Chapter 8 Rhea
RHEA
The hum of the borrowed cruiser isn’t smooth—it’s more like a nervous tic.
It rattles low in the floor panels beneath my boots, vibrates through the handrail every time I brush against it.
This isn’t a ship built for comfort. It’s a slab of welded lies and salvaged tech, masked as a freighter but armored like a forgotten war god.
Valtron calls it “subtle.” I call it suspicious.
The damn thing groans every time we change direction.
I’m not sure which will get us killed first—the Combine or the life support system failing mid-flight.
We’re cruising under the name Frostbite Queen. I didn’t pick it. If I had, we’d be flying Bite Me, Bureaucrats or something equally subtle. Valtron rolled his eyes when I said that, but I saw the twitch at the corner of his mouth.
He hasn’t smiled in hours. Not really. He’s coiled. Wound tighter than I’ve ever seen him.
We haven’t talked about the black-code signal. Not directly. I saw it in his eyes. That haunted heat that’s always followed him like a storm cloud waiting to break. But he didn’t take the call. He didn’t leave. That has to mean something.
Right?
The cockpit smells like old metal, recycled air, and Valtron’s musk. It’s unfair how good he smells. Like crushed amber and something wild—something that doesn’t belong in confined spaces with a woman who’s trying to stay focused.
He sits beside me now, head tilted back, his massive frame sprawled across the bench like the universe isn’t on fire around us.
“Your eyes twitch when you’re trying not to worry,” I say.
He snorts. “And yours flare when you’re about to interrogate me.”
“Well,” I say, folding my arms, “you do make a tempting suspect.”
His golden gaze cuts to me. “You saying I’m suspicious, news girl?”
I smirk. “I’m saying you talk like a spy, fight like a monster, and brood like a drama prince. You tell me.”
He leans forward, elbows braced on his knees, those huge clawed hands dangling between his thighs. “You think I like this?”
“This what?”
“This game. This mission. This… cage we’re flying in.”
“You sure act like it’s where you belong,” I shoot back.
He doesn’t answer. Not right away. Instead, he lifts one hand, tracing a slow, idle pattern on the bench between us.
“When I was fifteen,” he says, voice low, “they put me in the training pits.”
I blink. “The what?”
He doesn’t look at me. “Vakutan initiation. For warrior caste. You don’t get promoted by grades or ranks. You earn your place in blood.”
“Jesus,” I whisper.
“I was the youngest in my cohort. They expected me to fail. Hell, part of me wanted to. But then…” He finally looks at me, and the air between us goes still. “Dowron came to watch. He saw something. Pulled me from the pits. Trained me himself.”
My chest tightens. “That’s why you’d follow him off a cliff.”
“No,” he says. “That’s why I’d follow him back.”
I digest that in silence. The hum of the ship grows louder in the absence of our voices.
“Why tell me that now?” I ask, finally.
He shrugs one massive shoulder. “You’re connecting dots faster than I expected. Figured you’d find out anyway.”
I don’t miss the compliment hidden in the jab. “So you’re admitting I’m not just a pretty face?”
He glances at me sideways, mouth twitching again. “You’re a lot of things. Pretty is just the part that makes me crazy.”
Heat climbs up my neck. I look away before it turns into something more.
But the air’s already charged. Tension curling between us like a coiled cable ready to snap.
“You regret it?” I ask. “Serving them?”
He doesn’t answer right away. That’s how I know he does.
“I regret not asking questions sooner,” he says. “I regret every order I followed that felt wrong but did anyway because that’s what loyalty looks like. I regret…” His jaw clenches. “I regret not staying that night.”
My breath catches.
“You left without a word.”
“I thought I was doing the right thing. For both of us.”
“Well,” I murmur, “you were half right.”
He huffs a soft laugh. “You always this sharp when we’re about to walk into certain death?”
“Only when I like someone.”
He blinks. “You… like me?”
I groan. “Don’t make it weird.”
“Too late.”
We both laugh.
It’s soft. Real. And for a moment, the weight of everything else slips off my shoulders like a too-heavy coat.
That night, we don’t sleep.
We lie in the crew quarters, back to back at first, both pretending we’re comfortable. We’re not. The room is too small. The cot is worse than the one in the bunker. But neither of us moves.
“You ever think about Earth?” I ask, voice a whisper.
He shifts, turning just enough that I feel the heat of his body behind me. “Sometimes. When I want to imagine what peace smells like.”
I close my eyes. “I miss thunderstorms.”
