Chapter 13 #2
I always wondered how Ruk got his hands on a squadron of Hive scouting ships.
I wouldn’t put it past Commander Helion to give Ruk whatever he wanted if it meant getting his hands on Hyperion DNA.
I had a feeling I wasn’t the only I.C. operative Doctor Mersan had included in this experiment.
Ruk’s savage nature must have been enough to activate the beast inside me in some kind of crossover effect. One monster to another.
Adrian grinned at me over her shoulder, completely unconcerned for her life. “Nice claws. You didn’t have those last time Kovo checked on you. Did you? Have them before, I mean?”
“I did not.” I’d felt my fingertips tingling on more than one occasion the last few weeks. Usually when I was angry or upset. Now I knew why. Claws. I wondered if they could tear through a ship’s hull the way Ruk’s could.
“Those aren’t Atlan, are they?”
“No.” No, they were Hyperion. Royal Hyperion. From one of the oldest and purest bloodlines on their planet. Prince Ruk, as I understood things, didn’t even wear armor in battle. His skin was so tough he didn’t need it. Not even to fight the Hive.
“So, Helion lied to the guys? He said you had some dormant Atlan DNA turning on, and that was activating an internal beast like the Warlords have.”
“I do not know why this is happening to me.” Were all human females so talkative? I was not in the mood. When I was on a mission, I generally avoided interaction as much as possible. Until Ethan.
I could use a lot more interacting with him.
“I’m not surprised. Helion’s a real asshole.
He let me think Kovo was really dead, said my reactions needed to be authentic during the execution so everyone watching would believe he was gone.
Then he sent us to Earth. Said no one would look for Kovo here.
” She kept chatting, even when I did not respond.
“Except you, I guess. But my mom and my sister are both on Atlan with their mates and we can’t visit.
Which sucks. I miss them. Especially because my sister has two sets of twins.
They’re so cute. Oh my god, you should see them. ”
“I watched the broadcast. I saw you. You tried to save him.” My heart had bled when hers did, both of us believing a male we loved, a male of worth, had been taken from us. Except she found out the truth. I had carried my grief for years.
She shivered. “I don’t like to think about it.”
“How long did Helion make you suffer?” I shouldn’t ask, but I needed to decide whether to hunt the Prillon and eliminate him for what he had done to all of us.
“It felt like forever, but it was only a few minutes.”
My beast growled in disappointment.
Adrian shrugged. “I hated him for a long time, but Kovo convinced me to forgive him. Without Helion, Kovo would be dead for real and we wouldn’t be together.”
My beast snorted. There would be no forgiveness. Not from us.
She had the courage to smile at me. “Would be easier to like the guy if he wasn’t such a coldblooded asshole all the time. Always has an explanation. Even with you. I heard him say he’d been trying to get you to come to Earth for a long time. Is that true?”
“Yes.” Damn him.
“Kovo also said there’s never been a female Atlan with a beast before. He said you’ll be super famous on Atlan if you go back there. Rich, too.”
“I am already wealthy.” I had inherited both of my brother’s fortunes when they were pronounced dead.
Had not cared about the credits unless I needed something to help me hunt the Silver Scions.
Now I wondered if even that mission had been a lie.
If the one thing that had given me purpose the last few years was a fabrication of Helion’s as well.
An image of the three cyborg assholes at the morgue flashed to mind.
No. The Silver Scions were more than cold-blooded, they were ruthless. Evil. Could not be allowed to operate freely on an underdeveloped, primitive planet like Earth.
“When you collapsed, that doctor, Mersan, told the guys you might have mating fever.”
Did he? So that bio-medical scan and system checks I initiated with my suit when I first saw Ethan in the warehouse had found something after all?
The suit automatically sent updated physical and mission details to the I.C.
anytime I synced to their system. Mersan must have received the suit’s data when I sent the cyborg’s DNA to be processed.
That scan had been done a few minutes after I saw Ethan and reported everything was normal. I wondered what a full biometric scan would show now?
“Do you? Have mating fever?” Adrian was tenacious in her questioning.
Mating fever? For Ethan? “Yes.”
I lifted one hand and clattered my claws together just to see what it felt like.
Definitely not normal.
