by Gail Koger
“How badly are you hurt? Where are you? I’ll come to you.”
A groan was my only response as Tihar struggled to rise.
Summoning all my psychic abilities, I surged into his head and took control. “Open your eyes.” For a moment, everything was fuzzy. His vision cleared, and I could see funnels of black smoke rising from the destroyed compound. All around us was chaos, violence, and death. Askole warriors were ebony blurs as they fiercely fought off the rebel invaders.
I poured every ounce of energy I had into Tihar. “Get up and fight, dammit. I’m not losing you now.”
“Sarah?”
“Yes, I’m here, and I’ll never leave you.”
His fury hit me like a blow. “Have you lost your senses? Go. Now. Do not contact me again. It is too dangerous. Snoor cannot know about you.”
“Snoor? The rebel? Dangerous? I’m a fighter pilot and face death every fucking day. Do not use that as an excuse.”
Our link snapped.
“You goddamned sonovabitch.” I searched for him and found nothing. My psychic bond with Tihar was gone again. “Arrgh!” I kicked the shit out of a trash container.
After that, I was still able to catch a few fleeting glimpses of Tihar’s life. Mostly when he was in a dim shithole of a bar and drunk on his ass. Was he blowing off steam with his warriors? Or blending in with his enemy? Why did he think Snoor was a threat to me?
* * * *
Almost a year later, the rebels were finally defeated. There was still sporadic fighting along the western front, and even though the head rebel, Snoor, had escaped, Tihar had to be entitled to a little R&R.
A part of me was giddy with excitement at the thought of being reunited with the love of my life. Another part of me was sick with worry. Had the long separation damaged our mental bond? Did Tihar still love me?
Instead of getting a message from Tihar saying he was coming for me, I was notified that Sariel wanted to speak with me. My gut clenched in fear. Please don’t let Tihar be dead. Please don’t let Tihar be dead.
Sensing my distress, Musa flew into the room and settled on my shoulder. She jabbered urgently at me. I petted her head. “I know. I know. It’s gonna be okay. You’ll see. Tihar will come for us.”
KeeKee scampered up my leg. “Tihar come?”
“That’s what we’re going to find out.” I touched the icon, and Sariel’s fierce features filled the view screen. His expression was one of distaste as he spat a bunch of Askole gobbledygook. A mechanical voice translated it. “My son has realized you are not his chosen.”
Every bone, every muscle in my body reeled in shock. It wasn’t true. It couldn’t be true. “What are you talking about?”
There was a pause as the computer interpreted my words and the High Commander rattled off something in the Askole’s native tongue.
“You are inferior, child-size, and weak. You lack tentacles. You don’t have the skills to survive in our culture. Tihar has found an appropriate full-blooded Askole female to bear his children. Your bride contract had been nullified, and the credits returned to the Overlord.”
“What? None of this makes any sense. You said if we broke our psychic link, it would cause serious brain damage. You wanted me to mate with Tihar.”
Sariel spouted a bunch of guttural grunts and groans and some clucking. The translator said, “You misunderstood the situation.”
“The hell I did.” Something was rotten in Denmark. Tihar wouldn’t do this to me.
KeeKee asked, “Why he mean?”
A damn good question. “Where’s Tihar?”
The mechanical voice shot back, “My son is too busy to deal with you.”
But the Askole High Commander wasn’t? “Too busy doing what?”
“That is none of your concern. Once the contract was terminated, you lost all mate privileges. Any further attempt to contact Tihar is a breach of our laws, and you will be dealt with harshly. For your inconvenience, we will allow you to keep the Draconic, Musa,” the voice answered.
My inconvenience? Allow? I literally saw red. I bared my nice sharp fangs and in my best command voice demanded, “I want to talk with Tihar, face-to-face, now!”
“That is not possible.” The view screen went black.
That rude SOB had cut our vid link. Like that was going to stop me? I hit the Communications icon. A computerized voice announced, “The link is no longer available.”
Crap. The rebels had taken out the major satellite relay systems when the war began, and communications with that part of the galaxy was difficult at best.
