Stepping over the gleaming golden blade her fellow Protector had tossed to safety, Sugar saw Lake barely hanging onto the cable. She ran to the open elevator doors and jumped to the ladder on the wall. She reached out and gripped his shirt to stop him from falling.
“Protector Sugar?” Her body strained to hold on to him, but Protector Lake knew his fellow blade would never let go. If both of them fell down the shaft, the Destroyer and the Creator would be alone until new Protector hosts could be found for their sentient blades. He didn’t want that to happen. They’d all waited so long to see the Creator restored.
Protector Lake shook his head as he stared into his would-be savior’s determined gaze. “Let me go,” he begged. “Save yourself so you can guard the Creator. They need your help. Retrieve my blade form after my death and hide it until another host can be found.”
“No. You will not fall to your death. Hang on to that damn cable,” Sugar ordered fiercely. She gently shook his host body back to consciousness. “Wake up and help your blade, Junior. I know you’re in there. Don’t make me kick your beaten-up, bloody ass to prove I’m right.”
Protector Lake called out in shock when the cable he was still holding onto suddenly swung side-to-side under her hand. Sugar’s grip on his shirt tightened, but she didn’t cease the swinging.
“Stop,” he pleaded.
“Here he comes, Rodu. Catch him,” she yelled loudly.
Neither he nor his host body heard Destroyer Rodu answer. His host’s consciousness chose that moment to slip completely away. He energetically chased behind the boy’s essence trying to save what he could of his host’s young life. The blood loss was massive, and there wasn’t much he could do, but he would try. The Creator would want him to try.
“Athena,” Protector Lake whispered as mental darkness swallowed his essence and the essence of the young man who carried him.
Gina was pacing when her father came rushing up the ramp.
“Remove the woman from the cyro tube. Lake needs it more,” Rodu said, holding a bleeding Lake in his arms.
Gina fell to her knees at the sight of Lake’s badly mangled body. “No. No. No,” she said in shock. A firm hand lifted her by the collar of her shirt until she stood once more on wobbly legs.
“We have no time for you to process an emotional reaction, Gina of Rodu. We require your logic and your skills. Act with haste and wisdom to save Lake Allen Wright’s life,” Protector Sugar ordered.
Gina stumbled backward as Protector Sugar lifted the woman from the tube. She’d almost sealed it shut while her father left. It would have been too late to switch patients if she’d done so.
Sugar set the woman on the floor of the airship as she watched. It didn’t even feel wrong, which worried Gina more because it meant her human side was dealing with mental shock. She was already choosing Lake’s life over the woman’s.
“Quickly,” Gina ordered through a dry throat, motioning for her father to lower Lake into the tube. “Roll him. Place him face down. The tube can accommodate that position.”
His back was shredded. In some places, the wounds went nearly to the bone. Her hands shook as she gently pulled the larger pieces of cloth and metal from the wounds. Human bodies were more fragile than Lyran ones. And blood—Lake’s blood was already dampening the bed of the cryro tube. How was she supposed to keep him from dying when his blood loss was so extensive?
As a groan welled up inside her throat and forced its way out, her brain finally kicked into decision-making mode and began to shout mental orders about what to do. She had to stop the blood flow. She could use the small nitro tank to freeze his tissue and cells. She had to seal the wound to keep out infection.
Marta—she needed to converse with her healer sibling and make sure she was taking proper steps.
“I can almost see his spine. What happened to him?” Gina asked quietly as she worked.
But no one answered her question. She glanced up from working on Lake to see her father and Sugar kneeling on opposite sides of the nearly dead woman. An odd thought crossed her mind that the two of them kneeling over the woman looked almost ritualistic. She cringed at her thoughts and put her attention back on Lake as best she could.
“If you truly want this female to continue to live, there’s no other choice,” Rodu said finally, speaking the only thought they both had about it. He held out a hand. “I know the act may also shorten what life she has left if her body rejects the Creator. I will take the responsibility.”
