Catch a Falling Star (3 page)

Once she stepped off
the last porch step, she raised her eyes toward the barn and
squeaked in surprise as she dropped the light and swung the club
two-handed out in front of her. “Who are you? What do you want?”
She could barely make him out beyond identifying a tall shadowy
male shape coming straight towards her. Her bad ankle gave out
on her as she shifted her weight to it, causing her to hiss out
a breath in pain. The heavy wood in her hands didn't waver,
however.

“I think I am asking
you the same question,
querida
. Who are you?” She didn’t
recognize the voice and certainly not the accent.

“I'm... “ She started
to answer automatically then stopped and raised the club higher.
“Never mind who I am.” He was a stranger, of that much she was
certain, though she hadn't yet connected him to her salvaged
capsule. “This is my land. That's all you need to know.”

Intending to walk
around him so she could attempt to defend not only the house but
the barn, she first squatted down to retrieve the hand torch.
She held the club pointed at him with one hand while the
other  swept the ground for the light. She didn't dare take
her eyes off him.

She found it finally,
her hand closing around the metal cylinder while her thumb found
the switch. The powerful white light it emitted traced a path to
the barn and the partially opened door. She swung the light
around to the man, sweeping it over him before settling on his
face, deliberately aiming the bright beam at his eyes. His
clothing and his accent helped her tired brain to put two and
two together.

“You! You're the Fed
pig- , the pilot, aren't you?” It was spat out like an
accusation. “I thought you were dead.” She had to use the club
as a crutch to help her stand up again and her final words came
out more breathless than she'd hoped they'd be. Damn! Had she
twisted the stupid ankle again when he'd scared her?

The harsh light
forced him to turn his head to the side, but not for long. He
held up a free hand to shield his eyes from the glare. “Do you
mind?” he asked, the sarcasm evident even in the liquid candy
smoothness of his voice. “Where is the rest of my ship? You have
it stashed nearby?”

“No, I don't mind at
all.” She waved the light back and forth though it never moved
from his face before refocusing on his eyes. She couldn't help
noticing his dark hair and a face that was very well put
together. Then there were his eyes, dark yet shining in the
torch's light. He was certainly handsome... Terran but very
exotic... male... nice. What else did he ask? Oh, yes. “The rest
of the ship that
used
to be yours is – elsewhere and not
your worry.” She made sure to emphasize that, whether he liked
it or not, it was no longer “his” ship.

Though she didn't let
down her guard, she did continue to use the club as a crutch
while she thought. What was she supposed to do with him? Send
him away? That might be best, but for some reason she found
herself asking him a question instead. “Why aren't you dead?
There didn't seem to be much control behind your entry into the
atmosphere from what I could tell. And based on the wreckage,
none at all in the landing.”

The man grinned,
showing very white teeth. “I am, let us say, very lucky. You can
take me to my ship, yeah?” He wasn’t acknowledging the club as
if he thought it inconsequential, or maybe he just wasn’t afraid
of her wielding it.

“I appreciate your…
finding me, but I need to be get back to
my
ship.” Now
he emphasized ownership of the starfighter. “I am in your debt,
of course.” His hand moved down by his leg but it was impossible
to see what he was doing. “Perhaps you can keep the pod for your
kind assistance.”

“There's no 'perhaps'
about it. I don't need your permission to keep it.” She frowned,
suddenly not so sure of herself. Was he going to cause her
trouble over salvage rights? Did he have a right to fight her
claim? She didn't remember hearing how the law worked when the
person in the ship survived. Wait! It didn't matter. He was
Federation and this was Alliance territory. He was probably
considered salvage as much as his ship was by the Alliance, she
realized. She also realized she didn't like how that thought
made her feel.

