Page 199 of Gladiators of the Vagabond Boxset

Noa

We’d slumbered for a short while after that round of sex, then made the trip back to that pool for another swim.

We washed our clothes and draped them on a nearby heated rock to dry, curling up together on our pile of blankets for some more rest. My entire body ached, from walking, from the fight with the Dumb Duo, and from the sex, of course.

Luka had gone outside to confirm that it was getting dark again and returned with some really bad news.

“You’re sure they’re looking for us here?

” I asked, my eyes lingering on the tunnel that led to the cave entrance.

A shuttle had landed a little distance from our hiding place, its guards searching the nearby area.

A second shuttle was circling above, so there was no chance we could just sneak off.

He was kneeling next to our rolled-up pack of things, the blankets and the bag of ration bars.

“Very sure. There’s no one else they could be looking for.

The question is, how did they find us?” He dug out the medical scanner from the bag and held it up with a triumphant look.

“Sure, they know we’re probably headed for the science outpost, but how did they know this is how far we got? ”

I had a sick feeling in my stomach as he started to run the scanner over me with far more precision than he had last time. “A tracker?” I asked him. Had the Dragon tagged me like an animal? Was that how they had tracked us here?

“There,” he said, and one long finger pointed at a spot on my bicep.

Fuck, I knew what that meant, he’d have to cut it out.

Did that medkit have any kind of pain relief in it?

Anything that would be safe to use on me?

I was going to go ahead and say no; the Dragon was too much of a cheapskate to bother with things such as painkillers for her slaves.

Luka’s eyes were deadly serious as he riffled through the small kit, taking out a scalpel in sterile packaging and some bandages.

Yeah, I was right, that didn’t look like much.

I bravely stuck out my arm for him, my eyes on the cave entrance.

He had to hurry; if they located the entrance to this place while he was working on me, we’d be in real trouble.

I felt his fingers brush across my skin. “Easy, Noa. This is what I’m good at. I’ll be quick.” One hand pinched gently at my skin, and I wondered if he could feel the tracker that way. If I’d known it was there, would I have felt it? “On the count of three, take a deep breath.”

I didn’t want to do this, but a little pain was nothing compared to our freedom.

So I counted to three, focusing on Pato when he crawled into my lap and wrapped his tiny fingers around my hand.

The cut seared into my skin, sharp and prickling, and then came a far worse pain as Luka dug his tweezers into the small incision.

“Got it,” he said, pressing a bandage over my bleeding wound. “Hold it tight, I’ll be right back.”

With my fingers, I pressed against the small cut.

It wasn’t so bad. The tracker hadn’t been embedded deeply, but I’d seen Luka’s face.

He’d felt every second of it, just like I had.

That didn’t seem like the best trait to have as a doctor, especially a surgeon, although I supposed that most of his patients would normally be under anesthetic.

Digging out some tape from the medkit, I secured the bandage.

Then, I set myself the task of cleaning everything back up and making sure our meager belongings were packed.

I didn’t know how we’d get out of here yet, but I was sure we’d think of something.

At least now, the Dragon and her goons wouldn’t be able to follow us.

Luka returned after what seemed like an hour but was probably only ten minutes.

He had flakes of ash in his hair and a sheen of sweat coating his pretty skin.

He was grinning triumphantly. “I located a heat vent further in the cave system, with a shaft going up to the surface. I threw the tracker in, and I’m pretty sure it just floated right on out on that hot current of air. ”

I hoped he was right. We crawled to the opening of the cave together, hiding behind the gleaming purple crystals that surrounded the opening.

The guards searching on the ground were returning at a fast jog to the landed shuttle.

The second one that Luka had mentioned, which had been circling the area, was flying off into the distance.

Were they following the signal of the tracker?

Did they actually believe we were suddenly traveling that fast?

“Come on, quickly,” Luka urged me as the second shuttle took off and followed the first. We couldn’t be sure if anyone had stayed behind to watch for us, so we kept low to the ground and ran or jogged for each spot of cover we could find.

