Story Excerpt
Tank's Tweak

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Tank fought to shake the tight grip the wormhole had on the Lady Blue. His mate was sitting right next to him and there wasn’t a fucking thing he could do to protect him. If the wormhole collapsed, they were all dead.

“Just stay close to me, Z.”

His mate looked up at him, hopelessness shadowing his beautiful diamond-blue eyes. Tank reached a hand out and cupped Zackary's face. “If we don’t make it out of this alive. I’m very proud to call you my mate.”

“Ah, geez. Don’t sound so gloomy. We’ll make it out,” Zackary said with fear marring his musical voice. “We have to. You haven’t met my mom yet or even tried her fruitcake. You can't die without tasting her fruitcake. That would just be wrong.”

Tank smiled down at his mate. Although his partner in crime hadn’t allowed Tank to claim him yet, Tank would never regret the time they had together. Zachary was special and made each day worth living. It would be a shame if they died and he didn’t get to taste a piece of heaven.

“I love you, Zackary.”

“Yeah, me too.” Tears sparkled in Zackary's beautiful eyes.

Tank moved his hands away from the steering controls of the Lady Blue and reached for Zachary, pulling his mate close. There wasn’t much they could do now but wait and see what was going to happen. If they made it through alive, then they would take it from there. Until then, Tank wanted Zackary by his side, close enough to breath his mate’s scent in as they faced this together.

Tank held Zackary close as the Lady Blue was pulled into the wormhole. The ship rocked and shuddered until Tank wondered if they were going to be ripped apart. It felt like the air was starting to be sucked out of the room when suddenly everything stopped as they were tossed out the other end of the wormhole.

“We made it,” Tank exhaled as he hugged his mate tightly before letting him go and quickly reaching for the controls once again. Fuck if the crew of the Lady Blue didn’t live off of miracles lately. Tank was beginning to wonder if they were cursed from the accumulation of events lately.

“Yeah,” Remy said from behind him, “but where the fuck are we?”

"I'd like to be able to tell you, Remy," Crank, the explosives expert, said from the navigational console, "but this quadrant isn't on any star map we have in our data base. I haven't got a fucking clue."

"Well, there is good news," Tank said as he leaned over and looked down at his screen, his eyes scanning the readout once more. "Whoever was chasing us didn't make it through the wormhole with us. There's no sign of them."

"And that’s good news?" Blade snapped.

Tank rolled his eyes. Sometimes the coyote shifter had little to no patience. He calmed down a lot though since mating the Orillian, Adwaka. "It's better than being chased through a system we know nothing about."

"I'm still waiting for the good news," Blade snorted.

"We’re all alive," Zachary interjected with a bit of an attitude, "and that just might be better than my mom's fruitcake."

Tank chuckled at his mate and gave him a little squeeze. Zachary and his fruitcake. He'd never understand the strange connection his mate had with his mom's fruitcake, but if it made Zachary this happy, he'd try and get some, even if it was just to hide some away and bring it out as a surprise on special occasions.

Maybe he could get the recipe.

"Try and plot us a course somewhere other than here," Remy ordered. "Maybe if we move around a bit we'll come across something we recognize or at least an outpost of some sort. I don't know how long we can float around in space before we need to stop for supplies."

"Zachary," Tank said as he set his mate on his feet, "see if you can get the cloaking device working again. We might need it."

"Will do." Zachary hopped over to his console and pulled out his new vid-pad. His mate had  thrown such a fit back on Hyberian that Tank had dug up a new one and given it to him as a present.

Tank watched Zachary's fingers move across the console for several moments, awed by how fast his little mate moved, until he heard Remy clear his voice behind him. He chuckled and looked back down at his own console and tried to plot them a course to… somewhere.

“I have a solar system mapped out, but the computer isn’t recognizing the layout. There is a life-sustaining planet close by. Do you want me to set the coordinates for it?” Tank asked as he looked over his shoulder at his commander.

“It beats sitting here doing nothing.” Remy exhaled as he ran his hands over his head. “Go for it.”

“To strange ass places we shall go,” Tank said as his fingers did the walking across the console. He didn’t like taking his mate into the unknown. Tank’s number one priority was keeping Zachary safe, and that included keeping Zackary safe from Zackary at times.

“I have good news and I have bad news,” Zackary huffed from beside Tank. “Which do you want first?”

“Give us the good news,” Remy interjected.

“Well, the good news is, we’re lost.”

Tank cocked his head at his unorthodox mate as Zackary’s tongue hung out the side or his mouth. Tank groaned as the little pink appendage slide across very kissable lips. What he wouldn’t give to see said tongue sliding across one of his appendages.

“Okay, Z. We already knew that,” Remy growled. “Now tell us something we don’t know.”

“My cousin, Livewire, is going to have to fix the cloaking device. It’s a hardware problem, not software. So sorry,” Zackary chimed as he went back to whatever the hell he was doing. Tank couldn’t figure out half the time what Zackary did at the helm. He was clueless, but wouldn’t tell his mate this.

“I’ll go inform our resident mechanic that he has a job to do,” Remy said as he stood and left the bridge.

“Hey, I’m just a guy that delivered the bad news," Zachary said quickly as he watched Remy leave the bridge. "Make sure he doesn’t shoot me out of an airlock.”

Tank chuckled as he sat back. “I’ll make sure your sexy little ass doesn’t leave my side.”

“Speaking of sexy little asses, have you seen my collection of Paktillian collectable vid-cards?”

Tank once again was confused as hell by his mate. Zackary never made sense half the time and the other half... he tortured the crap out of Tank just by sitting next to him. His mate was so far out of reach that Tank would have to plot a course just to hold his hand.

He couldn’t understand Zackary’s reluctance to mate but didn’t want to upset his little Paktillian by asking. Tank was catching a serious case of the blue balls as he sat next to the man. If he didn't get some relief soon, they might fall off.

“No, I haven’t seen it. Maybe you can show me tonight when I get off.” Please let him get off soon…with Zackary.

“Maybe.”

Tank groaned under his breath. Zachary was out to kill him. He just knew it. The man dangled himself right in front of Tank then yanked himself away when Tank reached for the prize. It was getting to the point that Tank didn't know if he was coming or going. Well, that wasn't exactly true. He definitely knew he wasn't coming.