by Regine Abel
“These white circles indicate regions that are documented as uninhabited but where a notable increase in activity has flagged them to our radar as unusual. It can’t be blamed on the fauna since there are no large animal migrations taking place at this time of the year.” Chaos then pointed to a series of black patches. “These are the settlements. Notice how every white patch is placed in a central position in relation to the nearby settlements; too far for the population to stumble on them, but close enough that if they are indeed Breeding Swamps, the Kryptid Swarms could reach the settlements in less than two hours.”
My stomach knotted. If Khutu was indeed preparing an attack on Jaylon, it needed to be nipped in the bud. With the size of its population, completely defenseless against the engineered war bugs, the casualties would be unfathomable. Even with the Vanguard charging in first to save those who still survived, the Coalition would sustain terrible losses as well.
“How certain are you?” I asked, more as required formality than out of any type of doubt.
“A hundred percent,” Chaos said without hesitation and turned to face me. “Multiple settlements have started complaining about an increased presence of carrion eaters, and that’s only from the cities closest to Jaylon’s Planetary Council. I dread what we will find in the remote cities that seek complete isolation from others. Frankly, I think we should mount a purge right away.”
I nodded slowly, understanding too well the merit of his suggestion.
“You know the Coalition will want tangible proof, not assumptions no matter how compelling the evidence.”
“We do not need their permission to act,” Chaos snarled.
I snorted. His impulsive tendencies were why the Vanguard deferred to me as their unofficial leader. “You are correct, we don’t. However, if your assumptions are accurate, and I believe they are, we’ll need the Coalition’s troops to wipe out their remaining troops after we’ve thinned their numbers. Chances are many of us will die in battle. If we go on our own, by the time we recover from rebirth sickness, the Swarm’s numbers will be up again; and it will all have been for nothing.”
Chaos ran thick, frustrated fingers through his black hair. “I know all of that, but every hour we waste, their numbers grow.”
Rising from the desk I leaned against, I walked up to Chaos and placed a comforting hand on his shoulder. “I hear you, my brother. Nothing would please me more than for all of us to go in and obliterate them, but we have a traitor in our midst. If we mount a full scale attack now, they will know and be ready for us. They could take out the entire Vanguard in one swift blow, not to mention our women.”
Chaos flinched. While we all loved our girls, he proved the most fiercely protective of them and took their recent high number of casualties as a personal failure.
“You go on your stealth mission. Take Raven and Xenon, and you bring us back the proof we need. I’ll work on finding that traitor.”
“You find that bastard,” Chaos said. “You find him and then leave me the pleasure of tearing him limb from limb.”
* * *
This morning, two days after Chaos had set off on his missions, his unit landed on Jaylon and immediately set off to scout the suspect locations. With the planet’s backward ways, they couldn’t draw attention to themselves by openly traveling using high tech transports which would have significantly sped up their progress. The last time we’d communicated, Blujek, their Aznarian contact on the planet, had taken them to our safe house using traditional transportation. Their Soulcatchers were to remain there, out of harm’s way. The Warriors had used state-of-the-art hoverbikes hidden there, equipped with cloaking technology to both camouflage and dampen the soft hum of the vehicles.
It could be hours before I heard back from them. The biggest problem resided in the Soulcatchers’ limited psychic range. Unlike my Ayana who could be contacted halfway across the galaxy, Tabitha, Sonia, and Bridget couldn’t. Without proper communication technology, if anything happened to their Warriors, only Blujek could warn us. However, as a follower of Aznar, his religion also forbade him to use technology, aside from his exceptional dispensation when performing Planetary Council duty. This would further delay us receiving news.
While Warriors could communicate with each other over unlimited distances, it didn’t occur instantly as it did with Operators. Unless we were in very close proximity, it took time to establish the connection and a great deal of concentration. The farther the distance, the longer the time. But once connected, the conversation flowed without problem. This explained why all Operators and Soulcatchers were females as these delays only affected male-to-male psychic communications.
The tinkling sound of my door chime going off drew me out of my somber ruminations.
Ayana!
My hearts always beat a little faster. It had almost been two weeks since our first kiss—eleven days to be exact—yet every moment spent with her still felt like our first date. She mesmerized me and brought out a playful side I never knew I possessed. Smart, tough, and powerful, she made me question things I didn’t really want to, especially my stance on the Kryptids. I understood why she’d reject the concept of genocide, but she’d never been on the field of battle. Even now, my mind kept going back to Raven whom I almost regretted sending on that mission. If anything happened to him, I didn’t want to think about what it would do to his mother.
Reaching the entrance, I opened the door, and both my hearts leapt before the enticing vision of my mate. The beige Aspirant dress flattered her sexy figure, slender, with tantalizing curves in all the right places. I couldn’t wait for her to don the black and gold dress of the Vanguard at the end of her training. She gave me a shy smile, her beautiful dark brown eyes widening at finding me shirtless. She nibbled on her bottom lip while giving me a discrete once over.
“You have clearance. You know you can just come in,” I said in a gently chastising tone.
