The Star Prince (27 page)

"How?"

"I like to think things through. She rushes into action headfirst. She also doesn't care much for rules, and she has no discipline." He chuckled. "She'd make a terrible Vash. And that's fine by her."

Tee was listening intently. "I believe I would like this woman," she said slowly.

The lights flickered and went out. The emergency lights came on but the thrust levers flew back, all on their own. The sudden deceleration threw Ian to the floor, but by some miracle he floated away from what would have been a bone-crushing encounter with the flight console.

"Gravity generator failure," called the flight system computer.

"No kidding," he muttered.

Tee worked at putting the thrust levers back where they belonged. "For the love of heaven, Ian! Are you all right?"

"Yes." He floated like a kite above the empty chair. "Just relocated."

He tugged himself into his chair, buckled in, and inventoried his body parts. What ached from ricocheting off the floor didn't appear to be broken. Amazingly, his pulse had barely jumped. It meant he was getting used to the almost surreal, 007-like quality of his new existence. Though he couldn't decide if that was a good thing or bad. "What the hell happened?"

"I show multiple systems failures." Her green-brown, red-gold hair floated around her face. "Crat! Systems are dropping off-line faster than the ship can put them back on. And now the computer's not giving me the backups."

"Do it manually!"

"I am!"

The lights went out, and the auxiliary lights kicked on, dim and tinted amber.

"ELECTRICAL FAILURE, UPPER DECK," droned the computer's voice.

His stomach dropped with a wave of nausea, and he felt suddenly heavy in his seat. He swallowed convulsively, cold sweat prickling his forehead.

"I got the gravity generator back on-line," Tee shouted.

There was a jolt and the ship went silent. It took him a few seconds to realize that the ever-present sound of the air-recyclers was gone.

"PRIMARY LIFE-SUPPORT SYSTEM FAILURE. BACKUP SYSTEM UNAVAILABLE," the computer reported.

"There goes our air." Ian unstrapped. "We're out of here."

Tee slammed her hands onto her desk. "Great Mother, I don't show any pressure change on the status instruments. It's got to be a computer malfunction."

"We don't know that," he shouted back.

A klaxon blared. "ABANDON SHIP. ABANDON SHIP."

"Abandon ship?" Tee gaped at him. "How are we going to do that?"

"The external maintenance pod will do," he said as the thought occurred to him. It was a chamber of about three hundred square feet, little more than a launching point for space walks when needed for outside repairs. "We can detach it, then drift away from the ship."

"HULL BREACH DETECTED. FIVE MINUTES UNTIL STRUCTURAL FAILURE."

"Let's go!" He unbuckled her harness even as she battled to throw more failing systems on-line. Dying he could handle, if he had to, but he couldn't wrap his mind around the possibility of losing Tee. "Computer!" he commanded. "Transmit mayday message: 'Situation desperate, need immediate assistance.' "

Tee smacked her open hand on a red disc on the comm panel, activating a distress signal. Then she had the presence of mind to dislodge a portable emergency beacon to bring with them to the pod, to guide a rescuer to their location in case they drifted too far from the Sun Devil.

No doubt about it: the pixie was clearheaded in a crisis.

They stumbled out of the cockpit. Pushing her ahead of him along the gangway, he scrambled after her and they sprinted down the corridor.

"Something's affected the ship's warning software," she speculated, gasping as they ran. "It's disabled the alerts that were -supposed to tell us something was wrong. Now the computer thinks we have massive failures."

"THREE MINUTES UNTIL STRUCTURAL FAILURE. ABANDON SHIP. ABANDON SHIP."

"Or," she shouted above the klaxon, "we really do have massive failures and we're about to depressur-ize."

He swore. "Now's not the time to turn pessimistic."

Ahead was the hatch to the external pod. It looked like a golf ball with a white padded interior. He shoved her inside and pushed the heavy hatch closed, but it jammed a finger's width from sealing.

"SIXTY SECONDS UNTIL STRUCTURAL FAILURE."

He cursed viciously past his clenched teeth. If he couldn't get the hatch closed and the ship in fact depressurized, they'd lose all the air in the pod, with little time to grasp the thought before their lungs exploded and their blood boiled.

"FIFTEEN SECONDS UNTIL STRUCTURAL FAILURE."

