How I Helped My Smokin' Hot Alien Girlfriend Conquer the Empire

103: Tempting Fate


The kiss was going pretty well, but suddenly there was a spike of worry through the link and Varis was pushing me back. I let her push me back, but I also wondered what in the sequel trilogy was going on.

I stared at Varis for a long moment. Long enough that she blushed, her cheeks turning a deeper shade of blue, and looked away. I also could see a faint sparkling all over her body. Something I now knew to mean she was feeling a strong emotion.

Mostly because I could feel that strong emotion coming through the link at all times. And right now she seemed embarrassed more than anything.

"Is something wrong?" I asked, moving a hand up to her chin and pulling her back so she was facing me.

She surprised me.

"I forget myself with you," she said. "It's not proper to show affection like that in front of the troops."

I looked around at all the gathered troops, and then I looked back to Varis.

"Why would it be improper for me to show how much I love you in front of all the troops?"

Her mouth opened at that, and then it snapped shut.

"It's considered unseemly."

"Why is it considered unseemly?" I asked.

I was surprised at this little bit of livisk culture I'd never been privy to. I really needed to get a cultural primer from someone other than Arvie. He seemed to delight in all the cultural faux pas I was making on the regular.

"Well, mostly because the empress isn't a fan of public displays of affection, and..."

She let out a surprised yelp as I grabbed her by the arm and pulled her in. I dropped my own shielding, and the shield on her head dropped again as I pulled her in for yet another kiss. I didn't care if all the troops were watching. I would also have to thank Arvie later for giving me an assist and dropping her shielding at the opportune moment.

When I pulled away she was blushing again. I also couldn't see a faint shimmer around either one of us, and yet I was breathing this stuff in and I didn't feel particularly bad. The air didn't feel particularly hot.

I knew I was going to regret breathing in all this irradiated material later when I was bored of my gourd sitting in a rad chamber trying to get all the free radicals hitting my body from the inside to stop doing that. But again, it was totally worth it.

Also? It was time to disabuse my noble alien general girlfriend of a few notions that might fly in livisk culture, but I didn't give a flying fuck.

"If the empress doesn't like something then I'm totally going to do it."

"Bill," she said, still blushing. Only I sensed something else in there. She was pleased at what I'd just done.

"If the empress thinks something is wrong then that's the surest indication I've ever gotten that it's the absolute right thing to do," I said, grinning and winking at her.

"You're terrible, Bill."

"Maybe so, but I don't care if the whole world, if the whole spiral arm, if the whole galaxy sees how much I love you."

I still held her close. The power armor was in between us, which I could've done without, but she was right there. I could see the way her face sparkled. I could see the radiant look in her eyes.

"I love you. I could sense how scared you were, how determined you were to come and get me, and that kept me going."

She surprised me by smacking me on the chest. Hard enough that it might've been an off switch if I was a livisk with their two hearts and their tendency to go unconscious if somebody smacked them a little too hard right over the chest area.

But I wasn't livisk, and I was wearing power armor, and we had this whole battle pair thing going on as well. The practical upshot being she got my attention, but it's not like it did any sort of damage.

"Was there a reason for hitting me?"

"You were supposed to stay safe," she said.

"Well, in all fairness, the empress wasn't supposed to attack us."

"She could've attacked anywhere," Varis said.

"Yeah, it was kind of unfortunate that she decided to attack right where I was. Kind of odd that she decided to attack right where I was too."

Varis frowned. "What are you saying?"

"I'm saying I was in the shit in here. Arvie was helping me trying to find livisk life signs, and it was next to impossible because of all the interference from the radiation and the fire storms raging around us."

I looked up above. There were more craft flying through the area now, and it looked like most of them belonged to Varis. Not the empress. There were still flashes of blue and green and purple here and there from plasma cannons going off and fighter shielding activating as those plasma cannons hit their target, but all that glowing was off in the distance.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

For the most part it seemed like things were calming down a little.

I even saw a craft move in and start to spray something that had the fires going down just a little. It was a totally localized thing, but it was better than nothing.

"There's no way that anybody could've picked out my life signs in this mess," I said. "Which means there's probably somebody out there working for the empress, and they knew exactly where I was going to be so they could tattle to the empress and she could send her prince consort asshole to try and take me out."

Varis stared at me. It was a very serious look. She totally ignored all the other troops who were moving all around us, but I had the link. So I sighed and rolled my eyes.

"Okay, why don't you tell me why what I just said is so ridiculous that you're trying so hard not to laugh."

She finally did laugh, shaking her head and putting a hand against my armored shoulder.

"Because you're being utterly ridiculous," she said. "Do you have any idea how many people are living in my tower at any given moment? How many people are in my military? How many people are in contact with other people who are in contact with people who are more sympathetic to the empress?"

"You'll have to forgive me," I said. "I'm kind of used to having fleet engagements where we're slugging it out with the bad guys and if somebody tells on us, it's a serious deal."