“And, like every other time you’ve said it, I’ll reply that I don’t want to intrude until you are ready to receive me. What if you were still dressing?” She said that last sentence while giving a meaningful look at my naked chest.
“My home is your home. You will soon share it with me. My body is also yours. That, too, you will share in the not so distant future… I hope.”
A lovely blush colored her creamy-brown skin at my bluntness. Wrapping my arm around her waist, I pulled her inside and into my embrace. The door swished closed behind her, and I claimed her mouth in a slow, demanding kiss. Her soft moan, the sweet taste of her lips, and the exquisite feel of her hands on my bare skin had my loin plate aching to retract and let my cock out. Breaking the kiss, I cupped her cheek in my palm and caressed her glistening bottom lip with my thumb.
“You’re too tempting, but I won’t let your charms distract me. We’ve got work to do.”
Ayana’s barely hidden disappointment nearly shattered my resolve. Every fiber of my being wanted her. While humans were pretty open with their sexuality, I didn’t want to come on too strong with her. She was my bond-mate, and I wanted everything to be perfect between us.
“Come,” I said, leading her by the hand to the padded mat I had laid out in the middle of my living room.
After I’d taken over her training, we’d been alternating the location of our sessions between her place, mine, and the Atrium at her Residence. Since we’d become a couple, it ended up being more and more often at my place. She didn’t allow me to cook for her every night. According to her, it was to continue bonding with the other girls in their rare time together at evening meal. I believed it was more to hide our involvement that she still felt guilty about.
Sitting on the mat, crossed-legged in front of each other, we held hands and allowed our minds to meld. I couldn’t get enough of that connection. It almost felt like being one, physically, with your partner, which explained why so many couples formed between the girls and their Warriors.
The golden sphere of Ayana’s inner-self taunted me,
its lustrous surface still denying me access. Beneath it, the swirly spark of her first days here had grown into a large, stable vortex. We still didn’t understand what it did, except that whenever I messed with it, it tried to suck me in. The few times I allowed myself to get sucked in, it propelled me through some type of void before slamming me right back into my body. The first couple of attempts left me drained and a little nauseous, like with the rebirth sickness. Since then, Ayana had developed a bit more control over it and managed to temper the violence with which I re-entered my corporeal vessel, significantly reducing the side-effects of whatever this was.
It bothered me a great deal that we couldn’t figure out its purpose. Next week would mark the end of the girls’ training when they’d be given their official assignments. She didn’t qualify as a Soulcatcher which meant sending her to the Intelligence Services. The thought of dozens of Warriors traipsing through her mind in her role as Operator had my venom sacs fill to bursting. Where you could claim exclusive ‘rights’ on a Soulcatcher, you couldn’t on an Operator, least of all on one with Ayana’s tremendous power.
Chasing those somber thoughts away, I wrapped my consciousness around her golden sphere. It had started showing a few cracks over our previous sessions that quickly sealed before I could pierce through. Intimacy significantly helped accelerate the process, but I didn’t want to get in by exploiting her vulnerability during a moment of passion. I wanted her to choose to let me in because both her conscious and subconscious selves trusted me with her bared soul.
“Lower your walls, Sweetling.”
To my pleasant surprise, Ayana didn’t instinctively double her defenses as had usually been the case every time I asked her to lower them.
“I didn’t even bring them up this time!”
I chuckled inside. She expected a compliment—a well-deserved one at that—but I enjoyed riling her up too much.
“You didn’t bring up the extra one. Big difference! I’m starting to think you’ve got some unspeakable secrets buried inside that pretty golden sphere.”
“Oh, yeah! Tons of skeletons. I could barely close the door of that closet… make that closets!”
The image of a circular room with arched, medieval doors appeared in my mind’s eye. They strained from pressure before bursting open, skeleton parts exploding into the room. Ayana’s subconscious had sent me that vision the moment she’d imagined the scene. Such occurrences had been happening more frequently of late as our minds grew closer.
That gave me an idea.
“Set a door on your sphere, then open it for me.”
I sensed her hesitation at first, then the energy around her sphere shifted. As she tried to tackle the task, images of various doors flashed before me. Between each, a pause would follow, accompanied by a burst of energy. The models, intricate at first, became simpler in their design, and smaller in scale. At last, a square shape etched on the surface of the sphere; a trap door. My excitement rose as its blurry line refined and solidified.
Despite my eagerness to intertwine my soul with hers, I couldn’t risk setting us back by pushing too far, too fast.
“Excellent work, Sweetling! Do not fear; I will not try to get in. Today, I just want you to open it, even if it’s just a crack.”
Her sphere shone brighter, fear and excitement making its surface bubble and swirl. For a moment, I thought she wouldn’t manage to. It would have been disappointing, but the door itself had been a major success. When the trapdoor cracked open, I felt my physical body hold its breath. The slit, barely a couple of centimeters wide, let out a glowing white light, with iridescent sparks dancing around it.
So beautiful…
No wonder her aura was so enticing. Even now that the Warriors had acknowledged my mate claim on Ayana, they still struggled to resist her allure, and would continue to do so until we had completed our mating bond. Raven had the hardest time of it, having felt her, touched her soul during that first training session.
