I stop listening as their conversation registers in my mind.
Cara>>Local: Now it will display your name for the Titans when you speak.
Aera>>Local: Thanks. So I can hear what’s in their heads, too?
Cara>>Local: Yes. That’s good and bad. Just don’t take any of their guy talk to heart, yeah?
Aera>>Local: It’s all good. I’m Omega Force. I’m used to it. Nice to meet you.
Cara fist-bumps Aera, and we continue into the hangar.
Aera taps her ear com and shuts it off. “Guess I better be careful that this thing is off if I want to talk dirty to you.”
A hot wave of need dumps into my body. “Why…”
Aera motions a finger of her supple mauve lips. I’m quickly at attention inside my armor, my cock straining against my belt, praying she’ll give me a taste of herdirty talkjust so I know she’s serious.
I’m elated that she's flirting with me at all.
When we stop at the edge of the group that’s preparing for the mission, I wrap an arm around her and draw her backward into me so she can sense just how hard she’s made me with her little tease. Opening my helmet, I lean down to her ear. “I don’t know when this change started in you, but it is getting distracting.”
Aera bites her lip and peers up at me. “A muscled Titan saved my life. I basically woke up this way. Now you’ve distracted me, and all I can think about is that huge gun digging into my ass.”
I had thought she would be freaked out by seeing me in my natural form, but it appears to have stirred up the opposite. I can’t comprehend it.
Chasm steps onto a crate. “We have fifteen minutes to get everyone on course for the cruiser. Remember that this is not worth dying for. If you cannot give your best on this mission, I do not want you to go. Let someone else take your place. We are all tired. But this way, with our new numbers, we can afford rotations and rest cycles.
“If you are not battle-ready, but you want to help, remain here with us and prep our united fleet to move out of the nebula. This mission will certainly bring more attention to us.
“We need to be ready. To everyone who goes on this mission, thank you for the risk you take, and give the enemy a hot rocket boot right up their asses!”
Ash is the first to let out a war cry. Aera and many others join in. But I am starting to have reservations about going. The idea of setting foot on another Solcrue vessel of such caliber makes me cringe inside. But I pack it away and encourage Aera in line for the available, charged StarJumper suits.
She sighs as she trades out her armor for the suit upgrade and pockets her chip inside. “A little too big, again.”
“Just don’t take a hit there,” I tell her.
She thinks about it and moves the chip to a pocket by her neck. “If they take me out, they take out the chip too.”
Vandal>>Evo: Shit. Your girl isdark.
Vandal grins as he slinks by us to grab weapons from the crates.
Aera hands off her old suit to a group of Rebels that has assumed the job of armor charging and refurbishing with Diesel’s mate, Rhee, guiding them. We save everything we can.
When Aera is dressed, she confidently walks to the crates beside Vandal, takes a handgun and a rifle, stocks her belt with extra ammo, and waits while I do the same.
Vandal keeps throwing me twisted grins while he chews on a piece of wire and dances his brows suggestively.
I shake my head and ignore him as I encourage Aera to a Rebel ship at the end of the hangar.
Aera looks up at me like she’s annoyed. “You’re not letting me breach the ship. We’re going in last.”
“Yes. But we are still going. This is our compromise.” I encourage her up the ramp and to a drop slot in the main cabin just ahead of mine.
“Welcome, Rebels.” The com in my stall crackles lightly as it clicks on and off. “I am Reidar. I’ll be your pilot today. We will be dropping last because my sister, Kelta, is a jerk face and won Rock Paper Scissors.”
I lean out of my drop slot to peer up front. “Aera, what is Rock...”