My shoes were really starting to fall apart, but I didn’t complain.

There was no stopping until we’d gotten far enough away from that cave to be sure they wouldn’t find us.

Surely, they would come back to that area and search it again when they realized they were following a floating tracker the hot winds here had gotten hold of.

It was fully dark, and we were both panting for breath, dirty and sweaty.

Luka suddenly pulled me to a stop in the safety of a large, melted, twisted rock outcropping.

“Let me fix up your shoes before you hurt yourself again,” he said.

Then he proceeded to tear up a portion of one of our blankets and snugly tied it around my feet.

We drank some water, ate a ration bar, and shared a quick kiss.

Then we were back to hiking, but at a slightly more sustainable pace this time.

The trek to the science outpost took us a good eight hours.

I was a wrung-out mess by the end of it.

If not for Luka making an admirable attempt at fixing up my terribly torn-to-shreds shoes, I would have never made it.

By the end of our hike, the strips of fabric hung in tatters, but they’d done their job, and I had no new cuts or scrapes.

I wasn’t sure what to expect at the outpost, whether it was going to be big or small, with many people or few.

It was a dome at least ten times smaller than that of the resort, shimmering silvery against the purpling sky.

Dawn was approaching, but we didn’t fear another round of search vehicles this time.

Technically, Luka’s mom was not allowed to fly her shuttles near the research outpost. Luka said she likely wouldn’t risk such a thing, as she wouldn’t want to draw any kind of attention to her operations from the Aderian government.

I could see a small landing area cleared near the dome, a square bit of rock outcropping that looked solid and steady.

There was one ship on it—a re-supply ship of some kind.

It had a big, rounded belly and a blunt nose.

It looked more like a squatting toad than anything spaceworthy, but I’d seen ships just like it come and go from the resort’s landing area.

They were as reliable and steady as an atomic clock.

Inside the dome, a squat, low building with a bristling array of antennas and disks took precedence, but they also had what appeared to be a greenhouse, so they must grow at least a portion of their own food. There was no sign of anyone outside, and only a few lights were on in the outpost.

“We’re not going in. We’re going to board that ship and wait until it’s left the planet before we make contact with the pilot,” Luka said quietly next to my ear, his lips brushing against the ear shell.

A pleasant shiver shot down my spine, and I turned into his body, letting myself rest against his firm chest.

“You really think that pilot will help us? That he’ll let you contact your friends once we’re out of the system?

” I asked Luka, still not trusting the idea of blindly putting our safety into the hands of a crew of Aderians Luka didn’t even know.

Even though he’d told me repeatedly that most of his species was empathic to some degree and would abhor all the things his mother and his cousins had done, I still struggled to wrap my head around it.

I would put my faith in Luka, though. He’d proven to be true, he’d been kind to me, and he was kind to his monkey. So when he led the way between the rocks dotting the landscape, I followed, and when he helped me climb onto that plateau, I let him.

That ship was much larger up close, looming over us as we rushed across the flattened rock.

It had a dull black finish dotted with pockmarks and dents, a ship that had been in service for some time.

When I saw several panels that had been welded with clumsy, ugly fixes, I worried that this ship might fall apart when it tried to break atmosphere.

I had heard that leaving Jihari took a little something extra, that the planet’s gravity had an extra bit of punch for any ship trying to leave.

Luka was quick to locate a hatch into the ship, and to my surprise, it wasn’t locked when he spun the handle to open it.

“Who in their right mind would walk up to a ship out here?” Luka said with a shrug.

“Not as if this is a densely populated city hub.” He had a point, none of the resort’s guests ever ventured outside of the dome unless it was in one of the special windowed shuttles for a tour of some of the volcanoes.

He boosted me up through the hatch, and I crouched just inside the darkened interior of the ship, listening intently for any sign of life.

Pato leaped through the hatch after me, and he ran on all fours, quickly disappearing inside the ship.

“Damn it, Pato, come back here!” I hissed in a low whisper.

If there was anyone aboard the ship and they saw him…