by Amelia Jade
“Dying,” Elin whispered.
A spotlight flickered to life and was aimed out across the darkness of the cavern.
“What the fuck?”
The light had focused on a section of the darkness that crackled and shimmered with an energy that was easy to see with the light playing across it. About five or so feet across, maybe eight feet high with a slight arch to the top, it hung there maybe six inches off the floor.
“Our thoughts exactly,” Elin said, hitting pause. “Miners discovered it, apparently. The stories are jumbled, because not all of them made it out alive. Only the ones who fled right away survived. This time we rigged up transmitters so we could get a live feed of the video as they were down there. We figured it was a cave-in.” She resumed the video. “We were wrong.”
Kallore watched in growing horror as the soldier with the camera approached the void. A flashlight was played across it, revealing not the cavern floor, but a dull, reddish landscape instead. “That’s not the same place.”
Elin didn’t respond. Suddenly something on the other side moved. The soldier turned and ran, but it was too late; whatever it was caught it. The camera jerked around wildly, moving too fast for him to see what it was. Then the video disappeared.
“What was that?”
His mate just shook her head and tapped a few keys. “This is a feed from a soldier farther back.”
He watched again, this time from a different angle as the original soldier approached. They turned to flee, but now Kallore could see the monstrosity that emerged from the gateway. It wasn’t huge, so much as it was more akin to its namesake. A monster.
Glossy black skin covered the humanoid being, though it stretched and flowed in a stomach-churning pattern as the…thing…lunged forward. An appendage stabbed outward, seeming to melt from a club-like weapon into a two-pronged blade. The soldier was impaled and shaken violently.
Kallore had seen death before in its myriad ways. He’d knelt over fallen comrades and watched the last life leave their eyes. Men crying for their mothers and the screams of the mortally wounded as they tried to hold closed their wounds. War was a terrible, terrible foe, and one he’d never truly enjoyed. He enjoyed a good bout with one of his fellows, but those fights had rules, limits, and rarely did anyone die.
But never before in all his life had he watched a being simply rip the life from another. That was what he saw on the screen. A vibrant blue hue was forcefully ripped from the soldier, absorbed into the ugly black being, where it humped its way under the skin. The outline changed, stretching somewhat as the being seemed to grow with the absorption.
Although it was probably half his size, even after it had grown, the thing was clearly much more powerful than any of the humans. He watched as they unleashed their mightiest weapons against it. The shadow-being staggered backward under the onslaught, bits and pieces of its skin shredding. Whatever it was, it was tough. But the soldiers were winning.
“By the gods,” he whispered as a second monster came through the gateway.
And then a third. That was when it grew bad. He saw more and more soldiers have the life stolen from their bodies, the mysterious attackers rippling and bulging all over, their three-clawed feet carrying them forward with ease as they grew slightly with each life absorbed.
A soldier ran forward as he watched, aiming for one of the flanking beings. Kallore gasped as he vanished in an explosion of fire that reached out and wiped out the camera holder as well. The video ended there.
“What the hell was that?” he whispered into the stunned silence that followed.
“I ask myself that every time I watch the video.”
Kallore made his way around the desk, slumping into the chair. “They simply stole the life of those poor men.”
Elin bowed her head. “Yes. They did. That’s what we suspected it was too, though obviously it seemed rather farfetched at first. But in time we’ve been forced to admit it.”
“In time?” He looked up sharply, stabbing a finger at the screen. “How long ago was that taken?”
“Eight months, give or take. Once we sent a heavier armed team, one more well suited to combat into the depths, the Outsiders were nowhere to be found.”
“Outsiders?”
“That’s the name we’ve given to them. They aren’t from our world. That much we know.”
“So what happened next?”
“More of them started to come through. They beat us back at first, but we brought in heavy weaponry, advanced systems, and the like. They were beaten back, though it cost us nearly three hundred lives to do so. We went to their side.” Elin shuddered.
“You were there?” he asked.
“No. But I’ve seen the footage. Heard about it, though I don’t have it here. That stuff was locked away quite tightly. But Kallore…what we saw? Babies. They had huge constructs; four-legged walkers and beings twice your size abounded. We fought, but they were coming forward in overwhelming numbers. Thankfully only the smallest could come through the portal.”
“It didn’t end there, did it?” he asked.
“No. With it clear we were losing, the order was given to deploy a nuclear weapon through the portal, in an attempt to close it.”
He bowed his head. Part of his research and the training Elin had given him had covered the development of bombs, especially the nuclear and H-bomb variants. “Did it work?” He didn’t want to ask the question, but it was necessary. Kallore had to know.
“Sort of. Little of the explosion escaped to our side.”
“That’s good,” he said, perking up.
Elin shook her head. “But the portal absorbed much of the energy, Kallore. It grew, just like the Outsiders did! Do you have any idea how much energy one of those emits?”
He shook his head.
“When they recover, and once the radiation on their side fades, they’ll be able to send through their big units. Walkers the size of your dragons.” Elin sagged, looking the weakest, most defeated he’d ever seen her.