Sugar shook her head. “I agree there is no other choice, but this is my task to do. I know the words. My blade is providing them. And I will do it—just give me a moment to get my head straight about it.”
“Why do you hesitate?” Rodu asked.
Sighing, Sugar glanced up at him. “It is the name Protector Lake called with his last conscious breath. When I picked the blade up from the lobby floor, it showed me some of our history, Rodu. We have the souls of other people living inside of us—or at least the three of you do. They are immortal. We are not.”
Rodu shrugged. “My complete understanding is not critical. What is the real debate here? Her time is running short.”
Sugar waved the blade over the woman’s body. “It was like you suggested. This woman refused the Creator’s request to merge,” Sugar reported. She rolled the vibrating blade over and over in her hand as she pondered what to do. “Lake may die still. The woman may die still.”
“Yes—both are true,” Rodu said.
“No. Lake will not die.” Gina turned from the tube to glare at her father and Sugar. “The bleeding has stopped. There’s a lot of tissue damage and some bone as well. Lake’s body will have to be regenerated, but the process will not take long at his young age. Do not speak of his death within my hearing again or you’ll both be looking for another ride back home.”
Sugar nodded at the glare Gina gave her. “We wish to believe you about Lake living on.”
“Then command those damn beings inside you to help us,” Gina ordered, returning to her task.
Rodu softly cleared his throat. “The woman will not live without the blade. The Creator cannot help us without a host.” “Even if we save the woman’s life, we take away her choice about the blade. She may hate us for it,” Sugar said.
“That would be illogical. She’s already given her life once for the Creator Blade. What you speak of is the only chance the Creator Blade has to pay her back. The woman will not survive the trip home without merging.”
Sugar nodded and held the blade to her forehead. She closed her eyes and spoke softly. “Are you listening to this debate, Creator? My job is to protect you—to protect life as I see fit. The best way I can see to do that is to make sure you have a host. And you’re the only hope this woman has of not dying. I hope neither of you hates me for doing this.”
Sugar’s eyes flashed gold as she held the blade out in front of her. The Protector blade inside her spoke the initialization code, which she repeated aloud. Lights on the Creator Blade started flashing green. A small voice began the countdown. Now there was no turning back.
Gina looked at Sugar in awe. “You spoke Pleiadian. The blade is counting in Pleiadian. When did you learn Pleiadian?”
Sugar smiled without humor. “When I touched the Creator, she passed a lot of knowledge to me. My mind is still sorting it out.”
“If the blades are Pleiadian,” Gina pieced together as she listened. She sprayed Lake’s back with the sealant and then closed the lid to seal the tube. “Then all the discs and plates are Pleiadian.”
Rodu pointed to the blade. “None of that is important at the moment. Do it, Sugar—before it’s too late for it to merge with the host.”
“Do what?” Gina asked. She stood up covered in Lake’s blood. “I only have one tube. I can’t save both of them. I had to make a choice—you made me make a choice.”
With one gleaming arc, Sugar buried the blade deep in the woman’s chest. A brilliant light burst from the embe
dded weapon and had them all covering their eyes.
Screaming in rebellion over Sugar so callously ending what was left of the woman’s life, Gina closed her eyes and groaned in genuine pain. Did Axel know this callous, uncaring side of his mate? This woman had shared his bed and borne his children—this woman who’d just murdered a dying innocent without a shred of remorse.
Gina opened her eyes and blinked to adjust them. What she saw was unlike anything she’d seen before. She moved forward with sluggish steps. Her eyes didn’t know what she was seeing.
Rodu stood and turned to his daughter. “There was no time to debate the matter. This is the initial process of merging with a sentient blade.”
Gina glanced down. As gross as it was, it also relieved her. “So Sugar didn’t stab the woman to kill her?”
Rodu put a hesitant arm around his traumatized daughter. “No. Forcing the merge was the only thing we could do for both her and the Creator Blade. We don’t even know if we got it done in time to save the woman. If not, the Creator will eventually return to its blade form.”
