by Diana Palmer
“Like yours.”
“I am not a clone,” he said. “My enhancements are far greater than those of your shipmates. The clones require microcyborgs to augment their physical abilities. I do not.”
“But we used them on you at Ahkmau,” she began.
“Yes, because I was unconscious and my control over my own health was diminished,” he agreed. His eyes narrowed. “But we digress. You recall what Ambassador Taylor said to you at the Altair reception some time ago, that if I attempted to mate with you, I would kill you.”
“Yes, sir. You wouldn’t explain why.”
He reached out and picked up a metal ball sitting on a curved stand. He handed it to her. “Do you know what this is?” he asked.
It was very heavy. She nodded. “Yes, sir, it’s drasteel. It’s the hardest material known to current science. Not even a diamond drill can...pierce...it....”
Her voice slowed down because the commander took it in his hand and literally crushed it with his fingers. Their imprint was left in indentations that caused the ball to be grossly misshapen.
“Now imagine that this was a human body and I had no control over my strength,” he concluded.
Madeline felt the blood drain out of her face. She couldn’t take her eyes away from the misshapen ball.
“My normal strength is three times that of a human male,” he explained. “I cannot control it under certain circumstances,” he added delicately. “I injured you almost fatally on the planet in the Dibella system simply in the act of saving your life, and I was completely in control of myself.”
She began to understand what he was implying. It was devastating. It meant that, even if the interspecies acts in her government and his were revoked, it would make no difference. It wasn’t a cultural problem that separated them; it was a very physical one.
“During the Great Galaxy War,” he said softly, “Hahnson became involved with a Cehn-Tahr female, an outcast. I tried to warn him, but he was infatuated and refused to listen.” His face clenched. “She attempted to mate with him. When she realized what was happening, she called for assistance. If we had not been able to obtain an ambutube, he would have died. She broke his back in the first few seconds.”
She thought she knew Strick Hahnson very well, but she’d never known that about him. Poor man! Poor, poor man!
She looked at Dtimun with new knowledge, with grief and loss.
He felt the intensity of her pain like a blow. He moved away. He went to the window and stared out it, fighting for control.
She understood now. Hahnson was a strong man. If a Cehn-Tahr female could snap his spine in the heat of passion, when she was out of control of herself, what could Dtimun, with his enhanced strength, do to Madeline in similar circumstances?
“Indeed,” he said aloud, having seen the thoughts in her mind. He didn’t turn. “My Clan was affected far more extensively than some of the others. Our...enhancements...make us extremely dangerous. Especially to humans. You have no idea of the modifications we have had to make to protect you. The microcyborgs used in the Holconcom clones had to be restructured to make them inactive when in contact with human flesh aboard the Morcai, and in battle.”
She was feeling worse by the second. In all her imaginings, she’d never considered that their differences were so extreme.
“Your body exudes potent pheromones whenever you look at me,” he said in a subdued tone.
She honestly hadn’t known that it did. “But you shouldn’t be able to smell those,” she protested. “Your olfactory process...”
“My sense of smell is many times more developed than a human’s,” he said. “I have what you would call a vomeronasal organ, a Jacobson’s organ, which processes scent into sensory information. Even from a distance, your pheromones provoke a response which is becoming far more unmanageable by the day. Eventually, it will be beyond my control, unless I can find a way to restrain it.” He did turn now, and his eyes met hers across the room. “I told you once that nothing in the three galaxies is more dangerous than a Cehn-Tahr male when he is hunting. You have become prey. No other male is safe if he comes near you. I would kill Stern, Hahnson, even Komak just for touching you.”
Her breath left her in a rush. It was far worse than she’d thought.
He moved back toward her, stopping an arm’s length away with his hands locked behind his back. “The hunting instinct is involuntary, and purely physical, a shameful and painful legacy of the genetic tampering. It has little to do with emotion,” he added bitterly, and her heart sank because she had hoped...but then she remembered the beautiful woman she’d once seen in his mind.
His eyes narrowed and his face hardened. “Yes,” he said softly. “Deep emotion was involved there. It is not, with you. But make no mistake, a hunting male is capable of any deception to reach his goal. You understand?”
She nodded. She straightened into parade rest. “Yes, sir.” All of it, every tender moment, had been a means to an end.
“That is true,” he said. And he was lying. He forced that thought to the back of his mind. “Perhaps now you can understand why I have tried to distance myself from you.”
“Yes.” She felt a sadness that permeated her very soul. She hadn’t realized how deeply she was involved until now. She looked down, noting idly how very polished his black boots were. “Is there no chemical means of controlling the...behavior?”
“None that ever worked,” he said flatly. “Caneese and I discussed this at length when we were on Memcache. She thinks the prophecy concerns you, but it also involves a child born of a human mother and a Cehn-Tahr father. That is impossible.”
Her heart jumped at the remark. Hopeless yearning came, and went, in her mind. She nodded slowly. “Is it?”
“In four hundred years, no Cehn-Tahr has found a way to mate with a female of any species other than Cularian.”
