The Space Colonel's Woman (Dragonus Chronicles Book 1) (9 page)

Several wrong turns later, she found herself in the central control room.  It was crowded with uniformed staff wearing both Phoenix shoulder patches and designation logos.  Who stood in front of holographic screens projected from the surface of the curved white and silver consoles.  The atmosphere was one of such official importance, Julia was hesitant to interrupt.

“Can I help you?” The blond woman at the nearest console asked, her smile open and friendly.

“Hi, yes,” Julia stuttered. “How do I get outside?  Maybe to the gardens?”

Julia gestured to the camera bag at her hip and smiled, trying not to look too out of place while the woman looked her over.

“Oh, you’re Colonel Holden’s…guest.  Right.  Sure.” The woman brushed a strand of hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear when it fell back over her eyes. “I’m Ange Green.”

“Julia Swift, nice to meet you.”

Julia smiled and offered her hand, which Ange was quick to shake.

“Outside to the gardens, you said?  It’s best to take the relocator to the auxiliary science wing, two buildings over, and out the double doors at the end of the corridor.” Julia nodded, asked where the relocator was and headed in the direction Ange pointed, after asking her to let Mark know where she’d gone.

The relocator turned out to be a far weirder experience than the characters of the show made it out to be.  But then the one on
Phoenix Rising
hadn’t actually been real.  The one Julia had just ridden in left her feeling queasy and like she wasn’t all there.  She could still walk in a straight line on grounded feet, and yet.  Being in one spot then, with the flash of pristine white light, appearing in another less than a second later, was bound to cause a glitch in your programming.

The doors whispered closed behind her, and Julia found herself breathing the open air of her new home once again.  It was clean and crisp, and felt invigorating in her lungs; minty fresh in her sinuses.  She could easily get used to standing in the middle of a city minus exhaust fumes or smog.

Julia craned her neck to see more of the watercolor-blue of the sky overhead, so clear and clean it hurt to look at it.  The ghosts of two planets reflected the sun’s rays, just like the single moon did back on her Earth.  She lowered her gaze and rubbed the back of her neck before taking in the sights at ground level.  There was no chance of missing the Birdcage now.  It rose from the center of this Eden like an elegant greenhouse, surrounded by its lush plantings of emerald green spangled with blooms of every color and shape.  Groups of scientists huddled about, taking samples and readings with hand-held instruments similar in appearance to the tablets of Julia’s Earth. 

White paving squares meandered in a complicated architectural design along tree-lined promenades, beneath archways, through formal plantings with fantastical water fountains at their centers, and past private seating nooks; each with the same white benches as the balcony.  It was impossible to choose where to go first. 

Her decision was made for her when two men dressed in green overalls and carrying a metal crate between them, reached the doors.  They were too caught up in their heated discussion of the crate’s screeching occupant to pay her any attention.  So Julia went straight ahead, hand clutched knuckle-white on the strap of her bag.  This place may bear a resemblance to the parks back home, but the truth was, they weren’t.  They, and Julia, were on a different planet, in a different galaxy, universe even; and that knowledge would take some getting used to.

She had found a spot about ten minutes’ walk from the science building’s doors and was humming along to her playlist and munching on one of the fruits she was yet to learn the name of, when she saw Mark approaching.  He was dressed in his tactical gear, T60 clipped to his vest and APX in his thigh holster.  Julia went the impulse and snapped a dynamic portrait of her colonel, stark in his blacks against the crisp white of the tower looming behind him.

“Hey, you.”

His shoulders were a sharp line of tension as he brushed a strand of bourbon back behind her ear.  

“What’s up?” She asked, ignoring the sexy smile.  It had been four days but she had a pretty good handle on his tells.

“Gotta go off-world.”

Julia popped the last of her fruit into her mouth, and tried not to choke on the sweet dark juice.

“Oh.”

“Be back as soon as I can.”

It made sense.  Logically she knew what his job entailed.  Three years of watching
Phoenix Rising
had told her that much.  But the reality was different, and a lot more dangerous.  Television meant a change of scene, or a fade-to-black, and the actors went home to their lives at the end of each work day. 

