Blood of Denebria (Star Sojourner Book 4) (8 page)

“Stay there,” she told me. “I'm getting yours.”

I saw Wolfie slide her a dark look.

“Thanks,” I said when she handed me the dish. She had opened a few of her shirt buttons and her breasts were full and round, pressed against the taut material as she bent to set a glass of iced tea by my side.
Just enough to tease,
I thought.

Her hand lingered on my hip. I looked up at her and she smirked.

“You're welcome any time, tag,” she purred. “Yours could come with dessert.”

I watched her sway her hips as she turned and walked back to the sous unit. So did Wolfie. I saw Bat glance at Wolfie and shake his head.

Maybe the tent wouldn't be so lonely after all.

“Chancey,” I said and picked up the fork.

He slid me a look as he got to his feet and touched his swollen lip. “No need for apologies. You weren't in your right mind.” He went to the table. “If you ever are,” I heard him mutter as he took a knife and stabbed a mock chicken breast.

Bat got up and stretched his stocky body. “Ya'll thinking about infiltrating the slave camp, Joseph?”

“I don't know of another way in,” Joe said.

Bat extended a hand. Joe took it and let him help him to his feet. They walked toward the table.

“Joe,” I said.

He brushed off his pants and paused. “Now what?”

“How close were we to the BEM ship when I projected my mind inside it?”

Joe looked at Chancey.

“Two hundred yards, give or take,” Chancey said. “They were already closing in on us.”

“Bountiful couldn't read my projection,” I told Joe. “They didn't detect my presence until I tried to probe their minds.”

Joe picked up an empty dish and paused. “I'm listening.”

“What if I got close,” I said, “disguised as a Denebrian slave in the camp.” I put down the fork. “No probes. Suppose I projected my mind into the compound to locate the SPS?”

“Then what?” He lifted brows, as though to urge me on.

“Then I relay the information back on the Warrior computer and the team goes in and grabs the SPS.”

Joe methodically filled his dish while we all waited. “That's a wild plan,” he finally said. “Dangerous as hell and full of holes.” He looked at Chancey.

Chancey shrugged broadly. “What else would the tag come up with?”

Joe looked around. “Has anybody got a better plan?” He waited in the silence, then went and sat heavily on the ground.

“This one,” Huff said, “does not like it!”

“Noted.” Joe began to eat. “You have a better idea, Huff?”

“I…I will slay any BEM who harms my Jules friend.”

I patted his forearm and stared at the eastern sky.

With dawn, the storm clouds showed their dark forms, like great gods overseeing the foibles of mankind. Were they laughing? Could be.

After breakfast, I leaned my head back and closed my eyes. I wanted to sleep outside, near Huff. But the rain started early. First a patter dappling the sand and spattering off leaves and our equipment, and running down the sides of tents. Then hot strokes of lightning that stabbed the desert floor. The air grew heavy and harder to breathe as ominous rolls of thunder heralded the coming storm.

I washed my dish and walked away from the camp to study the sheer cliffs of the surrounding canyon. Earth's canyon floors could flood with sudden walls of water in bad storms. Why should it be any different here? I paused to pick up a tube of green glass and rubbed a thumb across its sandy porous surface. Fulgurite. A glass tube formed by lightning. This was probably a high lightning-strike zone. To the east, the storm approached on black sheets of rain.

I strode back to camp.

“Hey, what you got there, Bubba?” Bat asked me.

I held it up. “Fulgurite, Bat. Glass formed by a lightning strike. Anybody know how bad the storms get in our little corner of this world?”

“Floods,” Bat said. “Stuff being washed away, like people and animals. It's the monsoon season.”

“Then why are we camped in a valley?”

Joe got up and studied the sand cliffs. “Break camp!”

By the time we packed our gear and tents inside the two trucks, the sand was running in rivulets that combined to form streams.

Chancey jumped into the driver's seat of the BEM vehicle. Joe got in beside him. Huff and I took the back seats. Wolfie drove the Shaka truck behind us, with Reika and Bat beside him.

