Allies (Warriors of Karal Book 5) (9 page)

“We have plenty of fruit. It’s packed so that it doesn’t go off. Then there are dried fruits and dried pulses. And some nuts.” He smiled at her look of distaste.

“I think I’m already missing Karal,” she said.

They prepared a simple meal, Niko giving her small tasks to do that kept her busy, and he could see her begin to calm down. If you could forget about the fact that you were hurtling through space at a speed that would kill you if you crashed or were hit by any space debris, you could almost imagine you were standing on firm ground. There was a gravity field on the cruiser, so it wasn’t as if they were floating around, unable to function properly.

“There,” he said as they sat down together at the small table. “Just think of it as your new home.”

“I don’t feel as if I have a home anymore.” She ate her food slowly. “I can’t wait until this is over. Don’t get me wrong, I really hope we find this new planet. But I’ll be glad when were back on Karal and I can see your house. Maybe then I’ll feel as if I’m home.”

He looked at her and smiled, but didn’t tell her that for him, anywhere she was, was home now.

The mission seemed endless, even though they had only been in space for ten days. They had passed through one wormhole already, and now they were heading towards the next two wormholes. There was something in Niko’s behaviour that made her think that he was worried about entering them. Maybe she was reading too much into it—just being in deep space with no way of getting off the cruiser, of breathing fresh air, was making her a little stir-crazy herself. But Niko was used to these things, and so the fact that he seemed worried disturbed her. But she decided not to ask, because sometimes it was better not to know.

Maybe that was how things had been between her and her mother. Being on board the cruiser had given her time to think, and she had come to the conclusion that her mother had been behaving erratically in the lead-up to her takeover as President. But then that wasn’t surprising, was it? After all it was a huge feat, to manage to overthrow a man who had been ruling Earth for so many years.

Petra had only seen her mother briefly on odd occasions throughout those months. After her father died they had seen less and less of each other, and she guessed it was because of her involvement in some kind of resistance had grown. But Petra still couldn’t quite get her head around her mother being the leader of it.

She shook her head. This was all in the past, and had nothing to do with her life now. The chances were, she would never see her mother or Earth again, so it didn’t really matter anymore what happened, politically, on her home planet. Karal was where she belonged now.

“How are you feeling this morning?” Niko asked her as he walked into the kitchen and put his arms round her waist, pulling her back against him. He kissed her neck, sending shivers down her spine.

One thing that she had discovered, while on board the cruiser, was that having nowhere to go and nothing much to do, was great for their sex life. She wondered if she had already conceived, but Niko told her that the ship’s computer would tell her, or tell him, if she had. This was another thing that seem to worry Niko; he’d been told that females were chosen by the lottery, based on their fertility cycle.

At least that was how it usually worked, but she wondered if the situation on Earth had evolved too rapidly. That the council had decided to take her to Karal without the usual tests, and therefore she was out of sync with what was normally expected of a lottery winner. His hand roamed over her body, hovering over her belly, as if trying to sense if there was life inside her. She wondered if there was a problem with the computer on board the ship, if it wasn’t picking up her tag correctly. But she didn’t like to think about that, she wanted to think of the ship working perfectly, for it was all that stood between them and certain death out in space.

“And what are your plans for today?” she asked Niko.

“I thought that I would check the supplies.”

“You checked them two days ago,” she said as his hand crept higher, cupping her breasts, she leaned back against him, feeling the hardness of his cock, pressing into her back. She couldn’t help herself, she wiggled against him suggestively, and she was rewarded by his fingers tweaking her nipple hard, causing her to take a sharp intake of breath. The hand that had been resting on her belly moved lower, much lower, to slide across her mound and then his fingers rubbed against her clit.

“I find that it is best to keep on top of everything. That it is best to make sure that everything is working properly.” She leaned her head back onto his shoulder tilting it to the left as he leaned down so their lips met. He kissed her, his tongue parting her lips and she sucked on it. It was his turn to groan, he moved his hands away from her and spun her around, his hands going to the buttons on her overalls, almost tearing them off in his haste to open them.

She worked on his buttons, undoing them one at a time, which was all she could manage as her fingers fumbled in their haste. He pushed her overalls down off her shoulders, helping her shrug out of them until they were lying on the floor. Then he lifted her up and moved backwards so that her bottom rested on the counter.

He positioned himself between her thighs, and she cupped his face in her hands and kissed him, her tongue exploring his mouth, while his hands removed her bra. With her breasts free, he leaned down, kissing her soft skin, and then he sucked her nipples, licking at them, before sucking one into his warm, hot, mouth.

She ached for him. She didn’t know what he did to her, but he was like a drug she couldn’t get enough of. Forcing her hands to move again, she went back to undoing his buttons, sighing with satisfaction as the last one popped open, and she pushed his overalls down over his broad shoulders. She stroked his chest, watching his colours flow after her finger, as she trailed it, in circular patterns, over his skin.

Round and round his nipples, his colours mesmerised her, there was something almost magical about him. As if he was something out of a fairy tale, not an alien from another planet. But less and less these days she thought of him as being different to her. It was if they were meant to be together, their bodies fit together perfectly.

Oh yes. Perfectly.

Naked at last, he knelt before her, his mouth on her clit, his tongue flicking over it, sending shockwaves through her body. His teeth nipped at her sensitive skin, until she could stand it no longer. She thrust her hands into his hair, and pressed herself forward onto his face, needing him to make her come.

Niko pushed two fingers inside her, moving them roughly in and out, while his mouth continued to torture her swollen clit. Her orgasm raced towards her and then crashed into her, and she cried out, calling his name while pulling his hair cruelly, both wanting him to stop, yet needing him to continue, to take her to new heights.