"I mean, it's a serious deal here," she said with a shrug. "But we also live in Imperial Seat. This is the seat of the empress's power in the Livisk Ascendancy. I don't know why you're surprised that there are people out there willing to tell her your location when we're in the city she controls with an iron fist."

"I guess I never really thought about it like that," I said, frowning.

I knew there were people who were tracking my movements at all times. The livisk equivalent of social media or whatever it was they were posting all the pictures and videos they were constantly taking of yours truly when I was out with Varis. Was this because of that?

I'd never put two and two together and thought of those people using that to try and trap me. I wasn't a ground pounder. I wasn't used to having boots on the ground and having to deal with a local insurgency because there were people who had mixed loyalties to the empress.

"Son of a bitch," I said, laughing and shaking my head. "I guess I'm going to have to get used to the idea of people always watching me."

"You're a human with the General Consort insignia on your shoulder," she said, tapping at my own shoulder. I looked down to my armor and blinked. I hadn't even realized the General Consort symbol was there.

"Damn," I muttered. "There really is no getting away from that, is there?"

"Not really," she said, putting both of her hands on my shoulders. "At least not while you're with me."

"Then I guess there's going to be no getting away from it for the rest of my life," I said. "Though I don't know how much longer the rest of my life is going to last, considering how much the empress has been trying to kill me lately."

"Yes, that is a problem," Varis said, frowning.

I could sense the worry and the guilt coming through the link. Maybe she thought it was her fault. Maybe it was partially her fault for bringing me here. But considering the alternative was madness for both of us, I couldn't exactly fault her. So I figured I'd do something to distract her.

"Have I introduced you to Sera?"

She looked up at me, clearly confused.

"Sera?" she asked.

"The little girl I rescued from one of the bomb shelters in the mess up above. I actually only had a chance to get to the one bomb shelter on my own."

"What happened?" Varis asked.

"Well, Sera kind of fell out of the shelter. We were trying to do a rescue and then a fighter from the empress came in and started firing on the rescue ship and she fell while we were loading her onto a ramp."

"And you rescued her? How?" Varis said.

"Well, I..."

"He jumped after her."

I jumped, and then I turned to see a familiar face stepping out of a troop transport. Selii was right there. She came over to me and held a hand out. I could tell when somebody was telling me to bring it in, and so I took her hand and locked arms with her.

"Bill, you son of a bitch," Selii said.

"Selii, you... Well, I don't actually know anything about your parentage, so I guess I can't say anything about it."

Selii shook her head and chuckled. "You crazy bastard."

"What is she talking about, Bill?" Varis asked, her eyes narrowing as suspicion flowed through the link.

"It really was a rather precipitous action," Arvie said from his mech.

"It wasn't precipitous," I said. "I just did what needed to be done. I'm sure any of you would've done the same thing."

"Bill…" Varis said.

"The rescue ship gets hit by a blast from an imperial fighter, okay?" Selii said. "And the little girl falls and I figure that's all she wrote. She's going to fall to her death and there's nothing we can do about it, right?"

"Right," Varis said, still looking only at me as Selii went through the story.

"Then this crazy son of a bitch does a swan dive right off the top of the bomb shelter. Like we're talking he just jumps after the girl and goes for it."

"You just jumped after the girl and went for it," Varis said, her expression unreadable.

I figured she was trying to maintain appearances for the troops, but again, I also got the overwhelming sense she was pleased with what I'd done.

She sighed and shook her head, and at that moment, Arvie brought the mech down to its knees and the cockpit opened up. There was still a shield that covered the cockpit, but Sera was in there smiling and waving at her.

"Hello, General," she said. "Your pet human saved me."

Varis's sense of satisfaction quickly turned to one of amusement as she looked at me and then back at Sera.

"I suppose I can see why you would want to throw yourself after her. She's spirited."

"Yeah, well, all in a day's work," I said. "I imagine anybody would've done the same."

"I don't think so," Varis said. "We focus on securing the military objective first and then worry about rescuing people."

"No reason why you can't do both," I said, looking at the death and destruction all around us that I'd created with Arvie. Well, mostly Arvie. "No reason at all."

"There are plenty of good reasons," Varis said.

"It was no big deal," I said, waving a dismissive hand. "I survived the worst the empress could throw at me, right?"

I probably should've learned to keep my big mouth shut. Never tempt fate. It was one of those things you learned in the academy.

"Bill, you idiot," Varis hissed.

Because no sooner had I tempted that fate than there was a loud blast, and suddenly a glow surrounded all of us. I blinked and looked up and saw the giant head of a livisk woman hovering in front of us, staring down.

All the troops who'd put their hands behind their backs to allow themselves to be taken captive let out dismayed cries and fell to their knees. Some of Varis's people did that as well, but not as many as I would've thought.

Varis merely put her hands on her hips and glared at me for a moment before turning her attention to that giant glowing head that I totally recognized.

Primary target number one for anyone in the Terran Navy or the Combined Corporate Fleets.

"Well then," Varis said. "It looks like you and your big mouth just invited the universe to send us a visit from my sister-by-marriage."

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