Page 30 of Fallen from the Stars

“Is Kane speaking in your head?” Vasil asked, jarring her back to reality.

“He was, but he’s sleeping now.”

“I cannot tell you where anyone else is, Theo.”

Theo frowned. “Why not? I thought we were past that.”

His lips fell into a frown to mirror her own, and a crease appeared at the center of his brow. He dropped his gaze to the sand and shifted in place, tentacles curling restlessly. “Because I do not know wherehereis.”

“Are you saying you’re just as stranded as I am?”

“I found your pod just as a storm swept in. There was no land in sight to gauge our location. We rode the storm out, and this is where it took us.”

Theo lowered her stick, which she’d already picked clean of meat, and propped it against the stone ring Vasil had built around the fire.

“But you havethose,” she said, motioning to his tentacles. “You could just swim out there, right? Find your way back? It’s not like you’re stuck on land.”

Not like I am.

“I did not leave you in the sea, Theodora, and I will not abandon you here,” he said firmly. “I explored a bit this morning when I went for the fish, and I plan to go farther tomorrow.”

Hearing him say he wouldn’t leave her here eased something inside her, a fear she hadn’t realized she’d been harboring. Though she was good at tricking herself into believing her own capabilities, into believing she could survive if it came down to it, she was scared at heart. She didn’t know what she wasdoing, much less what she was going to do.

And…she didn’t want to be left alone.

She dug her toes into the sand. “So, until then…”

“It is only us.”

“What do we do in the meantime? What canIdo?”

“This area is essentially our den. We make the most of it,” he said, twisting to look back over his shoulder at the pod. “We have prey to hunt and fruit to forage, and your pod will serve as adequate shelter.” He faced her again. “Many of the humans I know enjoy the beach. Do you?”

Theo turned her head, looking past the fire to survey the beach’s pale sand and the cerulean ocean beyond. “I’ve never been on one until now. This is the first time I’ve been on land for more than a few hours in…eighteen years.”

Had it really been that long since she left Old Earth?

Vasil tilted his head back to look up at the open sky, which was darkening to gray-blue as evening deepened. “You were uptherefor all that time?” His voice brimmed with unmasked wonder.

“Yeah. You get used to it, you know? The more time passes, the less you realize what you’re missing.” She shrugged her shoulders. “I didn’t have much to miss anyway. My experiences planet-side were…unpleasant.”

“Planet-side?”

Theo removed the cap — which doubled as a cup — from the container beside her and poured herself some water. “Yeah. It’s something IDC soldiers say. Just means on a world. We spend a lot of time in space, even the ones who do the fighting. Time on a planet feels almost like this mythological thing after a while, so it kinda needs its own designation to keep it separate.”

Vasil returned his attention to her and leaned closer; she found herself both grateful for and resentful of the fire separating them.

“What unpleasant experiences did you have?” he asked.

Theo cradled the cup between her hands and watched the reflections on the water inside. “Shitty childhood.”

Movement from the corner of her eye forced her attention up again. Her heart skipped a beat as Vasil used his tentacles to drag himself closer to her around the edge of the fire. When he stopped, there was less than a meter of distance between them, and two of his tentacles were stretched out toward Theo — one in front of her, one behind. Neither limb touched her, but they weresoclose.

“My understanding of what those words mean to humans is limited,” he said. “The meanings they hold for me are shaped by my experiences, which were very different from yours. Will you tell me more, Theo?”

She studied his expression silently, searching his eyes. Desire lingered within them, but it was the interest in his gaze that caught her attention. He genuinely wanted to hear more. He wanted toknowher. If Vasil were human, she would’ve had sex with him without a second thought — she could see the potential for a real relationship in his eyes, and it called to her, speaking to what she’d wanted for so long. But there were so many differences between the two of them…

Could she really overlook them? Could she just fuck him and get it over with, as Kane had suggested?

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