The Space Colonel's Woman (Dragonus Chronicles Book 1) (11 page)

“Stay.”

“Always.”

Consciousness clawed at the cotton wool of sleep.  Julia’s mind rebelled, nestling deeper into the warm nothingness, but to no avail.

Her body was boneless; fluid and weary beyond calculation, yet glowing and humming, and warm.  She was aware of the nearness of him, of his every sleep-filled breath.  She sensed his body was aware of hers in the same way.  Of its own accord her body turned toward him, her eyes drinking him in. 

The morning sun caressed the contours of muscle and bone, absorbing into his skin, allowing it to glow from within.  Dark hair fell in that familiar way across his forehead.  The sweep of dark lashes concealed formidable strength under the guise of vulnerability as he slept.  Her desire to see the whiskey of his eyes was strong, but Julia resisted.  This way she could look at him to her heart’s content.

“Morning.” Mark said without opening his eyes, voice husky with sleep.

She snuggled into his side and closed her eyes, smiled when his arms moved up to keep her close.

“Morning.”

Chapter 11

“Turn it down.” Mark paced, hand rubbing the nape of his neck and hair wild; an outward sign of his turmoil.  “I mean it, Archer will have other candidates.”

“No.  It’s my job, and surprise, I’m damn good at it.”

Julia stood half way between her riled colonel and the door.  Her brows drawn together and jaw clenched.  It was just another in a litany of similar discussions they’d had since Colonel Archer had given her her own rescue team.  The offer had arisen when Julia met Colonel Archer in her office after her third glider training exercise.  Current emergency medical staff were transferring back to Earth, having served their required stint on the Dragonus outpost.  A situation which left Colonel Archer with two options; either assemble a new rescue team, or rely on the military exploration teams to back each other up.  Something that might work in theory, but if the teams were off-world the delay would be costly in both time and lives. 

Sarah Archer, being of sound military upbringing, went with the logical option.  Julia had twelve years’ experience as an advanced paramedic, eight of them as a rescue helicopter pilot.  Admittedly the experience was on another planet in alternate reality.  But, as Sarah had pointed out while Julia sat across the Commander-In-Chief, it didn’t take away from the fact that she had skills.  Skills Phoenix City was more than willing to take advantage of. 

Julia had left Colonel Archer’s office after the expected
thankyou’s
, handshakes, and
I won’t let you down’s
, and raced to find Mark; thinking he’d be as excited as she was.  It was the next step in establishing herself in her new life.

She couldn’t have been more wrong about his reaction. 

And that; had been over a week ago.

“This is ridiculous! I am
not
a damsel who needs protecting all the time.”

Mark’s scowl deepened and he shoved his fists into his hip pockets, never ceasing his back and forth.

“I love that you are strong enough and willing, but…”

“I want to keep you safe.” He held his arms out to her, but one glance at Julia’s stay away stance and they dropped back to his sides; useless. “Is that so wrong?”

She didn’t answer; too wound up in her indignant outrage – one foot stomp away from a full-blown redhead tantrum.  She was used to defending her choices.  She just hadn’t expected the censure to come from the man in front of her.

“Why train me in the gliders at all?  Did you really think I’d be happy sitting here twiddling my thumbs, while you’re out risking your life, protecting others, and playing the hero?”

He opened his mouth to speak but decided against it; and resumed his pacing. 

Her hair seemed to crackle with the static of feelings she’d held in check all week long and he was going to hear her, whether he liked what she had to say or not.

“I love a hero.” She permitted a resigned sigh to escape; a tiny glimpse of a smile at the corner of her mouth. “Every time he puts himself in danger, it’s with the vain hope his sacrifice will ease his burden of guilt.  In his team and the people he protects, he sees the faces of everyone he couldn’t save.”

Mark gaped at her.  Each of Julia’s words a physical blow; the depth of her insight into his psyche wiping away all ability to offer opposing arguments.

“Every time you fly out of here, or jump through a portal, I wonder if it’s the last time I’m going to see you.  Will it be the day you sacrifice what we have, what we
could
have; for the sake of the past?”

She sagged under the words that weighed heavy between them.  They’d taken a lot from her.  Especially the last. “But with the sweet comes sour.  I knew what you did when I chose to come here with you.”

