Free Shattered Destiny: A Galactic Adventure, Episode One by Odette C. Bell

that. I couldn’t shake the feeling
this place was cursed.
    I kept on my toes as I followed Mark. He
said very little as he walked around and completed a few tasks.
    I watched him, and though I had a hard time
understanding most of the systems he interacted with, it was
instructive.
    It was when we were roughly on the far side
of the operations room that an alarm suddenly blared through the
room.
    The scurrying crew stopped, backs snapping
so straight they looked like daisies popping out of a field.
    “Shit,” Mark spat, eyes bulging wide as he
twisted and half-ran towards a man in the center of the
room.
    From his attire and the stripes down his
shoulder, it was clear he was the captain.
    With no idea what to do, I pressed as close
as I could towards Mark without getting in anyone’s way.
    “It’s a civilian transport, non Arterian,”
the captain said.
    Mark swore again. “Is Xarin on his
way?”
    The captain nodded.
    Mark turned and swooped his attention across
the room until he locked in on the lift doors on the far wall.
    … Xarin.
    Oh god, I was about to see Xarin again.
    That realization flooded through my heart
and bled through my chest as if someone had punctured my
ventricles.
    Without my helmet, it was hell to control my
expression.
    I kept telling myself there was no earthly
reason to react like this around the prince – I despised royalty.
The very idea of it was anathema to everything I believed in. The
Arterians and their traditions were responsible for most of the
inequity in the galaxy, inequity that had directly led to my brutal
life.
    So I tried to harden my expression as the
doors finally opened and he swooped in.
    He was not wearing his armor.
    That point somehow stuck in my mind and
washed away my anger.
    He was completely exposed.
    Fear settled in my gut so quickly, it was as
if it appeared with the speed of a photon.
    I even brought a twitching hand up and
locked it on my middle.
    I wanted to be angry at Xarin –
he’d virtually kidnapped me and brought me aboard this ship. And yet all I could think about was how much of
an idiot he was for taking his armor off….
    He may think his ship was safe, but life had
taught me over and over again that nothing in this universe came
without danger.
    Xarin swooped across the room.
    He came to a stop before the captain and
Mark.
    Suddenly every crew member in the room
straightened, tucked a hand against their chest, and bowed low.
    Every crew member, except for me.
    I looked around confused.
    All eyes locked on me , and for the first time since entering the room, Xarin
deigned to look at me.
    “Bow,” the captain said through stiff
lips.
    Though I really didn’t
want to , I could read the captain’s mood. If I
chose not to bow, it would be the final move I’d ever
make.
    I flicked my gaze to the side and locked in
on some crew members who were still bowed, and tried to copy their
posture.
    The prince extended a hand at me, the
fingers wide. Without looking at me, he muttered, “Don’t bother,”
through stiff white lips.
    Then he turned his full attention on the
captain, practically shunting his back in front of me until all I
could see was his broad shoulders.
    “When will we intercept,”
Xarin demanded .
    The captain straightened up from his bow.
“We have not yet altered our course.”
    “Alter it now,” Xarin’s voice became dark.
“We have no time to waste.”
    The captain briefly shared a look with
Mark. Though I tried to stare around Xarin’s shoulder, I couldn’t
see exactly what that look was.
    “We do not technically need to intercept,”
the captain said carefully, very carefully. “It is not an Arterian
transport.”
    Anger suddenly punched through
my gut as I realized what the captain was getting at.
    Sure, there were 2000 people on that
transport, but they weren’t Arterian, so who cared.
    I could no longer control my expression.
If it weren’t for Xarin’s broad form blocking me off, I would have
locked my mutinous