Soldiers created games and sat around in the open field.
Others took to the training yard that the droids had set up.
When folks got too hot, they went inside for a rest. I didn’t join any of them.
I found a shaded area behind the habitat, kicked off my boots and socks, and then fell into the grass. I rolled onto my stomach, taking a deep breath. Fresh air. Nature. Soil and rain.
At the Colony, the upper ring loved using artificial scents, trying to bring a planet to the asteroid, but it wasn’t the same. You couldn’t feel the earth under your fingernails, the grass on your lips or the sun as it chased away the shade.
She would have loved it here.
I buried my face in the dirt. My lungs burned for air.
My commlink beeped. I ignored it, setting my head aside to take a breath that did nothing to ease my thoughts.
The memories came because of that stupid nightmare.
The first year after I escaped the Colony, I replayed those moments in my mind, searching for a change.
What if I did this, what if we had done that, what if we changed our entire lives so that never happened?
But it didn’t matter because every scenario ended the same, or worse, and so I told myself not to think about it. Don’t remember. Stash Her away in a bottle and lock that bottle away. Unfortunately, that never worked. The bottle was always cracked, and pieces of Her poured out.
The commlink beeped. Another. Another. I silenced all comms, didn’t feel like being bothered. Felt like moping there for the rest of the day, basking in the suns.
“Why is your commlink off?”
I shouldn’t have been surprised that Roys came to find me, and yet, I pushed myself onto my elbows to make sure it was him. He stood, blocking the light with all those rippling pectorals of his.
I yawned. “Was that you messaging?”
The time on the commlink proved I had dozed off and slept better lying here than I had in bed. It was barely two hours’ worth of napping, and still he was on my ass. And not in the fun way.
“Some of it,” he answered, donning his signature scowl. He looked so much better flushed and panting on top of me. “You missed patrol duty.”
“Is that so?” I picked apart grass to knot together like string.
“Arana found you out here smothering yourself in the grass.”
“Has a nice smell. Give it a try.”
“So you can keep my head there until I go blue in the face? No thanks.”
I threw the knotted grass at him. “Admit it, that was a nice try.”
He gave an annoyed but playful hum. “I partnered her with someone else, but the next one came out, and you were sleeping. When they tried to wake you, you smacked them.”
“Mm, can’t say I recall that. Pretty sure they’re lying.”
Although Arana warned the others before that I was mean when anyone tried waking me. Claimed I kicked her out of the bed once when she tried cuddling. Although I may have been awake, and just wanted to avoid cuddling. Wasn’t my thing.
“You’ll be patrolling with me now.”
Laughing, I sat up, legs crossed and hands on my ankles. “Now I know you’re bullshitting. You’re using this as an excuse to spend more time with me.” I pressed a hand to my heart while batting my eyelashes. “Oh no, Cap, have you fallen for me?”
“You’ve discovered my greatest secret.”
I played along and stuck a finger in my mouth, pretending to puke. “That is disgusting.”
“You’re the one who asked a foolish question.”
“Is it that foolish?” I cast my eyes from side to side. No one was back here. No one could see us.
“I think you want some more alone time with me.” I grabbed him by the holsters, tugging him forward so I had to crane my neck to look at him. “I’d be more than happy to oblige.”
He shuddered when I kissed his crotch and let my breath seep into his trousers.
His hand fell in my hair, giving a harsh tug, but as I looked up at him, a blush crept beneath his eyes.
He didn’t blush often, and that had me wanting more.
So I kept a firm hold on the holsters to continue my work, never breaking eye contact.
Roys lips parted and he glanced around, looking, unsure of what to do until he finally pursed his lips.
“Stop messing around,” he ordered, sounding more breathy than stern.
“I don’t think you really want me to.” I snuck my fingers beneath his shirt to trace spirals beneath the lip of his stomach.
“Ethin,” he warned, more authoritative that time. He yanked hard on my hair, getting me away from my newest obsession. Really, it was such a waste for him to have a body like this when he was no fun. “Let’s go. Once the patrol is done, you’re free to wallow in the grass all you want.”
Neither of us moved. I wasn’t interested in going on patrol. Roys knew that. He knew I didn’t like taking his orders. Not here. And maybe he realized that, too, because he knocked my hands away to kneel where he balanced on his heels.
Hidden behind the habitat, no one saw Roys catch my chin or heard how low his voice could go. “Good behavior is rewarded, remember?”
Goosebumps broke across my skin. “A reward, huh? You’ll let me finish what I started?”
He moved in. My eyes fluttered closed, waiting for that taste of cherry.
“Behave and find out.” Roys didn’t look back as he walked away. I was grateful; otherwise, it’d be humiliating how fast I followed.
He handed me the extra flamethrower, followed by my exoskin and visor, the last of which I didn’t put on. We met the last patrol on the west side of the energy shield to relieve them. A path led around the shields, but I moved away, closer to the flora.
“Ethin,” Roys warned. The name made my stomach churn.
“Stop being such a worrywart. We secured the area,” I grumbled.
The flora was beautiful when it wasn’t trying to destroy us. There were dozens upon dozens of different species, each petal unique. Some petals were waxy, others soft as fur, and I let my fingers drag over them because, in three months, I wouldn’t feel them again.
Each planetary tour would be different because each planet was different.
Most likely, I would be sent to places like Roys had gone.
Volcanic, frozen, dangerous, far too dangerous to send anyone of importance, so The Company sent us, the ones no one really cared about.
Doubtful that any other planets would have this kind of beauty, would make us want to spend a day under the suns.
These tours were rare, and from that point on I would think of this one and know it’d be one in a million.
“Must you do that?” Roys adjusted the flamethrower. He traveled close enough beside me that our arms brushed. “This flora tried to kill us, remember.”
“Not these specifically. They’re harmless; otherwise they would have been neutralized.” I waved toward the path inside the energy shield. “Go over there if you’re so nervous.”
“I’m not nervous.”
“You’re sweating.”
“It’s hot.”
“Yes, I would know. You like to mark your territory.” I tugged at the collar of my shirt. That put a proud smile on his face, and my heart did a weird little hiccup that I didn’t like.
“You didn’t seem to mind in the moment.”