7. Nyra #2
"Don't you walk away from me, Draevik Rhyx!" I yell, springing to my feet and stepping into his path. I’m tiny compared to him—a scavenger standing in the shadow of a mountain—but I’ve dealt with debt collectors twice his size and half as pretty.
"I know you’re listening. I know you can understand me.
Talk. Say something besides 'eat' or 'rest' like I’m some kind of defective pet. "
He pauses. His armor’s light intensifies, casting long, jagged shadows across the floor as he stands perfectly still. A deep, warning note resonates beneath the floorboards, mirroring his mood. The tension is thick enough to choke on.
“I have been wandering your metallic pet,” I provoke, and the mark answers with a hot, restless thrum beneath my skin.
"I've started calling it The Ship in my head.
Capitalized. Like it's a person. Did you know that?
The Ship's 'absolute' stasis field seems to have a few holes in it. I’ve seen the viewport. I’ve seen the secondary mess.
The Ship is letting me walk around, Draevik.
Is it going soft on you, or are you just losing your grip? "
Finally, he turns. The movement is so fast my eyes barely track it.
One moment he’s facing the door, and the next, he’s towering over me.
Despite the lack of physical contact, his proximity bears down on me.
I can smell the ozone and the faint, metallic scent of the ship clinging to him. It’s an intoxicating, dangerous smell.
"Virex Prime recognizes your presence," he rumbles, as if it were a relentless pounding that rattles my teeth. "You are a biological necessity, unrelated to security failure. The ship adapts to the marker. Your status remains unchanged."
“And my ship?” Too much edge slips into my voice. I have been saving this one. "The Harrow. I saw her through the viewport. Your warship has her clamped to the hull. My autopilot should have pulled her to a safe distance days ago. You grabbed her."
Something moves behind his eyes. A flicker of the amber goes darker, then levels out.
"The vessel was drifting," he rumbles. "Its power reserves were failing. Another cycle and it would have gone dark. Virex Prime secured it."
"Secured it or stole it?" I demand, my body tensing.
“Preserved it.” He goes incredibly still for a split second, his presence overwhelming the space. “You are welcome.”
"I didn't thank you—" I begin to snap back, but he easily cuts me off.
"The vessel is intact. Its systems are in standby." He moves toward the viewport as he speaks, his arm extending past my shoulder to press a finger against the glass, pointing at the Harrow's docking clamps. "It will remain clamped to my hull for as long as you remain aboard."
Without the need to touch me, his arm starts to feel like a wall beside my head, his chest a furnace behind my shoulder, and the viewport is cold against my forehead, and the space between all three has become a geometry I am suddenly, acutely aware of.
I can feel his breath disturbing the loose hairs at my temple.
Between his chest plate and the mark under my tunic, the bond thrums with a tone that makes my teeth ache.
"If you prefer," he continues, dropping into a register I feel in my sternum, "I can release it into the Choke and let the gravity wells finish what the power failure started.
" My mouth snaps shut. He holds the position for one more breath—long enough for me to catalogue every point where his heat meets my skin without touching—and then he pulls back, and the air rushes in to fill the space he vacated, and it is cold, and I hate that I notice.
He knows exactly what he just did. He dangled my ship over a cliff and dared me to argue. The Harrow is alive because his warship is keeping her alive, and if I push too hard, he can cut the line. My hands ball into fists at my sides.
"You're a real piece of work, Draevik," I spit, letting my frustration show bare.
"I am efficient," he counters without missing a beat, his expression impenetrable. "There is a significant difference."
I groan and force myself to stay put, refusing to give him the satisfaction of seeing me flinch.
"Explain why your ship thinks it's my mother then.
If I'm supposed to “rest,” I'd prefer to do it without the constant threat of being fried by the bulkheads every time I hit the limit of my leash.
You won't even let me have K-Seven back.
My drone is sitting in that locker five feet away, and you treat it like a weapon of mass destruction.
Give me my things, Draevik. Give me something that makes me feel like a person instead of a battery. "
He closes the final few inches of distance, and I crane my neck back just to look at his face.
His eyes are swirling now, the light in them shifting like a nebula.
He leans down, his face inches from mine—his features are sharp, alien, and entirely too intense.
A strange, dark beauty clings to him, and I hate myself for noticing.
"You understand nothing of what you are." His words are heavy with a dark, measured authority. "You are a disruption. A variable I did not authorize. Do not mistake my restraint for a lack of will. I could crush the life from your frame before your heart finished its next beat."
I bark out a laugh that sounds a bit breathless even to my own ears.
"Restraint? You call kidnapping me and branding me 'restraint'? I’d hate to see what you do when you’re actually trying to be mean. You talk about variables and authorizations like you’re some kind of accountant, but you’re just a bully with a big ship. "