This wasn’t television.  And it wasn’t a world populated by cardboard sets and Christmas light console panels.  This was Mark’s world.  And it was real, and deadly, and any off-world mission could be his last.  Julia couldn’t help wonder what would happen to her if Mark didn’t make it home.  After all, she’d only just arrived on Phoenix; hadn’t established herself as anything other than
Colonel Holden’s…guest.

“I’ll leave a light on.”

Mark used Julia’s outstretched hands to pull her into him, wrapping them around his neck before lowering his mouth to hers.  His palms rested on the small of her back as he kissed her, soft and lingering, before stepping back and tapping his radio.

“Garrett, I’ll be there in five.”

He laid a peck on her nose and smiled the crooked smile she loved so much.  The one that always made her smile in return; before running back the way he’d come.

“Please, keep him safe for me.” She whispered to the universe, and retreated into the world inside her camera.

~*~

Julia lay in bed, wide awake and alone in the darkened room.  She stared at the red glow of the alarm clock, where it sat mocking her from the bedside cabinet.  It’s black presence alien against the stretched and languid curves of the room’s design.  Mark had been gone for ten hours and thirty-four minutes; thirty-five minutes.

She had spent another hour out in the gardens before returning her camera to Mark’s quarters and going to the Mess hall for dinner.  Ange and Doctor Peyton had been sitting together and invited her to join them.  Their invitation had saved her the embarrassment of choosing where to sit, a task that reminded her too much of high school to be a fond memory.

She and Mark had been so wrapped up in each other that she hadn’t had time to meet anyone aside from Anora, Hayden, and Stephen.  And they were all off-world with Mark.

Over trays of schnitzel and salad Doctor Peyton had mentioned a movie night in the FOQ.  Two buildings right of center, Ange had explained as she swigged the last of her bottled water.  It wouldn’t have mattered what was playing, Julia would’ve gone anyway.  Anything was preferable to waiting alone in Mark’s quarters, counting out the minutes until he returned.  It had been better to socialize and begin the process of finding her feet in her new home.  Step one, making friends.

Nineteen-hundred hours had found her in the common room of the female officers’ quarters, seated between Ange and Doctor-call me Lenti-Peyton, eating pink popcorn made from Salmat kernels. 
Best of the Best
had turned out to be this reality’s equivalent of
Top Gun
, complete with a volleyball scene. 

Julia smiled to herself.  Apparently hot flyboys playing volleyball transcended all space-time dimensions.  Not that she was complaining.  Lenti and Ange had been great company and she hoped they’d hang out together again. 

But the movie was long over, and Julia, was sleepless in Phoenix.  The edginess she felt when she was parted from Mark freaked her out.  She had never been this dependent on anyone before.  Jumping into a relationship was one thing, but abandoning everything you knew for a man from another reality was something else entirely.  It didn’t feel like a mistake.  And she sure as hell didn’t want to take it back.  But it just the biggest fucking decision she’d made in her life.  Ever.   Maybe this was what it felt like when you found your soulmate?  Julia didn’t know.  She collected shells and random driftwood at the beach, not sexy-ass space colonels with non-regulation bed hair and whiskey-gold eyes. 

Whatever it was they shared, Julia would rather have it than not; even if it meant winging things for a while.  She grinned at her pun.  Besides, it wasn’t like Mark was any wiser about their situation.  He’d looked just as stunned by their connection as she was. 

Julia snuggled deeper into the pocket of warmth she’d made for herself in the huge bed.  Too much thinking was bad for your health.  Ten hours and forty-six minutes…

Through the haze of finally-arriving sleep, Julia heard the doors hiss open and Mark’s quiet bootsteps as he crept in.  She listened to the thuds of his boots hitting the floor, and the whisper of his clothes as they followed the boots.  When he arrived in bed and spooned against her back, his knees behind hers; he was naked except for his tags.

