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11
WEAPONS
We didn’t dock like normal. Instead, Kaav finally agreed to let me see through the bubble. Some kind of Hive Mind or super high-tech toggle happened, and suddenly I could see right through the bubble. We were close enough to theEve’s Ribnow that pretty much all I could see was the hull of the ship and the airlock door.
Something hissed, and we slowed down, coasting gently and glacially toward the airlock as the door swung open.
Suddenly we were inside, and just seconds later, an alarm sounded, and the outer door began to close.
“Wait a minute,” I asked, “I thought you guys disabled all our technology?”
Kaav held up his palms. “Thuliak must have chosen to do so. The null-field can be turned off if needed.
“So Airlock didn’t even need to be…”
I shook my head. “Thuliak must have wanted to ensure women would see him in person. Unlike Thuliak, I am choosing not to disable any ofEve’s Rib’ssystems. Do you think Hypatia will appreciate that?”
I laughed. “I don’t think she’s letting you out of this Airlock, if that’s what you’re asking me.”
The door closed all the way shut, and then air started to hiss in from the vents. I watched the gauges through the transparent wall of the bubble, and shortly after the gauges indicated it was safe to breathe, the bubble just popped.
I felt only the mildest hint of a pressure difference as the bubble popped. The air in the bubble had been fresher. That was the big difference. I inhaled a full lungful of the much staler air fromEve’s Rib. It only took a few breaths before I was acclimated again to the stale, recycled air.
“You promise me you’re going to stay in here?” I asked, worried Kaav might just disregard everything Chef had said and rush out into the ship, tainting everyone aboard.
Even if tainting was inevitable, I certainly didn’t wantmyKhetar to be the one to taint the entire crew. The last thing I needed was a bunch of woman lusting after my—
Goddess. I was already calling him “mine?” I barely knew him. All I had from him so far was a stolen kiss and a vague promise to never lie to me.
“I have a second body,” Kaav said abruptly. “I was trying to play coy with you and skirt my promise, but I’ve decided that breaks the spirit of my vow.”
“Wait, back up. You have asecondbody? Like a clone backup or something? What does that have to do with your promise?”
“My second body,” he said, grinning with smug satisfaction, “is cocooned on the outside of theEve’s Rib. It can easily evade your primitive means of detection. I was intending on keeping this body in the airlock, but using my second body to keep eyes onWrath.
“Back up,again,” I hissed. “Why is it cocooned? Are you going to turn into a butterfly? Is the body rainbow colored?”
He grinned. “No. It’s silver. The cocoon helps it to remain hidden. It’s not really a cocoon. I just thought that would give you a relatively accurate mental image.”
“It sounds creepy,” I said. “Do you switch between bodies? Do they look identical, save for the colors?”
I had so many questions. This was all too alien for me. It would have been alien enough if Kaav wasjusta man. Or just an alien. Or just had two bodies. Instead, he was all of those things, and none of those things individually made any real sense to me. Combine all three together, and I was lost. Somehow though, him being a man was still the most alien part of the equation.
He shook his head. “Normally I occupy both bodies simultaneously. When I’m not spying, both bodies stay near each other. Sometimes I even start a sentence with one body, then finish with the other.”
Two bodies at the same time? What did that mean when it came to…
My face burned red. I bit my lip to try to hide it, but Kaav was grinning ear-to-ear.
“Yes,” he said, “both bodies will serve you, Weapons.”
He moved forward, and without Kaav so much as touching me, I was pinned against the wall. I wanted him to touch me. I wanted to touch him, but I pressed my back hard against the wall, as if it was important to offer some form of token resistance.
“You haven’t even seen this body properly,” Kaav said. “Shall I remove my armor?”
“I…I…do you need the armor?”
He shrugged. “I certainly can fight better with it on. But I definitely fuck better with it off.”
