Flames of Arousal

by Kerce, Ruth D.

  “I’m thinking, after the delivery, if everything goes all right with Alexa and the twins, you and I get out of here.”

  “Out? How?”

  “I’ve been snooping around. I found our transport-connectors. They’re still functional. Braden won’t abandon Alexa, not even for a short while, not now. If she can’t be moved back to the Lair, then that leaves us. We need to return to Command Center. We can’t just sit here in this hole, while Marid attacks.”

  She squeezed his arm. “But what if Laszlo is right? What if Xylon can be saved, but the Lair is doomed? Remember what he said? Shouldn’t we try to survive by staying here?”

  “Shouldn’t we try to save as many Warriors as possible? What if Laszlo is wrong?

  What if we can make a difference? Xylon needs every able body fighting to preserve our way of life, to keep our freedom. Just Xylon surviving isn’t enough. Our security base needs to survive so we can protect our society and our whole way of life. Sometimes not that much is required to turn the advantage.” He needed to at least try, or he’d never be able to live with himself, especially if Xylon ended up defeated, and he stood by and did nothing.

  “Well, I’ve actually been thinking about all that myself. They’ll need Healers in the Lair, and on the surface, if the worst happens. Does Braden know about this plan of yours?”

  “Yes. We’ve discussed it, and he agrees. One of us needs to be in command. Brianna will be in charge now. She’s good, but she goes strictly by the book and she’s never held a command post under anything close to these circumstances.” He watched Leila digest the information, knowing she was turning over everything he said in her mind.

  “I agree, too. But I don’t want you going off without me. We’re a team. You have to promise.” The look in her eyes softened, pleading with him.

  He smiled and squeezed her hand. “Promise.”

  She visibly relaxed, and only then did her look switch to pure Warrior mode. “Once we return, if things look really dire, we can evacuate at least some of the population.

  Laszlo can’t bring everyone out the way he did with us. Even if he somehow could, this facility won’t hold them. But we could slowly send people in personal transport orbiters with fighter escorts to Tamara and Sunevia. Right?”

  Erik shook his head. “Won’t work. Tamara and Sunevia don’t have any defensive forces of their own to back us up. Nothing worthy of mention anyhow. We’d have to send too many fighters. We can’t fragment our forces more than they already are.

  Daegal would let the people and fighters go, but then take Xylon as soon as he felt we were unable to effectively fight back. With our forces divided, he could then easily take Tamara and Sunevia, too. All we’d be doing is delaying the inevitable, and not for very long. We need to regroup now, here, and present a strong front.”

  “Can we send a message? Tell Brianna what’s going on, that we’re all right, and let her know what she needs to do, step by step, if necessary.”

  “Brianna won’t adhere to a remote order. It’s against regulations…once the planet goes Red.” His last five words came out as barely a whisper.

  Leila’s face revealed her shock. “Xylon’s at Code Red?”

  She looked up at him again with pleading eyes, as if begging him to take the words back. He only wished he could. Not wanting to worry her any sooner than necessary, he hadn’t alerted her when he’d seen the status change. He pointed to a small screen on the far wall. “Current status.”

  After a quick glance in that direction, her grip on his arm tightened. She raised her eyes to his. “Brianna will listen to a message from Braden, from her own brother, won’t she?”

  “Normally. But I just got word that the Lair’s authenticator has been knocked offline. As such, no off-grid messages can be picked up by the comm system.” The authenticator separated genuine messages from phony ones—and also reported “send”

  locations to identify possible enemy transmissions disguised as ally communication.

  Voices, even images, were too easily duplicated to trust without authentication clearance by the computer.

  “Off-grid?”

  “Brianna can communicate within Xylon’s own grid system, and even within our outpost grids. So she can still give commands to the Warriors. This chamber works on a separate grid, so it’s secure, even when the Lair’s comm system is compromised. Not a problem if the Lair’s authenticator is working. But without it, we’re stuck. Either Braden or I need to go, in person.”