Julia sighed, her body relaxing against his hot hard chest as his arms folded her in close; humming at the heat of his lips on her shoulder.  Mark laid his head on her pillow, inhaling the scent of her freshly washed hair; his breathing slowing and deepening as he drifted off to sleep.  She sighed; allowing sleep to claim her too.  Mark was home.

Chapter 9

The way the morning sun filtered through the Birdcage’s dazzling alien glass and reflected off the corrugated wing spans of the gliders was breath-taking.  Julia couldn’t help standing and staring at the way the spaceships were stacked four levels high above her head.  Each ship rested on a giant silver soup spoon, the end of the handle attached to the support pillars.  They looked like an exotic breed of newly-discovered bird of paradise sitting on their roosts, each level spaced on alternate pillars from the ones above and below them.  In between were elegant balconies made of the same glass and silver as the Birdcage itself, only they weren’t balconies, but elevators to take the flight crews to their spaceships.

She must’ve been standing there for ages, eyes wide and mouth hanging open, because when Julia finally dragged her gaze away from the architecture, Mark was leaning against the first glider in the bottom rank; arms folded over his chest and ankles crossed.  His eyes were sparkling and a grin playing around his mouth. 

“Ready for the thrill of your life?”

“Absolutely.”

Mark pulled up just inside the rear cabin and tugged Julia back against him; arms wrapping around her waist as he ducked in close, hot breath stirring the curls by her ear. 

“You’ll be awesome, I know it.”

“I appreciate the confidence, Colonel.”

She pressed a soft kiss against his lips and Mark groaned his appreciation before releasing her. “You wanna fly us out?”

“What do you think?”

Julia dropped into the pilot’s chair, swinging her knees under the console and placing her hands on the alien equivalent of a steering wheel.  The little ship hummed to life in response to her X
2
gene and the thrill of connection sparked in the back of Julia’s mind as if Glider one was welcoming her home.  It was a sensation that left Julia feeling both overwhelmed and elated.  She wasn’t sure exactly how she was supposed to concentrate on telepathic flight data transference, while physically navigating them out of the Birdcage and into open air, but she sure as hell was ready to try.

“Propulsion, navigation, altimeter.” Mark gestured to sections of the display, each one self-illuminating when his palm hovered over it. “And your earpiece connects to Flight Control.”

She nodded and took the radio Mark held out to her.  It curved around the shell of her ear and tucked inside; the tiny tech so light it was easy to forget it was there at all. “Flight, this is Glider one, ready for lift off.”

Mark snorted with amusement as he settled into the padded leather of the co-pilot’s chair.  She felt her cheeks flush but didn’t look at him.  He’d have to teach her the correct terms, so she’d know for next time.

“Glider one, acknowledged.”

Julia, under Mark’s direction in the form of him pointing out the windshield, had no trouble maneuvering the glider off its silver spoon, out through the open door, and ascending to thirty-thousand feet.  They flew over the rear arms of the city’s crown, leaving it behind in the blink of an eye, headed inland to the coordinates Mark had programmed into the glider’s console matrix.  All she had to do was follow the plotted course.

Glider one was a dream to fly.  A pocket rocket of greased lightning that thrummed, purred, and rolled over under her touch.  Julia put her telepathic foot down and Glider one responded instantly, the landscape streaking as it sped by far below.

“Having fun?” 

Mark’s question was rhetorical since one look at Julia’s wide eyes, flushed cheeks, and manic grin was answer enough.

“She’s amazing!”

The display bleeped; destination reached.  Glider one hovered in place awaiting Julia’s next command.  A purebred alien pedigree on a telepathic leash.  Every system eager and ready to be set free.

“I’ll load the simulation.” Mark’s fingers tapping out a sequence on the console. “Just follow what you see on the display.”

“Okay.”

“You’ll do great.” He glanced up, eyebrow quirked in question, before looking back at the console. “You got us here, didn’t you?”

“True.”

“Program’s loaded.” He gestured to the virtual topography of a canyon with plenty of twists and turns, and a tiny red glider silhouette waiting at the bottom of the screen. “When you’re ready, Wings.”

