Page 10 of Hijack! (Cosmic Connections Cruise #1)
“There will be no second tour for me,” he said. “Evens contracted me only for this first trip.”
A chill twisted through her body in place of the silly heat lingering from his touch. “Just one?” She almost kicked herself for the plaintive note in the question. So she gathered herself up. “Oh. Then just one kiss isn’t a problem.”
He looked at her. “Would it have been a problem if there were more?”
Why was she letting this conversation continue when it could only become more humiliating?
“You shouldn’t stay aboard either.” His fingers clenched and unclenched. “There is something strange happening here. It seems the fluctuations aren’t confined to the electrical system.”
She scoffed out a breath. “What? Just because you kissed me?”
“Which you know was untoward. And not something either of us should indulge.”
She did know that. And yet… “It’s just a romantic old ship, and we were a little caught up in the ambiance and got carried away.”
“By definition in any language, a captain is supposed to be in charge, not getting carried away.”
“You might be captain, but you’re on the same ship as the rest of us.” She was probably insulting his rank and honor. “It’s fine. No one else needs to know. We don’t have to freak out about it.”
She couldn’t believe she was being so blasé.
She wasn’t the sort to risk a workplace relationship—never mind the password-protected page in her datpad—not with all the ways something like that could go wrong.
The way it was going wrong right now. Maybe he was right and there was something happening with the ship, but it would soon be over. And then, apparently, he’d be gone.
So why was she tempted to lick her lips like she couldn’t wait to taste him again?
They did a wary half circle, not quite a dance, as if they both wanted to make a break for the door but didn’t want to look like they were running away.
“I like this ship,” she said stubbornly. “I won’t be going anywhere.”
“Felicity, I’m telling you there’s something wrong here—”
“Just a fluctuation, you said.” She took another shaky breath, the humid air of the atmo-hall suddenly oppressive. “Maybe you can hop another ship to another star, but this is my chance. And that’s what the IDA promised with this cruise: a chance to find who they’re looking for.”
Before he could say anything else—before her tongue did anything else to get her in trouble—she whirled and strode from the hall.
She didn’t pause until she was on the other side of the door, where the sudden change in the air felt thin and cold. There, she sagged back against the bulkhead. But she didn’t want him to find her there, looking weak and hesitant. Not when she’d worked so hard to get here.
Thrusting away from the wall with her jaw set, she checked her datpad.
The ship’s public monitors showed the passengers hunting for the tokens, coming together as part of the game or calling out to each other as they passed.
From the level of ambient noise, a good time was being had by all.
Or most, anyway; Remy was standing alone at the viewport in the Starlit Salon.
Felicity wrinkled her nose at the reminder—as if she needed it—that not everyone would find a date or a mate. No matter what she’d told the captain or what the IDA brochures claimed, some connections just weren’t fated in this particular spacetime.
The musky spice of alien lion-man clinging to her might haunt her for a bit, but the possibility of a relationship with Ellix was about as real as Mr. Evens’ ghost.
Speaking of time and space, the chronometer showed the third sunset coming up soon, so she needed to start recalling the passengers.
Reflexively, she checked her bun. Oops, the tidy twist had slipped, but she slicked it back (while refusing to remember strong fingers in her hair) and smoothed down her uniform (while refusing to regret that strong fingers hadn’t roamed farther…) before hustling back to the salon.
Ikaryo had judiciously used the opportunity to reset his bar and added the trio of old-fashioned disco balls she’d fabricated during one of her middle-of-the-night panic attacks after she’d gotten this gig.
A moment of wistfulness made her sigh. How fun would it be to walk in wide-eyed, to not always be the one setting it up. But this was her job.
She sent an announcement tone through everyone’s devices, summoning them back to the salon, and stationed herself at the doorway.
Through her datpad, she listened to the excited chatter and good-natured ribbing as the guests took one last chance to match and swap tokens.
She quickly took notes on who had teamed up, who was standing with whom, the way certain connections seemed to be strengthening.
As the last guests streamed through the door, she basked in the sound of their happiness.