  “Does Laszlo know what you’re planning?”

  “Hell, no. I don’t trust him completely, and I think Braden is starting to feel the same. The man keeps too many secrets. We decided to keep a few of our own. All he’s told us so far is that Kam is working from the inside to destroy Daegal’s ability to completely overtake us. But Kam’s just one Warrior. Even if Halah does end up helping him, we just can’t sit around waiting and hoping they’re successful. Besides, even a partial defeat, with partial enslavement of our people, is unacceptable. Are you with me?”

  “I’m always with you, Erik. You’re my breeder-mate. I love you.”

  He kissed her gently, softly stroking her long hair. “And I you, my love.”

  * * * * *

  Lair of Xylon

  Torque paced in front of a wall of operational monitors. “Kill that damn alarm! It’s giving me a headache.” Xylon was now officially at war. He’d never really believed this day would come. Not in his lifetime.

  “L-SACS has changed our status to Red.”

  “No shit, Tara. Give me a security update.” He raked his fingers through his hair.

  “Marid fighters are still out of range.”

  He turned toward her and saw the confusion on her face. His bewildered feelings matched hers. “Why’d we go Red then?”

  “Checking.” After a few moments, she swore under her breath. “The Lair’s artificial atmosphere has been knocked offline by a remote feed. I didn’t even get a warning light on my panel about a problem. And…” She turned toward her brother. “Egesa troops have been spotted on the surface.”

  Torque’s heart picked up its pace. “How long before the life support can be repaired?” His mind raced. With Egesa on the surface of Xylon, all civilians were in imminent danger.

  “Techs are already evaluating. Backup seems functional and holding. Security teams are en route to intercept Egesa troops. L-SACS issued the order in response to tracking stats auto-fed into the system. I’m adjusting the numbers though. We can’t be left too thin back here in case they get through the line. The Slave Masters are probably going to try and take us in one piece before they signal Marid’s fighters to engage and destroy.”

  “Can we use our ground lasers? Are they functioning yet?” He turned back to the monitors. With one shot, they’d be able to take out an entire flank of Egesa troops.

  “Not yet.”

  The screens Torque stared at reflected multicolored charts and lines of data. Black areas displayed malfunctioning systems. “Where did Kam’s ship go? We could use his expertise here to reprogram our code sequences. Has the fighter spotted him yet?”

  The situation in the Lair was dire, to say the least. Daegal and the Egesa Slave Masters were too strong, had been building their security force, while the Lair had been losing theirs. Many Warriors had been killed in recent uprisings, many had defected to the other side, and many had simply disappeared. How were they going to effectively defend Xylon when the Marid fighters attacked?

  Despite the Egesa foot troops, he had no doubt Daegal would send in the fighters while Xylon remained weak. That’s what he would do. He couldn’t believe Xylon’s once strong, defensive forces had been reduced to barely more than one fleet, if Tara was correct about their current Warrior numbers, which she’d transmitted to his terminal earlier.

  Worse. The Council had called a meeting. And now that the planet was at Code Red, they’d take immediate action. Dread filled
him at the prospect.

  Brianna still wasn’t free, nor had they been able to contact her. He’d have to tell the Council. He knew once the ranking member took over, all would be lost. Torque had no faith in any of them or any viable ideas of how to avoid the disaster that awaited the planet and their society.

  “Have we picked Kam up?” he asked. When again no response was immediate, impatience filled his voice. “Tara, answer me!”

  “Don’t get your dick in a knot. Give me a minute. I’m trying to track, while listening to the pilot’s report.” She flipped some switches. “Kam has blocked his main signal. I’m not picking up anything, and the pilot lost him visually somewhere close to the Sand Moon. He didn’t pursue because the distance would take him too far from our outer boundaries. That would be dangerous, while Marid’s fighters are continuing their approach. We need every fighter we have.”

  “Kam can’t just disappear. Use the long-range tracking. Look for any vessel with a Xylon personal beacon to distinguish him from the fighters.”

