Chapter 11

Rikki

Huddled in a corner, buck naked except for the thin sleeping bag thing, I was trying hard to wrap my head around what the fuck was going on. I didn’t see a threat. The door was firmly shut to this place, that proximity alert ward thingy hadn’t started shrieking either. But whatever Thar’oc had heard, I knew it was real.

His wild black and blue hair stood on end around his head like the hackles of a wolf. His posture had dropped into a defensive crouch in front of me. He was holding the pistol from his thigh holster in his right hand, a sharp knife in the other, and his tail was waving wildly behind his back. The growl rattling out of him was terrifying, like that of a tiger or a vicious wild dog.

I tried to locate where the bag with my new clothing was, then where I could maybe get my hands on a weapon. I was pretty sure I could see the glint of his tail knife not far away from me. Those thoughts fled when a grate-like panel suddenly burst at the bottom of that strange bank of ancient computers. Was that a freaking tentacle? It really was! It was incongruously pink, with large suckers along the bottom.

“Close your eyes, Rikki,” Thar’oc warned me grimly, his deep, sub-harmonic voice vibrating through the room with his intensity. His laser pistol whined as he fired a shot into that writhing tentacle thing. Then another and another, and still it kept advancing, hissing and twitching each time my mercenary struck true.

I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t close my eyes. Something told me that whatever that thing was, it was danger incarnate. I couldn’t look away from a threat like that. I wanted a weapon; and I wanted to run, but there was nowhere to go.

Then that thing started to spill from the small hole it was crawling through, impossibly huge as its shape started to make more sense to me. Many tentacles, a misshapen head with huge blue eyes, and a third pink eye that flicked open. Immediately, the world started to turn hazy around me. I wanted to stand up and crawl forward. None of those thoughts made sense, but I found myself rolling languidly out of my blanket.

The whine of the laser pistol was sharp and bright, piercing through suddenly foggy thoughts. Then everything went clear again, the fog lifting, and my mind growing lucid. Thar’oc stood in front of a pile of gooey pink tentacles. They took up far too much space in the small room. Some had even spilled over his boots. His tail was wildly lashing, his pistol aimed down at the thing. “Are you okay, Rikki?”

He twisted his head to look over his shoulder at me, growling when he realized I wasn’t safe in the corner where he stuck me. It was that worried look that was his downfall. He didn’t see it in time. The tentacles twitched and then struck so rapidly that they blurred. I shouted a warning, but it was too late.

That thing held Thar’oc in those strange pink arms; he fought, pulling with his hand and slashing with his knife. With his tail, he was twisting to stab at the eyes in that weird head of the octopus-like thing, but without his knife attached, those were hard strikes didn’t seem to do much damage. Then I saw the maw that started to open from somewhere between those tentacles and any fear for myself faded away; that was just background noise at the sight of Thar’oc in mortal peril.

The knife was slippery in my hands. It did not have a hilt to hold, just a ring where it hooked around his tail. The knife bit into my palm as I clutched it, cutting my skin when I pulled back and struck as hard as I could. It was the most disgusting feeling ever as my hand struck that huge eye thing and sunk right in.

In an instant, the fight was all over. Like I’d flipped the magic button, the pink octopus thing collapsed to the ground. Thar’oc swayed on his feet, his arms and a part of his neck covered in weird suction marks. Then his azure eyes focused on me, and the wildest, feral grin spread across his handsome face. “You fucking goddess,” he said, his voice deep and gruff. He clutched his hand to his chest, “I’m in love.”

I opened my mouth, trying to figure out what I was supposed to say to that. He spun, turning his back to me, and then the laser pistol fired again and again into that pile of tentacles. He was making really sure that the creature was dead. “What is it?” I asked, choosing to take the easy road for now.

“Something that resembles a Grolarnx, only much smaller. I don’t think this one is young; it must be an unsuccessful half-breed.” That thing looked like a total freak of nature, and it had seemed pretty successful at what it wanted to do, kill, and eat things. I really didn’t want to know what a full-sized Grolarnx looked like.

