Page 45 of Mated on Live

His eyes narrowed, like he didn’t believe her, but he had no way of calling her out on it. He couldn’t exactly look up Spanish words. The Coalition knew a lot of things, but they unfortunately only knew one human language, and it was English. He could only take her word.

“Alright,” he finally said. “Why is the gravity off?”

“I’m making a video.”

“Yes, you told me you would before I left. But why does that necessitate the gravity being off?”

“Fun?” She shrugged, still slowly rotating.

“Well, turn it back on. I’m trying to load the storage bay and it’s very difficult to do when nothing stays where I put it.”

“Oh, yeah. About that…”

He blinked at her. “You don’t remember how.”

“No, I remember how.”

“Then, what?”

She beamed. “I’m stuck.”

“What?”

She turned, twisting in the air, reaching for the panel. It was just barely out of reach. But zero-G wasn’t at all like swimming. There was nothing for her to push against, and the harder she struggled, the more she spun in place. Her makeup and discarded clothes twirled uselessly in the air around her. Grabbing them did nothing as they weren’t heavy enough to push off of and throwing them did nothing because they couldn’t affect the screen to turn on the gravity. Not that she didn’t try. A makeup brush, her bronzer, and a hair tie were all floating in random spots around the room, victims of her attempts to throw them at the control console before they ricocheted off into oblivion, out of her reach and lost to the void of the room.

Serval made a sound, either smothering laughter or biting back a sound of annoyance, before he shoved himself into the bridge, pushing off the doorway with first his hand, then his feet.

His momentum carried him all the way to her side where he caught her up in his arms. She giggled, grabbing hold of him as he twisted in the air, boots coming to rest on the display screen. He pushed off from there, turning again, landing on the ground. He grabbed the console with one hand, stabilizing them in place as Sophie laughed.

Her legs kicked in the air as he hit the screen, restoring gravity. It happened slowly – probably to prevent them from slamming into the ground. He slipped his arm under her legs, keeping hold of her as he came to rest on his feet, and she settled into his grasp.

“Hola, mi amor,” she purred again, kissing his cheek.

“Ua lea, lov’alel,” he returned, one of his olules stroking her neck, making her shiver in delight.

“Did you get everything you need?”

“Yes. I bought you presents.”

“Oh, I love presents.” She patted his chest, silently urging him to put her down. Which he did, keeping one hand on her lower back as he stood straight. “But you know you don’t have to buy me things, right?”

“I enjoy buying you things. Besides, at least one of them is for work.”

“Oh?”

“I bought us outfits for the photo shoot for the ad campaign.”

“Oh! Yeah!” Sophie beamed. “Awesome, did you want to do that now?”

“We can.”

“Have you heard anything back from that little bug thing you installed in Prince Qui’tal’s charging dock?”

“No, not yet.”

“Ugh,” she dropped her head back. “Seriously, how long can a combot go without charging?”

“Some can go ten tendays or more,” he chuckled, stepping back. “But whenever he does, my device will get all the information he has stored and send it right to us. I’ll get a notification the moment the data hits my system, and I’ll let you know. Until then, I have a few other stories we can follow up on. And, of course, the ad photos.”

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