“Extend to every Federation library,” Dora added, and Zical realized that her knowledge of computer systems would be useful during the journey he was about to begin. Dora had capabilities no human had. She was smart and had an intuitive knowledge of machinery that he couldn’t discount. The golden light had zapped him twice, yet he hadn’t noticed the pattern contained within the vibrations that had led Dora to unravel the ancient message. Without her, there would be no mission.
However, no intelligent starship captain would take someone so new to life, so inexperienced, aboard a spaceship for such a long journey into unknown space. Most people couldn’t cope with the strain, the loneliness, the boredom. Dora could easily fall apart under that kind of pressure. A short while ago, she’d had trouble leaving her room. She could have trouble getting along with others in such close quarters. She might not adapt to life in space, and that could cause a loss of lives besides her own. Earlier, she’d forgotten to use her psi to filter the air. In space, lapses like that could be fatal. Despite the fact that she could be very useful, he needed experienced, space-hardened people.
And he certainly didn’t need Dora’s kind of distraction. With everything on his mind, he shouldn’t be noticing the tremble of her lip after he’d spoken harshly. Or how she’d flinched, then pretended not to care. Or the enticing curve of her hips and the natural sway of her breasts as she walked beside him.
No, he’d have enough on his mind without Dora along to constantly remind him that she embodied every physical trait he admired in a woman. The combination of her perfect body and her emotional vulnerability might cause him to make mistakes they couldn’t afford.
Ranth spoke calmly. “A complete library search will take some time and be expensive.”
“Do it,” Zical ordered, knowing Tessa would gladly authorize the expense out of the family finances. Sometimes having a rich family was convenient. At a time like this, their vast wealth might mean the difference between the survival and the end of the Federation.
Zical wished he could castigate himself, tell himself that he was exaggerating the menace. But he couldn’t stop the inner conviction that if the Perceptive Ones had gone to such trouble to build this elaborate complex, then the Zin were a formidable enemy.
Dr. Laduna joined them, his gills flaring with concern. “I would like to volunteer my services to the effort.”
“I appreciate your selflessness. The journey will be long and hard.” Zical noted that the scientist didn’t so much smile as preen, his eyes sparkling like green ice. “If you could see who among those working here might also be willing to make the difficult journey in the name of science, I’d be grateful.”
The scientists most knowledgeable about the Perceptive Ones were already on Mystique, studying the find. Hopefully, enough would volunteer so they wouldn’t have to wait for more offworlders to arrive before they left on the mission. Logic told Zical the Sentinel might take years, perhaps decades, even a century to return from its post, but the sense of urgency that Zical had felt ever since he’d entered the complex had increased, almost as if he sensed the Zin, thriving and hearty and warlike, waiting on the galaxy’s border for the right moment to attack.
Had he given them their moment?
“THANK YOU ALL for scrambling to get here so fast.” Zical greeted Vax, his friend and first officer, in the conference room Kahn had reserved for their use. The formal room had the finest communication system and priority access to Ranth. Food and drink from any of a hundred Federation worlds was available as well as a gorgeous view of the flowering garden of which Tessa was so proud.
During the months since Zical had climbed Mount Shachauri, his crew had scattered all over Mystique. Vax had been helping his aging parents settle on the northern continent. During the last years of the relocation, none of his crew had taken much personal time as they’d flown mission after mission to transport their people from Rystan to Mystique. Like many others, during the Endekian war, Vax had lost a wife and a brother. Perhaps Zical and the warrior had bonded over their grief and similar circumstances, perhaps they would have kept one another’s company during peaceful times, but their shared combat experiences had created a bond as tight as one of blood.
Zical had risked his life for Vax several times, and the Rystani warrior had returned the favor. For a trip to the edge of the galaxy, he’d prefer no other man at his side. He trusted Vax’s judgment to make the right decision during the times Zical wouldn’t be at the helm.
