Page 15 of Salvaged By the Alien Pirate

“Report!” Cirdox’s voice cuts through the dark, sharp as a blade.

No response.

Just the sound of my own breath, too loud in the oppressive quiet. The bridge, once alive with the steady hum of machinery, is now eerily still. My pulse spikes—too quiet. Not just systems down. Comms too.

Zara curses somewhere to my left, sharp and low. “We’ve lost everything. Main power, backup grids. It’s like—”

“Like someone cut the heart out of the ship.” My voice is tight, my hands moving instinctively over the dead console. My fingers find nothing but cold, lifeless metal. I don’t need my implants to know the truth. My gut is already screaming it loud enough.

We’re blind.

We’re vulnerable.

Andthey’re coming.

Chapter 6

Cirdox

ObsidianHavenloomsbeforeus, a jagged sprawl of metal and stone wedged into the heart of an asteroid. Dim maintenance lights flicker like dying stars across its battered surface, barely enough to cut through the surrounding void. The whole place hums with the low, steady thrum of quantum shielding—a vibration that worms its way through the ship’s hull and settles in my bones, setting my teeth on edge. It’s an old station, older than some of the wars that shaped this quadrant, and the deep groan of ancient machinery echoes through the narrow docking corridor like the place itself is exhaling.

I guide the Void Reaver through the station’s throat, wings tucked tight against my back, forcing them still despite the sharp twinge of strain in my shoulders. The passage is too narrow for comfort, the rough metal walls radiating a bone-deep chill even through our environmental shielding. One wrong shift, one twitch of my wings, and I’d scrape the delicate membranesagainst unforgiving steel. The docking clamps engage with a heavy clang, the impact reverberating through the deck plates beneath my boots, rattling the tension already coiled tight in my muscles.

Obsidian Haven isn’t a place you find on any star chart. The Brotherhood keeps it buried deep in classified records, one of many hidden harbors scattered across lawless space. It’s a place for ships with no safe port, for captains who can’t afford questions. After what happened at Vulpexia, we need every advantage we can get.

I can feel her. Even before I turn, Ifeelher.

Neon stands at the tactical station, her posture deceptively relaxed, but her eyes—those enhanced, electric-blue eyes—are sharp, scanning the station’s infrastructure with that ruthless precision she wields like a blade. My own gaze keeps dragging back to her, no matter how much discipline I throw between us. The bond digs into me like a vice, a slow, deliberate countdown I can’t escape. Two weeks. Maybe less.

The bond sickness worsens with every hour—the heat in my blood, the ache in my wings, the hunger to keep her close. It’s getting harder to hide. Harder to fight. The way my body reacts to her is instinct, coded into my DNA, something I can’t hack or overwrite. Every time she moves, my wings flex of their own accord, trying to bridge the space between us.

Her neural implants pulse beneath her skin like trapped starlight, casting shifting blue patterns across the console. It’s hypnotic. Dangerous. Because no matter how hard she fights it, no matter how much she denies it—Iknowshe feels this too.

And here, in the cold dark of Obsidian Haven, there’s nowhere left to run.

“Interesting setup,” she murmurs, more to herself than to me. Her fingers dance across the console, neural implants glowing asshe analyzes the outpost’s defenses. “Quantum shielding, fractal camouflage...whoever built this wasn’t messing around.”

“The Brotherhood protects its own—but loyalty is conditional. If they suspect a weakness, they’ll test it. And if they find me compromised, they won’t hesitate to replace me.” I keep my voice neutral, though her casual display of technical expertise sends another wave of possessive hunger through me.My mate is brilliant, dangerous, and completely oblivious to what she does to me.“We’ll be safe here while we repair and resupply.”

She snorts, a distinctly human sound of disbelief. “Safe is relative, Captain. Especially when someone’s hunting us across multiple star systems.”

Us. Nother. The distinction doesn’t escape me, though I doubt she meant it that way. My wings shift with satisfaction as she includes herself in “us,” the subtle movement betraying my response before I can control it.

The docking clamps engage with a metallic groan, the vibration rippling through the Void Reaver’s battered frame like a sigh of relief. The ship settles into the outpost’s docking bay, its hull scarred from near-misses and desperate maneuvers, the scent of scorched metal still thick in the recycled air. Outside, asteroid walls loom, worn smooth by centuries of solar winds, their jagged shadows shifting under the dim emergency lighting. The place stinks of rust and old mining operations, of forgotten ambitions left to rot in the cold.

I push up from the helm, rolling my shoulders before stretching my wings to their full span, working out the tension that’s coiled in them since the first shot was fired at us. The Void Reaver’s wounds are painfully evident—charred streaks where plasma fire kissed too close, exposed circuitry sparking in protest, loose panels hanging at sharp angles like broken ribs. The faintly sweet tang of burnt luminore lingers, a bitter reminder of the cargo we had to jettison just to stay alive.A power conduit above lets out a sharp crack, raining golden sparks onto the deck before fizzling into darkness.

We made it.Barely.

I exhale, the tightness in my chest refusing to ease. The damage is bad, but fixable. What’s not so easily repaired is the fact that we’ve been herded here, maneuvered into this outpost like prey funneled into a kill zone. And if experience has taught me anything, it’s that when the Black Eclipse goes to this much effort, it’s not just about a bounty.

It’s about a message.

“Zara, coordinate repairs with the Haven’s engineering team.” I watch my first officer’s ears flatten against her skull, her russet fur bristling visibly at the order.

“The Exoscarabs? Captain, you know how they are. Last time we docked here, their lead engineer threatened to weld Grig into his quarters for suggesting their repair protocols were ‘inefficient.’”

“I heard that,” Grig mutters from the helm, his pale blue skin flushing darker with remembered indignation. “They may be brilliant with machinery, but their interpersonal skills are worse than a malfunctioning service drone.”

---