Gina watched long molten strands unfold from a green fluid mass of what looked like live nerves. The nearly invisible strands rose into the air before plunging downward and through the woman’s clothes to disappear somewhere inside the woman’s body. It was bloodless and yet horrific at the same time. “What’s happening to her?”
Sugar grabbed the woman’s shirt where the blade cut it on entry. She ripped the fabric to widen the opening around the merge site. Now they could all completely witness what was happening.
Gina gasped as a golden breastplate started rising to the surface and forming around the woman’s chest and between her breasts. While that was materializing, the laser wound in the woman’s chest was also being closed with green threads coming from the same mass.
“The knife you used to stab her—that was the fourth blade, wasn’t it?”
“Yes,” Sugar confirmed rising from the floor. “In a short while, the blade should take over her body and wake up to talk to us.”
Gina turned to her father. “Is this what happened to you?”
Rodu shrugged. “Sugar and I believe it was the same process for all of us. We saw some of this happening to Lake. Hosts don’t seem to go through the process while awake. The woman will remember none of this.”
Leaning forward, Rodu kissed his daughter’s forehead. “I’m sorry you are suffering because of us, but thank you for keeping her alive until we could make this decision.”
Gina nodded.
After a couple of minutes, she gently pulled away from her father’s arms. “We’re going home while both of them are still with us,” she told them and headed for the pilot’s seat.
11
Marta and her staff were waiting for them in the hangar. Several jogged alongside the cryro tube as they took it away to the medical area. Her father walked across the hangar floor, carrying the still unconscious woman. Sugar followed on his heels.
Gina, as the pilot, was the last to debark. Marta waited at the bottom of the ramp and embraced her as soon as she got close enough.
“Stop hugging me, Marta. I have the blood of two humans all over me,” Gina protested.
Marta leaned back and made a grunting sound. “If it’s not your life force, I’m fine.”
“It is mostly Lake’s,” Gina admitted in a choked voice. “He’s lost so much blood, Marta. I fear his death is close. The being inside him cannot heal him fast enough. There was no energy or signs of life from him before I sealed the tube.”
“Pass the healing burden to me, sister. Let’s not expect the worst outcome until I have brought Lake out of stasis. Besides, Axel is a universal blood donor for humans. We’ll put some of his blood into Lake. Who knows? Perhaps your man will genetically accept Lyran DNA into himself and you won’t have to grieve your affection for a mere human any longer. He’ll be a hybrid like us.”
Gina rubbed her eyes. “This is not a joking matter and Lake Allen Wright is not my man.”
Marta trilled in mirth as she pulled her emotionally exhausted sister along with her as she walked. “Your weaknesses amuse me because you have almost none, Gina of Rodu.”
“I didn’t realize I was so amusing to you, sister.”
Marta smiled. “I find it amusing that you’re brave enough to fly three fierce creatures all over the planet, but not brave enough to face your feelings for an irreverent male. This does not sound like the blunt-spoken scientist I know.”
“I have no feelings for Lake that need addressing,” Gina denied.
“On the contrary,” Marta whispered. “You have an overabundance of feelings and reactions to that male. Like our brother, the only human feeling you have up to now allowed yourself to show to others is anger. Humans have an extensive range, Gina. Father is not typical in his expressions. He is what humans call stoic. I remember Father no other way, but Mother says he was a passionate and highly expressive human for the first five hundred years of his life.”
Gina thought of their discussion when she was trying to save the woman’s life. “He lectured me for having a cryro tube aboard my airship.”
Marta trilled again. “And yet it was fortunate for Lake Allen Wright that you did. I hope you pointed that out.”
“At the time, I was attempting to save the woman. She was dying too.”
“So the woman father carried off the ship is dead.”
“No—she lives still,” Gina said, pulling away. “She is going through what Lake went through when they first brought him here. The woman is merging with the fourth sentient blade.”
