Behind him, Eris bellowed a wordless war cry as she let loose with the guns, the rock in front of them exploding a second before they swung into where it had been at speed.
“We’re dead,” Sparky whispered. “We’re fucking dead. There had better be virgins in heaven or I want a refund.”
He felt the tension, the expectation in the air from both humans as they waited for the ship’s shields to get shredded by the shrapnel field where the asteroid had been. It was so thick he was surprised any of them could even breathe.
“Hey, Zero,” a new voice broke over the comm. T’Raal. “You look like you might be in a spot of bother. Need a hand?”
Zero grinned as the Sprite dropped out of high-speed right in front of them, the bigger ship extending its shields to deal with the shattered asteroid. The two ships side-slipped through the field, leaving it between them and the lancers trying to follow.
“Cutting it fine, Sprite,” he replied aloud for the benefit of the two humans in the cabin. “And yes, we’d welcome a hand here. Got ourselves a couple of dance partners that are a little clingy, if you know what I mean?”
“Yeah, well, Beauty was shopping, so we need to go back for him. Maintain current course and speed. We’ll be right back.”
“Roger that. Maintaining current speed and heading.”
The Warborne ship wheeled away, using a short hop to take it to the other side of the asteroid field before opening fire.
“My god,” Eris breathed, leaning forward in her chair to watch the battle on screen. “What kind of weaponry is that thing packing? I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“Little green men,” Sparky added wisely. “Although in the Warborne’s case, large and not at all green.”
“I dunno… sometimes Fin looks a little green around the gills when Red cooks,” Zero chuckled, a whole lot more comfortable now the Sprite had their backs. He’d never intended to take the Aegis all the way. He’d merely wanted to use it long enough to get the Warborne’s attention all the way out at Praxis-Four.
“You have a crew member called Beauty?” Sparky leaned on the arm of his chair, watching Zero avidly. “Now either she’s a stunner or a ten-pinter. Which is it?”
“Ten-pinter?” For once Zero’s innate ability to decode “human-speak” deserted him and he looked at the tall human blankly.
“Ten-pinter,” Eris supplied, shutting down the weapons console. “AKA, a potential sexual partner who requires the intake of a certain amount of alcohol, in this case, ten pints, before they become attractive enough to bed.”
Zero’s eyebrow winged up toward his hairline. “Ah… pleasant. No, Beauty’s neither. In fact, I’m not sure how he got his nickname… his real name is Altav.”
“You all have nicknames?” Sparky demanded. “What’s yours? Tinman?”
“Ha-fucking-ha!” Zero flipped him the bird. “Actually, Zero is my nickname. My real name is too long and complicated to be translated correctly.”
Not entirely true. He didn’t have a name, just a serial number that showed in a tattoo across his cheek if he let it. Not that he planned on telling the piss-taking human that.
“The only one of us who doesn’t have one is T’Raal.”
“Oh?” Eris asked as he unclipped himself from the pilot’s chair. Now they weren’t in combat, he didn’t need to be there. He could pilot the ship from anywhere. “Why is that?”
He shrugged, heading over to her. Reading his expression, she’d started to unclip herself, reaching her arms up around his neck as he plucked her from her seat. “No idea, just the way it is.”
There was a clunk, and the deck shifted sideways a fraction of a millimeter. The humans wouldn’t have felt anything but to Zero, it was like a tectonic plate movement.
“How about you ask him yourself?” he suggested and then hid his smile as her arms tightened around his neck, an apprehensive look on her face.
“They’re here. Now?”
❖
Eris had never met an actual alien before. Not one that wasn’t human in origin anyway. And Zero didn’t count because he looked so human she couldn’t tell the difference between him and Allen. But as soon as she saw the leader of the Warborne, T’Raal, standing in the airlock, she knew instantly he wasn’t human.
“Your eyes were different when you came to Tarantus before,” she blurted out as Zero walked across the boarding tunnel between the ships. And they were. On the security footage they’d been blue and human-like. Now, it was like looking into a cat’s eyes. No, it was like being studied by a blue-eyed lion on two legs. The man was a predator through and through, of that she was sure.
“Contacts,” he replied, an easy smile on his lips. “Welcome aboard the Sprite…”
“Eris Archer,” she supplied quickly, holding out her hand.
“Eris sustained neural damage operating an armored suit to get us off the station,” Zero added. “Her suit needs recovering from the aft airlock and bringing aboard. I’ll need Talent… did you manage to get the medbay fixed?”
“We did. Try not to blow it up this time,” the large Warborne leader replied with a quirk of his lips. Then his gaze slid past them. “Jayce Allen… why am I not surprised? You’re like a magnet for fucking trouble.”
“Hey, hey!” The ex-con held his hands up, palms out. “These two found me. I was trying to stay out of it but noooo, they insisted on my help. Probably wouldn’t’ve made it without me.”
“Yeah yeah…” Eris broke in as T’Raal motioned them through the door ahead of him, triggering the airlock and tunnel retraction.
“You still didn’t explain why you know so much about SO13… or why you ended up in Mirax Ruas,” she added, nodding toward the tattoos around his upper arms. Each marked a year in the
