CHAPTER 12
When Reece woke, he barely dared to breathe. Ishtar lay nestled in his arms, just like she’d relaxed against him in the dream—which turned out to be the best one he’d ever had. It allowed him to see a softer side to Ishtar, and he tasted her desire, quite literally.
Now, however, he feared her reaction when she roused. Would she be angry? Regretful, or…roll over in his arms and purr, “Well, that was unexpectedly pleasant.”
His eyes met hers and noted the wry amusement glinting in her gaze. “Glad you enjoyed. Perhaps, you’d be open to doing something similar again?” queried in a pathetically hopeful tone his warrior brothers would have mocked.
“I’d be open to that, so long as it doesn’t interfere with our mission.”
Ah, a woman after his own heart. “Any suggestions on what we should explore today?”
“Would you like to see the weapon I built?”
He froze and then wondered if he’d misunderstood. “Seriously? What happened to never fucking happening?” He paraphrased a little more vulgarly than necessary. Blame his shock.
She chuckled. “It occurred to me that I might have been a tad conceited to assume that the method I used to destroy the Kukakk is the only viable solution. Perhaps, as you said, outside eyes will see something I missed or the concept can be adapted to cause less damage with the same result.”
“I’ll admit I’m not an engineer or scientist. I’m better with software than machines. However, Little Star—”
She interrupted. “Who?”
Wait, did he detect a note of jealousy? He almost puffed his chest. “Little Star is my AI system and is quite brilliant. Once I pass along the bomb’s design, we can have it run simulations. I don’t suppose you have footage of the actual blast? Maybe energy readings?”
“Yes. My team and I measured everything, the power signatures of the Kukakk, the force required to shred it. The resulting tidal wave of energy.” Her lips turned down. “We documented everything, but it did no good since we couldn’t stop the resulting chain reaction.”
He reached out and stroked her cheek. “As promised, I will do my best to fix Mars.”
For some reason that only made her expression sadder. “I know you will.”
While he might have undressed her in the dream, they both remained fully clothed, and it didn’t take long for them to prepare themselves.
Rations and a caffeinated drink for breakfast, a brush of their teeth, a splash of water to face and hands, and they were ready to go.
As they walked, she told him more of the event.
“We built five machines, one more than needed just in case one of them failed.”
“Where did you assemble the energy bomb?”
“Right here in the citadel. The lower levels contain workshops where Martian engineers used to tinker and innovate. While the Kukakk occupied four major population centers, we managed to keep them out of our capital. It helped that the citizens here were the first to be genetically modified to reject their energy signature. Hard to achieve control when you can’t possess the people. ”
“That makes sense. I assume, since you never had to deploy the fifth, it remains here?”
She nodded as they stood on a round circle in the floor, which abruptly descended. He didn’t lose his cookies or composure, only barely. The elevator system had no enclosed walls allowing him glimpses of the various levels as they descended. Down. Down. Down…
“How deep does this place go?” he finally asked, having lost count.
“Ninety-one floors.”
“Geezus. Why go so deep underground?”
She shrugged. “I’ve heard a few theories, the most popular being because such a tall structure would have been unseemly. Another claimed it was safer.”
“From what?”
“I don’t know. There are periods of our distant past that are missing. When I became queen, all of this already existed. Albeit parts of it had been ungraded since their origin, as clever inventions became must-haves for comfort.”
When the elevator stopped, Aquarius kept on a brave face and tried to not think of the hundreds and hundreds of feet of rock and dirt between him and the surface. In a sense, this wasn’t any worse than Tower, if one ignored the lack of windows to the outside.
Ishtar led the way, her stride brisk. She passed by doors with signs in a language he couldn’t read. Martian. Cool. He’d have to ask Tower if they had any books so he could learn it—or he could perhaps nudge Ishtar for lessons.
At a huge door, she paused, and unlike other chambers, this one required her pressing her palm print to a square spot on the wall. It glowed, illuminating her hand before the door panel slid open.
He didn’t know what he’d expected. On Earth, machine shops, even computer labs dealing in assembly, tended to have a clutter of parts, whirring machines, a hum of electricity, and running motors.
Not so in here. He entered a vast space, probably forty or more paces across and just as wide. The ceiling overhead arched in a dome. In the center of room, the only thing of real note, a tall, polished metal cylinder with orangish-red gem-like nubs protruding.
