Page 136 of I'm Not Your Pet

I was at the door in less than a second, claws screeching and scraping, tearing at it in an attempt to get through its surface.Tendrils sprang out, enveloping the hinges, looking for gaps and crevices.Anyweakness that would mean I could get out and get to Huu-goh before they took him. There was no doubt in my mind that the pirates were here for the huu-mans.

And while I was concerned about all the cargo on board, nothing compared to the icy terror I felt when I thought of Huu-goh being stolen from me.

“No, no, no, no.” My breathing was erratic, my head spinning. “No.”

“Captain!” Mala tried to pull me away but I threw him off.

What if Huu-goh was with the humans?

What if he’d been locked outside the rooms?

They’d take him away from me.

“He’s out there—” I slammed my shoulder against the door, pain lancing up my side. “He’s out there—he’s?—”

“Roark,” Mala pulled at my shoulder again, and I snapped my teeth at him without thinking. He jolted back, fingers slipping away. The emergency lights flickered on, but the room was still far dimmer than normal. A fact that was hard to even notice as I continued to beat the door into submission.

The stars swam outside the windows, unmoving for now while the ship was stalled in space.

“He’s—” I panted, claws raking down metal.

“I know.”

“He’soutthere—”Thud, thud.More pain. More scratching. The damn metal barely gave beneath my fingertips. “He’s out there—he’s-out-there-he’s-out-there-he’s-out-there.”

“Roark.” A second voice. A second set of tendrils crept around my body in an attempt to subdue my frenzy. I fought them as I slammed against the door. By the time a third member of my crew joined in, however, I was lost. They yanked and tugged, their tendrils incapacitating me in a rainbow mass as the three of them dragged me to the cold, metal ground. My chestheaved, limbs icy as I twitched—attempting to get free even though the action was futile.

“He’s out there—” I managed, voice brittle.

“I know,” Mala said softly from above, his spots indigo with sorrow. “But you’re no use to him when you’re likethis.”

I didn’t know how tobeanything else.

But I needed to be.

I needed to pull myself together.

Needed to be their captain—even though it felt impossible.

I sucked in a breath, the rage and fear bleeding away as my body relaxed.

Each set of tendrils released me bit by bit, all of their faces tentative and nervous. The two cadets that had intervened, took a step back, averting their eyes out of respect as I lay on the ground, pathetic and sore, and heartsick.

“Come sit down,” Mala urged, his tendrils the last to leave as they wrapped around my arms, attempting to pull me up.

“I’m fine,” I assured him quietly when I was standing, ignoring the blood on my claws—my own—I shook off his touch as I made a beeline for the control panel. A cold sort of clarity washed over me. “Show me where they’re boarding.”

It seemed the pirates had managed to latch their ship onto us in such a way that they hadn’t broken the gravity seal. Based on the size of the vessel that had docked, there were thirty of them at the most. I switched to the infrared cameras, anxiously awaiting signs of the luminescent blobs that were our invaders.

“Quiet,” I instructed.

Immediately, the anxious chatter in the room settled into silence. “Turn up the volume.” Thrash, the Sahrk that was sitting at the desk, did as he was told, tapping the button till the buzzing sound of the empty hallways filled the room.

This was torture.

The emergency protocols were meant to make interference impossible. To protect lives over products. But—that only worked when there weren’t people outside the rooms. What if Huu-goh had been with the humans when this went down? He often was at this time. I couldn’t shake the thought once it had taken root.

What if he was in the cargo hold? Where there were no doors.

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