Mark was stock still; his need to move curtailed by the jagged edges of her confession.

“You love me for who I am, and
this
is part of me.” She whispered.  Her eyes downcast and tresses of bourbon fury hanging limp and exhausted around her face. “You’re just going to have to find a way of dealing with it.  Like I have to when my heart and soul, flies through yet another portal into the unknown.  And I wait.”

Her chest ached as she watched the man she’d chosen, who had chosen her, wrestle with his emotions.  Hidden behind the rough scrub of his hands over his face and slumped shoulders.  The silence, which had waited its chance, grew and morphed into the rough wounded space between them.

“This is my chance to lead a team.  My chance to be of use.  To prove myself.”  She said, voice quiet in a last ditch effort to make him understand. “Maybe, when it’s your ass that needs saving, you’ll be glad your girlfriend’s a rescue pilot?”

Julia finished strapping on her thigh holster and shrugged into her leather jacket; its new shoulder patches left on the bedside table.  No identifying insignias permitted for off-world teams.

“We’re two halves of the same whole, Colonel.  Did you really expect I’d be happy to sit and wait while you’re off saving the galaxy from the bad guys?”

She was drained, unburdening her thoughts the way she had, had been wrong and the guilt sat like a burning ember on her heart.  Mark stood by their bed, numb and scrunched in on himself; head full of new things to think about.  His eyes were wide and wary as he watched her tie her hair into a loose knot.  She wanted to stay and give him the time he needed; to listen, but time was not hers to command.  She had to go.  So she stepped over the emotional Grand Canyon between them, and pressed a quick kiss to his lips.

“I’ll see you later.”

She made to step back but his hand struck out like a cobra, a steel manacle around her wrist.  He yanked her into his arms and kissed her, ferocious and intense, the taste of anger, and fear, and love heating her from within.

“You’d better.”

The growl in Mark’s order shivered down her spine as he released her.

Walking out the door was the single hardest thing Julia had ever had to do in her life until that point.  She looked over her shoulder to Mark stood, his body held rigid with all he felt.

All Julia wanted to do was sit in his lap with his arms around her and listen to his heart thud beneath her ear.  But she had to go.  She imagined his view of her as she headed to the Birdcage to meet her team; her long legs clad in tight black BDUs, combat boots, with a holster strapped to her right thigh, and hair piled up off her neck.  Her silver angel wings simulating movement as she jogged down the corridor away from him.

Was this how Mark felt every time he went on a mission? 

Perhaps now they had both seen the other’s side of the coin, they could accept each other for who they were.

~*~

The trip through the portal was instantaneous; rainbow mist riding up the nose of the glider to dissipate over the windshield.  Julia materialized the little ship and engaged the cloak before climbing to a search altitude above the native forestry.

“Phoenix City, this is Rescue one.”

“This is Phoenix.  Go ahead, Wings.”

“We’re beginning search grid, will report back in one hour.  Rescue one, out.” She tapped her radio and punched in the code to sever the portal connection.

It was difficult to put aside her thoughts of Mark, but she was soon absorbed in an activity she had participated in so many times it was second nature.

Ten minutes in, the display bleeped a faint energy signature and four life signs.  Julia flew to the location and circled so they could assess their options.

Glider two was pretty beaten up.  A large scorch mark, black and smoking, had eaten through the ignition tiles on the port-side wing, and the rear hatch was twisted open.  The little ship sat at the end of its mile and a half impact gouge with its cockpit overhanging a ravine.

“Open a channel.” Julia said to her crewman and First EMT, Zeb.

“Go ahead.”

“Glider two, this is Rescue one, acknowledge.”

Dead air was the only response she received as she continued to fly a slow orbit above the crash site.

“Major Dawson, this is Rescue one, do you copy?”

Zeb was reading the display and imputing incident details for download when they returned to Phoenix, but looked up when Julia said his name. 

“Can you expand the cloak to shield both gliders?  Whoever attacked them may still be around.”

“You’ll have to land first, but it’s not a problem.”

She nodded to show she’d understood and turned her attention to the hulking medic and the petite doctor who were already pulling on black double-layered gloves.