She looked up. “Four hundred...years?”
“The genetic tampering, and an unprecedented solar flare during the time of experimentation, mutated our life span as well. Our emperor is over four hundred years old,” he told her. “He may live to be eight hundred years old. Our scientists think so.”
She was astonished. Her eyes searched over his face. “Will you live so long?”
“I am two hundred and fifty years old, by your measure of time,” he told her.
“You told us you were eighty-seven,” she burst out, and realized now that it was, like many things he had told the humans, a modicum of the truth. He could live to be hundreds of years old. A human life span was still a little over a hundred years, and many diseases and conditions of old age had not been eradicated. Dtimun would still be young, comparatively speaking, when she died naturally.
She had truly never realized how different their species were until now, when she knew the extent of it. A wave of grief washed over her and was reflected in the eyes that sought his face.
“So many differences,” she said hesitantly.
“More than I can even tell you, some of which have nothing to do with physical dissimilarities,” he returned flatly. “You must know that, under ordinary circumstances, I would never harm you. But my nature is savage, predatory.”
“If Hahnson could do a short-term memory wipe on me,” she began, “and take away the memory of Memcache...”
He touched her long hair, lightly, briefly, and withdrew his fingers at once. “The memory of that one day is all we can ever have of each other,” he said bitterly, the words almost torn out of him. “And removing it would make no difference. Not now.”
Her heart jumped at the unexpected admission. “But you said that the pheromones triggered the behavior,” she said.
“It began because of a mistake I made.” He held up his hand. “One day, perhaps, I can explain it. However, once the mating cycle begins, there is o
nly one way to stop it,” he said with subtle meaning.
She saw the traces of stress in his expression. “Then, perhaps, if you...with a Cehn-Tahr woman.” She tried to put it into words.
“You are the prey,” he repeated simply. “It is not possible to make substitutions, if that is what you are suggesting.”
She bit her lower lip. Talk about impossible situations. The atmosphere in his office was so thick with emotion that it was almost tangible. She didn’t want to think about the loneliness of the years ahead, because her days with the Holconcom had to be numbered, now.
“At least temporarily, they are,” he answered the silent thought. “In the close confinement of a ship in space,” he added with a flash of faint green humor, “it would probably become noticeable quite rapidly if I began to murder male crewmembers who brushed against you in the corridor.”
It took her a minute to realize that he was joking. She looked up and managed a smile. “Maybe I could take vitamins and work out,” she suggested, tongue-in-cheek.
He chuckled softly, despite the gravity of the discussion. “An interesting thought, but it would make no difference.”
“Microcyborgs and massive doses of dravelzium?” she persisted.
His eyes were a deep blue with sadness as he studied her lovely face in its frame of long, waving red-gold hair. “Our technology is not adequate to solve the problem,” he replied. “Many scientists have spent whole careers, covertly, trying. I have kept cells from Hahnson’s bonded consort all this time, in the event that a solution could be had.” He shook his head. “It is unlikely.”
“Edris Mallory will have to replace me on board,” she commented.
He actually groaned aloud.
“Don’t do that, sir. She’s smart,” Madeline protested, “and she knows her job. She just lacks self-confidence.”
“I can never find her when I have a problem with a crewman.”
“She hides. You scare her,” she said. “If you could just temper your attitude a little...”
“My attitude is what it is,” he gritted. “I have never modified it, not even for you.”
She sighed. “How are we going to explain leaving me behind?”
He was wondering the same thing. It was going to be noticeable to the entire base. He hadn’t considered that.
She brightened a little. “Altairian flu is going around,” she said. “I’ll inject myself with a mild case of it.”
“A drastic solution, surely?”
“A mild case,” she repeated. “And then what?”
“And then,” he said heavily, studying her, “we will see if your absence alleviates my symptoms.”
She was frowning, thinking. “Isn’t there really any way to reduce them?”
“Yes,” he said flatly. “Mating.”
She flushed. “Oh.”
He turned and moved around his desk to face her. “You must go back to your lab.”
She met his eyes evenly and tried not to reveal that her heart was breaking inside her body. “Thank you for telling me the truth, sir,” she said. “You know that I won’t repeat anything you told me.”
He smiled gently. “I know. You have never spoken of the fact that I can read your mind in almost three years.”
“It would be nice if I knew how to block that.” She gave him an odd look. “I’ve had some...strange...dreams lately.”
His expression was bland. “Have you?”
“Now, listen here...!”
He held up a hand. “I am not to blame. Perhaps you should refrain from drinking contraband coffee behind Lawson’s back,” he added.
She glared at him. “Coffee is the only pleasure I have in life. I refuse to give it up. He can throw me in the brig for a month. It won’t stop me.”
He chuckled at her determination. “Not much does,” he commented. “I have enjoyed these years with you,” he added, and the smile faded. “Perhaps Caneese can find a way to curtail the worst of the predatory behavior. At least you could return to the Holconcom.”
Something that no scientist in four hundred years had managed, she recalled.