It was an uneasy
affiliation between the United Alliance of Free Planets and her
world. First of all, big laugh on the 'Free' part. They hadn't
had a choice to join. It had been a unilateral decision on the
part of the Alliance who were greedily grabbing up any sector of
space they could to gain trade and resource advantage over the
Federation. Second, her planet was the only primarily Terran
colony in the sector and only a handful in the conglomerate
known as the Alliance. Fortunately, because of the prejudice
those in control of the government had toward Terrans,
Earth-born or not, her planet was never considered worth
bothering about. For years the Alliance ignored them and they
were mostly able to ignore the Alliance. Now, however, they,
like other previously forgotten outlying worlds, had become a
handy supply of warm bodies to populate Alliance battle cruisers
and ground troops.

That reminded her of
her brothers and that made her direct anger at the Federation
pilot, even if he wasn't on the side that had probably taken
them away. She raised the club and waved it at him. “Go find it
yourself. If you can.” She slowly spaced out her next words as
if he was a little slow to understanding. “Others have most
likely carted it off by now – in pieces – as salvage.”

The man’s grin
faltered and the harsh light showed the muscle that clenched in
his jaw. His smile was less sincere and there was no mistaking
the aggression when he turned his body to face her squarely. “I
am sure I did not make myself clear,
querida
. Please
show me to my ship. Where it crashed. Where you found the pod.
Then I will be out of your hair, yeah?”

He couldn’t see her,
not the details of her anyway, not with the hand torch blinding
him. She was just a faceless entity to him; an obstacle in his
way. He wasn’t going to ask nicely again.

He wanted to leave.
She wanted him to leave. So, he should leave. On his own.
Lyrianne used the club to aid her in turning so she could point
the light beam in the direction of the crash. She didn't seem
worried about him anymore, having turned her back to him.

“See that glow out
there?” It wasn't very bright but in the darkness it was visible
among the trees. “That's where you need to head. It shouldn't
take you more than three quarters of an hour or so of hiking to
get there. But there's probably someone there, most likely
already dismantling it.” She seemed to reconsider her certainty.
“Though they might still be waiting for it to cool down. It was
on fire and there was an awful lot of popping, sizzling and
exploding going on inside it...“ Just a tiny exaggeration for
effect, she thought. “I wouldn't recommend getting too close for
another reason, though. Folks can be pretty aggressive about
their claims.”

She was staring out
at the glow, wishing now she'd had a way to tow the whole thing
back with her. She'd forgotten the Federation pilot while she
started making a mental list of all the things she could have
gotten with the star metal and technology she'd had to leave
behind.

Her inattention
proved a lesson she wouldn’t soon forget when she was suddenly
disarmed, her club thrown back towards the barn. The arm that
encircled her waist was thick and unforgiving; the hard point
pressed beneath her ribs even less so.

“I do beg your
pardon,
querida
. I truly do. But I think you can
understand that I need to get back to my ship if I am to get off
this dustbowl, yes? And I need a quicker way to get there than
my feet.” Sounding infuriatingly amused, the pilot’s breath was
warm on the back of her neck when he added, “You will not
provoke me, eh? I think that would be very bad for you.”

Provoke him? The
young woman's reaction was a rise in her temper. She'd show him
provoke! When he'd grabbed her, she'd tensed up and she worked
on that first rather than answer him. Progressively relaxing
muscles from head to toes, she took slow, even breaths then
carefully shifted weight to her bad foot. She then braced
herself for the pain as she lifted the other leg to kick back
and up, simultaneously striking up toward his head with the
metal shaft of the flashlight.

Close as he was, he
felt her muscles contracting, anticipating a strike but not
knowing where it was coming from. He managed to take the foot to
his inner thigh and not the groin but the flashlight connected
solidly with his jaw and his head snapped to the side. He let
her go and stumbled back, the pistol in his hand now pointing at
the ground.

When he released her,
she was forced to put all her weight on the ankle and that
brought tears to her eyes. Still, she managed to put the other
foot down and bring the bad one up, hopping quickly into a turn
to face him. The triumph she'd felt fell away as she looked at
him.

