Nima handed him a weapon, and to Sera’s dismay, he aimed it at the padlock at his temple and fired. The little lock melted and fell away, and while he gained a few burns from the experience, he was able to toss the telepathy-blocking cap aside.
“Theyn is across the hall,” he said.
Elina nodded. “We’re getting you both out of here.”
They wasted no time crossing the hall, and once again the lock was no match for Ylian weapons technology. Theyn did not react when they came in. Sera could barely even tell that he was breathing. Beno took one look at his partner and his face went grey, then dark with rage. He and Sera both went to him.
“Theyn,” she said. “Theyn, honey, wake up.”
Beno put his hand against his partner’s solar plexus, just like he’d done before in that hospital room in Mexico. This time, there was no glow, and no answering response from Theyn. Sera leaned over him, her belly with its precious passenger resting against his arm. She gently took his bandaged hand in hers.
“What did they do to you?”
The baby kicked, hard – hard enough to nearly knock the wind out of Sera. Beno put his weapon against the lock holding the offending cap onto his bondmate’s head, and he fired just long enough to soften the metal. He grabbed it and pulled it loose, then stripped the cap away. All of Theyn’s thick golden hair had been shaved, and angry burns in loosely concentric circles dotted his scalp.
“Jesus,” Asa said.
A new voice shouted in the corridor. “Stop right there!”
Joely took cover in the cell while Asa, Elina and Nima opened fire. Bullets responded, ripping into the wall over their heads. Sera covered Theyn with her body, and Beno covered them both. The baby kicked like her life depended on it and sent waves of distress through Sera.
In the darkness, two points of blazing blue lit up the room. Theyn had opened his eyes, and they were burning like never before.
Sera, he said. Beno.
We’re here, she answered. You’re going to be okay. We’ll get you out of here.
Another bullet smashed into the concrete wall, sending dust and fragments raining down on them. Theyn gently pushed the two of them back.
In the Ylian tongue, he said firmly, “Let me handle this.”
“Theyn – “ his companion began to protest.
“That was not a request.”
They moved back and gave him room. Theyn rose from the cot like an angry god, his eyes shining halogen-bright. He was trembling, and his scales were beginning to glow, too, wreathed in golden energy that hummed like electricity. He walked toward the door, and one of the soldiers fired at him. The bullet struck him in the chest but bounced harmlessly away.
“Enough,” he snarled. Sera had never heard so harsh a sound in his normally-gentle voice. He extended his good hand, and the gun of the soldier who had shot him flew into his grip. He crumpled it and threw it aside.
“Holy shit!” the soldier cried. Theyn gestured in the air, and the man flew down the hallway, slamming into the door and breaking it from its hinges. The door hit the floor with such force that it shattered, and the soldier lay silent and still.
Theyn walked farther into the hallway, and Asa fell back to give him room. Nima and Elina continued to fire, but when they saw him, they gaped in shock and stood aside, staring.
Theyn held out his hand again as the energy around his scales turned into white-hot tongues of flame. He was unaffected by the fire, but the heat drove the humans back. Their bullets would not penetrate his skin, and he was not slowing.
Again, he said, “Enough!”
He pushed both hands out in front of him, and twin columns of fire shot out of his palms, intertwining and merging into one. The control room exploded in a shower of sparks, and the monitors and all of the computers died a miserable, melting death. The flame extended, burning a hole through the wall, and through the wall behind that one. None of the human guards remained standing.
Theyn dropped his hands, and the fire that laced his skin receded into a faint glow. He turned to face them, and his face was terrible in its ferocious beauty.
Beno pressed his fist to his heart. Beside him, Elina and Nima echoed the gesture.
Theyn spoke, and his voice was deeper and more resonant than before. “My people suffer and I will not tolerate more of this.”
Sera moved forward, passing the stunned reverence of her Ylian companions and the confusion of her human friends. She looked into his eyes as she approached, and he looked back, stoic.
“Do you know me, Theyn?” she asked. “Do you recognize me?”
