Drelix

The fact salvagers are hanging around Station X42 is an indication of the state of the place. The newer stations and well-run trading planetoids have proper defense systems. Not this place, given they clearly targeted a ship they thought was attempting to avoid detection, and therefore fair game.

The salvagers are not my main issue. It is the Bosszanto outside my ship waiting for my mate I need to deal with. I activate the canopy and as it rises, I see him start to grin at the sight of Crystal.

A grin which turns to a look of abject terror as I step in front of her. He makes the mistake of trying to run, and in a couple of wing beats, I'm on top of him, slamming his body against the wall as my fingers curl around his neck.

"Those codes were no good. We were sitting targets out there," I say, voice as low as it can go.

"There was a problem. I fixed it as soon as I could," he gibbers.

I release smoke from my mouth and suck it back up my nose. I think the Bosszanto soils himself.

"I promise, Sarkarnii, the codes were good! I wouldn't put Crystal at risk!"

"I should hope so because if I find you gave my mate bad information, I will come looking for you." I increase my grip, my eyes raking over him. "I doubt you need all your limbs to continue to be part of the pond life of this station."

"They were good! They were good!" he whimpers, his voice strangled.

"When you're quite finished," Crystal says.

She's stood with her arms folded and one foot tapping. My blood chills. She is not happy.

"I'm done." I release the Bosszanto and he slides to the floor.

"She will not be dining with you tonight or any night," I snarl. "If you want payment, you come to me."

"Do you always go full alpha male, or is it something you have to work at?" Crystal grumbles as I catch up with her near the end of the gangway.

"You belong…"

"To you, I get it, but you don't need to keep this up. Kaleb is harmless," she says, swiping her wrist over the scanner to the exit. "Not everything has to be growling and snarling." The door clicks open, and she slides through, leaving me to follow.

I've nevved her off somehow, although I don't know how, given the Bosszanto wanted her to do something she did not want to for the sake of a set of codes which nearly didn't work.

Which nearly got her killed.

Anger boils within me once more, to the point I consider going back to take it out on the unfortunate creature. But I'm sure Crystal will not approve, and her approval is what my rut desires more than anything.

"The main trading domes are down here," she says as I exit. "But I'm guessing you won't want to be seen in them." She looks me up and down. "Plus, you're going to be difficult to disguise. Do you have any way of contacting your trader?"

I extract the small comms device from my pocket and hold it up. "I do."

"Then call him, and arrange to meet him at the cafe called Kraznik," she says. "I can take you there without needing to go through the domes."

My contact, a Yetag trader, agrees with the meeting location, although he is unhappy at being kept waiting. I follow Crystal through the filth of the station, every passageway seemingly more disgusting than the last. It makes my scales want to crawl off my body. If I don't end up with mites, I'll be amazed.

"How long have you been here?" I ask.

Because you are not staying behind when I leave.

"Since I got dumped here by the aliens who took me from Earth, green reptilian twats," she spits, "no offence." She adds with a sigh and a brief glance at me. "Time is measured differently in this galaxy, but I think it's been about half a nova-year."

My mate has been on this heap of floating space dung for half a nova-year?

"You've done well."

"What? For a female?" Crystal retorts as she takes a lefthand fork where two passages bisect.

"For a human. It seems you are a rare commodity."

She snorts. "I wouldn't make it easy for them to abduct me a second time."

Given she was doing relatively well getting away from the Habosu before they used the disruptor, I can believe it.

"I'd never allow them to take me a second time," Crystal adds, darkly. "I'd rather die."

Regardless of the filthy surroundings, I fire out an arm and pull her into me.

"You will never die, and no one will ever touch a single hair on your head."

"You won't always be around," she says, eyes blazing. "You're here to get what you came for and then you're going to leave."

"But you forget." I trace the very tip of a claw over the faint scars on her neck, delighting in the shudder it provokes and the deepening of her scent. "You do belong to me in every way."

She wriggles and l let her go.

"Whatever, Drelix," she mutters, straightening her clothes. "This is the back door for Kraznik. Wait here while I warn the owner what's happening." She pushes at a grimy button and the door creaks open.

"I do not wait."

"You will wait," Crystal says, her sweet, blunt, white teeth gritted together. "Or you won't get what you came for."

My rut already knows it got what it came for, but I do also need the quantum booster…and the intel. With a growl, I make a show of hanging back.

Crystal gives me a long stare, and then the door snaps shut. I was not joking when I said I don't wait. Every seccari she is away from me is torture causing me to pace up and down the filthy passage, tail lashing, with no regard for the dirt.

The door opens and a hand extends, holding a fold of material.

"Put this on. Cover yourself up."

"I am Sarkarnii. I do not hide in the shadows."

A sigh.

"If you want to use the cafe to meet your contact, this is their terms. You cover yourself up, you keep quiet, and you don't burn anything." Crystal's head pokes out of the door. "It appears they've encountered Sarkarnii before," she adds with a smug smile.

I take the fabric. It's a long cloak with a hood. I swing it over myself, wrinkling my nose at the musty smell. Crystal rolls her eyes.

"The entire station stinks. Believe me, whatever you're smelling now, it can get a lot worse." She waves me past her and into the cafe.

I'm hit with the scent of cooking which is familiar in a good way, and I suck down the scent.

"You're in the booth at the back." Crystal points it out to me as she turns back to the door.

I capture her wrist in my hand, the delicacy of her bones intense against my touch.

"Where are you going?"

"My quarters," She huffs and sticks out her leg with the ruined pants leg. "I need a change of clothes."

"Come back here when you are done."

"Maybe," she says, not meeting my eyes.

"Come back, or I'll come for you and there will be fire."

The eye roll again.

"Okay," she says, with resignation infusing every part of the word and her body.

I let her go, and she slips out of the door into the passage and is gone like smoke, leaving my heart empty in a way I don't understand. Even the loss of my family didn't hollow me out in this way.

If she doesn't return, I will tear the station apart to find her.