Yet, this journey would be made up strictly from volunteers. However, Zical suspected that he need merely ask, and Vax would be there at his side.
Despite Zical’s urgency to begin his mission, he also cared about his crew and took the time to greet each one properly. If Vax refused the commission of second-in-command, his reason would be due to prior family commitments. His parents had taken the loss of their eldest son hard. “How are your folks?”
Vax grinned. “Mom’s starting an import-export business and enjoying herself.”
“And your father?”
“Dad’s always fishing.” Vax’s grin faded. “On the skimmer flight, Ranth briefed me. Count me in.”
Zical’s heart lifted with joy that he hadn’t even had to ask. He simply nodded. “I won’t hold you to your words until you hear more.”
“I won’t be changing my mind,” Vax promised.
As Zical moved on to greet Cyn, a green-skinned engineer from Scartar, he realized how much he counted on his people to agree to join him. The mission would be difficult enough without an untried crew who hadn’t had time to gel.
Cyn strode into the briefing room, her queenly posture impressive. But her skills as an engineer were what Zical valued. She’d pulled off the impossible more times than he could count, coaxing her engines to perform when they’d purple-lined and by all specs should have exploded.
She broke into a wide grin of greeting. “About time you called us back together, Captain.”
Unlike the rest of his crew, Cyn had a full family of parents, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles back on her homeworld, Scartar. Of all his officers, she was the most tight-lipped. However, rumors flew that she could croon a sweet lullaby to her engines.
“Agreed,” Shannon Walker, a diminutive Terran and his communications officer, clapped Cyn on the shoulder and joined them. A widow and a grandmother many times over, she’d told her brood that the sign of a good parent was to make certain one’s children no longer needed them. Since she was too young not to see the galaxy, she’d taken one of the first ships off Earth to study at a Federation school. The oldest and newest member of his crew, she’d fit in with ease.
“Did you make a visit back to Terra?” Zical asked her, holding out his hand to shake hers in the Terran custom.
She grabbed his hand, then tugged him close for an embrace. “We had a reunion on Flagonna.” She grinned, her eyes sparkling at her memories of the luxury vacation planet. “The grandkids had a blast in zero-g swimming pools, and my kids are finally learning to use their suits. A few are considering colonizing Ketric Prime. I love seeing them all, but I love leaving them, too.”
Every one of his officers had volunteered, but Zical wanted to make sure they understood. His gaze took in Vax, Cyn, and Shannon. “Ranth has briefed you, but I want to emphasize to you all that this could very well be a one-way trip. We don’t yet know where to find the Sentinel but suspect the ancient machine is out on the galaxy rim, out farther than we’ve ever been.”
“Even in hyperspace, the trip will take centuries,” Cyn figured out loud.
“We’re hoping to sling our ship around the Osarian black holes to increase our speed. As far as we know, we’re going deeper into the gravity well than anyone’s ever done. The hull may not stay together. We don’t know what effect traveling at such speeds in hyperspace will do to us. More importantly, the journey home will take all of those centuries you mentioned because the probability of finding two black holes so close to one another t
o shoot us home is next to nil.”
His crew’s expressions didn’t change. From Ranth’s briefing, they’d already figured out the basics for themselves.
“Even if we can find the Sentinel, we have no idea if we can communicate with it or how to send it back. The mission is full of unknowns—yet might be critical to the Federation’s survival.”
“Captain,” Shannon asked. “Do we know if the Zin are still out there?”
He shook his head. “Tessa has agreed to supply a ship with our best technology, and I’m recruiting scientists who specialize in the Perceptive Ones. I’m pleased that the Jarn specialist Dr. Laduna has agreed to head up the detail.” Zical paused, letting the facts sink in. “As we journey farther away from home, communications, if they work at all, will take years, possibly decades or centuries, even at light-year speeds of hyperspace. We have no idea what kind of resistance we will meet along the way. We are venturing into the unknown.”
“Sounds like fun,” Shannon quipped. “Where do we sign up?”