All this time, I had come up with excuse after excuse for Tihar’s behavior. My rotten father-in-law was keeping him from me. The war had stopped his midnight visits. As commander of the western fleet, Tihar was too busy to link with me or Zarek. Or he was protecting me from some unknown danger. But, oh no, it was my lack of tentacles. I wanted to punch him right in the kisser.
The fucker had screwed my DNA all to hell, and I didn’t even merit an apology? Or the courtesy of a face-to-face meeting? Was I suddenly that repulsive to him? I thought he loved me.
The sense of loss hit me like a freight train. My knees buckled, and I hit the floor. God, I felt like such a fool. Was everything Tihar told me a lie? I kept telling myself he loved me. I tried so hard to keep my fear and doubt from clouding my judgment. But now? I didn’t know what to believe. If he loved me, why hadn’t he contacted me? Hot tears rolled down my cheeks. I quickly brushed them away. No tears. Not until I knew the truth.
Musa rubbed against my face and chirped soothingly.
“We here. We no leave,” KeeKee said, snuggling under my chin. “Love you.”
“I love you too.”
Aunt Tess was suddenly in my head. “What’s wrong?”
I took a deep breath and told her.
“God, I’m so sorry.” She gave me a mental hug. “He’s an alien. Happily ever after isn’t in his vocabulary.”
“All I wanted was for Tihar to love me as I loved him.”
“Oh, honey. A little tequila and a ton of chocolate will fix you up.”
“Will it?”
“Probably not, but it’ll numb the pain until we can come up with a plan to make the bastard and his father pay,” Aunt Tessa responded.
“Tihar’s on the other side of the galaxy.”
“We’re a bunch of devious bitches. We’ll figure something out.”
Poof. Rho and Aunt Tess appeared in my room.
I shrieked, “What’s he doing here? He’s one of them.”
“I needed a lift, and he’s leaving now.” Aunt Tess nudged him. “Right?”
After giving me an appraising look, Rho vanished.
Bree and Zoey teleported into the room, carrying beer, chocolate, chips and salsa.
Musa and KeeKee made a beeline for the food.
Just kill me now. “You told them, Aunt Tess?”
“We Jones girls stick together,” Aunt Tess said, handing me a shot of tequila.
I downed it. The warmth eased the knot in my stomach. I wasn’t alone, forgotten, or abandoned. I had my family. The not so jolly black giant was about to find out what that meant. Hurt one of us, and you dealt with all of us.
“Tihar just made the biggest mistake of his life,” Zoey said, squeezing my shoulder. “He threw away the best thing that ever happened to him. You.”
Bree wrapped an arm around me. “Feel like killing something?”
“Oh, hell yeah. What did you have in mind?”
“Naugers.”
The image of a bulbous body with a long snakelike neck and the head of a raptor flashed through my mind. It wouldn’t be as satisfying as killing the Tai-Kok or kicking a certain Askole warrior’s ass, but they’d do. “I’m in. Where are my favorite Barets, Rio and Cokie?”
“Jaylan took them hunting Tanezumis in the lower caverns.”
Detja and Kaylee appeared in the room, carrying our armored battle suits.
“When a Coletti mate
s, it is for life. Lothel would have never abandoned you. Your Askole has no honor. You were a fool to accept his claim,” Detja admonished.
That’s me, the gullible halfwit. Go ahead and rub it in, why don’t ya. “Yes, ma’am, I failed to listen to you. It won’t happen again.”
“Good.” She handed me my battle suit.
Aunt Tess refilled my shot glass. “They say love is blind, and in your case, that’s really true. I did some research, and did you know when an Askole enters the mating frenzy, they excrete a hormone that jacks up your sex drive?”
I was going to need a lot more liquor. “You don’t say.”
“Rumor has it, the Askole who injects the gene-altering enzymes into their lust-crazed victim can reverse the damage done to their prey’s DNA by stinging them again,” Aunt Tess confided.
That caught my attention. I looked at Detja. “Is that true?”
“The Overlord did ask if you were sure you wanted to become Askole.”
“He did. I wasn’t thinking straight. You know, all those hormones?” I flinched when Detja narrowed her eyes and bared her fangs at me. Yikes. My tone was a bit snarky. When had I become suicidal?