Without thinking about it, Kallore rose and moved back around the desk for a second time. Now though, he put his arms around her, holding her tight without a word spoken between the two of them.
“How long?” he asked, not sure he wanted to know the answer.
“It’s a matter of years. The radiation on their side is fading faster than normal. Not even a decade at most. Then they’ll be back. We can’t fight them, Kallore. Not with any hope of winning.” Her spine flexed in his grip, tightening. “I’ll lay my life down before they get to the civilians, but I fear it will be in vain.”
Her proclamation flared his protective instincts. Nobody was going to harm his mate! Kallore would turn the world to ash before he allowed a single one of those murderous killers near his mate. She was strong, with a strength in her worthy of a dragon, but in the end, her body was still human. They couldn’t stand up to these beings.
They needed him for that. Humanity needed Kallore to save them.
But he couldn’t let them rely on him. Because he would fail them. Like he always did.
Chapter Eight
Elin
Things were going wildly off course with Kallore, and she wasn’t sure how much longer she could fight it.
Every waking moment that he was around, the drive to get closer to him sank its teeth into her. Elin fought it as hard as she could, but even her discipline had begun to crack. A week ago she wouldn’t have thought he’d ever get into her personal space. Then two days ago he’d kissed her on the cheek! Later that day she’d let him wrap his arms around her in consolation after they’d watched the terrible video.
She stared at herself now in the mirror. “You need to get it together, or he’s going to be responsible for you losing this post as well.” Hands smoothed out imaginary wrinkles in her uniform as she stood still, working up her courage. Each day was getting harder, but she hadn’t cracked yet. She told herself today was going to be no different.
Sucking i
n a breath with closed eyes, she shook out her nerves and headed toward the door, both eager and terrified to see Kallore. The hallways were mostly empty, which was no surprise. Despite being termed base commander, she was only in command of a dozen people, two of whom were dragons and one who was a scientist. It wasn’t exactly a prestigious command.
Like usual she beat him to the classroom, a place that was rapidly getting dull and unnecessary. Their lessons had become streamlined and Kallore spent much of his evenings when he wasn’t with her doing research on his own. Truthfully, Elin was running out of ideas of what to do. No physical challenge seemed to bother him, and none of the men she had were willing to fight him anymore, because he always won. Easily. Simply put, Kallore was getting bored, and she had nothing to counter it with.
Bad things always happened when soldiers got bored.
“Morning,” he crowed, sliding through the door with an easy grin on his face, his whitish-blond hair reflecting the tints of pale greens and blues more so than normal.
“You seem rather excited,” she remarked, not feeling the same exuberance, even as her eyes roamed his fit figure. How would his hands feel wrapped around her waist as he held her pinned to the wall?
What? Stop it! You can’t let yourself think about how delicious he is, or how soft his lips felt on your cheek.
Great. Her inner self was turning on her as well.
“What’s wrong?” Kallore asked, stopping short of slipping into a chair and instead settling his broad frame onto the desk itself.
“Oh, nothing,” she replied, cursing herself. Her mask had slipped. Not even five minutes into the day and already he was prying at her inner self, easing through the walls she’d erected, unwrapping her more easily than a present.
Elin felt raw and exposed as he eyed her, electricity in his gaze. She paced back and forth. His head never moved, but those same eyes tracked her from one side to the other, never moving, never wavering. He was locked on to her, and she couldn’t avoid him even if she wanted to.
“You’re lying.”
Of course she was lying. But it wasn’t like she was about to tell him the truth! That would involve revealing her past, and discussing something she’d done her absolute best to stow away, to bury deep down and move past. Of course, the military never seemed to let her do that, but she tried nonetheless.
“You can trust me, Elin,” he said softly.
She stopped and stared at him, hoping the anguish she felt wasn’t showing. Could she? Trust him, that was. Elin most certainly couldn’t trust herself with him. But that wasn’t the same as trusting him, was it? If he knew what was at stake, perhaps things would be better.
It never occurred to her that he might try to fix it.
“I didn’t want it to happen,” she said softly.
Kallore smiled gently, evidently misinterpreting her words.
“I know. You wanted to be out there, fighting the Outsiders and protecting your fellow humans. An admirable goal, truly. The oath you swore upon entering service means a lot to you, something that I’m sure many of your fellows can’t say about themselves.”
Closer to the truth than you know. “That’s not it.” She shook her head. “Well, it is, but that’s not what I meant. Not this time.”
For once the dragon shifter was silent, keeping his mouth closed and letting her do the talking. Elin had no idea why she was trusting him now, or giving him the details into her life. Kallore was just as likely to judge her like all the others had. But her mouth kept moving, the words tumbling forth slowly at first, but picking up speed as she grew in confidence, sharing her story for the first time in years. Just speaking about it helped alleviate some of the pressure she was feeling.
“This happened years ago, back when I was a staff sergeant, not a major.”
Kallore crossed his arms across his chest, the action amplifying the swell of his biceps to a most distracting degree. Elin swallowed and looked away.
“I was approached by a colonel, who requested me as his aide. I thought that was a little unusual, but who was I to argue? At first it seemed like an easy assignment, running his schedule, doing his paperwork, the like.”
