Beauty and the Fleet (Intergalactic Fairy Tales Book 2) by Robert McKay Read Free Book Online Page A

eyes never leaving Gadget. Beatrix wasn't sure how she'd missed it, but they'd obviously developed something deeper than friendship in the last couple of weeks.
    Torch and Hands examined Gadget for a couple of minutes and then helped him to his feet. "Not broken," said Hands.
    "Just very badly bruised," added Torch. "He's going to be fine."
    "And now we'll never hear the end of how he was right about the boxes," said Beatrix with a groan.
    "You're damn right," retorted Gadget without much venom. If he hadn't been in so much pain, Beatrix was sure he would have been smiling.
    They spent the rest of the day sitting around the pile of their flight suits like they had before the escape attempt, but no longer in silence. They talked and joked about the times they'd had back on Nedra and Beatrix remembered what it was like to laugh again. Gadget didn't even complain about his hip. One by one they drifted off to sleep, smiles still on their faces.
    Beatrix, however, was awake on her grey sleeping pallet, staring up into the dim lighting that always hovered at about the level of dusk. It was the middle of the "night", but she couldn't sleep. When she heard the dull thump of another supply drop hit the ground on the other side of the bay, she decided she might as well go open the world's most boring present. It was better than being left alone with her thoughts. Or worse, her nightmares. Most nights she only managed a couple hours of sleep. She couldn't push her fears aside. She knew there would be a day when she would come face to face with their captors and find out exactly why they were being held. In her nightmares she was subjected to endless types of torture. They always ended the same way though. She was stabbed through the back with a long knife and could feel it push out through her chest. Most of the time she woke up with a shriek and the others would startle awake. They'd mostly grown used to it by now. Pickle would take her hand, squeeze it, and go back to sleep.
    So she was glad for the distraction of the small grey box. It was smaller than usual. Not much larger than a loaf of bread. Beatrix bent down and scooped up the small package, curiosity winning out over wariness. She popped open the metal clasp that held it shut. Inside, wrapped in a plain grey cloth, was something completely unexpected and somehow foreign in this environment. It was a book. Not just any book. It was a Nedran book by her favorite author, Jacque Carroway. It wasn't her favorite of his novels, but she'd still read it enough times that the binding had begun to crack. Instinctively, she caressed the spine and found it heavily worn. When her fingers brushed the cover and found a sticky spot from where the price tag had been peeled away, she jerked back her hand as if she'd been bitten. Her copy had come from a second-hand store and she never could get off the sticky goo from the sticker on the cover. Tentatively, she flipped the book open to the cover page and gasped. It was hard to make out in the dim light, but there was a handwritten note. It was so familiar to her that she didn't even need to read it, though she did, over and over again. It read: To Beatrix, a true fan and friend, Jacque Carroway.
    This wasn't just any copy of A Dark Beauty . It was her copy of A Dark Beauty . From her house. She looked up toward the ceiling, her eyes wide, and dropped the book on the floor. If she just turned around and walked back to bed, she was certain she would wake up and it wouldn't be there any more. Just another twisted nightmare to avoid thinking about while she was awake.
    That didn't happen. Slowly her gaze returned to the floor, and the book was still there, resolutely denying its imaginary status. It didn't make any sense at all. The book being there felt like a violation. She could imagine eyes peering down at her from the dark reaches of the ceiling and it made her skin crawl. How could they have a book that had belonged to her back on Nedra? This