Hyperspeed Dreams by Anna Carven

Chapter Twenty-Five

Lodan pulledthe Krizen back and did a 360 loop, pulling in behind their attackers.

“Nice one.” Beside him, the Krizen’s assigned pilot, a young, ambitious flight specialist called Erdun, let out a low whistle of appreciation. “You’re gonna have to teach me how to do that.”

“I will,” Lodan growled. “Another time. Let me first shake off these irritating Vakkandik first.”

Who the fuck dared to fire on them? They had balls; he’d give them that. The first blast had glanced off the cruiser’s roof. The second had nicked her wing. All trivial damage, but if they sustained too many of these kinds of hits, there would be problems.

The Sylth alerted him to the presence of three attacking craft.

“Who are the idiots this time, Sylthen?” he murmured, threading his will through the eye of the AI; activating the ship’s plasma cannon. It might lack the power of the big plasma weapons mounted on Silence, but the Krizen’s cannon was pinpoint accurate.

They appear to be Avein craft,The Sylth replied. She was cool and impersonal. Any trace of her earlier madness was gone. Three in total. Do you wish to destroy them?

“Let me check with the boss first.” Lodan opened his comm. “Targets identified. Three assault craft. Avein origin by the looks of it. Seems they’ve seen through our cloaking. I wouldn’t be surprised if they’ve been following us since the tracking implant was activated. But they’re Avein… so I wouldn’t put it past them. Permission to take them down?” The Avein ships split formation, each veering off in a different direction. They must have detected him behind them. Beneath the flight controls, Lodan’s fingers tingled in anticipation.

Sneaky fucking Avein. What had possessed them to try and carry out such a death-wish of a stunt?

Revenge, perhaps? There was a time when his kind had not been so kind to their kind. At one point, the First Division had wreaked havoc on the Avein home planet of Taluun.

Shit.These Avein weren’t here to play.

And now they’d made the grave mistake of firing on his craft—the very vessel that carried his sick, vulnerable mate. She might not act like it—she always tried to put on a tough front—but her condition was growing worse by the siv.

It made him uneasy.

They had to get to this Praetorian HQ before the unthinkable happened.

“Negative,” Tarak said calmly. “You will not take them down.’

“Negative? But—”

“Bait them and head back out beyond Earth’s orbit. We will leave them there for the Seventh Squadron to deal with.”

“You had them on standby the whole time, didn’t you? You anticipated this.”

“Of course.”

“Of course,” Lodan repeated wryly as he gunned the thrusters and shot the Krizen back beyond Earth’s gravitational pull. She could easily outpace any Avein craft. He still didn’t understand what the fuck they were trying to do.

But the boss must’ve had an inkling, otherwise he wouldn’t have gone to all this trouble.

“We will capture them alive… for questioning,” Tarak elaborated, as if reading Lodan’s thoughts. “Besides, I am not looking to provoke a war with Mazek anytime soon.”

“If he’s behind this, then we should—”

“He is not. The Overlord of Taluun is not so stupid as to provoke me. No; I suspect this is the work of some young and foolish upstart.”

“Makes sense,” Lodan grunted as he spotted the familiar formation of the Seventh Squadron on the navigation holo.

Erdun sent the squadron a rapid-fire communication, alerting them to the enemy’s location. The Avein ships appeared moments later. They were trying to be clever; surrounding them from the front and rear and side.

But it was futile. Krizen was too fast.

Lodan could have escaped them at any time, but instead he slowed, allowing the Avein ships to surround him… letting them think they had the upper hand.

He flew defensively, telegraphing caution. Perhaps they would think he was spooked.

The Avein ships closed in…

Lodan’s trigger finger itched, but he didn’t dare fire. If he did that, they would scatter, and he couldn’t chase all three at once.

Slowly, carefully, he lured them…

Right into the jaws of the trap.

“Which one of you is the Squad Leader now?” He opened his comm and addressed the entire Seventh Squadron. They liked to rotate the position of Squad Leader, so every pilot got a chance to fly First Attack.

“Well, well. If it isn’t the Szark.” Lodan recognized the cheerful voice; a former Lieutenant called Norin. “What have you brought us this time, you crazy bastard?”

“Three maniacs with a death-wish and their heads stuffed full of feathers. Deal with them, would you? They’re to be captured and detained. Alive, if possible. Boss’s orders.”

“I’m aware. You checking out now?”

“Yeah. Got some unfinished business on Earth.”

“Don’t get too destructive. I know how you First Division bastards can get.”

“Speak for yourself, Squad Leader.” Lodan reversed the thrusters and executed a swift drop, plummeting toward Earth’s surface, leaving the three Avein craft in his wake.

Didn’t know I could move that fast, did ya?

On the holo, he saw them flying around in circles; confused as to where the fuck he’d just gone.

Then Norin and his squad moved in.

Beside him, Erdun chuckled. “Gonna have to chase ‘em, though. You’ve rattled them now.”

“Yeah. Good thing squad needs the practice. They haven’t done much combat-style flying since Imperial times. Lucky for them, the boss is being very measured in his response.”

“Well, he’s no Emperor, and that’s not a bad thing.”

“Indeed.” Lodan began to detach himself from the flight controls. “Take over now, Erdun. We’re well clear of the threat.” Which didn’t turn out to be much of a threat, anyway.What the fuck were they thinking?

Problem was, if the Avein were working with humans, then they might very well have alerted them to the Krizen’s approach.

Lodan peeled himself out of the command chair and made his way back to the rear cabin.

The first thing he saw was her.

She was staring at him.

Her eyes were narrowed; one eyebrow raised in a silent question, her expression as smooth and cold as polished stone.

But he knew her well enough by now.

He could hear the rapid pattering of her heartbeat.

He saw the slight tremble in her fingers.

He noticed the subtle undulation in the delicate column of her neck as she swallowed.

She was suffering. She was afraid.

But she trusted him.

He, who was cut from corrupted cloth; who had not even a clue how to feel these kinds of things—he had convinced her to trust him.

Somehow, she had made him do it.

He folded himself into the seat beside her and placed his hand on her faintly trembling thigh. Not long now, my love. All this will be over.

“I think our enemies might have just received an advanced warning of our arrival,” he said softly in Kordolian.

Jeral let out a soft, sinister chuckle.

Tarak’s expression was as inscrutable as ever. “We will deal with that as it comes. It won’t make much difference in the end, will it?”

Lodan grinned. “And here I thought mating and rearing your young had made you a little soft.” He was teasing, of course; ever since Tarak had taken his mate, his resolve had strengthened in a way that Lodan was only beginning to be able to comprehend. “But now it feels like we’re preparing for a full-scale war.”

Tarak gave him a long, hard look. “Hm,” was all he said, before turning to look out the window.

The blue-and-green surface of the Earth rushed by. The glittering infinity of space stretched out above them.

Not long now.

Lodan squeezed Tasha’s thigh. She put her hand over his.

They didn’t say a word. They just waited in tense, reassuring silence; the calm before the inevitable storm.