She saw Kallore’s eyes brighten as he started to realize where the situation might be heading. The corners tightened swiftly and his eyebrows narrowed, hooding the orbs until they were little more than thin slits filled with rage. His hands slipped down to his sides, knuckles whitening slightly as he clenched the table between his fingers and thumb.
“I’ll spare you the gory details, but he trapped me in the office late one night, and made advances on me.”
The table cracked as the dragon shifter gripped it tightly, forcing him to stand as it fell apart. “Did he force himself on you?” Kallore hissed.
“No,” she said, thankful it hadn’t come to that. “He stopped short of that physically, but he flat out told me that if I denied him, he’d see to it I never went anywhere with my career.”
She could have sworn smoke curled up from his nostril as Kallore steamed in impotent rage. Normally she might have felt scared of such a demonstration from someone as powerful as the dragon, but for whatever reason, his desire to protect her against something that had happened nearly a decade earlier was reassuring. She felt safe, knowing that with him around nobody would ever dare to try such a stunt with her again.
Except Kallore. Although Elin knew if she found herself trapped in the office with him late at night, his shirt pulled tight across his body and his ass looking tight and firm like it always did when she sneaked a peek, that this time she wouldn’t be able to resist. Everything that Colonel Moore had been missing, Kallore had.
“You seem to have defied him,” he observed after several moments of seething fury.
Elin stared at him in surprise. She’d never realized it before, but he was a good man. Honest, straightforward, protective to a fault, and most of all, he believed in her. He’d said so several times. Like now, where he felt that she had earned the title of base commander, not because they’d been shuttling her off somewhere secret on a fool’s errand, but because he genuinely thought she was worthy of the position.
“That’s not true,” she said, feeling the tears she’d fought back so hard start to well up. “Can’t you see, Kal? They sent me here not because they believed in me, but because they want to get rid of me! To send me on what they perceive as a crazy mission. None of them believe what you are, or that you can make a difference. So when I fail, which they know I will, then they’ll have the perfect excuse to demote me or force me out of the service entirely.”
She hung her head in shame. “Which is something I’ve already been thinking of doing. If I weren’t so damn stubborn, I’d have done it ages ago, but now they’ve got me cornered. I don’t know what else to do.”
In an instant Kallore was there, arms wrapped around her, supporting her as she slowly sank to the floor, letting her emotions get the best of her. For so long she’d been strong, holding herself together through sheer force of will. But now, now there was someone there she could trust that would help support her. That wouldn’t shame her if she showed any vulnerability.
Which is exactly why it was so easy for her to get close to him. To ignore all the barriers she’d set up, all the rules she’d written down for herself. If he’d been even an iota less supportive, she wouldn’t have told him anything. But Kallore had been a rock since the moment she met him.
Elin had dismissed him as little more than a cocky asshole who thought he was hot shit, and while he was still all that—though she’d never tell him!—he was more. Beneath the exterior was a caring person who simply wanted what was best for her. It was a foreign feeling to Elin, after so many years of being hyper-aware of every move she made and being forced to consider whether that would come back to haunt her as well.
“I’m proud of you.”
She jerked in his arms, acutely aware of how his muscles felt now that she was curled up into them. “What?”
Elin leaned back so that she could look up at his face. That was the first hint of anything besides confidence in himself that she’d heard. Could there really be a normal person underneath?
Her questions were buried under the weight of his gaze as Kallore’s face rotated to look directly at her. She froze, unable to move, to turn her head away. Instead they looked at each other for a moment that lasted for an eternity, neither one wanting it to end. Her breathing deepened and his lips parted ever so slightly.
This was it, she realized. He was going to kiss her, pushing past the last of her boundaries. The worst part of it all wasn’t that she couldn’t stop him if he tried, but that Elin wasn’t sure she wanted him to. If he lowered his lips to her, she was going to kiss him back. All of her self-worth, pride, and reputation would be shot if she did, but there was no denying the fire that burned brighter within her when he was around. The way they fit together as a perfect team.
In the end though, he didn’t make a move. Elin recovered and looked away. “I’m sorry,” she said, slipping out of his grip before he could try anything more.
Kal didn’t fight her though, he simply rose to his feet with her, maintaining a distance. His face looked pained and she knew then that it had taken a lot out of him to not kiss her.
“I understand.”
With one last wistful glance her direction, he walked out of the room, giving her the space she needed at the moment to deal with her emotions.
Elin slumped against the wall again, but this time she found a chair. Sinking in to it, she pulled her knees up to her chest and buried her face in them. What was she going to do? Stick to her guns and the plan, keeping Kal at an arm’s length or more? Or would she inevitably cave and give in to her other desires, both carnal and of the heart?
Ten years. Ten long years she’d kept every male at bay, unwilling to let even one of them have a smidgen of power over her, lest she find herself with another Colonel Moore on her hands. Some of them had likely been good men, but Elin hadn’t allowed herself to find out. Her defenses had been ironclad, to the point that some of the men thought she was into women.