The fact Mark had lounged back in his chair with no more concern than if he were having a few beers at a local bar, gave her back the confidence that had been seeping away the longer she held Glider one in check.  She took a deep breath, and accelerated into the computer-generated canyon. 

Julia focused on the display instead of the icy-blue sky beyond the windshield.  Her speed increasing as her confidence grew.  Glider one responded with enthusiasm to the combination of thought and touch, like a dog wagging its tail to the sound of its master’s praise.  And soon Julia had the little ship executing rolls, slides, nose dives, and high-angle climbs; a symbiotic understanding between pilot and machine.  A match made in the dark recesses of a long-forgotten Zydonian scientist.

The exercise was over before she knew it; holographic display bleeping the end of the simulation.  Julia rolled out her shoulders then her neck as she slowed Glider one back into an idling hover.

“Wow!”

“Wow’s right.” Mark sat in his seat, looking as stunned as she felt. “You can fly.”

Julia gave him a puzzled frown. “You doubted I could?”

“Oh, no no,” He waved his hand, then rubbed it through his hair, leaving random spikes in its wake. “It’s your skill level.  Combat pilots take two, maybe three goes, to match your interface compatibility.”

“So…” Julia felt a warm prickling sensation stroke her mind. “…I did good?”

“Yep.”

He pushed out of his chair and leaned down to kiss her. “Almost as good as me.”

“No false modesty then, Colonel.” Julia brushed her fingertips over Mark’s cheek and he chased the touch.

“Pilots aren’t renowned for their modest egos.” He stole another kiss and traced the shape of her lips with the pad of his thumb, before pulling back and whispering.  “Amazing.”

“Wanna fly it for real?”

Julia was keen for anything that meant she could do more glider-flying.  She was already addicted. “Hell yes!”

“Hop up, I’ll fly it first.” He chuckled at her crestfallen expression and tugged her up out of the chair, hand tight around her bicep. “Then it’s your turn.”

Mark flew Glider one through the actual canyon that turned out to be located right below where Julia had been flying the simulation.  She could see the beginnings of a target range under construction before he stepped on the gas and the purple-grey canyon walls became a blur.

She knew he was showing off, but she couldn’t help being impressed.  He flung the little ship around blind corners, over outcroppings, through rock arches, and straight up as they reached the end wall.  When they had levelled out back at thirty-thousand feet, Mark turned and bowed from the shoulders; his arms wide in a mimicry of courtly submission.

“Very impressive, Colonel.” Julia’s blue eyes sparkled with amusement. “Is it my turn now?”

He stood up, gesturing to the pilot’s seat as if he were a waiter in a five star restaurant.  “But of course, Wings, she’s all yours.”

She loved the way her call sign rolled off Mark’s tongue.  The whiskey-drenched velvet of it made her want to curl up in his lap and purr.

Instead, she drew herself into a world where only she and Glider one existed.  She was determined to complete the run perfectly; working on matching, and beating, Mark’s time would come later.  Julia dove into the start of the canyon and accelerated, dipping under the first rock arch before swinging the glider onto her port wing tip and flinging them around a blind bend.  Glider one levelled out in time to skim the rise of cliffs before flipping back onto her starboard wing to fly vertical through a narrow gap.  Before Julia knew it, the end canyon wall was looming up fast, but she waited; waited as the gap rapidly closed.

“Ah, Wings?”

Mark’s fingers dug into the soft arms of his chair.

Julia increased their speed, and yanked the nose up.  The underbelly of Glider one skimmed the wall of rock as they ejected from the canyon, and climbed back to thirty-thousand in a matter of seconds.

“Nice.”

“I did say I could fly.” She laughed at the stunned expression on his face.  The tension in Mark’s body melted away, leaving only broad shoulders and long lean limbs in its place. “What did you expect?”

“Yeah, you did.” He rubbed both palms over his face, speech muffled for a moment. “Knew you would.  Didn’t think you’d have that level of precision though.”

