And the room warmed up.
It was like magic. The heat didn’t radiate from the glowing crystal, it didn’t seem to come from anywhere. The air was simply, uniformly, warm. Too warm, in fact — overheating, I pulled my coat off and threw it aside.
Karnac watched me, the intensity of his gaze impossible to ignore. Perhaps the heat in my cheeks just came from the sudden rise in temperature. That’s what I’d tell anyone who asked, but I knew better.
It’s not like I’m underdressed or anything, I told myself. It was true, too. Defense against the mountain chill came in layers, and I’d only taken off the outermost. Under it I still wore the red knitted sweater I’d brought all the way from Earth.
“How does that even work?” I asked, trying to force my thoughts away from the smoldering look Karnac gave me. “The heat isn’t coming from anywhere.”
He grinned, holding his hands wide. “I do not know. The heater sustained damage in the crash, made worse by heavy use — it’s not designed for so large a volume of air. It went out of phase, and without an alignment crystal, hard to compensate for. An easy fix when you know what to look for, but it tells us nothing about the principles it works on.”
I blinked, confused by that, and intrigued enough to keep talking to him. As long as we kept it about business, it would be okay. I could stay focused. Really.
“So, you don’t understand your technology any more than I do? You just know which bit plugs in where, and what to look for if it doesn’t work?”
His forehead creased. “I am an engineer, not a scientist. I have never studied either physics or metaphysics. When would I have had the time? I do not even remember the Homeworld, we lost it when I was a kit.”
“Wait, what?” That came from nowhere for me. Perhaps it was common knowledge, but I’d never wanted to learn about the Prytheen. “What do you mean, you lost your homeworld?”
“It is not something I care to talk about,” he said, face blank and unreadable as sheet metal. “That wound cuts too deep. Suffice it to say that there’s a reason the only Prytheen you meet are warriors and pilots, and there was a reason we tried to seize your colony ship with its terraforming equipment. Not a good enough reason, but a reason.”
So many questions buzzed around my brain. Who had done this to them? Why didn’t they lead with a trade deal to get what they wanted? What was he doing on a warship, so young he didn’t remember his homeworld at all?
I didn’t ask any of them. Perhaps there would come a time to ask, perhaps not, but this was not it — Karnac’s muscles tensed, his eyes cold, his teeth bared.
Apprehensively, I crossed the workshop and put a hand on his arm. He needed contact, someone to ground him in the present not the failures of his past.
His skin felt strange under my hand. Rough, not human, but pleasant. As soon as I touched him, my mind decided to spin off on a fantasy, wondering what the rest of him would feel like, would taste like.
Karnac growled. Not a threat, not a warning. Something more direct, personal, primal. A shiver ran through me, my breath catching, my heart racing.
I’d met some of Crashland’s wildlife. I was familiar with the fight-or-flight response. But who’d ever heard of a fight-flight-or-fuck response?
I froze, trying and failing to hide my reaction. Karnac turned his head to look at me with an intensity that should have burned my clothes off.
“I, uh.” Stringing words together was a challenge. I bit my lip, thinking, and his cat-like eyes watched my mouth. Drifted lower, to my throat, his own smile widening. “I don’t think that, um…”
Glitch’s static-filled hiss stopped me from having to answer. He sat on a workbench, watching the door — or most of him did. His forepaws still rested on my bench, disembodied, and his tail wasn’t visible at all.
“Again, Glitch?” I asked, pulling my hand from Karnac’s arm as though his skin had turned red hot. This was why I’d set Glitch up as an early warning system.
Glitch had no chance to answer before the door slid open and Allison strode into the room. Still running with the pink theme which I thought looked even more ridiculous than her outdoor outfit — at least there, the pink served a purpose, making her easy to find in the snow.
Here, her otherwise sensible business suit made my teeth itch. Why would she waste maker credits on something so saccharine? Or, worse, had she brought it here from Earth?
I’d never realized how annoying her color choices were. Though I’d had no cause to find out until now: since Karnac’s arrival, she’d been a constant visitor, stopping by several times a day. I’d seen her more often than I had in any previous month.
“I see you’ve got the heating back up and running,” she said, or rather gushed. Karnac’s lips narrowed, his only response a nod. Allison showed no sign of noticing his discomfort, but then her eyes weren’t on his face. Her attention was lower down, tracing the muscles of his torso with her eyes.
Which suited me fine. If they got together that would make life so much easier for me. It would be madness to object to her trying to get her hooks into him. I definitely believed that, one hundred percent.
So why were my hands balled into fists? Why were my muscles trembling?
Get this straight, body, I snarled internally. I am not interested in this Prytheen or any other. Yes, he has the most bangable bod I’ve ever seen, but that doesn’t change the fact that he’s one of the assholes who stole my life.
“While we have your attention, boss,” I said as politely as possible, hoping to interrupt before she jumped Karnac right in front of me. “I’ve got some requests for the next supply run? Karnac’s been using a lot of parts, and we’re still low on—”
“Fine,” Allison glared at me, making a brushing off motion. “Send it over. It’ll be easier to justify now that Karnac is doing something worthwhile with the parts.”
That was almost a physical slap. Allison had been nasty before, but she’d never come so close to calling me useless in front of someone else before.
Karnac growled, a low, angry, dangerous sound. “Allison, that is unfair. Molly has handled vital maintenance, work without which this station would fall apart. I’ve made one repair.”
“Oh, you’re right of course.” All smiles again, Allison turned back to Karnac, leaving me seething. “It’s not that I don’t recognize the work Molly does, just that I have to justify my requests to Captain Joyce, and when there’s no change to report that’s not easy.”
I will not rise to the bait. I will not. Allison aimed her apology, such as it was, at Karnac instead of me. More than that, she was lying. While I didn’t know Captain Joyce well, she’d been the Wandering Star’s engineer before the Crash. She’d understand the need for regular maintenance, even if Allison didn’t.
“Anyway, I must get going, there’s the weather forecast to put together,” she said with another bright, plastic smile. “There’ll be a little get together this evening though, to celebrate the new heating — I’m sure that lots of us will be glad of the chance not to bundle up, so why not make it a party?”
With that she swept out, leaving a cloying scent of perfume behind her.