Adrian led me to a small supply room and pointed to my supply cube. They’d shoved it into a corner. I doubted they had been able to open it. The box was coded to my DNA as well as an encrypted voice command.
I opened the cube and lifted my armor. I put it on as quickly as possible, thankful the technology automatically adjusted to my current physical form. All Atlan battle armor was designed to adapt to the Warlord’s rapid size changes during battle to keep their beasts protected.
Took me a solid minute of intense focus to retract my new claws. Once I figured it out, I had no problem. In. Out. Safe. Deadly.
Excellent. These could come in handy.
Adrian leaned with her shoulder resting against the door frame, arms crossed, watching me dress. “So, what are you? What did they really do to you?”
Now that I was covered, I summoned the will to be civil to my new sister. “What do you mean? I am Atlan.” With claws, but still Atlan.
Her grin looked… mischievous. “I don’t think so.” She tilted her head and stared, studying me like I was an insect for dissection. My beast did not like it and growled at her.
She burst into laughter. “Oh my god. I wish I could be there to see their faces when you show up.” She reached into the front pocket of her jeans and pulled out a set of keys. Held them up in front of her and wiggled them. “You are going, aren’t you?”
I leaned over and lifted my rifle case from the cube. “Yes.” I would assemble it on the way.
She tossed the keys in my direction.
I caught them midair. “I need to see their maps and their assault plan. Now.”
She pulled her cell phone from her back pocket and checked the time. “You need to hurry. The attack is supposed to start in about an hour. It’ll take you half that to get there.”
“Then let us go.” I strapped an ion blaster to each thigh and shoved a knife in the built-in ankle sheath.
Practiced using my claws. They came out the tips of my combat boots easy as a hot knife moving through water.
When I retracted the claws, the armor’s self-healing structure immediately repaired the small punctures.
Took a few seconds to discover my gloves would do the same.
“That is so cool. Think Mersan could get me some claws?” Adrian lifted her fragile, human hand and studied it. “I’d like to be stronger. Not so fragile. Easy to hurt.”
I shook my head. “I am sure my brother loves you exactly as you are. It is his honor and purpose to protect and provide for you.”
“Now you sound like him.”
I shrugged. “It is our way.”
“Is that what you are going to do for Ethan? Protect and provide for him?”
A gaping hole opened under my heart and swallowed it whole. “I do not know. I am not sure what he wants. He is human. I do not know what a male of your species needs to be happy. To fall in love. To choose a mate. I lied to him.”
Adrian walked over and bravely, or stupidly, reached out and took one of my hands in her much smaller one, offering comfort. “He will forgive you.”
“How do I make my mate love me?” An Atlan Warlord had thirty days to woo his female once he found her. In that time, she was legally bound to him, under his protection. The mating cuffs ensured they remained together at all times, the slightest separation causing both parties physical pain.
I had no mating cuffs to keep Ethan with me.
There were no mating laws written in my favor.
I was female, not male. I did not have the right to simply claim Ethan was mine and then take him away for a month to win his heart.
He was not an Interstellar Bride and I was no Coalition fighter.
I had no rights, no way to keep him at my side.
She sighed and dropped my hand. “Excellent question. I don’t know. I never figured that part out.”
“How did you make Kovo love you?” I wanted the entire story of their mating later, when we had time to share every detail. For now, I needed the basics. The truth.
“I heard him roar in pain. I was touring the Atlan prison with my family and I heard him. I knew he was mine, so I just refused to let him die.”
“How did you know? You do not have a beast? Do you?” I studied the now intriguing human, wondered what secrets she kept.
She held up her hand and pointed to an odd birthmark on her palm. “Turns out I have an ancestor from Everis. Our best guess is my Everian Hunter bloodline decided he was my marked mate.” Her smile turned dreamy. “And his beast liked me back.”
“Kovo is yours.”
“He is.”
“Ethan is mine.”
“Okay. I feel you. Let’s go. But we have to find a mirror on the way. There is something you need to see before you leave.”
I tucked my helmet under my arm and walked out into the corridor carrying my rifle case. “What would that be?”
Adrian jogged along beside me with a huge smile on her face. “You’ll see. You’re gorgeous, don’t get me wrong. But you look a little… different than you did when the guys left.”