"They're pirates! What do you think? You're lucky Ilike you, roomie." He sighed. "That aircraft carrier is turning faster than I thought it could."
Just our luck. If the navy caught us before the pirates did, my dad would be the least of our worries. "Please hurry."
"This is going on our running tab. Munich. October 30th. You'd better be there."
"I promise. I wouldn't miss your fiftieth birthday for the world."
"Asshole. I'll be thirty, same as you. Are you already senile?"
We insulted each other a few more times before I disconnected and handed Gunnar his phone.
"Pirates?" he asked.
"It's either that or answer a bunch of questions when the navy finds us."
"Why is the navy upset with us, exactly?"
"If it were serious, they would have blown us out of the sky." I didn't want to think about the number of international treaties we'd most likely violated by landing nowhere near US soil. "Swear to God, I thought we were landing near Hawaii. I have a resort there. My friend Lonnie runs it for me. That's why I called him."
Gunnar turned to his computer screen, his fingers ghosting over his keyboard faster than I'd ever seen anyone type. "You couldn't have been off by that much."
I didn't recognize the computer program as one of Paskal's shuttle protocols. "Are you … did you hack into the internet?"
"They gave us a link, so yes." He shrugged. "We're right where you wanted to be, in the Pacific Ocean."
I huffed a relieved laugh. "That bastard Lonnie played me."
"Paskal's got a ship in the general area, but it's already a day north of Hawaii on its way to Vancouver. There's a naval fleet stationed at Pearl Harbor for repairs, but we'll be on the Big Island before they can reach us."
He pointed to his screen, where the blip for our shuttle flashed red about a centimeter below the big island on the map.
"Why is it blinking?"
Gunnar tucked his keyboard away and checked his seatbelts. A split-second later, the shuttle bounced and shook from impact. It hit hard, rattling the consoles and shaking us in our seats. Then, we skidded across the water, reminding me of the speedboats I used to race around the islands.
By the time we slowed to a stop, Gunnar looked like he was going to be sick. He unbuckled in record time, and then proceeded to undress to his boxers.
"What the hell—" was as far as I got before he shifted into his wolf in the small space between our seats. He lay down and rested his head on his front paws by my feet.
I couldn't resist the soft fur of his ears. I stroked them and then scratched behind them.
"Feeling better?"
"Yes. Much."
"Do you always get sea sickness?"
He nodded his big wolf head and sat back on his haunches.
"Well, I need the Gunnar with opposable thumbs to help me with the airlock."
He returned to his human form and rested his back against the cockpit door. "I didn't know if it would work, but I had to try."
"Did it?"
He shrugged. "I'm still queasy, but I won't puke on your space boots. Er, I hope."
He still looked a little green, but at least he could function.