“Look for a way to get to high ground,” I shouted to Chancey as thunder cracked overhead and lightning flashed around us. I felt the hair on my neck rise. “Huff! Don't touch anything metal.” Then I remembered. The seats and backrests were all metal.

The day darkened as black clouds roiled in a flowing river banked by canyon walls above our heads.

Then came the rains. Great sheets that drummed on the metal vehicle and poured down the windshield. Chancey gripped the steering wheel in both hands and squinted over it. The wipers flapped madly, but the blurred view ahead showed only in short strokes. He turned on the lights. No help. A white bird thudded into the windshield and slid past. If there was a way up to safer ground, we couldn't see it.

“Are they still behind us?” Joe yelled.

I glanced back and saw two smears of headlights bouncing at our rear. “They're still there! Roll your windows tight,” I said and rolled up mine. If a flash flood crashed through the canyon, the vehicle might still float.

Huff whined as he rolled up his. “This is not the water I like.”

Through the madness of rain, I saw water rising around our wheels, seeking easy paths like a living creature. Faster and faster it came, rising. Rocks and debris scraped the vehicle's underside.

“What's that?” I said as a roar deepened behind us. I looked back. Lights from the Shaka truck threw beams up into the sky.

Uh oh.

A sandstone-tinged tsunami rose and crashed, hurling rocks at the truck's body as a wave exploded through the narrow confines between canyon walls.

“Hang on! I yelled as the vehicle lifted and spun, a toy caught in a maelstrom.

Huff whined, threw a forearm around me and held me against him.

“Holy shit!” I heard Chancey shout.

The truck tilted. The canyon wall grew on my side. “Hang on!” I buried my face in Huff's arm and clung to him.

The truck slammed into the canyon's flank and was dragged along the sandstone wall in a screech of tortured metal. Muddy water seeped into the cabin through holes in the seats.

“Dammit!” I shouted as water rose. “Let go of me, Huff. Open the windows!” I frantically rolled mine down. Water smashed into the cab. I was thrown back as the cab filled. I held onto Huff while the truck bounced off the wall and was carried downstream. We gasped in air from a pocket under the roof.

“Is everybody all right?” Joe called out when the spent wave washed out of the cabin and the truck settled into mud.

“All right,” I said.

“Here is right.” That was Huff.

“Here's right too,” Chancey said disgustedly.

We crawled out of the vehicle. It was on a tilt, its left side buried in mud. The wheels were bent.

“It's totaled,” Chancey said quietly and helped Joe out of his seat.

The Shaka truck was on its side, behind us. Chancey sloshed through mud to go there, and talked to somebody inside.

“Are they OK?” I asked.

He nodded.

“Is that one totaled too?” Joe called.

Chancey kicked a wheel and nodded again.

Above, the sky had cleared, leaving a clear path of blue between canyon walls. Off to the west, thunder still rolled like a distant drumbeat and lightning flashed.

I sighed and watched a small green lizard-like creature on its back, legs waving, body twisting, as it tried to right itself. I went to it and nudged it over with the toe of my boot, and got my boot bitten for my effort before the creature scurried up the canyon wall.

Huff lumbered up beside me. “Jules friend. Creatures can be made into supper.”

“I suppose.”

We were a quiet group as we took stock of the damage to us and our gear. It was surprising that no one was seriously hurt. Bat had a scrape on his forehead and Reika had cut her right arm on a strut inside the truck. While Bat attended to her with dry bandages from his waterproof medkit, and put a new bandage over Joe's wounded side, I rummaged through our stuff. The trunks “had held closed on both vehicles. Wolfie was going through the gear in the Shaka truck.

“Damn.” There were no dry towels and we were all soaked.

Joe sloshed through ankle-deep water as he walked over, holding his side. “How's it look?”

I shook my head. “This stuff has to be dried out. But we didn't lose anything.”

Joe stared at the truck's bent wheels. “Nothing but both vehicles.”

I looked ahead to where the canyon took a left turn in the distance, and wiped water from my face. “It's going to be a long walk to nowhere, Joe.”

“I'm sorry I got you into this, kid.”

“I came willingly. More or less.”

Chancey sloshed over with Reika and Bat.

