Page 17 of My Tiny Giant

“Do I?” He grinned again. “I know plenty of right ways to rub a woman. Want to try—”

“Oh God, no!” I groaned, waving both hands at him. “Please, don’t go there. I’d much rather endure your insults than your innuendos—”

Following the curve of the creek, we ducked under a group of the trees that leaned over the water’s edge. The faint snapping of twigs high above suddenly caught my attention. Then, a large fine net fell on both of us.

Agan cursed under his breath, drawing his daggers from his belt.

“You okay, Eleven?”

The net tightened, pressing his arms to his body and squishing the two of us together.

“What the...” I struggled to free my right hand so I could get to the laser knife in my left arm pocket.

A group of yirzi promptly climbed down the trees, chatting animatedly in their language, “Got them!” A few of them held long, silver guns in their hands.

Agan cut through the thin but strong rope of the net, working his arm free. “We’re getting out of here,” he assured me.

One of the approaching yirzi raised his gun and shot without warning.

“Agan!” I yelled as his body slackened against mine.

Panic spiked, breaking through my best efforts to keep calm and think rationally.

Another yirzi pointed his gun at me and fired.

“You—” I started to yell at him as sharp pain pierced the side of my neck. Thick, sticky terror flooded me. My tongue refused to obey, and I couldn’t finish the sentence.

Darkness descended on my vision from all sides. Then the world disappeared.

Chapter 5

“S TAY BEHIND THE GLASS at all times.”

The meaning of the words came through my translator immediately, but it took me a few more seconds to process that it’d been said in Voranian—the language of Voran, the country on Neron, the closest populated planet to Tragul.

The memories of the ambush by the creek rushed through me. Then, relief from being alive came. Had Agan and I been rescued from the yirzi by Voranians? If so, we should be okay, then. They were our allies, after all.

---