“That’s it, Sweetling! You’re doing it!”
Instead of the ecstatic shouts I’d expected, silence met my words. As the seconds stretched, I began to worry something might have gone amiss. And then a furry head appeared in the narrow opening of the trap; a kitten, its fur the same hazelnut color as Ayana’s skin, peered at me with wide, curious eyes.
I burst out laughing, fearing it would knock me out of the mind-meld.
The rainbow sparks doubled in number as they continued their dance. I could feel Ayana’s happiness fueling them. When the kitten poked its head out, I carefully stretched myself towards it and gently petted its head, making sure not to let my essence seep into the opening of the door.
Ayana shuddered, the bubbling on the surface of her sphere reminded me of the fiery eruptions on the surface of the sun. That same burning fire roiled inside me to touch my mate’s soul. I felt dizzy, drunk from the feel of her. The day our minds fused, my hearts would probably explode.
“This is amazing, Legion! I can feel your emotions almost as if they are mine!”
“Yes, Sweetling. Or should I say kitten?”
Her laughter rose then suddenly died.
“Legion…”
The panic in her tone set all my senses on high alert. Before I could ask what was wrong, her trapdoor disappeared, her sphere taking on a silvery hue as a bright light shot out of the vortex below.
Ayana screamed both physically and psychically. A sharp pain cut through my brain as our connection was brutally severed.
“It’s a trap!” Ayana yelled before collapsing on the mat.
“Ayana!” I shouted, leaning over her.
A few tremors shook her body before she lost consciousness.
“Victoria! Ayana needs help! I’m bringing her now!”
“I’ll be at the clinic.”
I picked up my mate and rushed out of my quarters.
CHAPTER 6
Ayana
A pounding headache brought me back to consciousness. Fighting my way through the fog clouding my mind, I recognized Dr. Lashan’s voice talking. I couldn’t make out her words or if she was addressing me. My stomach roiled with the urge to vomit, but I thankfully managed to keep it in. In spite of their reluctance, I forced my eyes open only to close them again under the glaring light in the room. I moaned and raised a trembling hand to my temple.
“She’s in pain!” Legion’s voice said, sounding both concerned and a little accusatory.
His strong hand wrapped around mine, and I clung to it as if it could somehow provide me some relief.
“Calm down, son,” Victoria said. “I’m taking care of her.”
Seconds later, something cool pressed against the side of my neck followed by a hissing sound, and then the sting of a hypospray injection. Almost instantly, the claws digging into my skull relented. I released a shuddering breath as I regained the ability to function. My eyelashes fluttered and, through blurred vision, Legion’s beautiful face appeared before me, his features strained with worry.
“What happened?” I asked in a whisper.
“We were hoping you could tell us that, child,” Victoria said.
Legion cast a stern glance towards her before turning back to me. “You were laughing about the kitten, then something frightened you right before a light shot out of your anomaly…”
“It’s a trap!” I whispered, a feeling of dread crawling down my spine.
“That’s what you said, right before you passed out,” Legion said. “What trap? Did you intercept another conversation?”
“Do not pressure her, Legion,” Victoria said.
“No, no, it’s fine,” I said, my heart racing with memories flooding back. My stomach dropped as I turned to look at the doctor. “Where’s Raven?”
Legion stiffened.
“My son?” she asked, recoiling in surprise. “He’s on a mission. Why?” Her face fell and worry crept on her delicate features. “Is something wrong with him?’
“What is it, Ayana?”
>
I swallowed hard, the sense of dread coming back with a vengeance. “I… I’m pretty certain it was his voice. It wasn’t just his voice, either. I could almost feel him, his fear.”
“Fear? Very little scares Raven, least of all death,” Victoria challenged, sounding a little offended on behalf of her son.
“He wasn’t afraid for himself. It… I don’t know how to explain,” I said, sitting up on the medical bed. Running my fingers through my hair, I tried to make sense of the sensations and emotions that had blasted through me. “Before I passed out, it felt like a freight train was coming straight at me, with no way for me to dodge. But it wasn’t an urgent message that came at me, but all of Raven; his soul came at me. I could feel his thoughts, his emotions, his physical pain, and above all fear for the girls. Except, I don’t know what girls he’s referring to.”
Legion grew paler with each of my words. He let go of my hand and pulled his com device. “Wrath, contact Blujek immediately and tell him we need an urgent status report on the safe house.”
“My son…” Victoria whispered. Eyes filled with horror, she stared ahead without seeing, her hand fisting her colorful dress over her stomach.
Careful at first not to hurt myself, I sent out my senses to see if I could still use my ESP. Reassured by the lack of pain or discomfort, I pushed further, seeking Raven. He was very far away, and something prevented me from communicating with him, but he lived.
“He’s alive,” I breathed out, my mind still seeking to meld with his.
“Can you talk to him?” Legion asked, his hands gripping my shoulders strong enough to express his worry, but not enough to hurt.
Blinking out of my semi-trance, I repeated to them what I had just observed. Victoria’s sharp breath intake sounded almost like a repressed sob of relief.
“I think he’s calling out for help, but I don’t know what to do.”