Slag: Book Four in the Galaxy Pirates Alien Abduction Romance Series (Shifter) by Alana Khan (books for 5 year olds to read themselves .txt) 📕

“Dranii! Help!” They’re armed and I’m defenseless. As they aim at me, I feel him turn toward them. He then sweeps me away with the gentle swipe of his wing. He takes a colossal breath in, then exhales a great gust of flame, searing the three males where they stand.

When the flame stops, there are three piles of ash on the metal floor of the hallway. I glance around Dranii into the bridge to see it smoldering, a hole the size of a Volkswagen in the hull.

“We’ve got to get out of here before we plunge back to the planet!” I scream.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew this moment would come. I glossed over the details earlier, just wanting to get A’Zul into his dragon form. But I always knew we wouldn’t be able to land this ship gently. He’ll be able to fly out of that hole. I won’t be so lucky.

He makes his way to the hole, biting the remainder of the captain’s chair, tossing it out the tear in the metal, and letting it fall to the ground far below. I grab onto the instrument panel when the vessel tips sharply on its side.

We’re no longer in a stable orbit, we’re leaning, falling back to the planet below.

“Go, Dranii. Hurry before you die!”

He grabs me with soft lips despite his mouth full of sharp teeth and nudges me onto his back. Dipping his head to the floor, I use his head as a step stool, grab some of the spikes on his head to hang on, and swing myself into position onto the back of his neck in front of his wings.

As soon as I’m settled, I press myself against the spike at my back and hold onto the spike in front for dear life, my knees pressing against him. I yell, “Ready!” and he glides out of the hole then flaps his wings and we stabilize. If I had the capacity to think about what was going to happen, perhaps I would have closed my eyes before leaping out of a crashing spaceship!

A bolt of laser fire comes rushing at us, barely missing Dranii’s right wing.

Two small, round vessels are bombarding us with laser fire. They must be escape pods. Shit. They belong to one of the most evil and powerful males in the galaxy—they’re well-armed.

Dranii is recovering from that narrow miss when another burst of laser fire bombards us. He tries to change course to avoid it, but it hits him in his left wing.

He screams in agony even as he keeps us upright, turns his head, and lets out a screech so loud my eardrums vibrate. The noise transmutes into fire, shooting at first one and then the other enemy pod.

One pod bursts into flames and plunges through the clouds. I watch it, dripping fire, until it crashes onto the ground below, erupting into a giant fireball upon impact.

When I look back up, the second pod is gone. I don’t see another fireball plummeting downward and assume it got away.

The spaceship makes a slow graceful arc toward the ground, miles from the cabin, and crashes in a spectacular burst of flames. A pillar of black smoke reaches toward the heavens, backlit by the sputtering fire.

Dranii is flying slower now, then glides downward toward the barn.

This big creature, its body so well-protected by scales, has wings that are thin and vulnerable. His left wing has an ugly tear through it, singed in black.

After he lands, I climb off his back, and we walk into the barn. It’s dark out, the night lit only by the moon, the burning embers of the house, and the sputtering fire of the pod that crashed a mile or so away.

I help Dranii bed down in the stall where we planned on sleeping, then open the weapons container and pull out two rifles. One pod is at large, and if it returns, I will kill whatever motherfucker is in there.

I grab the crate with the medical supplies. Seneca gave me a quick rundown on how to use the gadgets and medications, but I’m not certain I remember everything he said. I guess I didn’t believe I’d ever really need them.

I return to the stall, which is similar to barns back home, surrounded with planking from the ground up about five feet. I was half hoping the dragon would be gone and A’Zul would be waiting for me, but the humongous beast is lying on the bed of hay.

“Dranii, let me see how you’re doing.”

He’s lying on his right side, his injured left wing tucked protectively against his body. He’s breathing shallow huffs of air in a cadence that’s a testament to his pain.

Although it’s dark in here, the dim light of the moon drifting through the doorway illuminates a dark dribble of what has to be his blood dripping down the stall door.

The hole through the thin film of his wing doesn't explain the amount of blood.

“Dranii. Where are you hurt, boy?”

He rolls farther from me, exposing a wound on his side.

“Shit.”

After running back to the pile of supply boxes and rummaging until I find a laser light, I bring it over to examine the damage. His protective plating of scales has been burned away in a ragged oblong hole about a foot wide. The gouge of missing meat is a fairly clean cut and not deep enough to damage any internal organs. I guess I should be thankful that the lasers did the damage, I think they cauterized as they made the cut.

“Poor baby,” I say as I rummage through the supplies, trying to remember what the medic told me.

When I look at what’s in the kit, it all comes back to me. I use the med-scanner to get a diagnosis.

“Laser wound,” the machine’s