Bat checked a bent tire. “Now if that just don't beat all.” He wiped his hands on his pants and squinted up at the sheer canyon walls. We all knew there was no way to scale them.

“Chancey,” Joe said, “take Wolfie and check out what's ahead of us. Find out just where the fuck that storm landed us!”

While we waited for Chancey and Wolfie to return, we used branches to dig a depression through soft sand in the trickle of clear water that ran through the box canyon. The sun was hot on my back and I felt weary from all that had happened, and from missing a night's sleep. But we needed to wash off the mud, and clean our clothes and gear, before we could contemplate our next move.

I wiped a hand across my sweaty brow and blinked up, where white birdlike creatures wheeled and keened above our heads. Reika, working beside me, paused to stare at the birds. “Close your eyes and you're back on Earth.” She smiled.

I smiled back. “Should only be.”

“Do you know you've got a great smile, tag?”

“Oh, yeah,” I said, “but it's nice to have the hype reinforced.” I began to dig again.

She did too. “Don't ever get a haircut.”

I paused again. Now that was new. I had gotten tired of being told to get a haircut, especially from my former father in law. My stock answer was that it kept my neck warm. Well, I could put that one away for a while.

I watched reptilian lifeforms wander back down to the canyon floor, hiding from us in the brush and scurrying out, their tiny claws clicking on pebbles, for a hurried drink of water. How quickly things returned to normal for them. But not for us. Even if we made it back to Korschaff, there'd be no help. The Denebrians, in terror of the BEMs, might turn us in to them.

Reika was working hard, slamming her branch into the widening depression and digging out sand. Bat worked across from us. Huff preferred to dig with his front claws, and his snout, and was going deep. Joe was asleep on a ledge of rock. We talked low, not wanting to wake him. Our boss looked exhausted.

I cupped my hands in the clear running water and washed my face, then sipped a drink. It had a bitter smell and taste, picked up from the roots it ran around. But water is water, no matter the planet, as long as there are no harmful bacteria in it. Even if there were, we had all taken digestall pills for protection against indigenous pathogens.

We washed our gear in the pool we'd formed, then the tents, and set them up. I couldn't wait to take off my clothes, already stiff with caked mud in the parched desert air. I caught Reika watching me as I took off my turtleneck, socks, and shoes. I glanced at Bat. How far down should I strip with Reika in our company? Had we been all males, we would have gotten naked for a good wash, and to clean our shorts.

Bat grinned, stood up and stripped down to his khaki shorts.

Oh. OK,
I thought and did the same. I washed as best I could in the cold, refreshing water and let it run down my chest and legs. Reika's gaze caressed my body with a demure look. I bit my lip and stared back. “Enjoying the view?”

Huff paused in digging and looked around. “I like ice and cold seas better, my Jules friend.”

“I know, Huff.” I sighed.

He buried his snout in the pool again and dug.

“I always enjoy a work of art.” Reika stood up and smiled at me as she unbuttoned her shirt and let it slip off her shoulders. Then she undid her pants and wiggled out of them. Bat paused to watch, too.

“Speaking of art…” I told her.

Khaki underwear are not sexy, but olive brown cotton enhanced the curves of her breasts and hips. Dammit! For all that had happened, and my weariness, still, my body was responding to her. I glanced at Bat, who failed to restrain a chuckle, and eased myself into the cold puddle. That should take care of things.

“Hey, tags,” Bat called and nodded toward Chancey and Wolfie, who were returning from scouting ahead.

We got up and walked toward them.

They were washed clean! Their clothes clung, sticky and wet.

“There's a pool around the bend,” Wolfie said.

Joe sat up, then slid off the ledge and walked up to us.

“A pool,” Chancey said to Wolfie. “A
pool?
My man, that's like saying the Garden of Eden was a vegetable patch!”

I stopped at the top of a knoll and swayed, my breath caught in my throat. “Oh my God,” I whispered.

Reika, standing beside me, drew in a breath and clutched my hand.