“It’s too late for Zarek to reverse the transformation, but I will inquire if Tihar has the ability.”
“Thank you.” I stripped down to my underwear and pulled on the battle suit. “Time to kill some monsters.”
Kaylee laughed. “Thor wanted to come too. I had a devil of a time talking him out of it.”
“He is his father’s son,” Detja stated proudly.
I nodded. “That he is.” Thor was adorable, where Talree was someone I wanted to avoid. When he was really pissed, he got all glowy eyed. It was like some special effect in a monster movie.
Aunt Tess made a face. “You kids have fun. Me? I’m not getting anywhere close to those carnivores.”
“We might need your talents,” Zoey protested.
My aunt shot back, “You’ve got Kaylee. Besides I wanted to spend time with Thor.”
“You’re the expert critter wrangler, not me, and Talree is taking Thor flying,” Kaylee countered.
“You will accompany us,” Detja commanded in her drillmaster’s voice and handed Aunt Tess her battle suit.
“Yes, ma’am.” The minute Detja turned her back, Aunt Tess gave her the finger.
And I thought I was suicidal.
“We come. We come,” KeeKee cried as she and Musa flew over to me. Salsa covered their faces.
“Remember? We’ve had this talk. You don’t have a battle suit. No battle suit, you die,” I told them.
KeeKee gave me her best sad puppy-dog eyes. “Me member.”
“And no shooting web balls at the ducks.”
“You no fun.”
That’s me. The party pooper.
Chapter Fourteen
To kill naugers, we had to get to the surface. Detja, Kaylee, Bree, Zoey, Aunt Tess, and I rode our hover sleds up a narrow escape tunnel built long ago. The dozen or so blast doors opened and closed automatically for us. The passageway ended in a large cavern filled with glittering, ginger-colored stalactites. In one corner, an energy field protected a decontamination chamber and regeneration tube. It made me wonder how many warriors got hurt hunting naugers. Bree said the varmints made the raptor dinosaurs look like pussycats.
Detja tapped her bracelet. The heavy blast door closed behind us. With a grinding noise, another door opened, revealing a burnt-orange sky and the heavily charred ruins of a forest.
The remains of a hunting lodge stood in a barren clearing. The walls had been reduced to mounds of useless rubble. Eerie shadows of an incinerated woman and child were imprinted on the tiled courtyard. Apparently, they had been running for the bunker when the blast hit.
As soon as we were all in the square, the outer hatch shut.
My Spidey sense jangled a warning. I scanned the area. “Hostiles two clicks away.”
“There’s a shitload of beasties out there too,” Aunt Tess cautioned.
A sibilant hiss sounded.
I searched for the source. There. Funky, milk-white cobra eyes peered out from under a tangle of jack-strawed trees.
Zoey looked around nervously. “I thought the naugers were cannibalistic and ate each other?”
“They are and they do,” Detja answered, a hand on the butt of her laser pistol. “I have never seen so many in this area before.”
The theme song from that shark movie ran through my head. “Think someone has been chumming the water?”
“Wouldn’t surprise me if that skinny bitch Lilkee and her Legionnaires are behind this,” Kaylee snarled.
“Great booby trap.” Aunt Tess’s gaze locked on the jumble of trees. “I think a tactical retreat is in order.”
Detja nodded. “I agree.” She touched an icon on her bracelet. The blast hatch refused to open. She hit the icon again. The control panel blew, spewing sparks in every direction.
“Shit!” Bree climbed off her hover sled. “Let’s teleport out of here.”
A shiny red sphere smashed into the courtyard. Snap! Pop! A wave of crackling yellow energy slammed into us, knocking us down like ten pins.
My head spun dizzily as I climbed to my feet. “What hit us?”
“Good question. God, it feels like I’ve been on a two-day bender,” Aunt Tess groused.
The funny black spots finally cleared from my vision, and I noticed that Bree, Kaylee, Zoey, and Detja were down. “Oh shit!”
Aunt Tess kneeled beside Detja while I checked the medical readouts on my cousins’ bracelets.
“Detja’s out cold. The stun grenade messed up her neural pathways.”
I nodded. “I’ve got the same readings. Good thing we aren’t Coletti, or we’d be taking a nap too.”
