Caleb shoved back from the table and stood to retreat to the kitchen. “No. Find another plan.”“There is no other plan. This isn’t even a plan, merely a nugget of an idea for the start of a plan that’s certain to fail and end in your deaths.
Narrow, angular features, pouty lips and hatred-filled pale, washed-out blue irises glared back at him.Caleb flashed the young man a malevolent smirk and readied his blade. “Jude Winslow, I presume.
What emerged from the portal was not the feared armada. Instead, it was a single ship. A familiar ship. I felt a quickening in my atoms.Clever, dangerous girl. I have been expecting you.
I’ll do whatever I can to help guarantee this plan succeeds, and I’ll try to make sure I’m in the right place at the right time.” “The right place and time for what?”“If I knew that, ma’am, I probably wouldn’t need to be there.
God, she was beautiful. Hair a tangled mess, clothes torn, lips pale and swollen, skin streaked in dirt. And she was so damn beautiful and flawed and perfect.
He steadied himself by resting one palm on her thigh and the other on the armrest, and rose to his knees. “I’ll be damned.”“Possibly. But not today, I think.
If humanity is annihilated because we were too busy squabbling with one another to manage a proper stand, we probably deserve the annihilation.
His whisper continued to stream a silent cacophony of warnings, kill and damage reports and pleas for assistance.He allowed himself two seconds to watch it and came away with the sense they were losing. Not lost and not soon, but losing.
You’re covered in blood again.”“I really am.” “Why are you always covered in blood when I wake up after being unconscious?” “Usually for the same reason you were unconscious, I think.
She burst into her hotel room pulling her blouse over her head with one hand while she yanked her shoes off with the other. No way was she going to face an alien invasion in heels and silk.
Good luck with the aliens, and if we survive this feel free to look me up on your next vacation.”“Good luck with the aliens? You are such a prick.
You’re insane.”“It’ll work.”“Which does not alter the fact that you are insane.
As soon as he had departed she directed her attention to the others.“I need a shielded containment box, radiation gloves and a micro welding torch. And a crescent wrench.
If her daughter’s ship had been disintegrated in space there would never be evidence of it, never an answer to what had happened to her.If she stopped to ponder the implications she might break. And Admiral Miriam Solovy did not break.
Blood drummed in her ears and adrenaline coursed through her veins, driving her to move. To act. Her hands trembled against his chest.Time vanished out from beneath her feet, one accelerating second at a time.
They flew high above savanna grassland. The sky was the deep cornflower blue of a sunny late afternoon on Earth…exactly the color of a sunny late afternoon on Earth.Only there was no sun. Whatever was lighting this planet, it wasn’t a star.
Her weight settled on her back foot as she crossed her arms over her chest and stared at him, now legitimately baffled.“How delusional are you, aliens in your head notwithstanding?
Do you love me?” His voice rang flat in his own ears, deadened and weighted with the recognition there was only one chance, and a fool’s chance at that
Individuals reacted in any number of ways to extreme stress and, relatedly, to impending death.A non-negligible percentage of people reacted in a manner which could be summed up by, ‘Screw it, I’m going out in style!
She gazed at the bay of wrecked shuttles in dismay. The last of her adrenaline seeped away at the sight of the widespread destruction.It occurred to her then, for perhaps the first time in this long nightmare, that she was going to die.
Guilt ripped into her like a rusty, serrated knife. It took up residence in her soul, settling in and getting comfortable so it could saw away ragged pieces of flesh and leave her to bleed.
Deep in the recesses of her mind, she knew they were probably watching. They watched everything, after all.Let them watch. Let them see what it meant to be human. To live.Let them see what it meant to love, and be loved in return.
Her pulse raced, pounding in her ears above the howling wind. A wave of dizziness crashed over her with the rapid flood of adrenaline. She gasped in a breath. “Don’t let go.
We don’t get to choose what happens to us—but we always get to choose how we react to it.
I wouldn’t be your best and most marvelous friend in the galaxy if I didn’t point out there might be a few negative consequences from all…” she gazed upward and twirled her hand in the air “…this.
That excuse only works until you discover the person is merely an individual like any other.
Alexis, please mind your mouth. Cursing in Russian is still cursing.
In sum, every pore of his being oozed one thing…okay, FINE. Every pore oozed two things. The first was irrelevant. The second was dangerous.
No…you can ask for a beautiful, witty, intelligent yet minxy woman in your arms every night, a mansion on a hill—or better yet in the sky—and the best bodyguards to protect you when someone does inevitably try to kill you. For starters.
They sit in their soundproof rooms and issue tone-deaf edicts and call themselves controlling the world. And one day they ask you to die for them.
He swallowed hard, annoyed at the sudden dryness in his throat. No reason to become all emotional about it now. He had already sold his soul for a chance at vengeance, and there was no getting it back.
People feared what they did not understand, and they without a doubt did not understand her. Those who believed they did least of all. She was something new.
We’ll go along with it for now. Valkyrie, keep close watch and be ready to swoop to the rescue.”‘Hopefully swooping will not be required, nor rescue. But I am ready to do both.’He squeezed her hand. “Alex?”“I’m ready, too.
The alien reached out her hands to hold Alex’s tightly. “Please. Some of what I want to express, it may be difficult to locate the right words.”“Of course.”Pure alabaster eyes stared back at her. “Child, there is a hole in your mind.
I frankly expected a far more negative reaction from you on discovering…” she glanced around the lab “…the situation. Why are you helping?”“I’m not helping—I’m merely not hindering in as strenuous a fashion as I am able.
It was a subversive notion, the idea that she was free. Free to choose where to go and what to do with her time.
Three men sat around a table. All were muscled and similarly greasy and easily identifiable as scum. As he breached the entrance all three were moving, drawing their own guns in surprise.Only one got off a shot.
Noah gave an exaggerated eye roll. “Just out of curiosity, is this the stupidest thing you’ve ever done?”“It wouldn’t be fair to rank them.” Caleb gunned the engine.
Caleb!” The sharp, forceful tone demanded he halt. He found he had complied, but did not turn around. His voice sounded low and hoarse, likely because he couldn’t breathe. “Alex, I can’t.
Alone for a few precious seconds, he drew in a deep breath. He stood on a ruined street in a ruined city. Destruction stretched for kilometers in every direction, all caused by a single man for whom vengeance had devolved into madness.
He did not have time to wallow, to give a moment’s thought to what may have happened to her or whether she was alive.Turn into the punch, grab hold of the gun, leap into the arena. Attack.He had to move. Now.
After all,’I’ve been thinking’ meant she had previously identified the parameters and analyzed all the branching considerations.