But she lost her thoughts to the wondrous sensations he created. Finally when he filled her with his tavis, he rode her hard, swift, and deep. She felt his pleasure as he lost himself within her and it added to her own. With every thrust, his pelvis slapped her bottom, with every thrust, he kept up his psi attention to her breasts, and when his hands grasped her hips and rocked her to him, she’d never felt so appreciated.
But it was his mental claiming of her that she savored. For long moments she couldn’t discern her thoughts from his. Swirling passion. Dominating lust. Captivating seduction. It was if they were one mind, one body, one soul.
When she spasmed and he released his essence—her cells adapted. She was glad. Glad that he was the one. Yet she still had enough of the realist in her to hope that now that she’d made the biggest decision of her life, it wouldn’t also turn out to be her worst mistake.
18
KIREK’S PRIMARY mission hadn’t changed, but as he sneaked out of Vansek’s private chamber, using his psi to counteract her automated surveillance system, his muscles protested. Muscles ached that he hadn’t known existed until the sick woman had abused his body with her peculiar tastes.
While he’d tried to check his ego when he’d accepted his hostage status, he couldn’t quite control his rage at what she’d demanded of him. For once, he’d worn her out, and she’d succumbed to sleep before placing him back into physical restraints, giving him his first opportunity to return to Drik’s private command post.
Putting Vansek’s deviant behavior aside was close to impossible, but for the sake of all those Kirek had left behind, he tried. With every step deeper into the residence, his heart beat a run-and-escape tattoo against his ribs. The last time Drik’s men had caught him, the punishment had left physical scars that would heal—he wasn’t so certain about the mental ones. Yet he’d endured.
However, most assuredly, if Drik caught him again, next time the consequences would be worse than Vansek’s depravity—although Kirek couldn’t imagine much worse than he’d already suffered. Yet, despite the risk to his body and spirit, he had to return to Drik’s private office. He’d overheard a guard talking about extra security and hoped that meant more sophisticated computer systems—not additional brawn.
Physically, he would never have enough strength to take on mature Endekian guards, but in his weakened state, he feared he might resort to using his psi powers to defend himself—powers that, so far, he’d kept secret.
Naked, Kirek traipsed through the maze, his presence unquestioned. Anyone who saw the welts on his body hastily looked away. To encourage his deception that he was on a mission for his mistress, he kept his head bowed, his eyes downcast, his shoulders hunched. It was no problem to limp or to flinch as he passed other people as if fearing he’d be struck.
Despite his trembling, despite breaking into a panicked sweat, he forced himself back to Drik’s command post. Two burly guards stood in front of the door. One spied Kirek, and neither his nudity, nor his scars, nor his demeanor made a difference. The Endekian’s hand reached for his stunner. Kirek attacked, at the same time putting all the strength of his psi into his shield. For beings born in real space, a psi shield wouldn’t have sufficed as a good defense. But Kirek had been born in hyperspace.
When the stun struck Kirek’s shield, the force reflected back on the guards—like a mirror reflecting light. Luckily for them, his shield dispersed the effect, and they didn’t receive the full force of the stun as he would have if his shield hadn’t protected him.
Wide eyed, mouths open, the Endekian warriors dropped to the floor, struck from the ricochet of their own discharged weapons. Kirek kicked the weapons aside and used his psi once again to open the lock to the command post and nullify the alarms. Sweat pouring off his chest, lungs pumping, Kirek dragged first one heavy Endekian into the room and then the other. Scooping up their weapons, he placed them close by, hoping after the stun wore off and the guards awakened that they wouldn’t remember what had happened. His other choice—killing them—went against his moral objection to taking life, except in self-defense. In addition, he knew that his captors would not look kindly on such an act.
Knowing his time was limited before their superior noticed the guards’ absence, Kirek booted the computer system, unsurprised to find more locks and encryption since the last time he’d been here. Quickly he bypassed the codes, aware that each passing second could be his last one of freedom.