“There’s the energy bomb.” She waved to it.
“That’s it?” He probably should have sounded more impressed.
“Expected something bigger?” she teased.
“Yeah. I mean, how did something so small pack such a powerful punch?”
“The luughal.” She pointed to the gemstones. “Within that cylinder, we simply needed to build a small frequency generator, which, when activated, spread the signal to the stones, which then amplified it, creating the wave of energy that blasted the Kukakk’s opposing force apart.”
He circled the device and, upon trying to count, shook his head. “There’s hundreds of those gemstones.”
“One thousand and ninety-three to be exact.”
His brows lifted. “Damn. And you said Earth doesn’t have these stones?”
“No. As I said, I stole the piece that was discovered.”
“To do what?”
“Power my ship.” Her shoulders rolled. “The newest iteration needed an energy source powerful enough to reach Mars in a reasonable time frame.”
“Hold on, wasn’t that gemstone less than two karats?”
“As I mentioned, they are an excellent energy source.”
No shit. It made lithium look like an obese distant cousin. “Wonder what we have that might be comparable.”
“I’ve yet to find anything on Earth that comes close.” She canted her head. “You haven’t yet asked if you can take the bomb.”
“Honestly, I’m going to look at other options first. As you said, no point in destroying the alien if there’s no one to appreciate it after.”
“While I’m sure your AI is very smart, we had our own systems capable of analysis, and we never found another way to disrupt the Kukakk’s energy signature other than an opposing, blunt-force blast.”
“Your systems may have been smart for your time, but they also didn’t predict what it would do your magnetic field,” he tried pointing out gently.
“Because the resulting backlash was unprecedented.”
“But now we have that data. Perhaps it will provide the answer.”
“I hope so,” a positive statement belied by her doubtful expression.
He spent that day taking pictures of the device, even though she transferred all the schematics for it to his computer in Tower.
Aquarius tended to be a more visual kind of guy when it came to spotting solutions.
For example, with coding, he studied the many lines of commands, filtering them, and somehow coming up with answers—AKA ways to get around firewalls and other such security features.
By the end of the day, he was as tired as if he’d spent hours in the gym. Mental exercise could be exhausting.
He noticed, as they ate, Ishtar kept glancing his way. Did she wonder if he’d try to seduce? Should he make his intentions known? She’d seemed receptive, but before he could even think of broaching it—or simply leaning in for a kiss—something chimed.
“What’s that?” he asked, glancing around.
“Communication system. Hold on.” She rose and went to a blank metallic panel on the wall, maybe a foot wide and half as high. Writing suddenly appeared on its surface.
“It would seem we’ve been summoned back to the tower,” she announced.
“Why? Has something happened?”
“I don’t know. Nimrod tends to be basic when relaying messages.”
Wait, Tower contacted her? That didn’t bode well.
“Good thing I collected most of what I wanted.” It helped she’d relented and agreed to give him all the data she’d accumulated.
It saved him a lot of time. Now he could let Little Star do its thing.
He had to wonder at her change of heart, though.
Pisces would likely claim it was because he’d given her a very nice O.
He had hoped to gift her many more before they had to return.
Would their abrupt return change what burgeoned between them? Guess he’d soon see.
Aquarius didn’t bother packing up anything. All the items he’d brought could be replaced, and they might be more useful here in case they had to return.
Their trek to the portal happened initially in silence, which he broke, saying, “Kind of bummed we won’t get to share a dream again tonight.” Might as well broach the subject.
“You’re assuming we would have slept.”
The reply almost had him tripping over his own feet. “Maybe this won’t be anything major and we can… um, er…” His cheeks heated as he failed to spit out what he wanted to say.
She glanced sideways at him. “Spend the night together?”
“Yeah.”
“I’d like that.”
Would it be unseemly for him to yodel and do handsprings down the hall? Probably, so he settled for an utterly romantic, “Cool.”
Ugh. Despite his inability to properly respond, he caught her smiling as they reached the portal.
Upon arriving back at Tower, they hit the stairs and were immediately zoomed to the seventh level. The door to Aries’ office swung open, giving a clear indication of where they should go.
They entered to find Sage holding the baby and Aries pacing, his short hair tufted as if he’d been running his fingers through it.