His Alien Slave (Alien Pirates of Cania #3) - Zara Zenia

1

Ellie

Ellie stared out the window of the classroom, lost in thought. She was in the middle of taking her final exam for Astronautical Engineering for the fall semester and completely distracted by the sun glinting off the snow. Graphs and schematics and designs for various space crafts and satellites were blurring together in her head as she attempted to refocus her attention on the test.

She had studied her ass off for the past five and a half years, taking part in everything offered at the Air Force Academy and was now in her senior year. Technically she'd worked far longer and harder to get to this point, making straight A's all through junior high and high school, getting her pilot license at seventeen, going to the summer seminars both her junior and senior years of high school, and entering the Academy at the age of nineteen. She'd started college late because being a military brat they'd moved all over the place as a kid and unfortunately, according to the schoolboard of the El Paso County School District in the great state of Colorado, she'd fallen behind and been held back in the fourth grade.

After that embarrassing moment in her life, she'd become determined to be an overachiever, so she'd never be held back again. She'd started taking every advanced class available, joined band and soccer and the track team, knowing the Academy wanted well rounded students who proved to be overachievers. In high school she'd done the Air Force ROTC, just to spite her father who was in the Army and had climbed the ranks slowly. She was determined to outshine the man. Knowing he'd failed getting into the Air Force Academy, she had decided to push herself hard and do what he couldn't. Become an Officer in the Air Force. Her dream had changed slightly since then to include an additional goal though.

Now here she was, six years later, only because after doing two years going for a Behavioral Sciences Major, she'd changed lanes and switched over to Astronautical Engineering. It wasn't that she hadn't liked Behavioral Sciences, she had, but it hadn't exactly been challenging enough and with the new Space Force being created, she wanted a chance to apply and what better way than to get into Astronautical Engineering?

It had been a long road with few breaks, but it was going to be totally worth it. After finishing this exam, she'd have one more semester and then she'd become an Officer in the Air Force and go to their elite flight training school where she'd get to fly in fighter jets. Hopefully, once she accomplished all of that, she'd then be able to transition into the Space Force. That was after her obligatory service to the Air Force, of course. Flying for the Space Force was the ultimate goal. Going out into space, patrolling the planet, looking for aliens… hell yeah. She couldn't wait. She wanted it now.

But first, she had to finish this exam and pass it with an A. With a final look outside, wishing she was up in the air zooming through the brilliant blue sky in a Cessna 150 — one of the few planes they had here at the Academy for them to fly — she turned back to the test in front of her and spent the next hour and a half answering everything asked of her and then checking her answers. She used every minute available for the test. She couldn't afford to mess this up.

"Pencil's down. Turn in your tests," the proctor said in a bored voice from the front of the room.

Ellie looked up and set her pencil down. She'd done everything she could. Rising, she brought her test up to the proctor. Before handing it over, she made sure her name was on it. God wouldn't that be stupid? Doing all that work and then forgetting to put my name on it! But no, it was there at the top of the front page, Cadet Ellie LaValle. With a smile, she handed it over and then returned to her desk to collect her things.

Breathing much easier, she headed back to her dorm. Tomorrow she was supposed to head 'home' for winter break — not that 'home' was actually her home, being that her family had moved yet again and probably wouldn't be expecting her to come all the way to Tennessee just for her winter break — but tonight, she was going to party like there was no