Bryce

Sora didn’t stop the teasing, and worse, Thea seemed to be completely immune to it. She just used it as an opportunity to flirt with me, which admittedly, made the whole thing much more tolerable.

I spent much of our travel time in the observation room, working through healing my meridians. Teolix had decorated the room with a lot of pillows and hanging sheer fabric, which made it comfortable and just a little romantic.

Thea snuck in more than a few times, but we always moved to the captain’s quarters before it got too heated. Less because I wanted to respect Sora’s wishes, and more because I didn’t want them spying on us.

Samira finished the changes to the registration halfway through the second day and started working on some other project that was too complicated for me to understand. She claimed it would speed up the ship without us having to power down the shields.

Thea seemed to enjoy cooking, and she reorganized the pantry in such a way that she was the only one who could find anything. I was pretty sure she did it on purpose. Anytime somebody asked where she put something, she would insist on cooking it for them. It didn’t take too long for her to drop the pretense entirely and just banish everybody else from the kitchen.

I even had to break up a fight between her and Sora over who owned the bar just because it was attached to the kitchen.

We tried letting them both have it, but for how amazing a cook Thea was, she was an equally terrible bartender. Any drinks that she served were too strong, and we ended up giving Sora exclusive rights to the bar after Thea brought me a glass of wine that had been half-filled with vodka.

Considering that Thea’s favorite drink order was an entire bottle of whiskey, I probably should have been less surprised.

We shifted back to real-space on the afternoon of the third day and I found myself on the small bridge trying my damnedest to get the port authority to allow us to dock.

“I’m sorry, Captain Virra, but we just don’t have any bays available that can accommodate a ship as elegant as The Fury.”

The overdressed man on the monitor seemed more annoyed than apologetic, and I was getting frustrated with him.

The Fury wasn’t a large ship. By most classification standards it was considered small or light, and anybody with half-functioning scanners could see dozens of empty hangars that could easily accommodate us.

Sora reached over the console that separated the pilot and co-pilot chairs and purposefully pressed the mute button.

“Bryce, we are in a very expensive ship approaching a planet that we both suspect has a lot of criminal activity,” Sora explained. “They want a bribe.”

“Right, of course they do.”

I motioned Sora away as I pressed the now glowing red mute button on the monitor.

“I understand that there are fees associated with landing a ship like ours, and I was simply expecting them to be listed on the invoice. If you would prefer that we pay those upfront, I would be more than happy to send, say, 10,000 credits? To an account of your choice, of course”

The man on the monitor smirked as he leaned forward and began typing something off the screen.

“Captain, this isn’t a corporate world, we don’t line out all of the little expenses. It takes a certain subtlety to do business here, and you would do well to remember that.”

A funds transfer request for 10,000 credits appeared on the screen. I increased the number to 12,000 before sending it back, and the man accepted the bribe with a wide smile.

“I expect that will be more than enough to cover a discrete message to Lyscantra.”

“Ah, you’re a patron of the sport? And you catch on quickly. You might just fit in here after all,” the lieutenant said. “I’ll send your message and I’ll even put you in a hangar down by the arena. The feed has her first bout scheduled to begin in half an hour. If you’re quick, and Lysc is in a good mood, you might still catch the end of her matches.”

“Thank you, lieutenant. If you could let her know a friend from New Eden has arrived, I would appreciate it.”

“Will do, captain, and please, enjoy your stay in Drassun.”

The call ended, and I spun my chair to see Sora chewing on their bottom lip with a look of contemplation.

“I had hoped that flying around in what used to be a dragon’s personal ship would have earned us a little more respect,” I said.

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“It probably would have if we didn’t have to fake the registration. Now it just looks like some nobody came into money and bought an overpriced yacht,” Sora responded. “What are the chances that Teolix was just a big boxing fan?”

“I don’t think anybody would spend this much just because they had a favorite fighter. I also don’t think that it’s going to be boxing.”

I stood from the chair and stretched my arms high into the air. After hearing a number of satisfying pops, I gave Sora a shrug.

“It doesn’t change much, just new information we can’t act on. How long will it take us to dock?” I asked.

“Not long. We should be on the ground in under an hour,” Sora replied. “Do you want me to go with you, or just Thea?”

“Just Thea; I want you here protecting Samira. I don’t trust our new lieutenant friend to be discreet, especially not if we seem like new money.”

“Your implants are still burnt out, and Thea doesn’t have any, right?” Sora asked. “I don’t like the idea of you two being out there with no way of contacting us.”

Sora had a point. Neural implants were amazingly versatile, and allowed you to do anything from reading through media feeds, to downloading training courses directly into your brain.

