2
Kass, Pilot on Transport Shuttle XF41, Airspace above Eos Station
“Shuttle XF41,this is Eos Station. Come in.” The Velerion ground base comm officer hailed my shuttle. I’d just dropped a bonded pair of Starfighter Titans and a dozen ground troops at the outer grid for a training exercise. I was coming in for the day. Done.
“Eos, this is XF41. Go ahead.”
“Lieutenant Remeas, you are to return to the BattleshipResolution immediately.”
“I dropped off their team. Are you sure?”
“Orders are to return to the Resolution at once to receive modified mission instructions.” The ground tech’s voice came through the cockpit loud and clear. Apparently I was not yet done with today’s taxiing service.
“Copy that, Eos. Going back to the Resolution.” I replied, checking my display for speed and expected arrival time. “What are the mission modifications? Does someone else need transport?”
I was tired and needed to sleep before I could be assigned another mission. All I wantedwas to take a shower and stroke off to my usual fantasy of Mia, my Starfighter training partner, yelling at me while we fought in the simulations together and taking her against the wall to silence that sharp tongue. If the new mission instructions delayed that, it might be an issue because my body was hard for her, even now, alone in space.
“Per protocol, you are to report immediately to Battleship Resolution. You have been reassigned to Starfighter MCS. Your partner has completed the training program and must be retrieved immediately from their home planet.”
My breath caught in my throat. Holy shit. With the time delay between Velerion and Earth, the training simulations we participated in together were an odd mix of recorded messages and mission reviews. Mia would go through a training simulation and then I would be notified and load up the program to experience and participate in the mission simulation myself. I knew Mia now. Her reactions. The tone of her voice when she was exasperated with me. I assumed she was familiar with me as well, as many of the pre-recorded messages I created were spoken in the heat of battle. The new Starfighter training system was like an odd game of virtual tag. We both had to learn and make adjustments on our own before the training simulation would allow us to win as a team.
And now, we were finished. Training complete. Mia was a Starfighter and so was I.
“Lieutenant?” The comms officer at Eos Station sounded confused by my silence, but this was a lot to process. Mia was mine. I was a Starfighter MCS. Free from Sponder’s control and free to make my own destiny at last.
“Shuttle X41, do you copy?”
“Yes. Earth. Mia’s on Earth.” I stared out the window at the blackness of space on my left and the looming Eos Station, a massive, sprawling ground complex on Velerion.
The comms officer chuckled at my rattled response.
“Congratulations, Starfighter. General Jennix is expecting you to report for duty.”
It had to be real if Jennix was giving the order.
My heart started to pound, and I couldn’t help the smile that spread across my face. The shuttle was empty. Ensuring the comms were off first, I shouted out my pleasure.
“Fuck, yes!”
She’d done it. My Mia. The female I’d been matched to for months. Who I longed to touch and craved like a drowning man needed air. Since I’d hacked my way into the training program, I’d kept the fact that I’d been partnered to a female MCS trainee a secret. From everyone. Friends didn’t know. Fellow shuttle pilots either. No one. In fact, the only one I could speak to about the training program was Mia, who was in the simulation itself. And that conversation had been limited to the few prerecorded options available. There certainly wasn’t one that said, Finish the mission and I will reward you with my head between your thighs.
I’d heard her voice. I’d spent hours and hours in the simulation fighting beside a recorded version of her. Yet I’d never seen a real image of her, only her avatar. Brown hair I ached to run my fingers through. Full lips. Dark eyes so intense and filled with secrets I longed to push her until that rigid control broke and she became fire under my touch. And she would burn. I saw the passion in her gaze, saw it in the way she battled next to me in our training ship, aptly named Phantom.
Since I was being sent to retrieve her from Earth, it meant she had not only finished the Starfighter Training Academy; she had accepted my prerecorded request to pair bond with me. Fight with me. Be mine. Forever.
When my match to Mia had occurred, I’d expected to be called into Captain Sponder’s office so he could yell at me for insubordination. But that had never happened. No alarms had been raised when I’d been matched to Mia. No one had known, which only made my satisfaction sweeter. There were so many around the universe using the training program, I figured there was no way any officer in the Velerion fleet would have time to monitor them all, which meant I’d flown under the proverbial radar.
At least until now, when a recruit from a far-off planet actually finished and impacted the current role of someone like me. Since Mia had graduated and was now a Starfighter MCS, that meant I was one, too. It also meant I’d meet her in person. Soon get her beneath me. Tell her how much that bossy mouth made me crazy. I wouldn’t have to get off to thoughts of her. I’d get her off.
And thank her for ensuring I now outranked Captain Sponder and his hatred.
The grin that spread across my face was unavoidable.
“Starfighter, you have not altered course to the BattleshipResolution.”
Starfighter. He called me Starfighter. Fuck yes!
“Is there a problem?” The comm officer from Eos Station must have been monitoring my position on their sensors.