As all of them stepped forward and bravely placed their retinal scans onto the vidscreen, confirming their willingness to put their lives on the line, Zical vowed to do his best to bring them back—even if it took centuries. No man had ever set forth on a journey with a more courageous and skillful crew. He was proud to call each of them friend, prouder still that they so willingly risked their lives for the good of those staying behind.
However, with their loyalty and courage came a huge responsibility, for their safety, for the completion of this mission. As captain, his job required him to make certain that their sacrifice would not be in vain.
“YOU AREN’T GOING.” Zical strode into Dora’s quarters, his jaw set at a commanding angle, his tone authoritarian, his eyes searching hers.
After the family meeting where a plan to attempt to contact the Sentinel had been implemented, with Zical in charge of the mission, Dora had expected to have time to plead to go along. However, hours of strategy that continued through a noisy meal had left Dora and Zical no time for private conversation. Afterward Zical had met with Ranth and his crew.
She didn’t want to speak to him now, either. Not in the mood he was in. Knowing she would annoy him and hoping he’d leave, she disregarded his statement. “I thought you’d come to see me to pay up.”
“Excuse me?”
“You owe me a kiss.” In light of the serious situation, her request seemed inappropriate, just as she’d intended.
But Zical didn’t get angry as she expected. Instead, he closed the distance between them in three long, predatory steps. She’d provoked him one too many times. At the hungry look in his eyes, her pulse spiked in anticipation.
Finally.
He was going to kiss her.
She attempted to keep the eagerness from her face. She didn’t care that she’d manipulated him, provoked him, preyed on his emotions. She’d waited too long for this moment.
He was going to kiss her.
Roughly, his large hands grabbed her shoulders, jerked her to his chest, and she tilted back her head to gaze into eyes blazing with desire and vexation. Oh my. She’d often wondered what it would be like to have his full attention. Now, she knew. Wondrous excitement churned in her heart.
Seriously. He was going to kiss her.
Dora had monitored the birth of a star, spectacular eclipses, the rise of civilizations. But nothing had prepared her for the thrill of standing within the circle of Zical’s arms, while his hands clasped her shoulders with fierce need, and her breasts pressed against his powerful chest as she waited for her first kiss.
“I always pay my debts.”
Her knee had to pick that moment to buckle, but with a stray psi thought, she stiffened her suit and barely tottered. She thought he might be rough, but he lowered his head with a tender slowness, giving her every opportunity to change her mind.
Like that would happen.
Inhaling the scent of his tangy breath, she refrained from rising onto her tiptoes and savored the fact that he was coming to her in his own rough-hewn fashion. Ah, this was one of the reasons she’d so much wanted to be human, to experience the senses that fed the emotions that—
His lips caressed hers.
Oh my, goodness. The touching was wondrous. Quiet softness contrasted with the loud thuds of her heartbeat. He took his time, and the warmth of his mouth raked hers, heat slipping and sliding into her core, raising her temperature until a fever raged and erotic shivers trembled down her spine.
THIS WAS SO much better than she’d imagined.
Delightful.
Delicious.
Decadent.
She parted her lips, welcoming his tongue and the taste of full-bodied masculine heat. By the Stars! Until now she hadn’t understood how she could feel fire and ice together, in the same moment. She hadn’t believed that every last sizzling cell in her body could be electrified, or how that energy could wrap her in a sensual cocoon of crisp and tangy desire. She hadn’t understood that one kiss would make her want so much more.
More kisses.
More touching.
More Zical.
Kissing Zical was like all the stars in the universe shining on her at once. She glowed from the inside out with a happy, uncontainable thrill that she would never forget. She wound her hands around his head, threaded her fingers into his thick dark hair, pressed her chest against his, and reveled in her first kiss.
She who had spent her life in a parched desert of circuitry was suddenly drowning in lustrous, gleaming, torrid … life.
