She grimaced. Of course they couldn’t take chances with guest welfare, but the pods were intended for emergencies only and were definitely lacking in romantic ambience.
The cramped confines of a lifepod were not the sort of close encounter she’d envisioned for this trip.
“At once,” she complied. “Please keep me informed so I can best manage our guests.”
She wondered if he would push back, hoard his authority for himself, but he only acknowledged before her comm clicked off.
She turned to address the room of murmuring guests. “I apologize for the interruption in our viewing tonight,” she said in her steady projection voice. “Due to a system fluctuation, out of an abundance of caution, we will be finishing our journey in the hatch antechambers. If you’ll follow me…”
When the murmuring got louder and a little more disgruntled, she hoped she wouldn’t have to remind them this shakedown cruise had been offered for free and they’d signed a waiver acknowledging the possibility of “unscheduled course changes and various adjustments to in-flight entertainment.”
At least this inaugural cruise had a minimum number of guests, so they could all fit in one pod together. She grabbed one of the decadent bottles of alien liquor from Ikaryo’s bar, vaguely thinking that while they were stuffed in the ugly little room they could swap stories of juvenile romanticism, and she could regale them with the tragic tale of her first and only experience with spin the bottle.
As she guided the guests out of the salon, she glanced back warily at the strange shadow. The movement of it seemed almost… conscious, not the repeating glitch of an electrical fluctuation in the screen, but something lifelike. It looked like a giant hand spreading its fingers (too many fingers) across the viewport.
Ikaryo fell into step beside her as they herded the guests down the corridor. “My augments didn’t register that shadow,” he said quietly, and she realized he was linked through his comm to Suvan and Griiek. “I saw it with my organic eyes, but my implants missed it all.”
Of course she’d noticed his cybernetic enhancements. It seemed rude to inquire as to their purpose, and they hadn’t been colleagues long enough to witness any of his additions in action.
“It wasn’t exactly a power fluctuation, but I don’t know what it was.” He paused while listening, then nodded absently. “Yeah, if you have a fine enough infruv-laser, I could adjust—”
Ahead of them, Mariah screamed.
The corridor lights flared almost sun-bright, and against the unforgiving glare, shadowy black fingers stained the walls, reaching for them all as if it might scoop them up to crush them—
As one, the passengers swiveled, stampeding back toward Felicity and Ikaryo. The oncoming rush parted around her as she stood frozen, gawping.
Over the retreating shouts, Ikaryo was yelling something into the comm. Voices were all around, but in her fear-stuffy head, she heard a hissing whisper…
Reflexively, she threw the liquor bottle still in her hand. She had never played sports, so the bottle tumbled awkwardly overhead. But as the gravity cut out again, it continued its path and smashed into the grasping shadow—
And exploded.
Spherical flames rolled in all directions as the spray of liquor ignited. The momentum of her throw propelled her backward, her feet floating up. She windmilled her arms. When/if the gravity returned, she’d slam down head first on the hard decking…
She crashed into something almost as hard but furry.
With his boots on the deck, firmly set, the captain plucked her out of the air, jolting a startled scream out of her—right when the gravity grabbed them again.
She clung to him, and he spun around, shielding her as the flames flashed out.
The fire suppression warning blared, and for a heartbeat there was nothing to breathe.
Ellix pressed his mouth to hers.
He exhaled into her. That puff of air when she’d screamed out all of hers was something to cling to. She tightened her grip on him, her head still whirling as if the gravity had never come.
An eternity later, the atmosphere refreshed, and she would’ve sworn it was more sweetly dizzying than any flower or liqueur. She gasped, horrified when it turned into something more like a sob.
“There was something in the hall,” she stammered. “A shadow. The thing from the salon.”
He gazed down at her, golden eye narrowed to a slit. “A thing. I didn’t see it.”
She twisted in his arms, looking for the others. “Ikaryo and the guests, they saw it.”
“They were running from something. Maybe the fire you started.”
She gaped at him. “I didn’t mean—”