“Fascinating,” Marta said. “I look forward to inspecting her. Perhaps I can witness some of the processes.”
“It is not fascinating. It is gruesome,” Gina said. “Sugar and Father both knew she didn’t want her situation.”
“A sentient blade can be refused? That is not how they tell their stories. Sugar expressly said Lake Allen Wright fought his.”
Gina shrugged. “As I understand it, the woman refused to host the sentient being before they abducted her. Yet she hid the blade to keep it from falling into the wrong hands. Sugar forced the fourth sentient blade to save the woman’s life. I watched some of it happen. Calling the blades parasites was not even close. They install themselves in a human cybernetically. I can only imagine how it connects to nerve endings and the brain. It gives me shivers just contemplating all those shared synapses.”
Marta was quiet for a while as they walked along. She finally turned to face her sister again. “I too would have done whatever had to be done to save the woman’s life, Gina. For what it’s worth, Sugar acted rationally in my opinion.”
“Rationality and logic—I have devoted all my years of study to them. Perhaps technological growth is not the indicator of progress Lyrans and humans believe it to be.”
Marta reached out and patted Gina’s shoulder. “I’ll leave the philosophical thinking to you. I’d rather use my energy in practical ways. I’m sorry your clothes got ruined. Put them in the recycler as soon as you can. You look grotesque.”
Gina stopped inside medical and watched Marta rush off to talk to the team working on the woman. Lake was still motionless in the cryro tube, but it would preserve his health enough for them to work on his body later. She looked down at her clothes and saw their condition. She would be nothing but a stressor if her mother arrived and saw her this way.
Reversing her path, Gina left medical to go to her room and change. So much moisture gathered in her eyes that it was hard to see where she was going.
“Everyone is looking for you. Axel is worried about your state of mind. He said you haven’t gone to see the children since you came back. I find that concerning myself.”
“It’s okay. I’m not…” Sugar paused to look for words to explain. “I needed to clear my head before seeing the babies. I didn’t want to bring the energy of this stuff to them.”
“You didn’t kill the woman, Sugar. You saved
her life. I offered to do the initial merge to spare you. Remorse and I are longtime friends. There was no need for you to bear such a burden,” Rodu said, shoving Sugar’s shoulder as he sat down in the chair next to her. “Why are there two chairs here? Do you require company when you brood? I normally do my brooding alone.”
Sugar snorted. “Now you try to be funny. Nyomi is right. Your timing sucks.” She looked at her hands and once again felt the arc of the blade before she drove it home in the woman’s chest. “Turning bad guys to dust has never been a problem for me, but doing this was different, Rodu. I killed the woman’s chance ever to die normally. I gave her to the Creator Blade without her permission. That hugely violates her free will.”
Rodu shrugged. “Even if you hadn’t made that decision, these Lyran machines would have taken the woman’s dying choice from her anyway. Marta would never have let her die. It’s not in my daughter’s nature to do that. Neither she nor her mother has let me die over the years, and there have been many opportunities.”
Sugar nodded absently at Rodu’s explanation. She got it. She understood that everyone made tough decisions once in a while, but she’d never made one quite this large.
The last crazy one she made was in allowing herself to fall in love with Axel. The one before that was venturing into that damn cave to look for a sentient blade.
Now she was sitting between two regeneration cylinders waiting for Lake and the woman they still hadn’t identified to be healed enough to wake up. Thankfully, the oxygen-rich cylinders were cloudy enough that the grisly regeneration process couldn’t be seen easily.
Sugar had also learned from Marta that merging with a blade changed a person’s DNA and even their fingerprints. So much got altered on the flight home that the Lyran ID scanners hadn’t been able to discover who the woman was. Since Rodu had blown up the woman’s purse and belongings when he’d killed her abductors, no one would know anything until she woke up and told them.
Dad Panther (Alien Guardians of Earth Book 3) Page 8