Starlight Bloom - A Short Story

STARLIGHT BLOOM

A Sci-Fi Romance Short Story

By Oryxia Bluebelle

Dr. Nia Mercer has spent four years keeping an impossible alien flower alive.

Dr. Elias Voss has spent six months questioning nearly everything she does.

Brilliant, infuriating, and far too confident for Nia’s liking, Elias is the last person she wants beside her when the mysterious Starlight Bloom opens ahead of schedule.

Then Nia hears a thought that isn’t hers.

His.

Suddenly, two fiercely competitive scientists who can barely tolerate sharing a laboratory are sharing something far more intimate—their thoughts, emotions, and secrets. And the farther apart they try to get, the more dangerous their strange connection becomes.

But their unexpected bond may not be an accident.

Something is changing inside the research station. Something connected to the alien bloom. And when an unexpected threat places everyone aboard Helix Station in danger, Nia and Elias are forced to trust the one person neither of them expected to need:

each other.

Because the Starlight Bloom didn’t simply open.

It may have been waiting for them.

Rivals to Lovers • Telepathy • Forced Partnership • Alien Mystery • Sci-Fi Romance