Page 27 of Fated to the Dragon Alien
Tall. Moving fast.
Her breath caught. He was there.
Stavian. Hope crashed through her chest harder than the rock on her leg.
He was running—faster than she’d seen him move in all their time down here. His boots slid to a stop right beside her. Relief flooded his silver eyes as they locked onto hers.
Urgency and something deeper—fear—were etched into the angles of his face. But not for himself and not for her.
“Don’t move,” he said, his voice low and hard as he dropped to his knees and reached for Sema. “I’ve got you.”
EIGHT
Stavian
The cargo transfer had just cleared when Stavian stepped past the final checkpoint, the scent of hot metal still thick in the air. The transport shuttle sealed behind him with a hiss. Three fortified containers of precious basian crystal were locked beneath reinforced, bolted brackets. He barely glanced at them.
He was thinking about her again.
It had been three cycles since he’d seen her last. Since she’d sat beside him in that too-small maintenance duct and told him goodbye like it hadn’t nearly cut him in half. Truly, she had no idea what she’d left behind in him. Or maybe she did. She was too smart not to.
The bay doors started to close behind him when Darven’s voice stopped him short. “Controller, the transports are nearly here.”
Stavian nodded as they moved into the sealed control center and gave clearance for the transport to open the dome and land.
“You missed the network chatter. Again.” The lieutenant leaned against a standing crate, arms folded, uniform crisp like he hadn’t touched a tool in his life. “Big week for surprises.”
Stavian exhaled, ready to move on. “Transport cleared and landing in progress. No anomalies. We’re on schedule.” He looked pointedly at Darven. “If this is a report, make it short.”
Darven smirked. “It’s not a report. You might be running the model facility in this sector, but you’re still five cycles behind on internal updates.”
That got Stavian’s attention. He paused and turned to his lieutenant. “Five cycles?”
Darven pushed off the crate and strolled closer. “Didn’t you notice that your command feed’s been throttled?”
“No,” Stavian said with a frown. “But I never had much time for ‘network chatter,’ as you call it.”
“I know, but I thought you should know about this,” Darven said. “Network’s been locking tiered oversight reports from certain facilities, including this one. I only heard about it from my brother in the Raakt sector on private channel. You should know that the Axis are reviewing Zaruxian command positions across the board.”
Stavian narrowed his eyes. “Why?”
Darven raised his brows. “You really haven’t heard.”
“Heard what?”
Darven’s mouth twitched. Not quite a smile. More like satisfaction. “One of the penal colonies sparked a rebellion. Toppled the entire containment grid, sent out a distress beacon, then disappeared. Gone.”
Stavian’s stomach dropped. “Which colony?”
“Vexis 112-1 through 112-4. Borderline-class. Farming,” Darven said. “Internal files aren’t public yet, but word is the overseer is a Zaruxian, and he led the breach. Untraceable since. Did you know him?”
Stavian shook his head as an uneasy numbness tingled in his fingers. “No. I’ve never had contact with any of the other Zaruxians in the Axis system. We’ve always been stationed too far apart to encounter each other,” he said, managing to keep his voice steady. “What else?”
Darven tilted his head, amused now. “You want the full list?”
“Tell me what you know.”
“Slarik Arena is a burned-out shell. There were mass escapees and full annihilation of the mechs there. No official word on if it was an accident or not, but the system noted two Zaruxian fighters among the missing. Word is that the Zaruxian changed into a dragon form and set the whole thing on fire—not sure that’s true. I never heard of such a thing,” Darven said. He lifted a finger. “Plus a brothel collapse in sector twelve. Manager vanished—also a Zaruxian.”
