Page 48 of Time Traveling Space Bastards
And Valtens was now fifteen years older on a planet that didn’t know he was royalty and still hadn’t gained a single shred of self-awareness.
“So, they powered you back on, did they? Well, snap to it. Get rid of them so we can go home.”
“No,” Ghol said.
“Excuse me? Iownyou. I’m your future king.”
“Most of the planet already doesn’t want you as their king. When they find out you kidnapped and attempted to murder the Devouring Mother, they will riot and eat you alive,” Ghol said.
“Who’s going to tell them?” Valtens taunted.
“Bigger question is who’s going to save you, brother?” Kuka said, stepping into the living room totally strapped with guns.
“You think I goanywhereon this awful planet without protection?” Valtens asked, pulling a weapon out the back of his trousers.
Where the fuck did that come from? And why did he immediately point it at me when I was the least likely person in the room to have the ability to take him out? Fuck me. Was this how I went out?
I didn’t have time to react. Valtens fired, and that gun didn’t shoot bullets. It shot some kind of light. Yeah, I would have beencompletely fucked and dead, but Enix jumped in front of me and took the blast.
And when Valtens fired, so did Kuka. The smaller gun that shot light barely made a sound, but the weapon Kuka fired shook the entire house and absolutely obliterated Valtens. The only thing left of him was a pile of dust.
Did his parents want that back? Did Valtens evenowna dustpan or vacuum? And Enix got shot for me. That was probably the most romantic thing anyone had ever done for me and he’d better not be dead.
He wasn’t. He bolted to a sitting position and his chest was mangled to all fuck. I remembered he hadn’t been programmed to feel pain, so at least there was that.
“We need to get the fuckoutof here, with all of Valtens’s weapons. Someone will call about the noise from the gun, and we don’t need to be here when the police show up. This place is filthy, so they won’t think that’s the owner of the house on the floor,” Enix said.
“Are you okay, brother?” Torrek asked. “You saved the Devouring Mother. You’ll be a hero.”
“I can’t feel it, if that’s what you’re asking, but you’re going to have to find a way to get me repairedwithoutgetting me shipped back to my previous owner.”
“First things first, we need to get the fuck out of here,” Kuka said.
Yes, we did. Idid notwant to come to the attention of any cops.
My chest was completely mangled and getting it fixed was going to be complicated, but I didn’t regret what I did. Torrek and I were closest to her, and I was solid. Torrek bounced off me when I jumped in front of her. He had been trying to do the same thing, and he’d be dead now. I was the only one who could survive it.
AndIgot lucky, too. The weapons Kuka had gathered were powerful weapons that would have killed even me. One would have reduced me to a pile of ash, and another would have blasted a hole straight through me that couldn’t be repaired.
The gun Valtens had was more advanced than anything on this planet. It would have served him well against humans, but that was a civilian weapon back home. It wasn’t nearly as powerful as the ones he managed to buy from the military.
And I still would have jumped in front of her if it was one of those weapons.
Ghol kept staring at me as we prepared to flee. It seemed like he wanted to ask me something, but it wasn’t the time.
“I’ve connected to the cameras in this house and erased everything except Baxter tied to the chair. I’m fairly certain by the time they gain access to the footage, we’ll be gone.”
I was pretty sure Ghol had just done a major thing, but I couldn’t think about it until we were all safe. We snuck out the back, through the elder’s property the way we came. I had a feeling if anyone was going to call about the gun going off, it wouldn’t be her.
Valtens threatened her youngling. I could understand not getting human customs around this strange holiday at first, but he’d been here fifteen years. If it was custom to leave the light off if you didn’t want to give sweets to the younglings dressed like demons and risk vandalism, he should have known that by now.
It didn’t matter which galaxy you were from. People were protective of their younglings. She’d have no problem if it was a gun, and it killed him.
Valtens was also aterribleneighbor. It was like he didn’t know what to do with his trash. He’d been throwing it into his backyard and that was the smell the elder kept reporting. Once we hopped the fence, we had to wade through mountains of it to get to the house.
The elder stepped out of the house when we exited her property.
“Is it done?” she asked.