“Never seen one,” he says.
“They’re messy. Loud. Frightening. But… cleansing.”
“Like you.”
I turn over.
Now we’re face to face.
Breath to breath.
“I’m not some cosmic spa treatment,” I murmur.
“No,” he says. “You’re lightning.”
I stare at him. “That a Vakutan thing or just your overgrown ego talking?”
“It’s truth.”
Our eyes meet for a long moment. Then he leans in, lips brushing my own. I gasp, arching my body into him, tasting his breath, his heat. A tingle becomes a throb between my legs.
His hands are fire. Not burning—just impossibly warm, big enough to span my entire back.
When he kisses me again, it isn’t tentative.
It’s possession. Heat floods me. My thighs press together instinctively, chasing pressure.
His cock presses against my hip—thick, hard, alien and familiar all at once.
“You’re sure?” he asks, voice raw, golden eyes boring into mine.
“If you stop, I’ll kill you.”
He growls, low in his chest, and rolls over me. I feel the weight of him—massive, powerful, heavy with need. His scales rasp against my skin where my tank top rides up. His tongue—forked, god help me—slides over my neck. I arch, moaning.
“You smell like thunder,” he mutters, voice deep with hunger. “You taste like war.”
I dig my fingers into his shoulders. “Then win me.”
Clothes vanish. I don’t remember how. His hands are everywhere—fingers exploring, learning, teasing. When one of those claws drags lightly down my belly, I shudder, legs spreading without thought.
His mouth moves lower. I cry out when he reaches my pussy, tongue sliding over me with maddening skill. It’s not like a human tongue—more textured, more heat. He circles my clit until I’m writhing, gasping, pleading.
“Valtron, fuck, please—”
He chuckles, dark and sinful, the sound vibrating against me.
“You always this needy, little thunderstorm?”
I don’t answer. Can’t.
He rises, lining himself up. His cock is huge. Red. Ridged. I brace myself—half terrified, half ravenous.
Then he pushes in.
My scream is swallowed by his mouth.
He’s too big. Too deep. Perfect.
Every thrust is a claim. He moves like he’s trying to brand me from the inside. My hands claw at his back, desperate to hold on as pleasure builds fast and hot.
“I should’ve stayed,” he whispers, voice cracking.
“I would’ve let you.”
He growls, kissing me hard, rolling his hips. Our bodies slap together, slick and desperate. His thumb finds my clit again and I break—coming around him, legs trembling, tears slipping down my cheeks.
He keeps going. A second orgasm crashes into me before I’ve even caught my breath.
Then he tenses.
“Rhea—fuck—”
He comes with a roar, spilling into me, hips jerking as he presses deep one last time.
After, we collapse together, tangled and breathless. The hum of the ship fills the silence.
“I still miss thunderstorms,” I murmur.
“I’ll find you one.”
“You better.”
“I always do.”
We cling together, breath slowing, sweat mingling. I want to ask a million different questions. Logical questions.
“What happens if this works?” I ask instead. “If we make it?”
He reaches up, brushes a strand of hair behind my ear.
“Then I stop running,” he says. “And we figure out what the hell this is.”
“This?” I echo.
“You. Me. Ripley. All of it.”
My throat tightens at the sound of her name. He’s never said it aloud before.
“You knew?”
He nods. “Didn’t want to guess. Didn’t want to be wrong. But I knew.”
“I was scared,” I whisper. “Still am.”
He presses his forehead to mine.
“Me too.”
Then I say the thing I haven’t dared.
“If we make it… I want to try. For real.”
His voice is raw.
“Then don’t let me screw it up.”
And in the silence that follows, we don’t say love.
We don’t need to.
It’s already here.
Time passed and we’re so close to the relay outpost. The coordinates are locked. The ghost channel is ready. Everything hinges on this next stretch.
I’m in the cargo hold, suitcase in one hand, data crystal nestled in foam, humming faintly like it knows it’s been trusted with fire.
The air smells of recycled metal, coffee—burnt and stale—and the faint bite of ozone from the ship’s shield generators.
Outside the reinforced window, the ice-moon surface rolls past in white-grey drift, broken only by the dull glow of the distant relay tower.
“Rhea,” Valtron’s voice comes through the commline, low and tight. “How’re you doing?”
I let out a breath. “As good as someone carrying the fate of half the galaxy on a suitcase can be.”
He chuckles, but there’s no warmth. “Don’t make me come find you.”
“I’m not built for speed, but I can outrun crashing stars.”