He faltered for a moment, and the glowing in his eyes subsided. The light around his scales disappeared, and the moment passed, leaving Theyn standing in amazement. “Sera?” His voice was quiet again, and when he looked down at her abdomen, tears sprang to his eyes. “The baby is so big! Has it been that long?”
She embraced him, and then Beno was there, too, holding them both in his powerful arms. Asa put his arm around Joely, who leaned into him in relief.
Elina gave them a moment, then went to power up the shuttle. She beckoned their human friends to follow her, and they did. After a moment more, Nima interrupted the mates’ embrace.
“There are more soldiers coming, and this is not a safe place to linger, Your Highness,” she told Theyn. “Please… let us take you out of here.”
He nodded. “Yes. Let’s go somewhere safe.”
She nodded, and they boarded the shuttle for the getaway.
The shuttle took them to another green meadow, this one in the valley between two peaks in the Ural mountain range. The pastoral beauty was only slightly marred by the towering structure of a camouflage unit that rose hundreds of feet into the air. Dozens of workers scaled its sides, adjusting the thousands of crystals that made up the glittering sides of the planet’s next line of defense.
There was a landing strip with four other shuttles, and full-blooded Ylians came and went, their scales and eyes shining in the sun. The air smelled pure and clean, and the very ground felt sacred.
Theyn had been quiet since their departure, and Beno slept for the majority of the flight. Sera sat between them, comforting them and being comforted by close contact with the men she loved. The baby had settled down into a sleepy contentment, and now that they had landed, she was quiet.
A blue-eyed hybrid woman met them when the shuttle’s hatch opened, leading a team of other hybrids, most of them with golden eyes. They helped Theyn and Beno onto hovering stretchers and bore them into a glass-sided building near the airstrip.
Nima walked with Sera as they followed the medical team. “They will take good care of them, I promise you.”
“They had better.”
Epilogue
They never told her what the human scientists had done to them, but it took over two weeks for them to heal from their ordeal, even with advanced Ylian medicines sent from Bruthes. The three of them were given a beautiful apartment overlooking a clear alpine lake, where the water sparkled in the light of the sun like a field of strewn diamonds. They had a kitchen, a comfortable sitting room, a deep and luxurious bath tub, and a nursery prepared for the baby’s imminent arrival. Their own room was graced with a huge bed, bigger than any king-sized mattress that Sera had ever seen, and the place was all light and air and welcome.
Asa and Joely were given the option of separate apartments of their own, but citing concerns for conservation of resources, they chose to room together. Sera wasn’t fooled for one minute.
The scaly patches on her hands continued to grow, until they extended up her arms and over her shoulders, chest and back. They were golden and iridescent, and she felt like she was wearing some kind of organic jewelry when they twinkled in the light. She wondered if this was just part of being pregnant with an Ylian child, or if she had somehow been permanently changed.
On the day the camouflage unit was completed and the Earth was finally hidden from Taluan eyes, when the sun was warm and
the breeze light, Sera went into labor. The medical team came to her, and in accordance with Ylian norms, she was put into the deep tub with her mates at her side.
The water seemed to help her pain and eased the contractions. Theyn and Beno did everything they could to soothe and support her, from rubbing her back to mopping her sweaty brow with cool cloths. Joely sat on the edge of the tub and tried to function as her Lamaze coach, but she did it poorly, so eventually she just opted for giving moral support.
It was in the early hours before dawn when their daughter was born. She had Beno’s chocolate skin, Sera’s blonde curls, and despite the fact that she should have been a hybrid, she had Theyn’s completely blue, shining eyes. She was born without crying, and when they brought her up out of the water, she clung to Sera’s chest and snuggled peacefully. Both of her fathers stroked her long golden hair, and she gripped their fingers, responding to both to of their voices when they spoke to her.
They named her Kira. As Sera held her newborn daughter, safe in the arms of the men she adored, she wept with the joy and beauty of it all.
She kissed Kira’s forehead and whispered in her softest voice.
“Welcome home.”
END
She turned slowly and without looking back, set off across the field to return to the cave and after that, to her life on Earth.
END
Alien Message: Alien Romance (Sensual Contact Series Book 1) Page 35