Amid Stars and Darkness (The Xenith Trilogy #1)

“Seriously?”

“Where’d you get a spinik, Gibus?” Ruckus asked, leaning on the side of the tank so he could get a look now as well. “I thought they all died off a few years ago?”

“They did,” he affirmed, beaming. “I created her.”

“You cloned her?” Delaney pulled back, eyes wide, and stared at him with a new appreciation. They could do stuff like that back on Earth now, sure, but it was still pretty cool to see it up close and personal. Even if she had no idea what a spinik was.

“I improved her,” he corrected her. “You see these?” He pointed to the teeth on her tail. “The originals didn’t have them. That’s probably why the progos picked them off so easily.”

“It’s like a type of bird,” Ruckus filled her in telepathically, because the Sutter was continuing and there was no way to get a verbal word out with him talking a mile a minute.

“Once I’ve tested her out, we’ll be able to see if this new version of spinik can be released into the wild. If they can survive a progo attack—their number one predator—at least two out of three times, I’ll have successfully raised Missy’s species from the dead.”

“Honestly, you sound a bit crazy … but I can see why you’re so excited,” she told him.

“Well, of course you can.” Apparently he didn’t know what modesty was.

She didn’t know why his weird genetic experiment surprised her; he had been the one to create the device that allowed Olena to do this to her. Maybe part of her had assumed he’d learned his lesson. Then again, he was trying to save a species. That couldn’t be bad, right? A bit mad scientist, but not necessarily bad …

Ruckus took a step back from the glass. “Make sure you don’t let that thing out. If anything happens to Delaney, I’m going to hold you personally responsible.”

“That’s not fair,” Gibus said, and spun on his heel, almost knocking into Delaney in the process. “Pettus is the Teller here, not me.”

“And you’re the genius who got me into this mess,” she stated, a bit annoyed that he hadn’t even apologized for it.

“Hey.” Having noticed the slump to her shoulders, Ruckus gripped her hand once more. “I’ll do this as quickly as possible and be back for you. Then you can get some rest.”

She nodded, and for a moment it looked like there was something else he wanted to say, but he must have changed his mind, for he leaned in and kissed her cheek before turning to go. The second he was gone, she felt the panic from earlier seep back.

“Delaney.” Pettus stepped over to her. “We won’t let anything else happen to you.”

She glanced over at Gibus, who was wiggling a finger at the spinik like one might to a goldfish. Lifting a brow, she returned her attention to the Teller.

He winced, playing up his reaction in an attempt to make her smile—which oddly worked. “Try not to think about it.”

“Almost getting shot or”—she pointed at the Sutter—“that?”

Pettus laughed lightly, and she was momentarily caught off guard by how comfortable she felt around him. Now that she’d had a few minutes to adjust to Ruckus’s leaving, she realized she wasn’t as terrified as she would have been without him a few days ago. She didn’t know the Teller as well as she did his commanding officer, but she trusted that he’d do his best to keep her safe.

And he was right. As badly as she wanted to curl into a ball and weep right now, where would that get her? She was still shaken up, but a distraction might do her good.

“Ruckus says you figured out how to fix my face situation?” Delaney addressed Gibus then. “Want to show me how it works?”

“I can’t show you,” Gibus said, “because there was only the one prototype. So reversing what was done to you can’t be redone. However, I can explain it.” The spinik forgotten, he dashed over to the other side of the vast room, snatching something off one of the tables among a pile of metal scraps.

Pettus leaned in and stated dryly into her ear, “This should be interesting.” When she looked at him, he winked.

“Here it is!” Gibus was holding a small device about the size of a pencil and one-inch thick. It had a blue light tip that flashed every three seconds, and four silver buttons.

“That kind of looks like Doctor Who’s sonic screwdriver,” she mused, and when the two of them frowned, she heaved a sigh. “Never mind. When this is all over, remind me to loan you the DVD set.” She tilted her head at the device. “How do you know this is going to actually work?”

If there’d only been the one prototype, and Olena had it, how could Gibus be sure this thing would do what it was supposed to? What exactly had he tested it on? The last thing she needed was for something to go wrong, and instead of looking like Olena, she’d end up looking like a spinik, or worse, an ung.

“I’ve done experiments,” he said vaguely. “It’ll work. Trust me.”

“Pretending for a second that we actually do”—Pettus quirked a light brown brow—“how does it work?”

“Simple, really.” He tilted the device so that the blue end pointed at Delaney. “You aim, and then twist at the center, like this.” A slow hum emitted from it as he demonstrated. “And you hit the third button.”

“Why the third button?” she asked. “What do the others do?”

“Nothing.” He shut it down and slipped it into the pocket of his light green lab coat. “I just thought it looked more aesthetically pleasing this way. Only one button made it seem kind of quaint, you know what I mean?”

“I don’t believe either of us do,” Pettus answered for her, “no.”

*

IF SHE STOPPED moving, for even a second, flashes of Trystan’s body crushing hers, his blood on her hand, and Lura raced through her mind. After she’d almost slipped into her second panic attack, Pettus had caught on and gone out of his way to keep her distracted.

They spent the next three hours teaching her how to play a card game.

The game was called topsy and involved a deck of triangular cards that were held point down. Each player received a chunk of the deck, in their case a third, and all of them would flip a card from their hand at the same time, placing them faceup in the center for everyone to see. It was sort of like the game War, in that it was a game of chance, with certain cards trumping others. Once she got ahold of what each image was and which were the highest ranking, she started having a lot of fun.

It was actually very relaxing, doing something so normal, so mundane, and she got swept away in it. For a while, she was able to forget she was sitting across from a Teller and a Sutter, instead of a soldier and a scientist. She was able to forget that they were aliens, and simply enjoy their company.

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