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Yarvok
Irace along the top of the partially collapsed supply depot, pumping my legs as hard as I can. The Rork looms over Oliva’s prone form, its maw split wide enough to snap her into oblivion with one fell swoop.
I have to run faster. I have to run faster than I ever have in my entire life. I can’t let anything happen to Olivia. I would die if something happened to her. She is my everything. She is the missing piece of my soul for which I’ve been forever searching and never even knew it until now.
Now I do know the aching absence that has been there before Oliva came into my life. No wonder I was constantly looking for the next dangerous, get rich quick scheme. I was trying to fulfill my life with enough distractions so I didn’t have time to think about how lonely and miserable I was.
I always figured finding a woman and settling down would come long after I’d made my fortune. I’d honestly never given it much thought. I just took it for granted it would happen someday. I never thought I would be one of those ridiculous men who moon over and yearn for a woman like a lovesick poet.
And yet, here I am, ready to take on one of the galaxy’s most dangerous predators with my bare hands to save a woman I’ve only known for a few months. And yet in that few month’s time, I learned something about myself even as she unfurled her mysteries for me.
I am not some loner, some solitary creature who wants to be left alone to drink away his troubles in a bar at the end of the day. I’ve come to enjoy the time I spend with Olivia. Not just the lovemaking, but the small moments. The quiet moments of domestic bliss where we talk about nothing of importance, or sit and drink coffee and enjoy the sunrise together.
I don’t want to lose those things. They seemed so mundane that I had taken them for granted. Perhaps some part of me even resented that I’d traded lofty dreams for being domesticated.
And yet, now that I am in a paralyzing moment where it all might be taken away, where it has already been taken away if I’m not fast enough, I realize what a fool I have been. I’ve been waiting for some big revelation that I love Olivia, but that’s not the way love works.
Love develops organically on its own. I realize that I do love Oliva. In fact, I’ve been in love with her for some time. I can’t put my finger on when it happened, but it did.
I love Olivia and I won’t let anything happen to her.
The end of the roof approaches rapidly. I put on the final burst of speed, judging the space remaining. I have to time this just right. I have to spring off the cornerstone of this building with as much linear motion as I can muster and maintain.
I lift my knee up to my chest as I reach the corner. My foot no sooner touches the edge than I bring up my other foot and plant it as well.
I launch off the corner of the building, moving in an almost direct line toward the beast. I can see I’m going to be too low to catch hold of its back like I intended. Instead, I put my hands up over my head and assume a streamlined position. I want as much of the impact of my landing as possible to be concentrated in the smallest imaginable space.
I crash into the side of the creature’s ribcage. The impact is incredible, and I feel the bones in my arms strained to their limit.
I also feel my fists sink in several inches. Bone yields as readily as scaled flesh. When I land on the ground beside the creature’s thick leg, my hands are covered in blood and none of it is my own.
The monster turns its deadly maw away from Olivia and points it at me. The beak opens wide and it darts downward. I juke to the side, and then slam a mighty overhand right home right behind its left eye.
The Rork stumbles a few feet and then falls to its belly. For a moment it struggles to rise. When it gets its feet under it again, it turns away from us and runs for the breach in the fence.
I have no time to savor my victory. I hear a weak groan behind me.
Olivia! Oh no…please be all right.
Thirty-Five
Olivia
The heavy bale of wheat knocked the wind out of me when it landed on my back. Not only can I not move, I can barely breathe. I struggle to wheeze in enough air while hoping that the monster is happy with its mouthful of wheat and will finally leave me alone.
Then I feel the wheat move off of my body and I suck in a grateful breath of air. Strong hands gently pick me up and put me on my feet. I look up into Yarvok’s ridged, worried face.
“Olivia, are you all right?”
“Yarvok,” I gasp, collapsing against him. “Thank goodness. I knew you’d come and save me.”
“I barely made it in time to drive off the Rork.”
“Rork? I thought you said it was D’loreans stampeding through our brewery. You said they were herbivores.”
“They are herbivores. Unfortunately it appears that their stampede began as a result of the Rork chasing them. Which is quite strange.”
“What’s so strange about it?”
