into a jog as he pursued the intruder. He got close enough to hear uneven breathing, a hint of panic in raspy sound, and lunged to catch the female. She dodged into a set of quarters with a broken door, almost disappearing before he saw where she went, and everything went silent. Nokx took his time, lingering in the corridor as he listened for the female’s movements, and calmed his breathing. She was trapped in there, so no need to get worked up.
He waited until his irritation faded before he stepped up to the broken door. The quarters had been used as a brig for the longest while until Gemma, Wyzak’s mate, tore it apart with her cyborg arm. The engineers hadn’t gotten around to fixing it, though they were supposed to have gotten the necessary supplies on the spaceport. Nokx folded his arms over his chest and blocked the full doorway to the room. “Come out.”
Silence was the only response.
He rolled his eyes and tried again in Earther, in case she didn’t have a translator implant like the other females. “I know you’re in here. Don’t make me drag you out.”
Something rustled in the darkness near the wardrobe against the wall, but no Earther appeared.
Nokx stepped through the doorway, shoving the crumpled metal door out of his way, and flicked on the lights. “All right. You made your choice.”
A squeak answered, then a blonde head popped out of the wardrobe. “Okay, okay.”
He folded his arms over his chest and studied her as the Earther extracted herself from the wardrobe. She was not as tall as the other Earthers on the ship, and slight of build. She looked younger as well, not that he would have said anything of the sort to Gemma or Violet. Faros learned the hard way that Earther females did not appreciate speculation about their age relative to other females. And they especially did not appreciate speculation about their mass relative to anything else in existence.
The memory of that day still made Nokx want to grin.
The Earther in front of him wore plain gray clothes, rather rumpled and unimpressive, and clearly wasn’t part of any crew or profession that required a uniform. Her wide green eyes found him and widened still more with some emotion he recognized as panic.
Nokx didn’t let any sympathy leak into his voice. “Who are you and why are you on this ship?”
The Earther blinked a few times, then gestured at something behind him. “I’m EJ. I was invited onboard.”
“Invited onboard,” he said, carefully bland. No reason to get angry and rage at her. They both knew she hadn’t been, but he’d learned to let people spin out their lies until it was enough to trap them. “Who invited you?”
Her eyes darted around, searching for clues in the room around them, and she cleared her throat. “Uh... Fryx.”
“Fryx.” It was a relatively common Xaravian name, so she at least knew enough to try a lie that could have worked. Although it wouldn’t have worked for long, because if there had been a Fryx on board, Nokx could have summoned him and dealt with the deception. Nokx didn’t go on and instead let the silence stretch, since she fidgeted and shifted her feet like a nervous marmox. He waited. At least her nervousness was entertaining.
The Earther nearly hopped on one foot. “Yes. Fryx. And he won’t appreciate you chasing me about and frightening me. He said I could stay in these quarters until we reached the next port.”
He snorted and shook his head. “Come on. Stop lying.”
“It’s not a lie,” she said. Her cheeks slowly flushed pink. He’d learned that meant strong emotions, so the Earther was angry or embarrassed or sad. Or possibly aroused, although that seemed unlikely. The Earther, who’d called herself “Eeejay” though it didn’t sound like any Earther names he’d heard, clenched her dainty fists and tried to give him a hard look. “And who are you, to be questioning me like this?”
He laughed, rocking back on his heels, at the sheer audacity of the little Earther. She was certainly fierce for something so small and vulnerable, without scales or armor to protect her when she infuriated the world around her. Which she undoubtedly did on the regular.
Eeejay just looked angrier. “Well? Why are you laughing?”
“Because you’re funny,” he said. He still chuckled, though he jerked his thumb at the corridor behind him. “Let’s go.”
Her gaze darted around once more, and she cleared her throat as she retreated back