Jerking her chin up, she answered succinctly, “Why would any woman want that? Our men keep getting progressively more controlling as they take more and more wives. The Terillian men give their undivided attention to whatever woman chooses to share time with them. Issues of sex notwithstanding, most human men have a poor attitude when it comes to women.”
“You’re overgeneralizing and you know it. There are several men that have held themselves pure in the hopes that you’d choose them.”
“The minute they have me, they’ll just pile on more brides at the speed of light. No, thank you. I’m putting that decision off as long as possible.”
Shaking his head, he murmured, “You’re young, and brave, and sometimes foolish. Since you cannot seem to avoid slipping off unescorted, I’m forced to assign you a warrior.”
“Don’t say Norio!”
“You know he’ll let no other guard you.”
“I’m not marrying him.”
“I never said you had to.”
“I hate him.”
“You don’t.”
“I do.”
Smiling down at her, Mamoru spoke softly, “He’s my first. It’s his right to guard the imperial sister.”
“I don’t want…”
“You two will have to stop arguing sooner or later. How about sooner, so I can visit. If you ask me, Norio is a bit of an ass.”
Keiko began reaching for her robe, happy to receive a visit from her best friend. Mamoru, ever irritated with the Earth ambassador’s daughter, frowned at her. “No one asked you to spout off an opinion on imperial affairs.”
“Hell’s bells, Mamoru, you gotta loosen up a bit. Can’t you ever break with official imperial protocol? If Keiko doesn’t like the man, having him lurk around all the time will just make her anxious. Is that what you want?”
“You talk too much about situations that don’t concern you, Miss Rose.”
“You don’t say? Well, we all need a hobby.”
“Have you changed your mind about my proposal?”
“Are you kidding me? Whoever thought we’d be a good match must have been out of their ever-lovin’ mind. Besides, you already have five fangirls at your beck and call. You don’t need me.”
An expression of hurt crossed his face for a brief second, and then his usual mask of indifference slipped into place. “It will be as you wish.” Nodding at Keiko, he turned on his heel and left the room.
Shaking her hair out of her eyes, she shrugged into her robe. “That was rather awkward. My brother really likes you.”
“Bullshit. If he liked me, he wouldn’t have taken five wives before he thought to approach me. Honestly, I just think he’s looking to add a blonde to complete his collection.”
“You really don’t care for him at all, do you?”
“Hell no, can we stop talking about this? We have bigger fish to fry.”
“You must have heard about the evac.”
Pulling a piece of folded paper out of her shirt, she crawled onto the bed and sat beside Keiko.
“What’s this?”
“Just look.” Holding the paper out to catch the lamplight, they gazed at the image together.
“Oh, my God. What are they?”
Unable to keep the smug expression off her face, Rose chirped, “Krylonians.”
“They’re hot.” Keiko could barely contain her excitement.
“Mamoru says we’re breeding compatible, but that could mean anything from artificial insemination to cloning. What I want to know is if we’re compatible in the ways that really count.”
“Now, that’s the ten-million-dollar question, my friend.”
“You’re way too excited, so you must know something.”
“Promise you won’t tell a living soul?”
“Cross my heart, now spill it.”
“I asked Brycor what their junk was like and if he thought we’d be sexually compatible, pleasure wise.”
“And?”
“He described nearly human junk, except they carry their testes in their legs. I asked him a million questions. Long story short, he reported that he’s never heard of their sperm being noxious or overheated but they’re a little larger than human men… all over, if you know what I mean.”
Gasping, Keiko brought her hands to her mouth. “You think there is a chance we might be sexually compatible like real couples?”
Nodding happily, Rose replied, “They sure look like husband material to me. Imagine a husband for our very own.”
“I’ve always been ashamed to admit that I hate the idea of sharing a man.”
Rose rolled her eyes. “Don’t be ashamed of that. The yuck factor makes me want to gag. It would be like sharing a toothbrush with several other women. Who would enjoy that?”
“Not me.” Keiko began to get really excited, but she held her enthusiasm in check. “We need to know more about their customs and stuff. Maybe they treat their women badly, or make them walk around naked or something awful.”
“You couldn’t be more wrong. Brycor says Krylon women are in charge, and the men do whatever they say to keep them happy. Actually, I got the feeling they treat their men kind of like our guys do us. That makes me think, Krylon men will be thrilled to see us coming.”
Smiling at each other, Keiko felt real hope for the first time ever. “Grab my knapsack. I found an electronic tablet of some sort. Maybe there are images of other aliens on it.”