She lost all sense of the passage of time. Closing her eyes, she focused on only him, their fused lips, their breaths mingling, his heart beating next to hers, creating a current of spice and a tide of bracing need. His kiss was so much more than she’d dreamed that she couldn’t quantify, analyze, assess. Not with her senses spinning madly out of control. Not with her blood roaring in her ears. Not with the wonder of finally being exactly where she wanted to be—in his arms.
When he broke the kiss to draw a ragged breath, she opened her eyes, searched his face, but she’d no idea that she would see surprise mingling with regret.
“What’s wrong?” she murmured, and attempted to tug his head back down to where they could kiss, again and again.
“You still can’t come with me.”
She allowed him to see a small smile. “If I thought I could change your mind with a kiss, I wouldn’t know you very well, now would I?”
His eyes narrowed. “What are you up to?”
She giggled. “You believe that just because I enjoy kissing you I have ulterior motives?”
“Absolutely.”
He grasped her wrist, pulled her hand from behind his head where she’d threaded her fingers through his hair, and stepped back.
She sighed. “Ah, you give me too much credit.” Or perhaps himself too little. “I wanted to experience a kiss. Now I have.”
“And?”
“Your kiss was wonderful—just as I’ve always suspected. You are a very passionate man.”
“You are a passionate woman—but not the one for me.” Zical tightened his lips, and a muscle in his neck ticked. He waited a moment for her to argue. She didn’t.
Rystani men were strong, proud creatures who didn’t bend easily. Although she could have given him a dozen arguments to take her along, he would be closed to her words. “I can see your mind is set.”
“You accept my decision?”
Hell, no. “Do I have another choice?” She gazed at him, keeping her eyes downcast, her face demure, then wondered if she was overacting. Surely he wouldn’t believe she could be so pliant and meek? But he appeared only a tad suspicious, no doubt seeing what he wanted to see.
He really should have known better.
Chapter Eight
DORA HADN’T BEEN human long enough to collect many objects that meant anything: a holovid of her and Tessa, another of their entire family, and her link that permitted direct
access to Ranth. Tessa had taught her that Federation credits might not be accepted currency everywhere, so Dora had stocked some luxury items that might be of use for barter.
Traveling on a starship didn’t allow much room for baggage, but since Dora didn’t have much to pack, she was finished before Tessa breezed into her quarters. Her friend brought a coffee mug and a platter of Miri’s home-baked chocolate chip cookies, a Terran delicacy that Dora had come to appreciate as much as Tessa. The scrumptious scent usually made her mouth water. Too nervous to eat, she knew she wouldn’t be able to swallow a bite until she’d divulged her secret.
Tessa took one look at Dora and set down both coffee and cookies. “What’s up?”
“I’ve deceived you.”
“Okay.” Tessa shot her a searching look. “I’m sure you had a good reason, but even if you didn’t, I want you to know that no matter what you’ve done, I love you.” Tessa’s gaze shifted to the packed bag, then back to Dora. “Whatever you’ve done, don’t ever forget that you have a family, you belong with us, and it’s very human to make mistakes. You don’t need to leave. We’re here for you.”
At Tessa words, Dora throat clogged with those horrible tears and her nose turned all stuffy. She sniffled, hating the idea of leaving her very best friend, a friend who gave love so unconditionally. “Thanks.”
The two women hugged, and Dora praised her lucky circuits that she had such a dear friend. She was going to miss Tessa.
Tessa broke their embrace and slugged down half her mug of coffee. “Enough of the mushy stuff. Fess up.”
Dora paced, her hands loose by her side. “Although I always wanted to be human, I also liked being a machine.”
Tessa frowned. “You want to go back? Is that possible?”
“I don’t want to go back, and it’s a good thing because it’s not possible. My brain is integrated on a cellular level and can’t be disconnected.”
“Sorry. I shouldn’t have interrupted. Go on.”
Rystani Warrior 02 - The Dare Page 11