Now.
He smelled it before he reached the bay.Fuel discharge.Engine wash.The unmistakable signature of a ship that had launched recently.
He hit the cargo bay doors at a dead run, slamming the manual release, and the blast doors ground open.
The bay was cavernous.Cold.Industrial lighting cast everything in flat white.Dust lay thick on the storage crates lining the walls, the deck scarred from old loading operations.
He snarled as he whirled around, looking to the end of the bay.The doors were still cycling closed, the atmospheric shield shimmering in front of the blackness of space.
And through the gap, the running lights of a shuttle… Getting smaller.
And… gone.
His scream of pain and fury was ripped from his very soul, bouncing off the walls to ring in his ears.
He'd failed.And the knowing of it dropped through him like a dead weight.
There was movement in the corner of his eye, and he snapped around.Three, no, four figures stepped out from behind the storage crates to his left, weapons up.His eyes narrowed.Thesedraanthichad stayed behind.A blocking force meant to slow pursuit while the shuttle cleared the station's traffic control range.
His grin stretched wide.Obscenely wide.
They were already dead.They just didn't know it yet.
The first one fired and an energy bolt screamed past his ear, close enough to singe the hair at his temple.He didn't flinch.He was already moving, closing the distance faster than any of them expected because they'd planned for a standard warrior, not a male with absolutely nothing left to lose.
Hitting the nearest one at full speed, he drove the male backward into a storage crate hard enough to dent the metal.The crack of his spine was audible over the clatter of his dropped weapon.Raaevik took the second in the throat with the combat blade before the male could get his weapon around, and hot blood sprayed across his forearm.
The third fired, the bolt catching him in the ribs.An explosion of pain flared over his ribs and chest, making him jerk like a child’s toy.A bolt at that range should have dropped him, put him out of the fight, but he was already moving.The bolt hadn't killed him, and that was the only fact that mattered.
He jerked upright, massive hand wrapping around the muzzle of the weapon shoved in his face.The owner grunted in surprise just before Raaevik yanked.Hard.The warrior stumbled forward just in time for Raaevik to slam his forehead into the male's face.Bone crunched, and he went down.
The fourth was backing toward the far wall, shaking his head, weapon held in trembling hands.His eyes were wide, terrified.
“Who…whatare you?”
Raaevik stalked him, blood dripping from his blade.The burn on his side throbbed, but he didn't care.It didn’t matter.Nothing mattered but finding her.
"Where did they take her?"
The warrior fired wildly.The bolt hit a crate three meters to Raaevik's left.
Stalking forward, the snarl built in the back of his throat as he closed the distance.It wasn't like any sound he'd ever made before, something deeper and more primal than anything he recognised as his own.
"Where?"
"I don't— I was just told to hold the bay..."
Raaevik grabbed the rifle barrel, wrenched it from the male's grip, and slammed the stock up under his chin.The male’s head snapped back, and he crumpled.
Not dead.Raaevik grunted.Good, he would be alive to talk later.
He stood in the center of the bay, his chest heaving.The shuttle was gone.Emily was gone.He was breathing air that still smelled like the exhaust of the ship that had stolen her.
The hum of the atmospheric shield and the slow drip of blood from his fingertips onto the deck were the only sounds left.
"Report."
The voice was calm.Deep.Absolute.