Finally. He was in.
Ignoring the temptation to send a message home to his parents, a communiqué that might be detected and lead to his recapture, he sorted through the files in search of information pertaining to glow stones and Rystan and missing inventory. If the Endekians didn’t have all the glow stones they’d stolen from Rystan, who did have them?
Kirek perused file upon file. The Endekians had first invaded his home world many years ago, and the vast number of records staggered him. The resources the Endekians had committed to the project had almost bankrupted their world. But why? Why did they want the stones? What did they do with them? Where were they now?
One of the guards he’d dragged inside moaned. Kirek set the stunner’s beam on the lowest setting, aimed, and fired. The guard made no further noises. But the distraction had cost him precious seconds.
Again he dug into the files, his mind sorting, looking for connections, seeking a reason behind the invasion and subjugation of his world. The glow stones were the key.
Finally he found a clue in a treatise written by an Endekian university professor who’d speculated that the glow stones worked on the same subatomic frequencies as a wormhole. Wormholes were simply tunnels where space curved in upon itself.
Kirek’s own teachers had suggested he think of space like a three-dimensional blanket. Where the folds touched, wormholes could provide a shortcut between two distant coordinates. Kirek thought of spatial dynamics in simpler terms. Instead of going over the mountain, a wormhole was the tunnel through it.
Before hyperspace travel, scientists had theorized that wormholes might be the best way to functional space travel. However, wormholes were submicroscopic. So people and glow stones would never fit into the hole—unless a way had been found to enlarge and stabilize them. To accomplish such a task, the wormhole would have to be propped open by an exotic substance that had an outward pressure equal to a neutron star. The ends of the wormhole would have to be located where one wanted to go to and fro. The idea had proved impractical and remained pure theory.
The Endekian professor had gone on to suggest that a glow stone’s explosion might disrupt a wormhole—since they shared certain scientific parameters—by tearing the fabric of space-time apart on the subatomic level. He’d speculated such an explosion would cause space to implode and the wormhole to collapse onto itself.
Interesting.
Were the Endekians following up on the seemingly obscure theory? But why were they devoting enormous resources to the project? The Endekians were infamous for their warlike natures—not scientific study.
Obviously, Kirek had yet to find all the pieces, but the implications worried him. If the Endekians were trying to blow up a wormhole, they had to be concerned about what was coming through. Since no Federation world had the kind of advanced technology to create and maintain a wormhole, the threat had to come from outside the Federation—and if that were the case, why had the Endekians kept their endeavor to collapse the wormhole a secret?
Kirek copied the pertinent file and searched through the rest of the data, pulling out the most arcane references to glow stones. Knowing that what he did next would undoubtedly cause his recapture, he sent all his information to Mystique, marking the data “most urgent.”
As he suspected, moments after he employed the com systems, Drik and his elite guards barged into the command center. Although he’d expected them, he still couldn’t stop his nerves fr
om jumping.
His weapon aimed at Kirek’s chest, the guard in charge shouted, “Move away from the con. Keep your hands up where I can see them.”
Kirek lifted his arms over his head and stepped away from the con. Drik frowned at the unconscious guards then at the compromised computer system. “How did you avoid setting off the alarm?”
Kirek took a stab in the dark. “Did using glow stones to close the wormhole work?”
Drik shook his head in disgust. “Revealing that knowledge was stupid. Now I’ll have to kill you.”
Kirek’s mouth went dry. Even knowing his actions might cause his death, he’d had no choice. Still, he’d rather live. “My death won’t stop the truth from getting out. I’ve already sent the data to Mystique.”
“That’s where you’re wrong.” Drik approached him with a scowl. “Since our computer system couldn’t stop you last time, I decided not to rely on it again.”
“You’re saying the data I found is false?”
“I’m saying your communication didn’t go past our hyperlink system. We intercepted your message.”