“Until gravity wins.”
“Gravity’s got nothing on me,” I snap, adjusting the strap of the case across my shoulder. “I’ll meet you at the node.”
“Got it,” he says. Then, softer: “Be safe.”
A beat of silence. Then: “I love you.”
My breath catches.
The line goes dead.
I stare at the commlink, blood pulsing in my ears like drums. I don’t know what to say. The words hang there between us, unspoken and urgent. I swallow hard.
Then the alarm kicks in.
Red flashing lights. Klaxons. Steel doors sliding shut.
“Brace!” Valtron’s voice roars.
Something bursts outside. The entire ship shudders. My suitcase goes flying. I catch it with one hand. The crystal rattles inside and I squeeze my fingers shut.
“Mother—”
Footsteps pound. A squad of fighters breach the hold bulkhead. Four men in dark armor, blue visors, rifles raised.
“They know,” one says. “Storm team Alpha to deck six.”
I don’t give orders. I’m just the anchor. I lift the case and dash toward the ladder.
Valtron’s voice in my ear: “Get to the node. I’ll hold them.”
I don’t answer. Panic burns my veins red, and adrenaline is the only steady heartbeat I feel. I run.
Blaster bolts streak across the hold—snapping electric blue, sizzling like daylight in a night sky. I zigzag between crates, one exploding where a round hits, foam and metal shrapnel showering me. The smell of burnt resin hits my nose. I choke.
“Rhea!” Valtron bellows. “Move!”
I scramble up the ladder two rungs at a time. The metal bites at my gloves. My chest heaves. I hear glass shatter behind me. The wall where the fighters approaches cracks and glows red-hot.
I burst into the corridor. White light. Heat.
The world distorts with alert flares. I run.
I can see him in the doorway—a massive silhouette buffered by golden eyes.
One of the fighters shoots. Valtron steps into the bolt.
It cooks through his armor like acid and he doesn’t flinch.
He grabs the shooter’s wrist and twists. A snap. The man screams.
I don’t stop. I run. My shoes skid on the liner. The walls seem too close, the air too hot. The corridor smells like burnt circuitry, sweat, gunpowder.
The node is at the end. The door slides open before I even reach it. A guard shakes his head and waves me in. I shove the suitcase inside and slam the door shut as I trigger the access panel.
Blue lights. Whir. The crystal fits in the slot. It clicks. A hum. The screen floods with confirmation. Channel open.
Thirty seconds later, I hear the ship—our ship—ripe with explosions. The fighters have broken through the vacuum seal. The corridor behind me shudders.
I swing the case off and lift the crystal from its foam. I hold it like a newborn.
“Valtron,” I whisper.
“I’m coming,” he says. His voice distant.
The door bursts again, frantic. A blast hits the node door. I brace myself. The case falls. The crystal rolls. I drop to my knees. My fingertips close around it.
“Rhea! Get out!” Valtron screams.
I turn. The corridor behind me is fire and steel. I don’t hesitate.
I sprint back the way I came—past the crates, past the hole in the wall, past the shattered hold. The vibration underfoot intensifies. The ship tilts. Gravity shifts. The hull tears open. Snow pours in like static.
I reach the ladder. I climb two rungs without looking back. I dive off into open air of the cargo bay as the section behind me explodes. Glass, metal, screams. I land hard. I roll.
The suitcase breaks open. The crystal bounces across the floor and I catch it on instinct. My body burns. My elbow screams. My breath is the air someone used up hours ago.
I sprint to the boarding ramp. Outside, void-lights. Star-field. The theft craft we stole—small skimmer, hotwired, engine already screaming. I jump in. Strap myself in. I look back.
Valtron emerges from the wreckage. His armor scorched, one leg limping. Behind him the cruiser’s hull folds in on itself and ignites. He waves. He climbs into the skimmer. Engine starts.
We’re out.
The skimmer lurches into the void, leaving the cruiser behind—a doomed carcass.
I don’t cry. Not yet.
But once we’re clear, still under the radius of destruction, I pull the crystal to my chest and my body finally gives in. The tears come uncontrolled. Hot. Bitter. Relief and grief mingled. I don’t care if he sees.
Valtron says nothing. He wraps his massive arms around me. His lips rest on my head. The smell of scorched metal and his blood—faint but there—is all around.
I let myself go.
Because the world just tilted and I’m hanging on to a man who looked like a weapon and turned out to be a lifeline.
We fly into the void and I don’t know what happens next.
But I know we survived tonight.