She was beaming when she entered the salon, her heart feeling as light as the blazing ball of hydrogen and helium shining through the viewport. “Did you find all the tokens?” she called out. “Are you ready to claim your prizes?”
An enthusiastic cheer made her grin. “Yes, I know that the real prize is the friends—and maybe more—we make along the way. But free gifts from some of the most romantic brands in the galaxies are also nice.” Another cheer. “Let’s get started…”
On a banquet table in front of the viewport, Ikaryo had arrayed the prizes, all of them meant to induce happiness about the journey. As Felicity turned to the crowd, readying her MC patter, a shadow moved across the attentive faces.
She blinked. They shouldn’t be to the third sunset just yet.
She’d set the schedule so there’d be time for everyone to have prizes in hand along with another drink and hopefully whoever they’d felt the most connection with.
Although that added up to three hands, but whatever.
If Captain Never-Smiles had sped up the ship to get through the evening…
Even as she thought it, she spun around, knowing he wouldn’t do that, and the sun should’ve been still shining through the viewport.
It wasn’t the moon eclipsing the light. There was a strange shadow moving over the transparent plasteel.
The crowd was silent, obviously puzzled by the unsettling visual, as something like vining, smoky tendrils spread across the screen.
For a confused moment, Felicity thought the strange shadow was on the outside of the ship, then her eyes told her it was inside the salon, with them.
But finally, she decided it was moving within the viewport itself.
She had a vague sense of how the viewport worked as half window, half screen, adjusting for rays of light as needed.
Was it malfunctioning? That would make the final sunset less beautiful…
The ship jolted, hard.
Gravity failed, just long enough to confuse all her internal organs before she bumped down to her heels again. Several people staggered, a few fell into their neighbors, who reached out to steady them, many of them linking arms and other appendages against the unsteadiness—and the sudden unknown.
The shadow in the viewport screen writhed as if equally distraught.
Her datpad pinged with the sound for a private comm, and she quickly inserted the detachable ear piece. “Captain?”
“Felicity.” Ellix’s voice was urgent. “Griiek caught an energy surge in the salon, but monitors aren’t picking up anything.”
“I see it—something,” she told him quietly, knowing the tech would carry and enhance her subvocal words. “I don’t want to scare anyone here, but we lost gravity for a moment too.”
He let out a string of words that her translator couldn’t decipher. “This cruise is over. Please have all passengers report to the lifepods off the main hatch for the duration of the trip.”
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—”
Never mind the vow to keep a careful distance. He pulled her close to him again. “Of course not. I was trying to make a joke. A bad joke.”
She shuddered in his arms, clinging to him. Only then noticing when her fingers snagged in holes in his uniform, and he winced. “Ellix…”
“It’s nothing. I’m fine.”
“You wouldn’t say that if it was nothing and you were fine,” she retorted. “Let me see.” She struggled out of his embrace, distractedly noting how he hesitated to let her go. Probably just concerned the gravity would fail again. She circled him. “Oh. You’re burned.”
“Nowhere as bad as last time. Just singed.”
The stink of burning fur didn’t choke her as much as the evidence of how he’d protected her.
“It shouldn’t have burned,” he said. “There was no ignition source, and synthequer isn’t flammable anyway, certainly not enough to scorch through plasilk.”
Her fingers hovered hesitantly over the wounds. “We should get you to the med bay.” Though the trip was too short to warrant a doctor, the health module would have the basics for treating something like this.
He took her helpless hands, enclosing them in his much bigger ones. “Nay. What we have to do is get back to port.”
She grimaced. “Yes, of course. They’ll have medical support there. You don’t need me for that.”
He squeezed her hands. “Keep ahold of me in case the gravity cuts again.”
She grimaced. “Why did I not get magnetic boots?”
“You shouldn’t have needed them.” His voice dropped an octave. “This tour has been cursed from the start.”
“That’s not true.” She thought for a moment. “Although Mr. Evens did suggest the ship is haunted.”
“Ghosts are imaginary. These problems are not.”
“Captain,” Delphine’s urgent voice crackled through both their comms. “We’ve lost long-range contact with port… And with navigation. Controls are dead.”