A nauger slunk toward us.
I shot it. Two more appeared. I took them out. “We need help. Like now.”
“I can’t link with Rho, Voss, Talree, Jaylan, or Zarek,” Aunt Tess advised.
I tried with the same results. “Crap, I can’t connect with them either.”
Aunt Tess vaporized another nauger. “They’re getting bolder.”
“Can you drive them away?”
“I’ve been trying. My critter wrangling abilities are on the fritz.”
“Fuck.” I surveyed the area for any kind of cover. Next to the bunker wall, an overhang of rock formed a small, defensible cave. I pointed to it. “Let’s put the girls there and use the sleds to form a barricade.”
“Sounds good.” Aunt Tess grabbed Kaylee’s arms and dragged her in.
Using a fireman’s lift, I picked Bree up and carried her into the cave.
“Behind you,” Aunt Tess cried, firing her laser pistol.
I spun around and shot a nauger charging me. Its body disintegrated into a million fireflies. “I’ll keep them back while you move Zoey and Detja.”
“Okay.” Aunt Tess hauled Detja inside and came back for Zoey.
In between killing the monsters, I shifted the hover sleds.
My psychic radar went on red alert. I spotted an obese nauger hanging from the rocky outcrop. Its claws scrambled desperately as it attempted to pull itself up. The sucker was going to fall.
“Look out, Aunt Tess!”
She looked up.
With an ear-shattering screech, it fell.
Aunt Tess’s cry of alarm was abruptly cut off as the nauger landed on top of her.
“If she’s hurt, I’m gonna gut you.”
The nauger sniffed Aunt Tess.
Dammit, she was unconscious. I didn’t dare shoot. I couldn’t risk hitting Aunt Tess. The rubble gave me plenty of ammunition. I threw bricks at the monster.
Smack. Smack. Thunk. The raptor wannabe snarled at me, exposing a mouthful of needle-sharp teeth.
I bared my fangs. “Not impressed.”
The nauger latched on to Aunt Tess’s arm and dragged her behind a sled.
“Smart guy, huh?” I pulled my sword, raised it a
bove my head, and yelled bloody blue murder.
The nauger emitted a loud hissing growl.
“Geez. This is not a competition. C’mon. Attack me.”
The nauger gnawed on Aunt Tess’s arm for a moment, then spat it out.
Thank God, she was wearing a battle suit. “Tastes nasty, doesn’t she? But I taste yummy. Really yummy. Come and get me.” I shouted my battle cry. “Mwah-hah-hah.”
It hissed nastily and lumbered toward me on short stubby legs.
A turtle could outrun Mister Chubbiness. I didn’t have time for this crap. Armageddon loomed. Yelling like a demented banshee, I charged, side-stepped the nauger’s snapping jaws at the last second, and lopped off its head. Blood sprayed all over me. Yuck. Was it my destiny to always look like an extra in a slasher movie? I wiped off my helmet.
Aunt Tess moaned.
I hurried over to her and punched the medical icon on her bracelet. Her shoulder was broken, and she had a concussion. Damn. I was the only one left standing.
Lilkee’s mocking voice filled my head. “Looks like I will rid the galaxy of all the half-breed mates at one time. I will send my father a vid with the gory details.”
That was when I noticed a bright-red drone hovering overhead. “Nope, not gonna happen.” I destroyed it.
“A pathetic primitive like you cannot stop us.”
“Wanna bet?”
“My scientists developed an ultrasonic device that drives the creatures mad. When the naugers are done with you, there won’t be enough left to bury.”
“You’re a dead woman.”
Lilkee laughed like a hyena. “Your screams will be music to my ears.”
“Lady, they need to up your meds.” If she had a mustache, she would be twirling it.
“The females’ laser pistols have been drained,” a male voice announced.
What! I quickly checked my gun. Those slimy bastards. Only the power reserves were left. Which gave me about three minutes to kill as many naugers as possible.
The skinny bitch gloated, “With only a sword to defend herself, the filthy hybrid won’t survive long.”
My lips curled in disgust. Lilkee had piss-poor mental shields and didn’t realize I could hear everything she and her henchman were saying.