Before us the canyon widened, surrounded by a ridge of crimson lava, frozen in overlapping sheets, gifted with a golden peak by the late sun's rays. White fangs of water gushed from bluffs and breathed veils of mist across a green pool below. The overflow cascaded over ledges and into a sparkling stream that sank beneath the sandy ground. A grove of lush trees with twisted trunks and fat red fruit stood before hangings of indigo berries that clung to lava walls. I watched a flock of white birds hop from vine to vine to pick off berries.

Suddenly Huff howled. He loped across the rocks and leaped into the pool with a great splash and disappeared beneath the surface. We waited, but Huff can hold his breath for a good half hour.

I smiled. “Everybody in the water.” I dropped the gear I'd been carrying, slipped off my backpack and trotted to the water's edge. This time I got naked first and jumped into the cold pool. I laughed as I watched Reika fling off her shirt as she ran, unhook her bra, throw it over her shoulder, and stop only long enough at the water's edge to kick off her shoes, hop as she pulled off socks, and wiggle out of her pants and underwear before she held her nose and jumped in.

Chancey and Bat were both naked as they dived into the chilly water. Only Joe elected to sit on the bank and watch the fun. Wolfie, ever the loner with his extreme military mindset, began to set up one of the tents.

The birds flapped into the sky with shrieks and disappeared above the ridge at our antics.

Good!
I thought. More berries and fruit for us. They had wings to take them to other oases. This one had been claimed by aliens.

Reika swam to me, her thick black hair wet and shiny. Her olive skin dripping water. Her black almond eyes laughed as much as her mouth. I scooped her into my arms and lifted her. She arched her back and water poured across her full, round breasts. I pulled her close, until her breath was on my cheek, and stared into her eyes.

She ran her hands through my hair. “Hair like golden wheat,” she whispered. “Wet golden wheat. And eyes the color of a mountain sky. I couldn't take my eyes off you from the minute I found you in the ditch.”

I laughed. “You didn't find me. I found you!”

She cradled my head while I held her up, and kissed me hard on my mouth. “I've been wanting to do that for days,” she said.

“I've been wanting you to.” The water buoyed us as I swam into the pool's deep end, holding her tight against me. She spread her legs around my hips and I felt my body respond. “I've got an idea,” I whispered and kissed her ear as I sidestroked, and carried us behind a waterfall. I grinned evilly. “Now I've got you, my little wench.”

She wrapped her legs around my hips and pushed against my penis. “But do you know what to do with me, my evil master?”

I lifted her to sit on a low rock ledge. “I can think of a few things, my slippery slave.”

She rubbed her hands across the muscles in my arms, over my wet back. “Oh, my lord. You are so strong, and I am only a weak little girl.” She pouted, pulled down my head and kissed me.

I settled on top of her. “And don't you forget it.”

She took my hard penis in her hand and guided it to her vagina. “I am helpless, my liege. Do with me as you wish.” She lifted her hips, grabbed my buttocks and pushed hard against me.

I moaned as I entered her. “You were born to serve your master,” I gasped, “my little vassal.”

She rolled on top of me and thrust down. “Oh. Be gentle with me, my liege.”

I moved in deeper, and rolled on top of her, no longer aware of the cold air against my wet body, or the weariness of the days and sleepless nights. “I will use you as I wish, peon.”

“Where is my Terran Jules friend?” I heard Huff ask anxiously. “Is he somewhere near to find?”

“Goddamn him!” Reika squeezed out.

“He's in the woods picking berries, fur ball,” I heard Chancey say. “That way! Go fetch.”

The orgasm began like flashes of electricity through my body. Reika moaned and arched her back. I knew she was reaching it too. I moved faster, pushed deep inside her, and she responded by clamping and unclamping her vagina. We came together in that ecstasy of physical oneness where you no longer know where you end and she begins. She was a cat, clawing at my back, lifting her legs around me. She threw back her head and cried out. The world dissolved in that orgasm. We were lucky we didn't fall off the ledge and into the cold water.

When it was over, I slid out and rolled off her. “I hope I didn't hurt you too much,” I panted, “my little slave child.”

“Oh, my overlord, I was born to please with my pain.” She threw an arm across my chest. “Maybe later, we'll try again and I will attempt to pleasure you more.”