  “I know. I am. Don’t worry. I’ll find him. But frankly, he’s not top priority on my worry list right now. You can reprogram our codes yourself.”

  “Yeah, but I’m not as fast or as good with the codes as Kam. Besides, we need to know what he’s doing. Somehow, I feel like he’s up to something. He wouldn’t defect.

  If I’m correct, and we’re not coordinated with whatever plan he’s involved in, who knows what the result could be.”

  “He shouldn’t be acting on his own. We can’t take responsibility for that.”

  “I know. But I still think it’s to our advantage to locate and communicate with him.

  Any word from Pitch Pantera?”

  “No.”

  “What about Erik and Leila? Any progress on locating them?”

  “No.”

  “What’s the status again on Brianna?”

  Tara turned in her chair, giving him a look of pure frustration. “Why don’t you go down there and check on the progress yourself? I’m trying to do fifteen different things over here.”

  “Don’t snap at me, Tara! Brianna is our top priority. We need to get her out before the Council meeting.” Plans flickered through his mind. If the worst happened, he’d need to get himself and Tara out of there. The Lair kept a remote station on the Ice Moon. They could coordinate Xylon’s remaining forces from that location, if need be.

  “Unless you want me to go down there and laser-torch her out of the chambers myself, there’s nothing further I can do from here. Now stop riding my ass!”

  Torque raised his hands in mock surrender. Tara took shit from no one, not even him. He respected that. “Sorry. Do your thing. I’ll start changing our operational codes to make access more difficult, hopefully impossible, for Daegal. The modifications should make the Council less frenzied.”

  Tara turned in her seat. “You do that,” she grumbled. She turned back around. “Be sure you protect those new codes.”

  “Hmm, yeah. Any ideas about how? Our other codes contained the highest security and even that wasn’t enough.” He couldn’t bypass the official security channels. The codes needed to be saved in certain databases for them to work properly when cross-checked by each respective system in use. The same people still maintained access to those databases, which couldn’t be changed without Council approval.

  They stared at each other in silence for a moment, then they both smiled.

  * * * * *

  “It’s part of the process, Colonel,” Brianna told him. “We need to fuck you anally.”

  “Too damn bad. You’re not fucking me in the ass with that cock, ladies. If you try, you’re liable to find it, along with my cock, shoved up your asses.”

  The blonde backed away, eyeing him warily.

  Brianna didn’t believe his threat. He might stop them, but she didn’t believe he’d try anything more than that. Giving him her best look of frustration, she planted her fists on her hips and looked him dead in the eye. “Why do Earth men whine like babies when it comes to anal penetration?”

  Briggs’ eyebrows rose to his hairline. “Excuse me? Whine?” He snorted. “I have never whined in my life.” Avoiding her gaze, he crossed his arms over his chest. “And I am not a baby,” he added in a low voice.

  Brianna almost laughed at the pout that formed on his face from her teasing. Before she could voice her feelings again, an alarm echoed loudly in the chamber.

  Damn! L-SACS had just declared a Code Red. Her heart raced at a frantic pace. She needed to get back to Command Center. Now. Briggs might turn into a casualty of war, after all.

  No, she shook her head as she studied him. His gaze returned to her and he studied her at the same time, with those intense, dark brown eyes of his. She’d make certain he was taken care of. Not that her concern was personal, of course, but if he was part of a project set up by Laszlo, he might be more important than she knew.

  She turned to the red-haired Warrior. “See if you can get in touch with the engineering team trying to cut us out of here. Tell them to step up their efforts, even if they have to bypass safety measures.”

  The female nodded and hit the open button beside the door.

  Brianna spoke to the blonde. “If I can get out of here, I’ll send Tara down to take my place.” Her heart squeezed painfully at the thought. She didn’t want her sister to have this man, she suddenly realized, not quite understanding her feelings. Briggs was a virtual stranger, an Earth man, and this was just an Initiation. She’d never felt territorial about any man before.

