Page 24 of Taken By The Alien Warrior Pirate

Of course, I had my selfish tendencies and I wanted her to stay with me forever, but the worst thing I could do, especially at a time like this, was put a lot of pressure on her when she was already feeling the weight of her worries.

“I was helping Silver in the maintenance room yesterday,” she mentioned. “We are sort of… getting along.” She glanced off into space with a soft smile. “I was helping her with some programming issues for our own robots. I fixed a few glitches for her in the system and rewired a few things. By the end of it, she seemed impressed. I’m not sure I've got her full respect yet, but we’re definitely getting there.”

“I’m happy to hear that. Silver has a tough exterior but she’s like jelly on the inside.” I paused and grinned. “Sometimes.”

“Well, she definitely doesn’t seem to hate me as much as Amada does,” Carmela admitted in a defeated voice.

“I wish I could say Amada will eventually come around,” I said with a slow exhale, glancing around the hangar, thankful that we had the alone time to talk, if only for a little while.

“What is wrong with her anyway?” Carmela gave me a pensive glance, studying me intently.

“She’s jealous of you,” I mentioned.

“That’s what Silver said, too.” Carmela frowned.

I laughed. “Silver loves to add her insight to things even though she’s an AI. She views herself as one of the sophisticated elite types of robots.”

“She’s very smart,” Carmela agreed. “We don’t have any AIs like her where I work.” She paused reflectively and glanced at her lap. “Sorry…worked.” She said the last word so softly it was barely audible.

“We programmed her that way and she's evolved, growing in intelligence.” I tried to change the subject so that Carmela wouldn’t stay in a rut, fixated on thinking about her old job. I didn’t want to make her any promises I couldn’t keep.

“At least she isn’t made of human or Alesian matter,” Carmela said, wrinkling her nose.

“That’s a Belic specialty.”

“Is it?” Carmela looked horrified that I would have such a casual response to it, but that wasn’t my intention at all by saying it.

My heart dropped and I quickly backtracked. “That’s not what I meant exactly—”

“It’s okay.” Carmela’s features softened. “I know what you are trying to say.”

“They’re monsters, let’s just call it that.”

Carmela’s smile was dark. “Monsters of the worst kind.”

“I know that things are rough with Amada, but I’m trying not to press her buttons right now because I need her to cooperate,” I admitted. “You know… so we can eventually defeat those monsters.”

Carmela nodded. “I can understand that.” She glanced up at me. “How long were you two together?”

“A while.”

I could see the disappointment etched all over Carmela’s face. “I’m afraid to ask, but I want to know at the same time. Well maybe it’s none of my business and you don’t have to answer but… just how long is um… a while?”

I hesitated. “Ten years.”

Carmela’s jaw dropped open. “Ten… tenyearsyou say?”

I tried to make her feel better. “Well, when you factor in our lifespan like we were discussing earlier, it’s really notthatlong.”

Carmela looked away, seemingly disturbed by the revelation. “It is a long time if you’re counting by Earth years.”

“There isnothingbetween us anymore,” I assured her. “What’s in the past is in the past, and I intend to keep it there where it belongs.”

I already knew that Carmela had never been in a serious relationship before, so I aimed to go easy on her feelings about the subject.

Carmela glanced my way, but it was brief. Her smile looked forced. “She is still in love with you.”

“What Amada wants and what Amada gets are two totally different things,” I said.

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