“CAPTAIN.” VAX JOINED Xander and Alara the next morning in their pocket beneath the plants. Vax spoke quickly and kept his voice low to prevent Shannon from overhearing, since she remained only a few body lengths away with Cyn. “Shannon’s too sick to go on. She can barely turn her head.”
Xander had known the Terran was ill, but every jump in space had caused her to deteriorate more quickly. Without a trained healer, with no communications and no supplies, he could do nothing for her. Although he never forgot that millions of beings would die of the same disease if his mission failed, watching Shannon’s decline increased his frustration and weighed heavily in his heart.
“We aren’t leaving her behind.” Alara spoke heatedly, defending the woman who came from a race that had killed her parents. Xander couldn’t have been more proud of her. “If we must, we’ll carry her. She doesn’t weigh—”
“Captain,” Vax interrupted her. “There’s something else.”
“Yes?”
“Clarie’s gone, again.”
“What do you mean he’s gone? He couldn’t have wandered away through these plants. As little as he is, he’s still too large to twist his way through.”
“Maybe he transported away, just like he did when he brought us here,” Alara suggested.
Vax looked from Alara to Xander as if he believed Alara had lost her mind, but Xander thought she might be onto something. “Alara may be right. Ever since we found Clarie—”
“Maybe he found us,” Alara suggested, her ideas clearly skipping ahead.
“We’ve traveled in a manner I can’t explain.” Vax’s brows narrowed. “Clarie’s always around during the process, first during the journey from the ship to Lapau, then from Lapau to Saj.”
“And Clarie’s pet, Delo, glows during the transport as if he’s a power source,” Alara added. “I wish I could read Delo’s DNA, but he’s blank to me. At first, I thought he was a holopet but now . . .”
“Now,” Xander thought out loud, “we have to find a way to that mountain and search for the Perceptive Ones, and Shannon isn’t up to such a strenuous trek.”
Shannon limped into the tiny area, helped by Cyn. “We Terrans have a saying. If Mohammed can’t go to the mountain, then the mountain should come to Mohammed.”
“Who is Mohammed?” Vax asked.
“That’s not the point,” Shannon snapped as Cyn carefully helped her to sit with her back propped against the plants for support.
Xander shot her a look carefully devoid of pity, wishing he could offer her food or water. He didn’t like the look of her pinched lips that indicated pain or her delicate skin that appeared too thin. “Do you mean the mountain should come to us?”
“You’re taking her too literally.” Alara nodded at Shannon as if she understood. “She means we should leave our bodies again and explore with our minds. Why waste time trekking when we can soar?”
“Good idea.” Xander should have thought of the option himself. But after spending most of his adult lifetime thinking that leaving his body was cowardly, he had difficulty believing in the usefulness of his skill.
“I don’t like you leaving without me,” Vax argued.
Xander clapped Vax on the shoulder. “I need you to protect our bodies.”
Vax snorted. “From what?”
Xander didn’t answer. Instead, he knelt by Shannon. “Can you hold on a little longer?”
“Find a cure, Captain.” Shannon held his hand, her grip weak. “It may already be too late for me, but I’d like my grandkids to live.”
At Shannon’s words, Alara looked away, but Xander caught sight of her eyes brimming with tears. “We’ll do our best.”
“Count on it,” Alara added.
Xander lay on the ground and motioned for Alara to lie beside him. She’d been so exhausted after leaving her body last night that he hated to ask her to repeat the experience so soon, but she joined him without hesitation.
Still he had to ask, “Ready?”
“Yes.” She interlocked her fingers with his, and he couldn’t think of anyone he’d rather have at his side.
Since he had more experience in astral extension, he altered his mental state more quickly, but didn’t have to wait long for her to join him. Today was another sun-filled day. With no clouds in the sky and no wind, the planet seemed devoid of life—except for the woman at his side who vibrated with energy and determination. Together they soared toward the mountain and the straight ridge he’d noted yesterday.