“Yes, but Caneese has a gift for biochemistry,” he replied. “She likes you.”
She smiles. “I like her, too.” She frowned. “Sir, I’m not prying, but it seemed to me that she was closer to you than an acquaintance.”
“She is,” he said quietly, but he volunteered nothing more.
“Does she have a mate?”
“Yes. But she and her mate have been apart longer than you have lived,” he said. “Her eldest son was killed in the Great Galaxy War,” he said with quiet sadness. “She blamed her mate for that.”
“I’m so sorry,” she said gently. “She’s such a nice person.”
He searched her eyes. “It occurs to me that I have shared more of my private life with you than with anyone in recent memory.”
She smiled. “It’s because I’m a clam.”
His eyebrows arched in query.
“A small crustacean with a shell that it closes under threat,” she lectured. “A metaphor for the ability to keep secrets.”
“I see.”
She shrugged and her eyes twinkled. “Besides that, you trust me.”
He smiled. “Perhaps I do.” His eyes narrowed. “But you should not trust me. And this is the last time we must ever be alone.” His hand moved to the mute sphere and deliberately deactivated it, at the same time he opened the door.
“Yes, sir.” She gave him one last look and moved to the door. The weight of the sadness was growing.
“Life is not fair,” she commented.
“No,” he agreed. “It is not.”
She wanted to wish him well, to say goodbye, to say anything. But she couldn’t manage the words. She went out and closed the door behind her without looking back.
She walked away, oblivious to Komak’s concerned gaze. He started toward the commander’s office, but hesitated when he heard the crashing of ceramics and the muted, building growls coming from inside. What he had to say could wait a few hours, he decided, turning away. Or a few days.
He frowned as he considered the way Madeline looked. This part of her history was sad. He knew the monumental obstacles in the way of what she felt for her commanding officer. He wanted to comfort her. But things had to move at their own pace. He couldn’t risk interference. Not yet, at least.
* * *
MADELINE WALKED OFF the Morcai, and caught a skimmer to the medical center. She walked blindly into her own office. She’d been able to keep her chin up in the commander’s office, but the full weight of what he’d revealed to her was crushing.
“Oh, good, you’re back,” Edris Mallory said with a kind smile. The smile faded. “Dr. Ruszel...?” she added, worried.
“No calls for a few minutes, Edris,” Madeline said huskily and with a wan, forced smile.
“Yes, ma’am.” Mallory saluted and went back out.
She was nice, Madeline thought as she powered the door shut, and locked it. She pushed a button on her desk and activated her own white screen, to thwart any probing vids. Then she sat down behind her desk, laid her cheek down on her forearm and dissolved into tears for one of the few times in her entire life.
She wished she had someone to talk to about it. She didn’t have a close friend. Well, Stern and Hahnson were close friends, but how could she talk to them about a situation that was potentially a death sentence if they let something slip?
She slid back the sleeve over her wrist scanner and injected herself with a nonlethal form of Altairian flu. The symptoms, gratefully, presented immediately. She allowed herself to slump to the floor, buzzing Mallory on the way down. Unethical, she told herself. Necessary, her mind replied.
Edris came in and gasped wh
en she saw her commanding officer on the floor. “Ma’am! What happened?” Lieutenant J.G. asked worriedly.
“Don’t know. Some sort...of quick-acting virus, probably,” she whispered. “We had that Altairian in here yesterday with flu...” She let her voice trail off suggestively. She was sicker than she ever remembered being. Lovely, lovely sickness that would save her from the ordeal of being around Dtimun, longing for something she now knew was impossible.
“I’ll call Dr. Hahnson at once,” Edris said, and scampered.
* * *
“ALTAIRIAN FLU,” HAHNSON PRONOUNCED with a strange glance. “Funny how quickly you caught it.”
“Isn’t it?” she asked, so weak she could barely speak. “I felt fine earlier.”
“I know. We’re supposed to lift in two hours,” he added quietly.
“Obviously, I won’t be lifting with you, except in an ambutube,” she said in a weak attempt at humor. “You’ll have to take Edris.”
“No!” he groaned.
“Mallory may be young, but she’s good.”
“She flunked out of combat school with the lowest grade in academy history,” he exclaimed.
Madeline gave him a droll look. “She isn’t going to be asked to shoot people. Just to treat them. Cehn-Tahr people. Or if we get the opportunity, Rojok people. She won’t get in your way. And it isn’t as if it’s the first time she’s gone with you.”
He grimaced. “The old man won’t like having a substitute.”
She closed her eyes. “Well, we don’t have a choice—it’s Mallory or nobody. Cularian specialists are thin on the ground. Our substitutes are on a training mission themselves. There is no one else.”
“I suppose so.”
She pushed the comm switch next to the examination table. “Mallory, in here on the double,” she said in what she hoped was a commanding tone.
Mallory came in seconds later, flushed and worried. “Yes, ma’am?”
“You have to go with the Holconcom,” she said.
Mallory flushed even more and started to argue.