Page 12 of Bonded

I had to shake my head to wrap my brain around that sentence. “So, what’s the difference?”

A pad in front of me illuminated. It looked like a transporter landing zone. Instead of beaming up a person, though, it showed a three-dimensional image of the four-armed dragon-orc alien that I’d seen in the mess hall.

“This is the captain of the crew. Ithran, Dirsigian male.” Along the side of his body, the ship listed his stats and overview as if I was looking at a patient’s intake form. Height, weight, race, status, morphology. He was a vegetarian, which was a surprise. All Dirsigian warriors seemed to be. Even more so, he was of a more strict order, and he seemed to prefer flowers. A very rare varietal only available in his planet system, which was very, very far away.

There was also a farm nearby. I hit the nav maps and found that there was a colony nearby. This was the ship’s home base.

“What colony is that?”

“Earth 4040.”

“Earth 4040? I thought those terraformed Earth colonies were destroyed?”

“Correct. Earth 4040 was destroyed.”

“But you just said that Earth 4040 was where you claim a port? Your home base?”

“Yes.”

“How can you have a base that doesn’t exist?”

“It exists.”

“Did you not just say that Earth 4040 was destroyed?”

“Yes.”

I decided it wasn’t worth it to pursue this line of reasoning, and so I moved on.

“If Ithran is the captain, who is the pilot?”

“The pilot is incomplete.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry. Then who is navigating you?”

“I navigate myself now.”

That answered my question about being some sort of intelligent life. “But you said that you had a pilot but incomplete? How so?”

“I have a heart and mind.”

I didn’t know how that answered my question when the holographic image of Captain Ithran shimmered away and was replaced by a life-sized display of two familiar males standing side by side. They were the two named Vryek and Ruzan, the ones who came after me in the mess hall. The ones I was drawn to.

They were both large. They were in the same league as Ithran, but there was something about the captain that told me that if it came down to it, he would win any challenges to his authority.

Ruzan was the larger of the two, with metal decorating the tips of his horns and small hoops hugging his earlobes. Vryek, though leaner, still had corded muscles rippling over his frame.

Both were more attractive than I cared to admit. The memory of their gazes on me, of their mere presence and the way they pulled me as if I’d just found my new gravity. The raw, primal energy that exuded this holographic image made me question my sanity.

“These males? They’re your heart and mind?”

It was more a statement than a question. The Ship seemed to understand. “Yes. I have chosen them, and they have accepted being linked with me.”

“What if they didn’t want to be linked?”

“The possibility did not compute. I would not have been able to if they were not willing.”

“Oh, so since you knew they would accept, that allowed you to extend the choice?”

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