Genus: Unknown Adaptation (17 page)

The situation might have been amusing under any other circumstances, Kate thought as the shuttle carried her and her Sirian 'mates' to the space center.

She was pretty sure that at some point over the past week the Sirians had figured out that she knew and yet neither she nor they acknowledged it-as if it would simply go away if they didn't.

Wryly, she admitted to herself that it just might at that-if it wasn't for the situation they found themselves in. It was human nature to adjust to most any state of affairs, after all, a protective mechanism of the mind help cope with even the most dire circumstances without damage to the mind. And she was by no means immune to it.

They had been, to all intents and purposes, living with her since the last time she'd picked them up at the club and she was very quickly adjusting to their presence. Primarily, she knew this was because they'd done nothing to make her feel threatened and reasoning with her instincts wasn't possible.

There were no overt signs of danger and that primitive part of her mind had dismissed them as a threat.

She'd grown so used to having them underfoot and in her bed, in point of fact, that it was all she could do to keep her wits about her to prevent herself from removing all doubt from their minds. That was the only area where the higher functioning portion of her brain still held sway over the instincts.

She could see that they could feel threatened if she made it clear she knew who they were and that in turn could increase her own danger exponentially.

They'd annihilated the security guards sent to kill them, after all. She had no reason to doubt that they would still be just as aggressive in preserving their lives as ever, no matter how sweet and passionate they behaved toward her. The fact that they perceived her as their mate might protect her-and it might not.

She didn't want to find out!

So she had carefully avoided saying or doing anything at all to make it clear she knew who they were.

And that need to watch herself was probably the only reason she hadn't succumbed completely to the illusion they'd created to convince her they weren't alien at all, she acknowledged wryly.

Because they were either picking up human behavior very, very quickly or she was getting used to their

'oddness' very, very quickly.

She hoped it was the former because they were about to be put to the test. She had a bad feeling, though, that it was actually a combination of the two-her growing accustomed and basically ignoring the strange unhuman behavior and the Sirians picking up more human-like behavior from being around her.

They were all about to find out!

Her stomach knotted with anxiety as the shuttle pulled up to the passenger terminal at the Space Center.

She glanced at the Sirians as the shuttle stopped and forced a weak smile. "If we get separated for any reason, don't worry about it. We can meet up again once we're aboard the ship."

Ronan frowned and then lifted his head and stared hard at the busy port. "We will stay close to you."

A mixture of relief and more anxiety flickered through Kate. His 'accent' was still thick, but he was doing well with his English!

"Why we would separate?" Dax asked with just enough suspicion to unnerve her. Well, the question and the fact that his English wasn't nearly as good as Ronan's.

"Ronan should do the talking if possible," she responded before she thought better of it and then added hurriedly. "His English is the best. So it isn't as likely that you'd be misunderstood and get the wrong instructions … about where to go, I mean."

"Fifty credits," the robotic driver enunciated in a flat tone. "Please remove any personal items when you depart the taxi. Exit the vehicle now."

Jarek glared at the robot. She had a feeling that he still hadn't fully grasped that it wasn't a living thing and took exception to being given orders by it.

She sat forward and stared at Jarek expectantly until he climbed out of the open taxi door. Dax shifted across the seat and climbed out behind him and then she and Ronan got out. Her knees felt wobbly as she straightened on the sidewalk outside the space port. Her belly went weightless as it sank in that this could well be her last view of anything on Earth.

Dismay, not anticipation, flickered through her.

She had decided long before she discovered the Sirians that her future was on an alien world-not Earth.

Her home world had too many problems to cope with them and it was in everyone's best interests to colonize.

As a colonist, she had a far brighter future to look forward to and every person that left Earth made it a little more comfortable for those who stayed.

And she still felt like weeping at the thought of never seeing her true home again, never breathing the air of Earth or feeling its soil beneath her feet. It was familiar. It was dear to her heart.

She thought that Sirius would always seem alien to her, no matter how long she lived there.

"We go now?" Jarek asked, studying her worriedly.

Kate forced a smile as she met his gaze and abruptly wished that he would change back to the 'human'

he'd been the first time around. She supposed she should be more used to the way he looked now, but the way he'd looked before was the way she thought of him-all of them.

Shaking the thought, she nodded and struck off toward the passenger entrance. Ronan shouldered the single bag she'd brought with her. Everything else that she was taking to start her new life had been sent to baggage the day before.

She hoped to hell she didn't arrive on Sirius with half her stuff missing! She was going to be seriously pissed off if they had misplaced any of her crates!

It wasn't like she'd be able to dash down to the mall and get anything to replace anything she'd lost!

She glanced up at Ronan when she sensed he was studying her. "You remember what I told you guys about checking in, right?"

Something flickered in his eyes. "Yes. You are worried."

It was a statement not a question. It was amazing how easily he seemed to read her no matter how hard she tried to pretend nothing was wrong! It must be some sense that humans didn't have, she thought distractedly. Because humans never seemed to be that observant or intuitive-unless it was with someone they'd known a very long time.

She forced a tremulous smile. "It's really unnerving to think about leaving Earth and probably never coming back. I keep feeling like I've forgotten something important and left it."

