Page 18 of Protected By the Alien Space Guardian

I had never believed in fate or destiny before, but I was beginning to wonder if a greater power was at work here, something or someone who would make sense of all the killing done to my planet. I hoped with all my heart something good would come out of this.

If I had been a different type of person, I would have been hell-bent on revenge. I hated the Cryons with all my might and would have loved nothing more than to dish out some payback, but I wasn’t a fighter—like a woman named Ashley Silla told me about, who was right now on Earth, killing Cryons. I wasn’t a humanitarian like Silla either, so I didn’t know where that left me. What I did know, though, was that I wanted to be with Raasla and find out more about the soulbond and soulweb glyphs. It intrigued me. It allowed me not necessarily to forget about Earth’s tribulations, but it distracted me from it. Besides, it seemed there was already a rescue mission at work, one much better equipped than me.

“Are you ready?” Raasla, never far from my side, finished his conversation with Garth and came to place an arm around me. I looked up at his handsome face, whose lines were becoming more dearer to me with every passing day.

“I am,” I confirmed and smiled at Silla.

“Take care of her,” Silla requested of Raasla before her attention moved back to me. “Take care of yourself. We’ll miss you.”

I embraced the woman who I would have never met hadn’t it been for an alien invasion, making me once more question the designs of the universe, fate, and all that.

“I will keep an eye open for your family,” she said, even though I had told her not to bother. My dad had died a long time ago, and I had been on the phone with my mom when my sister was killed by the Cryons. I doubted they would have allowed my mom to live, and in all honesty, given the kind of ordeals survivors went through, death might have been more merciful. Not everyone was as lucky as me to have a Raasla rescue her, or a Garth as it was in Silla’s case.

“I’ll miss you too. We’ll be back,” I promised Silla.

Her embrace was unexpected and sweet, and I hugged her right back before Raasla and I entered his ship.

“Alone at last.” He grinned mischievously.

“How long will it take to get to your friend?”

“Long enough for you and me to get to know each other a lot better.” He kissed me hungrily.

“But first, you tempting soul binder, we need to get into space.” He smacked my ass, and laughing, we went to the bridge.

“How will we find him?” I sat down in one of the two captain’s chairs as he busied himself with all the necessary tabs and commands on his tablet to get the ship into space and us on a safe course in hyperspace.

“He doesn’t want to be found,” Raasla replied distractedly, and the view on the large screen ahead of us changed as the spaceship lifted off the ground and began its ascend into the atmosphere.

My superiors were happy enough with the large group of humans I had rescued and taken to the Pandraxian Empire to allow me some lenience over the coming days. I lied to Possedion that I was on my way to intercept an even larger Cryon transporter filled with human cargo. The price I dangled before him was enough that he didn’t question my security overwrite as I told him I needed to go dark. In truth, I didn’t want him to notice the second lifeform aboard the ship, Zoe.

Sooner or later, he would start to ask questions, but until then, Zoe and I were free to indulge in getting to know each other better in and out of bed.

Finding a trace of Noodar was as hard as I had expected but not impossible. If he hadn’t wanted to be found, there would have been no way for me to track him down. But he had left little traces here and there, and I didn’t think I was far off the mark when I concluded that he wanted me to find him.

It took six space days to map his location to Rotodex Four, one of the last surviving planets in the vicinity of the Black Abyss. It was a gamble visiting this planet. Living on it was utter madness. One never knew when the Black Abyss would take another deep, hungry breath and fill it with stars, moons, and planets.

“Is that… a black hole?” Zoe asked, mouth agape.

“We call it a Black Abyss, one of the last unexplored phenomena in the universe,” I filled her in.

Relying on Noodar knowing more than I did, I brought our spaceship down to Rotodex Four’s surface.

“How do you know where to find him?”

“I don’t. He will find us.” I landed the ship on a large cliff, where it could be seen for miles around. For good measure, I activated a beacon.

“Want to go get some unrecycled air?” I asked Zoe, feeling a slight sense of unease for her accompanying me outside. I hadn’t seen Noodar in years, so I couldn’t be sure of his reception of us.

“Sounds like an excellent idea,” my wonderful mate beamed. I loved the way she was open to any challenge and her willingness to embark on this adventure with me, which wasn’t her fight. That she was making it hers told me more about her feelings for me than words would have, although I had to confess I was yearning for her to say the famous three words.

We had barely stepped foot outside when my comm announced the fast approach of an object through the air. I narrowed my eyes and watched a black dot become larger.

“Oh my God,” Zoe exclaimed, pointing at the sky behind us. Even from here, the Black Abyss was visible. Like a giant eye in the sky watching us.

“I don’t think it’s going to eat us today,” I tried to assuage her fears, “but soon. We shouldn’t stay here long.”

A small planetary cruiser landed a few paces from us. I put my arm around Zoe and pulled her against my side, ready to push her toward the still extended gangway, while my other hand rested on the butt of my blaster.

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