Thar’oc didn’t take much time to check his injuries. He was focused on making sure I was dressed, and stuffing my shoes so I wouldn’t slip and slide and get blisters again. My bleeding palm was quickly bandaged with tender fingers. Then he tossed his pistol in his bag, pulled another out to put in the holster at his thigh, and scared me when he strapped another to mine. “Just a precaution. We need to leave ASAP. That dead body is going to draw in other creepy crawlies.”

When he started assembling a huge rifle as the final step before we left, it drove home his profession. That was the tool of his trade, the real one. A rifle that he’d probably used countless times before. It might be responsible for some of those notches he’d carved into his horns. I swallowed roughly, forcing myself to get over my aversion to having a gun strapped to my thigh. This wasn’t Earth; this was a freaking space station populated by crooks and criminals.

In short order, he had me hustling out the door, all the gear packed up and strapped to his back. The rifle he cradled carefully in his arms, and it was only his tail that kept me connected to him; a loop circled my wrist. The knife glinted at the tip again; it had been quickly cleaned on the remains of my shredded catsuit.

“Shouldn’t we hide out here another day?” I asked, “Your ship isn’t leaving until tomorrow, isn’t it?” Where else could we run if these weird bowels of the station weren’t safe any longer? Not that they had ever been truly safe if that weird creature had been roaming down here all this time. Thar’oc had mentioned that this place was home to some very unsavory things; now I knew what he meant.

“I’m calling the Captain, telling him of our situation. Without that tracker on you, he might agree to just take us aboard.” He only thought of that now? Though I had to admit that it hadn’t been bad to hide down here, not at all. I’d liked every part of it, except the monster thing. Thar’oc was the most generous lover I’d ever had, in more than one way. My whole body flushed just thinking about the sex we’d shared.

“Rikki,” Thar’oc said, his tone stern but holding a hint of amusement as he glanced over his shoulder down at me. “Behave, sweetheart. We have no time for fucking right now.” Oops, I flushed even more. I should remember that his nose was much more sensitive than mine. Apparently, he could smell my interest even when I hadn’t had a proper chance to wash up after the last time. I hoped we could get on that ship because I desperately wanted a shower. I hoped they had showers with water on a spaceship. What if it was just soap and hot air or something? Now that would be awful.

I felt weirdly chipper and energized as I trotted after my mercenary through the dark, dank maintenance tunnels. It smelled wet and musty in here, and only the light from his communication device led the way. The thing was kind of like a small watch strapped to his wrist, but it did so many things I couldn’t keep it straight yet. A smartphone times a million.

When we got further away from that little chamber we’d slept in, among other things, Thar’oc relaxed. “Here’s our problem,” he said. “They know I’m part of the Varakartoom’s crew. If that prick has any brain cells, he’ll have men watching the ship in case we go for it.” That made a lot of sense, so if we were now heading directly for his ship, what were we going to do about it?

“I’m going to call them up and ask if they can spot the watchers. I have a plan. I just need the Captain to agree to it.” That last he spoke in such a fashion that my shoes suddenly felt like lead; he sounded like he thought that was going to be the biggest obstacle.

How strict was this captain, exactly? Was he that much of a rogue, a money-obsessed bastard who didn’t care about coming to the aid of one of his crew members when they needed it? This wasn’t like the military, where Thar’oc had broken the rules, I hoped. He spoke of that crew like they were his family.

First, we had to reach an exit. Thar’oc wanted to get a sense of the mood on the station before he breached the subject with anyone. That didn’t take us long and when we glanced out the service door, a different one from last time, I felt like the station was the same. A throng of aliens and vendors, a wild range of smells and noises. There was nothing to suggest that they were agitated.

My mercenary seemed to think the same. His tail had curled around my middle and anchored me to his hip while, with one hand, he was rubbing his carved horn and the dozen notches on it. “I’m calling him now,” he declared and raised his wrist to his mouth to do so. A grim look in his pretty azure eyes that I didn’t like one bit.