Page 7 of Keeping Freya
Freya
Tap, tap, tap, my foot echoes on the metal floor. The guy, O’Rec, I think, has been gone for a while now. I’m not entirely convinced he’s returning, but the trio seemed close. Human mates, well, I’ll be damned. I have seen this fated mate thing he’s referring to. It mostly happens with the more furry aliens, and once they get a whiff of their mate, they won’t let go. I stubbornly ignore the fact that the big scarred one called me his mate. I am not on the market, I’m on my way home.
I hear footsteps approaching, and O’Rec peers out of the tube they attached to our ship.
“Hello again,” he sings. Please, do not shoot; I brought friends.” I sigh. This guy is impossible to hate. He is all charm, smiles, and good manners.
I don’t lower my gun just yet, but when two very pretty women step out of the tube, my mouth falls open and I lower my weapon.
“You… you’re human!” I am astonished as they both smile. O’Rec smiles at a petite white girl with short blonde hair, and the brunette with long braids waves at me.
“Hi, I’m Lauren! And this here is Mara. Mara is O’Rec’s mate, and I think you put my D’Var in your holding cell.”
I start to feel embarrassed, but she laughs. “It will teach him some humility,” she winks.
I gesture at them to follow me. “Come with me. I’ll take you to meet the other girls first, and then we can figure out what to do. We’re a democracy, and although they made me captain, I won’t make decisions like this by myself.”
“So… you’re keeping the guys locked up?” Mara asks, and I nod.
“Call it an insurance policy.”
We go to the Control room where the rest of the girls wait. I make introductions, and we hover around the table in the back, which is way too small for us now.
“Why did you enter our ship?” I ask O’Rec, because there is no point in beating around the bush.
“You are traveling on a Sternotheri ship; they are our nemesis. We were tracking another of their ships, which led us here. We lost their trail, so we decided to look for answers. Our scans showed human lifeforms, and since we have human mates, that gave us an extra incentive to make sure you were not held captive by those assholes.”
I look at the girls, a mix of conflicted emotions on their faces.
“Can you get us home?” Anna asks.
“I’m sorry,” Mara says. “We haven’t been looking into Earth yet, but it’s not a planet that’s well known around here.”
“So, we’re not in the Milky Way?” Daphne asks.
“No, we have no idea where we are, somewhere far, far away that’s for sure, but where and more importantly when is a big question mark.”
My mouth sets in a tight line. I refuse to accept this.
“What can you do for us that we can’t do ourselves?” I know my tone sounds hostile, but damned, I’m pissed.
“We can take you to a safe place,” O’Rec says, unfazed by my hostility. “We have allies on a planet called Novarron. You will receive sanctuary there and be free to live as you please.”
“Will anybody research going home?” Anna says, her lip wobbling. “I just wanna go home.”
Daphne puts an arm around her for comfort. “We can look for a way home, can’t we? You appear to have superior tech to anything that’s known on Earth.” She gives O’Rec a hopeful look.
He hesitatingly nods, “We can see if we can find something, but I cannot make any promises.”
Frowning, I assess the situation. It all sounds like a lot of bullshit to me. I won’t argue with them just yet, but this is not the end of this conversation.
“Will you release my crewmates?” O’Rec asks, and I look at the girls.
“Anybody against it?” Nobody says a word, so I rise. “Okay, that’s settled then. I will free them, and then you can go back to your ship, and we can have a meeting about what we want to do.”
“We can stay on the ship and do a couple of repairs?” O’Rec suggests.
Before I can shut it down, Daphne already beams at him. “That would be wonderful! I, for one, am sick of dragging that rotting hand everywhere to open doors.”