  Checking her vid-cell, she saw a clear signal. She snatched the device off her belt.

  “Brianna to Command. Reply.”

  “Finally! Torque here. Are you out?”

  “Not yet. Give me a quick update. I don’t know how long this signal will last.”

  “We’re at Red. Marid fighters are approaching but still out of range. Life support is offline, but backup is functional. Egesa troops are on the surface. Ground lasers are malfunctioning. We’re down to one fighter fleet in the air. Xylon foot troops are en route to engage the Egesa and any Marid Agents who might be with them. Xylon’s Council has demanded a meeting in approximately…seventeen minutes.”

  “All right. If I’m not out by the time the Council meets, you have to do everything you can to prevent the ranking leader from taking command. He’ll negotiate terms of surrender, Torque, rather than fight with the low number of troops we have.”

  Silence stretched on the other end. Finally, Torque responded. “Surrender? Are you certain?”

  “Regulations dictate in order to save civilian lives, if no ranking officer is available for command or the security forces of the Lair dip below a certain level during a time of war, surrender shall be immediately negotiated. Stay up on Lair procedures, brother.”

  “Shit. So you’re ordering that we go against regulations? Do you know what you’re asking?”

  “Yes, Torque. I know. And don’t tell me you’ve never thought about doing anything like that. You will follow my orders in this. Then you will assume command until I’m able.” She’d never gone against regulations in her life. But surrender was not an option. Not to Daegal and the Slave Masters, not to anyone. Ever.

  “I’ll do what I can.”

  “That’s not what I asked.”

  “I heard what you asked.” His voice turned gruff over the vid-cell. “Don’t worry about me, little sister. Just get your ass up here as soon as you can.”

  Briggs knew it was now or never. While she was distracted. He lunged forward and grabbed Brianna. He twirled her around, wrapping his arm around her neck.

  She dropped the vid-cell, and the device smashed to the floor, cutting off communications. “Damn it,” she mumbled.

  “We’re through playing, ladies.” Slowly, his mind had been clearing. Instead of the chemicals affecting him like they’d expected, he’d fought them off. Now, he needed to get out of
here. He remembered. He knew his mission.

  “Let her go!” the blonde ordered. “Now!”

  “I believe I’m in control here,” he told her. “Back off, or I’ll break her neck.” A lie, but seemingly an effective one, for the blonde moved away.

  Brianna sighed, sounding put out by his words and actions, then her elbow jabbed back into his ribs.

  Ugh! He doubled over, and before he knew what was happening, she flipped him over her shoulder, onto the bed. Shit.

  She rubbed her neck. “Not smart, Colonel. I could have thrown you to the floor and injured you. And right now our Healers can’t get down here. Remember that.”

  He grunted, sitting up. Damn it all. His own stupid fault. He’d underestimated her.

  Well, he wouldn’t make that mistake again. The woman was well-trained indeed.

  “I’ve got more important things to deal with than your pathetic attempt at escape or whatever your intention might have been.” She reached down and retrieved her vid-cell.

  “Pathetic?” Yes, he’d gone easy on her, not wanting to hurt her. But pathetic was a low blow.

  “He’s too clearheaded, Brianna,” the blonde replied, hands on her hips.

  “So I see. His Earth physiology, no doubt. How do you feel, Colonel? We are officially at war, and I have troops to command, if you’re not in distress.”

  “War?” Had the countdown begun?

  “War. Check his stats,” she told the blonde. “If the fever is no longer affecting you, Colonel, I’m postponing this Initiation. I need to check into the project anyhow. Find out why you’re really here.”

  Good luck. On the one hand, he breathed a sigh of relief. On the other, disappointment rushed through him. “May I have my clothes?” To say he felt a bit vulnerable while completely naked, now that his sexual needs had waned, was an understatement.

  With a look of regret on her face, Brianna glanced down at his cock. A moan almost escaped him. He’d remember that look in his dreams, he was certain.

  She shifted her gaze to the blonde, who now held a small monitor in her hand.