I lifted my head and looked at her. “Or kill me more.” I let my head drop back down. “My serf.”

The weariness hit me suddenly. “I've got to get some sleep, Reika.” I rolled off the ledge and felt chilled from more than cold water as I splashed into the pool. My body cried for sleep. I swam across to the bank with Reika at my side, got out and toweled off. I was staggering by the time I got into my clothes. My dried black turtleneck drooped at the collar and sagged at the hips. My new black pants were ripped at the knees, and there was already a tear in my new blue jacket.

“Thanks, Wolfie,” I mumbled as I passed him. He was on his knees, pounding a metal stake into the ground. He nodded toward the closest tent. I entered and almost fell over the cot. I laid down and sighed. I think I was asleep before my head hit the air pillow.

What was that? I opened my eyes and looked around. It was night. I heard my friends talking outside the tent, and caught the smell of roasted meat. They had let me sleep through supper, knowing I needed sleep more than food right now.

I sat up and rubbed my forehead. Something had touched my mind. A feather touch, but definitely a tel probe. I stood up and glanced around.
Who are you?
I sent.

Just friends come to visit. Keep sending, Jules.

Older Brother!

I threw back the flap of the tent and ran outside. ”Joe!”

He jumped and spilled his plate.

“They're here!” I said.

From the light of the small campfire I saw the stunned look in Joe's eyes as he stood up. For a moment there was only the sizzling drone of the waterfalls.

“They found us!” I said.

“Where?” Joe demanded.

“I don't…” I tried to probe for a direction. The tel link dissolved. “I don't know. They withdrew the link. They were using it to locate us.”

“Those mother fuckers!!” Chancey threw his dish on the ground and stood up. “They got us running like scared fucking rabbits!” He unholstered his stingler and spun the ring.

Reika threw me a worried look and picked up her backpack. Wolfie and Bat went for theirs. I knew the packs held the warrior equipment.

“Here we go again,” Bat said wearily. He slung his pack over his shoulders and put on the display helmet. “Only problem, boys and girls. Where in perdition do we run to this time?”

Huff took his ankle mouse beamers from his pack and strapped them on. “Someplace with no BEMs?” he offered.

I tried to probe for a direction. Their tel link dissolved, but my probe touched many minds, all connected within a network. “They're coming.” I felt their approach as a growing pressure against my upraised shields. I scanned the sky and took a breath. “They're getting close,” I said numbly.

Joe strode up to me and grabbed the front of my jacket. “Are you
sure
?”

I nodded.

Chancey trotted to a ledge, leaped onto it, and studied the sky. It would be hard to pick out moving lights in that desert blaze of stars.

“Hide the gear under ledges,” Joe ordered. “The tents too.”

I went to the edge of the camp, with the sound of tents being quickly broken down and stuff being thrown under ledges, and tried to concentrate.

“Huff!” I heard Joe shout. “Stay away from him!”

Huff whined, but he didn't approach me.

Where are you, older brother?
I sent out on a hunch and probed for a direction.

Closing in on you and your team. We know what you seek, Jules. The star positioning system. You will all be food for Bountiful before we allow that to happen.

A chill like ice slid down my spine. I turned to look at Joe and reached out to steady myself with a hand on a ledge.

Joe strode over to me. “You're in touch with them, aren't you?”

I nodded. “They know we want the SPS. They intend to—“I took a breath. “They're going to—“

I was wearing my stingler. He pulled me toward him and silently unstrapped it. His face was grim.

I closed my eyes.
Is Bountiful with you?
I sent.

She is with us. To draw you in. You are a formidable telepath, my alien friend, but Bountiful is stronger.

I gasped and broke the link. Only Brother benefitted from it. I realized I was squeezing Joe's arm and let go.

He gripped my jacket to steady me.

We require no further links, Terran, Brother sent. We have you.

Chancey trotted up. “I don't see any land vehicles. If the slimes are coming, it's by air.”

“Doesn't matter,” I said. “They know where I am. It doesn't matter.” I brushed off Joe's hand and backed away from them.

“What are you doing?” Joe asked.

“They can only read me. Take the team and go.”

Joe glanced at Chancey.

