Page 36 of A Monster’s Future

My eyes landed on the time on a wall. Had it been an hour already? That went by quickly. “Let’s head back down and check up on everyone,” I said.

The second I powered my device back on, alerts flooded the screen. Some of them were from Chris, one from Annabel, and a handful from our group chat. I was still trying to figure out which one to reply to first when my device lit up with a call from Chris. I picked it up immediately.

“Chris?”

“Julie.” His voice sounded rough. “You’re okay. Good.”

“Yeah, I’m okay. Are you okay? You were shot!”

“I’m fine. I got super lucky. Shot went right through, missed every organ. But Charlene is…” There was a pause. “They have her in surgery now. We are in the infirmary. But I’m fine. And plus, I have a beautiful Tessa here caring for— Oww! That hurt, woman!”

“You’re as high as a kite. You can’t feel anything.” I recognized Tessa’s warm, friendly accent.

“Yeah, they gave me the good stuff. But nothing is as good as you.”

That had me frowning. “Umm, Chris, you’re supposed to be negotiating, not flirting,” I said, wondering if he was messing up our chances for a trade as we spoke.

“It’s fine. I showed her the ore. The deal’s a go.” He blew out a pained breath, proof that he wasn’t as good as he claimed to be. “Plus, I got shot while dragging Miss Shaw over to our side of the table. That counts for something.”

No wonder she’d already been there.

There was the sound of movement, and the next voice was Tessa’s. “Since Chris can’t seem to do anything useful right now on account of they have him drugged up, I’ll catch you up. My intelligence tells me those were local thugs, hired out by someone off-station. The second the station found out Vossell was involved, they sent every spare officer after them. They caught them all.”

“We tried to contact everyone, but all your comms were off,” said Chris, his voice a little farther away.

“We thought they were tracking us.” That reminded me of Sergio. “Is Sergio alright?”

“He’s fine. The guy’s made of tough stuff.”

“They had scanners listening in on calls and messages, but they can’t actually track you,” Tessa explained.

“That’s good.” I didn’t like being disconnected from everyone. “What now?”

“We continue our talks somewhere more private. If Nova Vita is going to this length to stop the trade, then there must be something good there. The ore looks to be of great quality. Very clean. And the prices are fair. We will continue our talks back at our hotel instead.”

“Our people need to return to our ship,” Grtirr grumbled next to me, “where I can tend to their injuries.”

“What did the Kadrixan say?” Tessa asked.

I relayed his information, then tacked on the fact that Grtirr was our medic.

“The medical facilities here are top-notch, but I understand if your medic prefers to treat his own. Meet us in the docking bay. We’ll get your wounded back to the ship, then we parley.”

I wrinkled my nose at the unfamiliar word.

After ending the call, I caught up with the rest of the missed messages. Sergio was alive and boasted that he’d tricked two of the idiots into running headlong at station security with their weapons drawn, thinking it was him. Annabel heard that one of the drones the thugs had been using had gone down in the park, and she went to look for it with Igor. There were also several photos of Omnia Pictures employees courtesy of Dana. I recognized one of them immediately as the guy who had grabbed me and immediately flagged him.

Very soon, Grtirr and I were stepping into an automatic station transport. We planned a quick stop at the hotel first so we could check up on Tatertot before heading to the docking bay.

Chapter 19: Grtirr

The docking bay had a somber air. Chris sat in a chair with wheels, looking better than the last time I’d seen him. But it was Charlene who had my full attention. She was lying on a stretcher, eyes closed. Her skin was too pale, even for a human, and her breathing shallow. My training as a medic took over, and I moved to her first, lifting her carefully, making sure she was secure inside the shuttle before I even thought about anything else.

They’d done surgery on her to remove the bullets, but because of her rare Rh-negative blood type, they had trouble finding blood to replace what was lost. They stabilized her with fluids and offered oxygen therapy, but all that had only been a stopgap.

We’d never had trouble treating humans before using our universal synthetic blood, which, to my surprise, had worked for both species. Though I really shouldn’t be surprised since we were biologically compatible. If our blood could not be exchanged, the resulting offspring would be attacked by the mother’s immune system and would not be viable. The fact that this phenomenon sometimes occurred even between two humans had shocked me when I first learned of it.

When I came out of the shuttle again, I found Chris trying to stand on his own. The male was acting almost belligerent, but in a friendly manner, like he’d imbibed too much. It was apparently a side effect of the painkillers they’d given him.