"Kick the door shut!" he shouted. They rolled on their backs, pounding their boots against the jammed hatch. Close, damn it, close.

"STRUCTURAL FAILURE. ABANDON SHIP."

Tee made a strangled scream and rammed the bottoms of her feet on the door. "No!"

"ABANDON SHIP. ABANDON SHIP."

The hatch sealed shut with an ear-popping hiss, and the life-support system inside the pod took over. The air was dry and stale-smelling. Ian sucked in huge, lung-filling gulps. "By your right arm— the manual release— pull it! "

Tee yanked the release handle.

His heart pounded like a sledgehammer.

The pod detached with a jolt and floated free, bobbing in space like a fishing lure in a rippling pond.

"This thing has propulsion jets. Somewhere." His fingers searched an unfamiliar control panel. The manufacturer had familiarized him with the pod's operation once, on the starship's maiden voyage. "There." He activated the nozzles and used a tiny joystick to back away from the Sun Devil— even at full speed, maybe too slowly to save them, should the ship blow.

Tee must have read his thoughts. "At least this way we have a chance," she insisted. "On the ship we'd have none."

They braced themselves for the explosion, huddled together, eyes shielded. But all that thundered around them was their labored breathing.

The Sun Devil held together.

"Well," he said. "It looks like we're still in the game."

She huffed. "You'd better believe we are. We're going to get back in that ship and start her up. I'll have you on Earth before Randall's engines grow cold."

He didn't know whether to shout a war cry or kiss her senseless. "Let's do it."

They fell away from each other and went to work. Ian fired the steering jets rearward, stopping their backward movement. Holding the joystick, he tapped the steering jets, expelling just enough force to start the pod moving toward the ship. Tee crouched by the porthole to offer additional visual guidance. It was a fair distance to the ship, and there was no guarantee they'd make it; the little pod wasn't designed to fly long through open space.

"We're not getting any closer," Tee observed, frowning.

He gave the jets more fuel. But the Sun Devil maintained its position relative to the pod.

"We need more," she said.

"Fuel's almost gone."

"Already?"

"We traveled a good distance, though it doesn't look like it."

She stared outside, her expression grim. "The Sun Devil is drifting away from us at a greater velocity than this pod can manage."

If they didn't catch up with the ship, they'd be stranded in the pod that, unlike the Sun Devil, held a very finite volume of air. "How much time do we have if we're stuck in here?"

Tee held her palmtop with trembling hands that revealed the truth about her outwardly cool and calm demeanor. "Approximately five standard galactic hours."

Five hours. The clock was ticking.

He gave the jets another spurt of propellant.

"Low fuel," cautioned the onboard computer in a soft, feminine voice.

"We're gaining on her now," Tee said excitedly.

Ian manipulated the joystick. "I played a lot of Nintendo as a kid." he said. He sent more propellant into the jets. Come on, come on.

Adjacent to his joystick, a red light blinked in warning. "Jesus, not yet."

The jets drained the last of the fuel. Ian threw up his hands. "That's it," he said.

"Fuel depleted," agreed the pod's computer. Though it did no good, the voice sounded ever so sorry.

On Grüma, Lara emerged from a cafe wearing an expression of triumph. Her delicate silver jewelry sparkled in the moonlight. "They tell me the princess' crew is staying at that inn"— she beckoned with her chin— "across the street."

"That's odd." Gann walked alongside her. "Why aren't they on their ship?"

Her breath misting in the chill predawn stillness, she said, "Well, according to that man in the cafe, these folks just got out of jail. They were released only an hour or so ago. Perhaps their ship is impounded, like mine."

He gave her a small smile. "By the looks of it, yours will soon be back in your hands."

Once they reached it, Gann banged his fist on the door to a guest room within which the man in charge of the crew supposedly slumbered. He hoped, for Tee'ah's parents' sake, that the gentleman in question wasn't at that moment sharing his bed with the princess. Vash royal women were expected to be virgins when they married. But then, Vash royal women were expected to stay home, too.

He knocked again. Sounds rustled from inside the door. Then a deep and very irritated voice called out, "Coming."