He hit buttons on the console and the display fed him Julia’s run statistics.

“Sixty-point-two seconds.”

“Is that good?”

“Damn good, for a first time.”

“What’s your best time?”

“Forty-eight flat.” He smiled. “Take a bit to beat me, Beautiful.”

“I’ve got time.” She straightened in her seat and huffed a breath, making the whisper curls around her face dance. “Besides, it’s only twelve seconds – give or take a point.”

Mark’s belly laugh had him clutching at his sides, knees pulling up on reflex.

“No doubt you’re a pilot.” He gasped for air. “Confidence isn’t something you’re lacking.”

“Sure, you’re laughing now, but we’ll see who has the last laugh when I come in under forty-eight.”

Mark wheezed, slumping deeper into his chair as his laughter consumed him.  Julia circled around and headed back to Phoenix, glowing with pride in herself and a steely determination to wipe the grin off her colonel’s handsome face.

Once she touched down and Glider one had, with the help of some mysterious alien tech too complex in nature to delve into, come to rest on its docking clamp, Mark stood up and rested his hands on the arm rests of her chair.  It was a familiar action and she couldn’t help the fission of heat licking up her spine.

Perhaps he was thinking along similar lines because he smiled, slow and thoughtful, and leaned in to kiss her breathless.  Julia moaned, couldn’t help it, and ran her hands up into soft black whorls; tugging Mark closer, keeping him right where she wanted him.

Time had passed, but she had no clue how much when he pulled back; gasping for air and running his tongue over the contour of his lips.  His dark pupils edged in a thin ring of whiskey fire.  Julia felt the heat of his gaze on her heaving breasts and tried to calm her racing heart.  She wanted him; wanted him bad.  But Colonel Archer was expecting her to report on how her first flight had gone.  Their pleasure would have to wait.

She stood into the small space between the chair and Mark, ran her hands over his chest and down across the place where he was hard and eager for her.  He ground against her touch in a silent request she had to refuse.

“Mark.” She murmured in warning as he traced a palm around the shape of her ass, pressing her closer. “Colonel Archer’s waiting.”

He kissed her again, hips grinding tight and close, so turned on the slightest hint of weakness on her part would find her bent over a chair, and screaming her pleasure for all of Phoenix City to hear.  Julia moaned aloud at the thought and knew she’d already surrendered.  Mark’s tongue tasted the cavern of her mouth as he scooped her into his arms, carried her into the rear cabin and placed her on the bench seat.

“On your knees.” He ordered, rough and urgent as he tugged both BDUs and white cotton panties down her thighs.

He gripped tight to the curve of her hips and thrust in deep and quick.  At this pace it’d be over all too soon.  Julia could do nothing more than lay her forehead on the cool leather and push back to meet each stroke; the feel of him filling her amped by the lingering buzz of adrenalin sparked low in her belly.  Glider one’s telepathic approval of their X
2
bond thrumming a warm caress across her mind shoved Julia over into climatic bliss, chased quick by embarrassment, aware the ship understood what they were doing.  Could see how having Mark in and around her affected her.  How his touch anchored her to her body.  Glider one fed the information back to her through their connection, through Mark’s as well, and Julia shuddered with the surging insistent heat of it.  Bright blue synapses igniting and overwhelming her as Mark joined her in a torrent of confusion and completion she feared she would forever crave.

~*~

Julia sat in Mark’s lap, back to chest with her legs splayed over his, and sighed in contentment.

“I aim to please.” He chuckled, cupping her breasts through her shirt and making her hiss as he tweaked her nipples. “Customer satisfaction is my only goal.”

She laughed, full and light, still riding her afterglow.  His hands slid down her flanks and tickled her hips, making her squirm in his lap.

“Unless, you’re wantin’ round two, I suggest you sit still.”

He stared at her with such intensity she felt like a mouse hypnotized by a cobra.  Her heart thudding, breath caught, and temperature rising; the spell breaking when he tickled her ribs.  Julia felt him harden as her ass shifted around him.