He’s dangerous.

He’s violent.

Quite possibly, he’s as emotionally unstable as I’ve become since my imprisonment.

Still, I want to kiss him. I like what he just said… and I think I’m starting to believe him. That he wants the Roth to change.

That by taking over, Earth will be safer. The universe will be safer.

I want the picture he’s painted of the future to be real. So much so that I’m willing to bend. A little.

I only hope I’m not as breakable as he seems to think I am.

“Your mother must have been very special. I’m so sorry you had to go through that.” It’s inadequate, but he dips his chin and closes his eyes as though I’ve said something really meaningful.

Have I been this awful to him? That the merest blasé statement gets that kind of response?

“Nydo…” I say quietly, my fingers still around his thick wrist. “I haven’t been very kind to you. I haven’t been… kind in a long time.”

I scrunch my nose up, because I suck at apologies.

“I don’t need you to be kind,” he says quietly.

He stares at me with his huge, dark eyes, mere embers of orange flickering in their depths. It’s like the entire rowdy hall disappears, and there’s only me and him, sitting together, having this conversation.

“I need you to be the queen you are,” he continues. His fingers tighten on my thigh, causing my breath to catch. “I need you to be strong enough to bear what is yet to come. I need you to want me as much as I want you. Give me all your fire, Leigh, because I will take it, I will take it, and gods help me, I will beg for more.”

My eyes are wide, waiting for him to close with a snide comment or petty remark about what I can call him in the bedroom. But he says nothing else, just watches me carefully, calmly, like his words haven’t just turned all my assumptions on their head.

Roghat chooses this moment to stand up, the wound on his throat already knitting back together, though blood still stains his shirt.

“A chroida to our king and queen!” he shouts, raising his glass.

“A what?” I ask.

“A chroida.” Nydo doesn’t let go of me, his hands comfortably warm over the dress. “You’ll see.”

“To the male who would bring the Overlord to his knees!” Roghat shouts, and the whole room repeats it, raising their glasses.

“Oh. A toast,” I say, cottoning on. It’s so weird when the translator doesn’t work.

“To the female who would cut off his head!” Lyko shouts, joining in.

“To the king and queen,” Ayro finishes.

“To the king and queen,” the filled room choruses, then cheers break out as everyone drains their glass.

“Are they toasting with water?” I ask, perplexed.

“What else would we chroida with?” Nydo seems equally confused.

“Alcohol?” I laugh, raising my eyebrows.

“A Roth must always be prepared for battle.”

“Oh, is that right? Is it common for Roth to fight after a party?”

“Before, during, after… alcohol would only make things worse.” He’s grinning down at me, and the way his smile transforms his whole face will never cease to amaze me.

Maybe it’s because of the lack of alcohol being served, but when the first shot punches through the ceiling, the Roth are the first to react.

All hell breaks loose.

The plas pulse triggers an immediate reaction from me, though I’m much slower than Nydo. I tug the pieces of the plas sniper rifle from where I’ve hidden them on my body, fitting the sections together as Nydo hauls the heavy metal throne over the two of us.

“Do you often keep plas energy canisters in your cleavage?” he asks.

“Never can be too careful. A human must always be prepared for battle.” It amazes me, actually, that I’m able to form words at all, much less try for a joke. Being pinned down as plas pulses ricochet all around us takes me right back to when the Roth invaded our ship, slaughtered all the men in our crew, and took all of us, all the women, prisoner.

But I guess I’m all out of fear, because all I feel… all I feel is pure anger.

My throat still twinges where Roghat gripped me, and I can’t help that a little part of me hopes he’s been taken out in the crossfire.

“Think we’ll get lucky and Roghat will be dead?” I ask, twisting the segments of the rifle together.

Nydo barks a laugh, turning towards me with surprise. “I would have killed him for you.”

“Yeah, but this is so much more karmic, you know? No blood on my hands, other than the blood that’s already on them, right?” I hold up one of my hands, which, indeed, has a bit of dried Roth blood coating it. Gross.

Nydo blinks at me. “I would have cleaned you if I had known. I should have known. I will take better care of you,” he says, barely audible over the sound of the battle raging outside our little bubble.

“I’m cool with that, considering I’ve been concussed and strangled in short order. But let’s get out of here alive first, yeah?”

“Make for the doors!” Roghat thunders, and a mechanical grinding sounds, the floor shaking under my knees and palms. “Prepare the ships for battle. We ride to glory this night!”

“Don’t tell me the Roth definition of glory is dying in a firefight,” I grit out, slamming the last piece of the rifle into place.

“I won’t then,” Nydo says smoothly.

“Fuck,” I say in a strangled voice. “Right. Okay.”

“Look at me,” Nydo says. His eyes are bright orange, and heat shimmers all around him. “You will not die this night. We will make it out.”

I nod once. I have no other choice but to believe him. Doubting myself in this instant is a recipe for disaster.

“For the king and his queen!” a new voice shouts into the chaos.

“Doors are opening under the floor,” Billie yells, somewhere nearby. “Get in there now, Leigh.”

“On three, I’m going to flip the throne. Run for it. I will cover you,” Nydo barks the orders.

For a moment, I almost ask him if he needs my gun. Then I swallow the idiotic question, because no. He doesn’t need a gun. He’s a fucking weapon of mass destruction all on his own.

“Three,” Nydo says, and the metal throne heaves as he shoves it off of us.

I blink.

The hall is destroyed. Where the table once stretched, there’s a long crevasse, narrow enough to allow the defending Roth to slip through. Plas pulses sear through the air, and Piper’s blonde hair disappears, a pink energy pulse sizzling where her head was seconds ago.

“Go, Leigh,” Nydo yells, his hand propelling me forward. “I have you!”

Shit. I need to move.

I run for the opening, my rifle clutched in both hands.

Through a new hole blasted in the ceiling, a Roth destroyer floats overhead, the plas turret whirring as the gunners reload the cartridges.

All my Federation training clicks into place in my brain, and time turns soggy and thick.

There’s a small blue light blinking on the very tip of the turret.

The auto-aim guide.

“That’s where you hit,” my trainer’s voice barks through my memory, so familiar, so real that it’s almost like she’s standing right at my side. “You take out their ability to aim, and they can’t fire the turret. The auto-aim is the only unshielded bit on the Roth destroyers, because they couldn’t figure out how to protect and utilize it at the same time. Taking it out is the only thing that will give you a fighting chance at survival, snipers.”

Of course, we knew that once the ships were on the ground, we were fucked, but it was better than watching the destroyers tear through city after city.

I skid to a stop, just shy of the hatch.

The rifle butts up against my shoulder and I flatten myself to the debris-littered floor. Flames dance around my periphery, and the turret on the destroyer begins to glow as the plas cartridges heat.

I have mere seconds to get this shot.

I inhale deeply. My heartbeat slows.

I have one chance.