Wonderlands by Una McCormack

Author:Una McCormack
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pocket Books/Star Trek
Published: 2021-05-18T00:00:00+00:00

Book’s ship

The Luxiar system

“You know,” Burnham said, as they sat together on Book’s ship, “it strikes me that you could just as easily do this job by yourself.”

“I suppose I could,” he said. “But you came in handy last time.”

“I thought I got in the way last time.”

“That too. But I thought you might like to see another trance worm.”

That was certainly true. But more than that—she had realized, on her way over to meet him, stopping to drop off supplies to a few worlds en route, doing a few errands for Sahil—she was looking forward to seeing Book. She had missed him. Not that she would say this to him in a million years. She said the next best thing. “I’d love to see another one.”

That made him smile. Which made her… She wondered what the name for this feeling was. She decided that it was happiness. Seeing him smile that way made her happy. She wondered what this meant. She decided not to analyze it too closely. Perhaps it was possible to analyze things too much. Perhaps she should trust her instincts a little more.

At Luxiar, they received news from his contacts that the “merchandise” was safely in their hands, and ready to be transported to his ship. “Good news,” he said. “No need for heroics this time.” He caught her look. (Was it her look? Sometimes she thought he caught her mood.) “What?” he said. “Were you looking forward to getting into another scrape?”

“It keeps the reflexes sharp.”

“I promise I’ll rustle up a scrape for us soon. Or perhaps you could work on that?”

“Perhaps I will,” she said.

At last, the trance worm—he’d called her Lily—was on board. When they were back in space again, she went down to the hold with him to take a look. She loved seeing him with these creatures. She loved to see him so relaxed. “Can’t wait to get to Sanctuary,” he said. “Can’t wait to talk to her properly.”

They were standing close to each other. There wasn’t much room in the hold. Book cleared his throat.

“Are you okay?” she said.

“Yeah,” he said. “Did you… Did you know that your hair is longer than it used to be?”

“I guess I did,” she said. “Given that it’s my hair. Why? Is that a problem?”

“No.”

“Good.”

“I like it,” he said. “Is it okay for me to say that?”

“Yes,” she said. “It’s okay for you to say that.”

They stood looking at each other. Burnham thought, Is he about to kiss me? Before she could decide how she felt about that, an alarm started to sound. She looked deep into his eyes and said, “Alarm.”

“Yes,” he said. “It is.” They blinked at each other. Then Book said, “That’s a fucking alarm!”

They sprinted back to the main cabin, where Grudge was yelling at them, Where the hell have you two been?

Two black ships, with white markings, heading toward them and firing on them. Book’s ship lurched violently. The alarms became more strident.

“Bad news,” muttered Book, grabbing for the controls and trying with limited success to steady them.

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