“Can't do that, Jules.” Chancey stepped closer. “No man left behind. It's our mantra.”

Joe held out my stingler. “Then take this with you, kid.”

I backed away, my hand on the ledge. “They might make me use it on you, Joe.” I smiled wanly. “You should've given me that cyanide pill.” I looked at Huff. He sat on his haunches and watched us. “Stay with them, Huff,” I called. “You hear me?
Stay
with them!”

He raised his snout and howled.

I glanced at Joe and Chancey one last time, then turned and ran behind the ledge and into the black night before either of them could spin their stinglers to stun setting and hit me with them.

“Jules!” Chancey shouted.

“Come on,” I heard Joe tell him. “We've got four others to think about.”

I ran east, back toward the narrow box canyon, using the light of Denebria's orange moon, hanging low in the sky, to see my path. Perhaps the sheer canyon walls would impede the BEMs' tel probes. I tripped over a log and sprawled in the shallow stream. My palms were scraped and bleeding as I got to my feet. The moon that had guided me was behind the cliff and I stumbled through darkness.

You're running into our arms, Older Brother sent. How nice of you to make this easy for us. Keep coming, Jules. You're doing fine.

I stopped and slid down to my knees, gasping for breath. Even if I escaped the BEMs, there was no place left to go.

I put my head in my hands as I heard the whine of a hovair, and wished I had a knife. At least if I had a knife, I could make a quick end. “Please! Great Mind. Don't let them feed me to that monster alive.” I began to sob and couldn't stop. A passage from a poem played in my head.
I am weary of days and hours, blown buds of barren flowers, and everything but sleep.

The whine of the hovair grew into a deafening roar as it hovered overhead. I drew in a shaky breath, got up and ran, terrified, not knowing where I was going, splashing blindly through the dark stream.

And smacked into something big and white. I fell to my knees, dazed.

“Friend Jules,” Huff panted, “climb onto my back.” He got down on all fours.

“Damn you! Why did you follow me? They'll get you too.” But I lifted myself onto his back and he sprang forward and galloped on all fours.

The hovair paced us. A light from its underside flicked on and swung in our direction. It pinned us in its glare as Huff raced along the floor of the canyon. I clung to his fur and wrapped my legs around his flanks.

The hovair cruised above our heads and lowered. I heard a door slide open. “Stop!” came the command through a mic. “We mean you no harm, Jules. You must get onboard now!”

Huff panicked. He ran sideways to evade the craft and tripped. I was thrown and landed hard in a bed of wet pebbles with my right ankle twisted beneath me. Pain blazed through it. Huff scraped the ground with his claws as he tried to get up. He howled, more a cry of pain, and fell back again.

“Huff!” I picked up a heavy branch and limped toward him, gritting my teeth against the pain that shot up my leg, and stood between my loyal friend and the tall shadows that emerged from the grounded craft.

“Come and get us, you bastards!” I screamed and swung the branch. The light was leveled full in my face as they approached. I stood in front of Huff, who tried again to rise but fell back. “You want us? Come and get us, damn you!”

A tall shadow approached. I swung at him with the branch, but missed with the glare of the light in my eyes. I saw him lift his arm. Pain crashed through my head. My knees went out from under me and I was suddenly on my back, staring at a blur of stars. I couldn't move my body.

“I'm sorry,” the shadowy figure said. “You left me no choice.”

The stars swam in a sky that became fluid. I felt my head roll back as gentle hands lifted me from the ground.

“Watch his ankle,” someone said in stelspeak.

“Hurry,” another voice said. “They're coming!”

I tried to raise my head, but couldn't. Huff howled in terror.

“Don't hurt him. Please!” I mumbled. The stars swam away and left me only a void.

My left cheek throbbed. The murmur of voices separated into words, then shreds of a conversation in a foreign tongue. The smell of antiseptics. A dull ache in my right ankle. There was a taste in my mouth I couldn't place. Something like sweet pickles. The conversation became knitted into coherent words and sentences in stelspeak. I moaned and opened my eyes.

“He's waking up,” someone said and touched my left cheek. I tried to brush the hand away but my arm wouldn't lift.