2
Alexius of Velerion, Jamie Miller’s personal quarters, Earth
I’d been followingJamie Miller’s progress for weeks. Months. Ever since I received word from training academy officials that I’d been chosen by an Earth recruit in the new Elite Starfighter otherworlds virtual battle program. Then I became obsessed with her because, while she’d been across the galaxy, every day we were paired, the more she became mine.
Based on her stunned expression, I was not the only one suffering the shock of being chosen, of realizing our bonding was finally real. Standing before her was much more intense than interacting with her in the training program. She had been nothing but a possibility, a digital fantasy. Now I could see her, feel her. Touch her.
My first glimpse… she was everything I’d imagined. And even more perfect.
“Excuse me? I’m what?” She lifted her hand and rubbed both of her eyes. Blinked. Looked at me again. “You’re still here. Why are you still here?”
“I am not leaving. I must speak with you, Jamie.”
She stared, her gaze disoriented and confused. I fought back a smile. She was more beautiful in person. Her voice wrapped around my cock that much tighter. She looked… flummoxed. The feeling was mutual.
The new training simulations had been distributed to Earth and multiple other worlds months ago, with no results. Until now. The few surviving Starfighters on Velerion had been fighting and struggling to defend my home world. And they were faltering. Dying. Being picked off one by one as exhaustion or the relentless attacks of Queen Raya’s Scythe fighters wore them down. The truth was, we were losing the war. Queen Raya’s surprise attack on the Elite Starfighter moon base had wiped out eighty-five percent of our forces. Time and merciless small skirmishes had nearly decimated the few we had left.
Velerion was in trouble. We needed new Elite Starfighters. Without them, our entire civilization, our planet would fall to the evil queen’s invaders and her Dark Fleet allies.
If we lost this war, we’d be rounded up, slaughtered, or enslaved. Our planet would be gutted for resources. Our children taken. Our history and culture would vanish from existence after eons of peaceful prosperity. But the Dark Fleet would not stop at Velerion. There were other worlds ripe for the taking. Many with far fewer defenses. Including Earth.
Every planet chosen for the Elite Starfighter Training Program was in danger, even if they didn’t know it. We needed help now, but the training would benefit every single one of the chosen planets later.
If Velerion fell. I was determined not to allow that to happen.
“This can’t be real.” Reaching up with both hands, she brushed the hair out of her face and tucked the long strands back behind her ears. After all the time I’d watched her in the simulations, I was finally seeing the real female. She looked sleep rumpled and sexy. I wanted to bend down, grab her, and haul her to me, crush her mouth with my lips. Make her body mine. But I dared not. I was on very treacherous ground. The law was clear. Even though she’d completed the training, she had to come with me of her own free will. I was not without honor. No matter how badly my people needed her help, I would not force her to return with me to Velerion to save the planet.
“I am real.” She was an Elite Starfighter now. She would choose to help. We needed Jamie Miller. We needed a thousand more just like her. Male. Female. Androgynous. Human. Centaurian. Andromedan. I didn’t give a fuck where they came from as long as they had the skills to protect Velerion.
The fact that Jamie had chosen me in the program was a gift. I’d gotten hard the first time I’d received word of our match, when I’d seen her avatar appear on my data screen. Her curves. Her dark hair. Seeing her stand before me now was a shock to my system. I’d heard her voice in the training simulations. Seen her smile. Heard her sass. Ached to touch her. In fact, I had thought of her, been consumed with my need for her from the first moment the training simulation had connected us. I had to hope she felt the same in return, but the way she was acting, I couldn’t be sure.
The reality of her was a shock to my system, lust and physical need both urges I was not prepared to feel pulsing through every cell as she stood before me. So close I could smell her soft skin, see the sleek shine of her hair. My fingers twitched at my sides as I fought to remain calm. She was mine now. She’d finished training and taken her vow to be mine. She had accepted me. We were a bonded pair. My body belonged to her as hers belonged to me.
Yet she stared at me as if I was a stranger. As if we had not spent hundreds of hours together in training simulators. True, we’d been on different worlds, but I knew her voice. Knew the way she moved. Knew her.
Surely she was familiar with me as well? “Are you going to invite me in?”
“No. Not that it matters since you’re already inside my head.” She reached up to touch my cheek but stopped before making contact. I nearly groaned in disappointment. “Shit, you look so real.”
I grabbed her hand and pressed her palm to my cheek. “That’s because I am real, Jamie. I have come a very long way. I need to speak with you.”
My growing obsession hadn’t boded well for my mission the last few weeks. It was pretty fucking hard to be undercover—behind enemy lines—as a smuggler on Queen Raya’s Syrax asteroid base when all I wanted to do was watch Jamie’s training sessions. During the day, I lived and worked among the Dark Fleet. Eating with them, doing business, and staying alive within the black heart of the Dark Fleet’s strongest fighter base.
At night, in my quarters, I’d watch the replays of my missions with Jamie. Distraction led to mistakes and mistakes cost lives—mine and those of Nave and Trax, my fellow Velerions who were undercover with me.
At first I’d been skeptical of the Velerion Delegation’s plan to bring the Elite Starfigher squadrons to full staff. But the more I’d watched Jamie in the sims, the more I’d rooted for her. Anticipated her completion every tortuous day working on Syrax.
Now I was light-years away from the Vega System to retrieve her. To take her to planet Velerion and her rightful place in the Elite Starfighter program.
“Please, Jamie, may I come inside and speak with you?”
“So polite. Sure, dream man. Come on in.”
“Thank you.”My understanding of her native language was nowhere near fluent. Yet I had to convince her to agree to come with me before I could give her the cipher injection. Even then, it would take the nanoparticles several hours to establish the proper connections with her brain, optical and auditory neurons so that she could understand all languages.
The way she was looking at me, I feared she may refuse to accept anything I said.
Impossible missions seemed to be my only missions since the war had begun.