Armed and ready for trouble, Lara stood a few paces behind him, her collar turned up to ward off the chill. There were a few more thumps. "You Grumans don't let up, do you?" the man grumbled from inside. "This had better be good." The door slid open.

For a heartbeat Gann lost his vision in the bright light spilling out from the room. Then a shadow loomed in the doorway. Gann bunked, squinting at the giant towering above him. "Great Mother, Muffin! What in the blazes are you doing here?"

In the pod, Tee sat back on her haunches, her expression one of utter disbelief. "We're out of fuel?"

"We even used up the fumes." Think. There had to be another way out.

"I don't believe this," she said. "The ship is right there"— she slammed her open hand on the porthole— "full of air. And we're here."

Four hours and forty-one minutes. The air-remaining readout was extrapolated out to the ten-thousandth place. The speed-blurred descending digits were a taunt, a challenge. What are you going to do now? He dug through boxes, storage lockers, lifted the padded flooring and peered underneath. There was a solution hidden, somewhere. There had to be. The thought of passively waiting for rescue revolted him on the most basic level.

Tee's hand rolled into a fist. "It's the computer. It did this to us." Her knuckles turned white, and she let out what sounded suspiciously like a growl. "I swear to you, Ian, if I ever get my hands on the manufacturer, I'll wring his neck." She gave a wan, crooked smile. "Pilot, negotiator, cook… murderer— look at all I'll have on my resume after this stint. Oh, and marksman. We mustn't forget about that."

Her attempt at humor coupled with her obvious apprehension drove a stake through his heart. He thought of her jump-in-feet-first enthusiasm, her desire to make the most of each moment. The likelihood now loomed that her life would be stolen from her, too soon and unfairly.

"I shouldn't have dragged you into this mess," he said. "I'm sorry I ever offered you a job that day on Donavan's Blunder."

"No, you aren't." She crawled to where he sat and placed one hand on his raised knee. "And neither am I. No regrets— do you hear me, Earth dweller?" Her chest rose and fell, and her eyes grew strangely bright. "These past few weeks have been the most glorious time of my life."

Her confession drove home the sacrifice he'd made when he'd put aside his personal wishes for the good of the Vash Empire. He wanted Tee as his wife, though reason told him a future with her was as frustratingly out of reach as the ship floating out-side the porthole. In a quiet voice, he admitted, "I feel the same."

She sighed, and he pulled her close. For long moments they stayed like that, cheek to cheek, breathing in unison. Succor and sexual arousal mingled as naturally as scent and smoke from burning incense.

Four hours and twenty-seven minutes.

"Hold me tight," she whispered. Their arms came around each other, their legs tangling. As the contours of their bodies fitted together, their lips met in a kiss— soft, warm, and loving. She clung to him as he buried his face in her hair and, before he had the chance to analyze all the reasons he shouldn't, he murmured, "I love you."

She threw her head back, bewilderment, fear, and joy filling her wide golden eyes. The mental and emotional affinity he'd felt with her since the day they met surged, combining in a powerful physical attraction.

In wonder, she touched her fingertips to his mouth. "I know we can't be together, but— "

"Don't give up on us so easily." He wanted her, damn the consequences.

The welfare of all outweighs the desires of an individual. Hastily he summoned the Vash teaching that was supposed to remind him of his duty and make him feel better about falling in love with the wrong woman.

It didn't.

Softly, she said, "We might die."

"We're not going to die," he ground out. He shot another glance around the pod, looking for an answer, anything to fix this mess. "We'll find something. We always do."

"But if we don't… " Her hands smoothed over his thighs. His muscles bunched under her palms. Ian, "I don't want to die not knowing what it was like to… make love with you."

He grabbed her fingers and squeezed. She winced, and he relieved the pressure. "I see. We make love, because we don't have to worry about consequences. Nothing matters anymore, right? But it does, Tee. It does to me. Yes, we might die. But I'd never do it for that reason alone. I've wanted you forever. I've wanted this consummation, too."

Tears filled her eyes, the first he'd seen in the entire time they'd been together.

He brought his forehead to hers. Their damp skin heated, their breath mingled. "It's been almost five years."

He felt her tense with surprise. "Without love-making? Are there no palace courtesans on Sienna?"

"I chose not to visit them. Sexual intimacy means nothing to me without emotional commitment."