The Sirians surrounded her as they went through the automatic doors and filed into the terminal. All three lifted their heads and surveyed the huge building packed with people for several minutes and then seemed to relax. It wasn't until they gave her more room to move that it hit her that they'd formed a protective wall around her until they could determine whether there was any danger or not.

An odd sensation fluttered in her belly. She thought it was more than that telltale sign that they weren't human. She felt … sheltered, protected in a way she never had before-like she had her own personal bodyguards!

She had mixed feelings about that, she decided. It was nice in a way.

On the other hand, prisoners were also guarded and that didn't produce as nice a feeling as the sense of being protected.

In fact, she didn't like that feeling at all!

Dismissing it with an effort, she studied the instruction bulletins on the overhead monitors. "Draftees are supposed to report down there," she said, pointing to the other end of the terminal. "I have to check in over there. I'll meet up with you guys at the café over there when we're done … unless they want you to go ahead and board the ship. It that's the case, then I'll see you when I get on, ok?"

Despite the fact that she'd carefully explained the boarding procedure to them when she'd found out that fully half of the passengers on this ship would be 'draftees', none of the three looked pleased at all that they were going to have to leave her.

To her relief, Ronan finally nodded, although his expression was grim. Settling a hand at the small of her back, he herded her toward her own destination. She tried to convince herself he was just walking her to the line and meant to continue from there to the place where he and Dax and Jarek were supposed to check in, but there was a possessiveness to his body language that made her uneasy.

Actually, she amended after glancing at Jarek and Dax-all of them had this 'mine' attitude about them, glaring at any man that happened to glance even casually in their direction.

To her relief, though, once they reached the check-in line, they only paused briefly to stare down any men they happened to notice looking in her direction and then moved away. She watched them as they left, her uneasiness shifting to worry as to whether they were going to be able to carry off the 'disguises' she'd managed to round up for them. She'd been trying not to think about the fact that this was going to be the most dangerous part of her plan to return them to their home world. She had been trying to convince herself that they wouldn't give themselves away or that the papers she'd paid for wouldn't stand up to close scrutiny.

The chances were that she'd be arrested right along with them if the papers weren't as good as she thought they were or she'd been told! She was very much afraid that it wouldn't take the authorities long to track the purchase back to her!

She was clammy with fear when she turned resolutely away and focused, or tried to, on going over a mental list of her preparations for departure to make sure she hadn't left anything undone. The line in front of her had inched up a few paces when a voice finally penetrated her abstraction and she looked up to discover that Sissy was about a dozen people in front of her in the line and trying to get her attention. A surge of pleasure went through her as she recognized her friend and then abruptly did a nosedive as her mind leapt from Sissy to her 'mates'. She smiled with an effort and waved.

Sissy waved at her in a summoning motion.

Everybody between the two of them gave them both dirty looks.

She smiled with an effort and shook her head. "I need to keep my place. I don't want to be standing here for hours."

"I've already been standing here two hours," Sissy said irritably. She seemed to debate with herself and finally shrugged. Stepping out of line, she walked by to where Kate was standing. "I'd begun to think you were going to miss the ship!"

As glad as she was for the company, Kate met Sissy's look warily. "You know me-check and recheck.

I'm always convinced I've missed something. Looks like I'm still going to have plenty of time to wait."

Sissy nodded. "You'd think the way they're going that they were worried about somebody getting on the ship that didn't have a ticket," she said dryly.

"You never know."

Sissy's lips flattened with wry disgust. "You aren't serious?" she responded, nudging her chin in the direction the Sirians had disappeared. "I guess that means you didn't notice the long, long line over there of

'draftees'."

Relieved that Sissy obviously hadn't seen her arrive with three of the draftees, Kate glanced in that direction with pretended surprise. "You mean they really are forcing some people to colonize?"

"Tut tut! Our government wouldn't do that! It's a free world! No, no, no! They just didn't realize they wanted to colonize until the military picked them up! And they're under guard because the government is worried someone might try to take their place."

That comment startled Kate. She actually hadn't noticed the military presence. She'd been too focused on Ronan, Dax, and Jarek to notice the armed men pacing the area around the draftee station!

Oh my god! Guards, she thought! What if the real owners of those names she'd given the guys had been picked up! She hadn't been able to check-hadn't considered that she needed to make an effort to see if they had been!

They are here.

A wave of dizziness washed through Kate when she heard the voice in her head. It wasn't just a voice, though! She knew it was Ronan.

Disbelief followed-the certainty that she was imagining the voice and a refusal to accept the fact that they were all in deep trouble.

They are here. I have scanned the thoughts of the guards.

Kate didn't just feel dizzy that time. She felt a wave of nausea that was terror inspired.

She could worry about the fact that Ronan seemed to be telepathic later!

Leave! Go! As casually as you can, step out of line and … uh … pretend you think you got in the wrong line and look around and then leave!

You will leave also.

Sissy was talking to her, making it nearly impossible to concentrate on the danger they were all in!

Closing her mind to Sissy's chatter, she focused on trying to resolve think of a way to resolve the situation.

You're going to have to think of a way to take the place of the men whose papers I got for you! There won't be another ship leaving for Sirius for almost a month! And we'd run the same risk next time! I'd have to get more papers for you. You can't go without papers!

A few moments passed before he responded. We will find a place to watch and then we will remove the others if there is an opportunity.