Right now, what we really needed was a way to contact each other, and functioning neural implants would have been a simple solution.

“Then we’ll have to leave Thea here, and have you come with me,” I said.

“Thea won’t like that.”

“No, she won’t.” I frowned. “But you and I are more than capable of defending ourselves, and I’m not leaving Samira alone.”

“I don’t mean to be rude, but how capable are you actually, Bryce?” Sora looked skeptical and I didn’t blame them. The only thing they had seen me do so far was pass out at a bar and nearly die casting a single spell.

None of that would have inspired much confidence.

“It will probably be another week or two until I’m fully healed, but I can defend myself without causing any more damage,” I said. “As long as I don’t cast any of my more theoretical spells.”

“Theoretical spells?” Sora asked.

The spells that I described as “theoretical” were that way for a reason. I had what could only be described as an obscene amount of mana available to me. There were several spells I had created that I could cast in theory, but I couldn’t safely test.

Some couldn’t be cast in an atmosphere without igniting it, and others were more directly destructive.

I had learned my lesson about careful testing thirty years ago in the Para Vista system. Of course, I wasn’t about to give up an opportunity for revenge against Sora’s teasing, so I just silently turned and walked away.

“Bryce, this feels important. What exactly do you mean by theoretical spells?” Sora asked again.

“I’m going to go find Thea to let her know she’s staying behind.” I left the bridge smiling.

This week had been full of a lot of very unexpected things. I had been poisoned, kidnapped, tortured, nearly sacrificed to a demon, and even had a dragon steal all of my money just so that he could hand me a one-hundred-million-credit luxury yacht.

None of that compared to how surprised I was when I found out Thea actually enjoyed housework.

Because of her strange love for cleaning, and because we had just eaten lunch, I could find Thea in the kitchen washing dishes.

“Hey Thea, we need to talk. Do you have a moment?”

I had to shout from the bar because she had banished me from the kitchen. Incidentally, Samira had also threatened to blow the ship up if I ever touched anything in the maintenance corridors. Times like these, I really didn’t feel like much of a captain.

“Hey princess, you aren’t breaking up with me are you? Here I was, so certain that I secured my place as the best girlfriend ever after what I did last night. Actually, I think those may have been your exact words.”

Those were my exact words, and she absolutely had secured that title. Which made me feel even worse about what I was about to ask, but Sora was right. We needed to maintain contact with the ship, and that meant Thea needed to stay with Samira.

“No, it’s nothing like that, but I need you to stay with the ship while Sora and I meet with Lyscantra.”

Thea stopped drying her hands and stared at me for a long moment. She was clearly unhappy, but eventually sighed in defeat.

“Okay, fine. I’ll stay behind, but only because Bryce the captain ordered it. Now, Bryce, the girlfriend, is going to explain everything,” Thea demanded.

“We got off on the wrong foot with the port authority. Everything is fine now, but it made it obvious that we aren’t locals and that we have money,” I explained. “If that was it, then I could just have Sora stay behind. But the other problem is that neither of us have working implants, so if there was an attack, they wouldn’t be able to contact us.”

“And what happens if you and Softie get attacked? Or if this Lyscantra is another dragon, who is pissed about her delivery being late?”

“If that happens, then Sora can contact Samira and she can tell you,” I explained. “We’re both more than capable of defending ourselves, and in the absolute worst case, Samira can track Sora’s implants, which will lead you straight to us.”

She didn’t seem convinced and was now standing on the other side of the bar, glaring with her arms crossed. The effect lost some of its intimidation because Thea had taken to wearing my old academy jacket around the ship, which was way too big for her. She looked more like a rebellious teen than a dangerous, otherworldly devil.

That ridiculous thought made me smile, which didn’t do all that much to improve Thea’s mood.

“I’m serious, Bryce. I don’t like this.”

“I know you don’t, and if I thought we had another option, then I would go with it. But I don’t think there are any good choices here.”

“Fine, but you’re making this up to me. Right now, in the captain’s quarters.”

There was nothing more that I wanted at that moment than to find out what the mischievous glint of gold in her eyes meant for me, but it had to wait. We were landing soon, and I still had a few things that needed to get done.

“I can’t. At least, not right now, and probably not for a little while. I still need to let Samira know, and then I need to get the cargo ready to be unloaded.”

“Then you’re double making it up to me, and I’ll be expecting my payment in full the moment you’re back on the ship.”

“Deal.”

We kissed over the bar and I had to stop myself from skipping on the way down to engineering.

Life as a captain really was full of compromise and sacrifice.