“I'm sorry! Are you
hurt?” She was shocked that the flashlight had connected. That
was the first time she'd ever hit anyone other than
occasionally, accidentally, clocking one of her brothers when
they were rough-housing. Fat Farley didn't count. He'd deserved
it. She put a hand out toward the Fed pilot, feeling guilty.
That's when she noticed the gun. Her eyes opened wide and she
gasped. “You... you... That's a gun! I thought it was... ”

Though she tried to
put her weight back on her bad foot, she quickly realized it
wasn't a good idea. Desperate to put space between them, she
tried to hop backwards, afraid to look away. It took only a
couple of hops before she came down on loose soil and lost her
footing, landing on her butt with a jarring impact to her
tailbone and spine. It was enough to bring out a cry of pain and
more tears.

The flashlight had
fallen so that its light was now directed at her though she
ignored it. For the first time he could get a good look at his
adversary. The long braid she usually wore had come loose
earlier, her hair freed to surround her head in a cloud of
reddish brown waves, leaves and twigs caught in tangles. The tan
overalls she wore, as well as her cheeks and forehead, had
smears of oil and soot from the crash site. Light blue eyes
blinked in the torch's light, red rimmed and betraying the pain
she was still feeling from the injured ankle and a freshly
bruised backside. Her thick, dark eyelashes were wet from the
tears.

The pilot hesitated
seeing her like that; his snide remark dying in his throat.
Rubbing the heel of his palm against his throbbing jaw, he
worked it from side to side. He was lucky she hadn’t broken it.
Kind of served him right, he supposed. He
had
stuck a
gun in her side though the perverse side of him wanted to know
exactly what she’d thought he was threatening her with.

Eyeing the woman more
closely, Miguel realized that this woman was as human as he was
and not alien as he’d first assumed. Terran colony planet though
it was, he hadn’t been convinced they were sharing the same
building blocks of life. That wealth of soft looking hair and
those corn flower blue eyes confirmed it, however. With a slight
grin cocking the unhurt side of his mouth, he lowered his hand
from his face and offered it to her.

Determined not to
allow him to think she was crying, let alone afraid of him,
Lyrianne wiped at her eyes then drew her legs up so she could
cradle the throbbing ankle with both hands. Her glare as well as
her posture, despite her vulnerable position, shouted her
defiance of him.

“You stuck a gun in
my ribs!” She was having trouble accepting that it had actually
been a gun. She'd been mesmerized by his closeness, she was
embarrassed to admit. And, heaven help her, his voice and his
hot breath on her neck, so different from drunk Fat Farley's,
had been making her weak in the knees. Almost from his first
words, she hadn't sensed any real danger from him and she'd
actually been behaving, she realized, with a mindset that put
him more into the category of a good guy than an enemy. Was she
crazy? Hell yes, she decided, she probably was. But so was he!
“You threatened to shoot me!”

He’d taken a step
towards her, which flexed the muscle in his thigh, which
reminded him of the thwarted kick he’d taken to the leg. His
breath hissing out, he snatched his hand back and pressed it
hard into the muscle, as if that pressure would relieve the
ache. It didn’t, but it did remind him that his jaw had taken a
knock, as well.

“I did not!” he
yowled back, the hand fisted around the weapon moved in to press
against the inside of his leg while his other hand came up to
try and hold his face together. “You hit me!” he accused, trying
to work his throbbing jaw again. He could hear a clicking.

Glaring at the woman,
the pilot hobbled a couple of steps away and to the side of her,
wary of being attacked. The light was shining in a broad beam,
illuminating her, and he saw them for the first time.

“Are- are you
crying?” Tears shown plainly on white cheeks, glistening in
wide, shining eyes and Miguel felt his insides sink to his feet.

“Forgive me,” he
started, wincing at the pain in his face. “I did not mean to
make you cry.”

“As if you could!
You
didn't hurt me.” With a disdainful sniff, Lyrianne snapped the
denial back at him, rubbing her tender ankle. The longer she
watched him, though, the less she felt angry at him. He might
not be responsible for
her
injuries, but she
had
hurt him and she felt bad about it. It was too easy to feel
sympathy, she thought, and hard to be afraid or stay angry when
she still didn't feel threatened despite the gun he was holding.