When at last she was spent, he kissed her thighs and then worked her way up her body, kissing her skin, paying particular attention to her breasts. By the time he reached her mouth, and was fully standing, she was in a state of arousal again. And when she felt the press of his cock against her sex, she could tell he was highly aroused too.

Slick noises met her ears as he slid into her. The walls of her sex gripped him tightly, and he flexed his hips forward, pushing deeper. Pulling back out, he lunged into her again, and then moved his hips in a circular motion, stretching her, stimulating her until she was ready to come again.

Niko kept a steady rhythm, and she felt his body tensing under her hands as she stroked his skin, feeling his hard muscles flexing and relaxing. And as she lowered her head to leave soft kisses over his shoulder, she felt the familiar buzz of static electricity on her lips.

His arm encircled her and he held her close as he impaled her on his cock, in and out, until finally, he thrust hard into her, and his cock swelled and fused with her, his seed pumping into her womb. As if he had set off a chain reaction, she came, her legs wrapped around him as she clung to him, wishing they could stay like this forever, two bodies joined in ecstasy.

But that could not be, they had a mission to complete.

He checked the readings and adjusted the course slightly; he knew that it was incredibly important their course was correct and the cruiser was at the right angle of entry. This wormhole held an anomaly which they had never encountered anywhere else.

While the entrance to the wormhole itself was fairly easy to navigate, Niko knew that when the cruiser reached the exit, there was what could only be described as a strong current, trying to drag them off to the left. Their acceleration had to be increased just enough to shoot them out through the end, otherwise there was a chance they could be sucked out into another part of the universe.

And it was not as simple as just turning around and re-entering the wormhole. As a cruiser crew had discovered two generations ago, they had travelled into the wormhole, and were never heard of again. That was not going to happen today.

Once successfully on the other side, they were only ten light-years from the next wormhole entry point. But instead of shooting straight for it, they had to slow down enough for a probe, which was anchored in a four-way crossroads of wormholes, to feed them information. This would include any messages from Karal, and also any warnings that there was a problem after the second wormhole, where a large asteroid belt was waiting to throw debris at them.

He kind of hoped the probe would have news for them, and they would have to go elsewhere. There was no way the Karal could safely set up a colony for humans this far out, unless it was their last resort. But he had his orders, so he adjusted the cruiser minutely, and hoped everything went OK. The system data was old; he only hoped it was still accurate.

The wormhole appeared on his computer screen, and he headed for it, for once hoping luck was with them. But even if it wasn’t, they had no choice but to continue.

“Is your seatbelt secure?” he asked Petra as the three beacons flashed in front of him. This was the last point in which he could change mind and abort the entrance of the wormhole. He looked across at her, and saw her checking it.

“Yes, it is secure. You’re making me nervous, Niko. Is something wrong?” she asked.

“This wormhole is just a little bit trickier than the rest. But we will be fine. I just wanted to make sure that you are secure. That way if it’s a bumpy ride you won’t get thrown around the cruiser.” He smiled, trying to reassure her. He knew that she was worried too.

“I trust you, Niko, you got us this far. And surely we wouldn’t have been sent out here unless this is where they needed us to be.” And then a shadow crossed her face. “Or is your Ruler hoping that I might get lost out here?”

He turned quickly and shot her a look that told her he didn’t know what she was talking about. It took him a moment to comprehend what she was saying. “You think I’ve been lying to you all this time? You think that I have no feelings for you?”

“No.” She shook her head. “Of course not. Forget I said it, I think I’m just nervous.”

The cruiser was just about to enter the wormhole, but before it did, he briefly reached over and touched her hand, squeezing it, letting her feel his colours against her skin and hoping that she could read them enough to know that he would do anything for her. “You forget that if anything happens to you, it would also happen to me too. So please believe me, we will make it through to the other side in one piece.”

He only hoped those words were true, as they were sucked in to the wormhole in a spiral of greens and blues. The cruiser tried to twist, to go in the same spiral round and round. But he knew he couldn’t let that happen, he had to fight it. It was imperative that they stayed on course, that the cruiser stayed true to the route they had to follow. If he lost control now, there was a very good chance that he would not regain it by the time they reached the other side.

He looked down at the control panel, which showed him the wormhole and where they were in relation to it. The cruiser was over halfway, according to the screen, but it was juddering badly. His hand, gripping the control stick, could not absorb the vibration, and his brain was telling him to let go. Resolutely, he flexed his fingers and then held it tightly, his colours forming red rings across the back of his hands.

Three-quarters of the way through, they were getting close to the anomaly and he could already feel the slight drag to the left. Niko concentrated hard and then placed both hands around the control stick. For several more minutes they carried on. The pull did not increase, although they were now very near to the exit. This gave him false confidence and then suddenly the cruiser veered to the left, and he had to battle to pull it back, to keep them straight.

Beside him, he could sense Petra gripping the arms of her seat. But she didn’t speak; she just let him do what he had to do, and the trust she had in him, gave him the strength to fight for control. The colours were flashing around his hands, red and purples looking like bruises, and his arms began to ache, the tension in them building until they were shaking.

He watched the screen closely, watching as the computer calculated the velocity needed to exit the wormhole. Niko slowly eased the control stick forward and they picked up pace but the drag became even more intense. When he glanced up, outside of the cruiser to the left, there was nothing but open space. It was like a big black hole, sucking them into the nothingness.

A light began to flash above his head, a warning from the computer that the cruiser was under increased stress. He was praying that it all held together, that they would get through this. But the journey seemed wasted, the danger unneeded, because there was no way this route could be used. It would only be a matter of time until one cruiser was lost into the abyss of dark space.

Increasing their speed again, they hurtled towards the exit. The drag was becoming a little less intense, but he could not afford to relax. Not until they were out into normal space.