“Kate, Levi, you two okay for a low rappel?”

Both nodded; the tense lines of their bodies as they moved into the back cabin divulging the seriousness of the job at hand.

“Opening rear hatch.”

Kate and Levi rappelled down the ropes they had tied off to the welded bars in the glider’s roof; their feet touching the ground a second or two afterward. 

Julia missed the clear floor panels of SR4, but the display doubled as a live feed so she still had eyes on her team.  It wasn’t the same, but she could work with it. 

“Crewmen off rope.” Brendan radioed in her ear as he dropped the ropes over the side and held on with a gloved fist to the sidebar while Rescue one banked, ready to descend and land well back from the ravine.

“Got that cloak up?”

“Activating now.” Zeb focused on the holographic loading bar in front of him.

The sound of wind in a tunnel signaled the cloak adjusting to the new command, and Julia couldn’t help the heavy exhale that left her chest lighter.

“We’ll have to anchor the front so we can keep it from sliding over the edge.” Brendan explained two coils of cable shrugged over one shoulder, another two in his hands.

“Makes sense.” Julia agreed, tapping her comm open. “Levi, can we reach them?”

“The ground is too unstable to go in.  We’ll have to tie the glider off so we can work faster.”

“Brendan and Zeb are on their way.” Julia confirmed, soothing the telepathic eagerness between her and Rescue one and watching her co-pilot, and assigned Marine, descend the ramp via the display.

They had hooked carabiners to the modified anchor points in the underside dips of Rescue one’s wings, before running the kernmantle ropes across the divide between the two gliders.

“Wings, the cables are attached.”

“Copy, Brendan, I’ll reposition to take up the slack.”

Julia hovered Rescue one ten feet above where she’d landed and micro-maneuvered to port, tightening the cables an inch at a time as the glider descended in increments.

“HOLD UP!”

Julia dialed up the inertia controls to make Rescue one heavier, before running over to Glider two with a field kit in each hand.

When she reached the rest of her team, Brendan was listening to Levi’s assessment of the situation; nodding, and making the occasional gesture for emphasis.

“We’ll need a spreader bar to get that ramp down.”

Kate was looking through the narrow gap, a flashlight in her hand as she attempted to locate Major Dawson and his so far missing team. “I can see three of them, or at least I think it’s three.”

Brendan had returned, and with Levi’s help they cranked the bar.   The ramp separated from the chassis with the ear-splitting screech of protesting metal.  When the gap was wide enough to wriggle through, Julia followed Kate into the rear cabin.  The interior was all dark shadows and random arcs of blue from the sparking alien circuitry that danced with each lethal surge.  Two bodies lay amongst tumbled supply boxes.  Kate reached the first and began to assess his condition, while Julia headed for the second.  He was moaning, and trying to get free from a tangle of cargo webbing and the hard-shelled yellow weapons’ cases.

“Hey, hey, it’s okay, don’t move.” Julia soothed, calmer than she felt. “What hurts?”

“My…head…” He said, turning towards the sound of her voice.

The blood running down Lieutenant Flynn’s face looked black in the harsh white of the flashlight beam, adding a garish edge to the situation.  A head lac.  Julia pulled on yellow gloves from the field kit, the latex snapping sharp against her wrists, and pressed a wad of four-by-fours into the Lieutenant’s matted hair; guiding his hand in place over them. “Press here.  Hard.”

The Lieutenant nodded, dazed and loose-necked like a bobble-head doll, but his hand remained where she had left it.

“Zeb, can you dig Lieutenant Flynn out?  I’ll keep looking for the others.”  She didn’t wait for confirmation, before moving further into the depths of the wrecked glider.  Unsure of what she’d find.

Major Dawson was sprawled across the console.  He was breathing but unresponsive to his name.  Levi came up next to her and helped maneuver the major out of the pilot chair and onto a back board he’d positioned on the floor.  Being as gentle as they could, but conscious of their limited time, Julia put on a neck brace while Levi velcroed the board’s straps over Dawson’s body.  Aside from the threat to life and limb should Glider two slide over the edge into the ravine – taking Rescue one and her crew with it – there was the chance that whoever shot them down would return for prisoners, alien tech, or just to make sure they’d finished the job.