Out-of-body extension had distinctive advantages. When they reached the portal similar to the one on Mystique’s Mount Shachauri, a stone door with the sign of the Perceptive Ones’ symbol carved into it, they passed right through the physical barrier. They needn’t fear falling off the mountain or a strange animal threatening them. Their bodies were safe.
Now what? Alara’s thoughts entered his mind as she floated down a long stone hallway. Right angles delineated where walls met floor and ceiling, signifying this was no natural formation. Although no sunlight penetrated, their auras lit the way and they could “see.”
Let’s follow it into the mountain, he suggested.
Didn’t the entrance on Mystique have machinery? Didn’t bright lights come on when your people entered? Alara asked.
Yes. Perhaps it takes a physical body to trigger those mechanisms. Or perhaps the Perceptive Ones built this complex for other reasons. If Xander had had a neck, he would have sworn the hair on his nape would have been standing up. Something felt . . . wrong, and he tried to figure out what his subconscious was picking up that his mind couldn’t figure out—but he came up with a skinny, paltry zero.
Hey. Alara pinpointed the problem, seemingly with no trouble. This is a dead end.
The passageway simply stopped. It was if someone had ceased tunneling and abandoned the project—only they’d done so neatly. The wall he faced was as smooth as the other walls, floor, and ceiling.
Alara turned to him. Do we go through?
Sure. Perhaps it’s another blockage like the one that led in from outside.
Alara slipped through the rock, and he followed. But they’d eased into solid stone. Despite the fact that he didn’t require air, he felt as if he’d been buried alive. Still, he wouldn’t back out without following through. Let’s proceed a little further.
Do you suppose this journey is creepy because we aren’t used to traveling through solid mass?
Even if I got used to astral extension, it’d still be creepy, he admitted.
Her laughter filled his mind, and they soared right through rock, dirt, and even a tiny cavern. Judging the passage of time was impossible. So was estimating their progress. To him one part of the mountain looked just
like another.
But when they suddenly exited into the air and sunshine of the other side of the mountain, disappointment washed through him. I was so certain we’d find . . . something.
Let’s go back and try again. Maybe we missed a clue.
Her willingness to return inside the cloying mountain impressed him. If we soar around the outside, maybe we’ll spot another entrance.
But after an estimated hour of careful searching, they’d returned to where they’d begun by the first entrance without discovering anything of use. The idea of going back to Shannon with nothing to show for their efforts weighed on him. Are you up for following this same passage again?
Maybe we should go more slowly this time.
The urgency of their circumstances, the lack of food and water, in addition to Shannon’s worsening condition, might have made them hurry. You think we missed something?
Nothing obvious. But maybe there’s a secret entrance. We only flew in the direction the tunnel would have continued if they’d kept tunneling straight ahead.
He caught on to Alara’s idea and followed it to a logical conclusion. Suppose they went left or right and changed direction?
Or up or down? Or diagonally?
Or suppose they went nowhere? The Perceptive Ones might have stopped on this world for just one day over a millennia ago and then moved on for reasons of their own. He kept the discouraging thought to himself.
Since the mission had begun, they’d run into one surprise after another—but all along he’d been aware that the information Ranth had collected from this part of the galaxy was pure theory. Xander and his crew might be on a useless mission—no, he would not think of failure. Not when they had once again entered the cavern. He would focus on the seamless black stone.
Alara floated by the ceiling. I wish I had hands.
Why?
To brush away the dirt and cobwebs.
Keep looking. He tried to sound encouraging, but in truth, her even-tempered spirit was keeping his hopes alive. Last night when she’d adapted to him, for a moment he’d felt as trapped as he did in this airless tunnel. But after she’d given herself to him fully, he admitted to himself that he liked knowing she would always be with him. Alara was intelligent, beautiful . . . and Endekian. But he no longer held that against her. He knew that if there was one planet that would accept a union between them, it was Mystique—a planet where the laws allowed complete freedom, as long as one didn’t harm another. Beings from many planets lived there side by side.
The Ultimatum Page 25