Scrambling off the bed, Rose lugged the hefty sack over and they dumped the contents on the bed. It took some doing but they managed to get the tablet working after pulling the crystal out of her laser rifle. The device was loaded with information and a translation program. They spent hours digging through it as other women showed up to join in the fun.
Chapter 4
~ Shar Jalon ~
Keiko’s Music Mix Four
Rather than the time jumping diminishing when Shar Jalon put some distance between it and the ship, it happened twice more before they figured out how to modify the ship’s shielding to prevent it. Since the shifting stopped after the engineering team increased the density of the shielding to three times its normal thickness, it led some to hypothesize that sub-atomic particles were breaking free of the temporal anomaly and colliding with the ship. Meanwhile, each jump had shoved him further back in time to a couple of weeks before the wedding. They hadn’t been successful in figuring out why it happened only to the clones of the Jalon line. So far, five others had had similar experiences.
Today, Shar Jalon stood monitoring several holographic interfaces, remaining always vigilant for clues as to the cause of the temporal fluctuations. Maiko came up with one random theory after another to explain the phenomenon. The same words kept circling around and around in his mind. The mothers must be protected. What it meant or where it came from, he didn’t know.
Whereas, other men might feel like they were losing their mind a little, Shar Jalon knew better. As a genetically engineered clone with a proven success rate of solving even the most complex problems, it made sense to trust his instincts. Paying attention to each detail and running probability scenarios in his mind, he sifted through large amounts of data, separating out what might be germane to solving the riddle. It was boring work, but clones were designed for such tasks.
As they watched, the holographic interface malfunctioned. It blinked a few times, the digital images breaking down and a brief image with audio appeared for nearly two seconds. The person speaking was old and female. A male stood behind her and spoke as well. From their panicking demeanor and voice inflection, Shar Jalon thought they were trying to warn them of something.
“The couple looks like the two of you, only much older,” he commented dryly.
The prince responded with a note of warning in his voice, “I suppose whatever time dimension we hailed from, I must have remained loyal to my female.”
Shar Jalon looked at him for a brief moment before bowing his head slightly in acknowledgement. There was
no longer any doubt in his mind that the two were meant to be together.
Shar Jalon stepped closer to the view screen and ran a program to clean up the quality of the feed they’d received. He could hear Maiko and the prince arguing in the background about their role in this situation. Maiko seemed to believe that they’d end up back in time. The more mature clone would have joined the prince in his belief that it wasn’t possible, except after being jerked backwards through time on three separate occasions as of late, he knew it was quite possible.
Though he wasn’t able to clear up the audio enough to hear what they were saying, they’d also been scrolling words across the bottom of the screen in multiple languages. He was able to clean up the digital breakup enough to read the message.
An older member of the science team who had been standing at his side, gasped. “There is a strange warning. Beware the vortex.”
His attention fell from everyone else in the room, as a consuming sense that solving this riddle would unlock his destiny settled over him. Steeling himself for whatever was to come, he had to figure this out one way or another.
Working endlessly over the next few weeks, Shar Jalon barely ate, slept, or visited with his clones. He normally ate in the dining hall, sparred with them for a couple of hours a day, swam in the luxurious Krylon pools afforded to them on the prince’s vessel, and spent time in their makeshift cloning unit, overseeing the still forming clones. As of late, his time had been consumed on unlocking the riddle of the huge metal artifacts and none of his clones would waste time recreating when there was such serious work to be done. That meant, they all felt the fatigue.
He pondered over the strange message. Beware the vortex. What did it mean? As the hours ticked by, he poured over the electronic data. Days ran together and he couldn’t remember if it was morning or evening aboard the ship. This made him think it might be time to grab some sleep. It worried him that fatigue might lead to him overlooking an important clue.
Chapter 5
~ Keiko ~
Keiko’s Music Mix Five
Keiko stood for one last moment, looking at her now empty room. All the trappings associated with her status as imperial princess had long since been packed and were in the process of being loaded aboard a Candorian freighter. Being rescued felt a little like winning the ‘I get to live’ lottery, but leaving the place she’d called home for much of her life still left an ache in her chest.
Rose and their friend Jen rushed up, clearly thrilled to be boarding the huge freighter. “Keiko, come the heck on. Girl, you have got to see the Candorian men. They’re hot.”
Sighing, she shrugged. “To you, every alien man is hot. I thought you were dying to meet Krylonian men.”
“I am, but it never hurts for a girl to keep her options open. We’re barely twenty years old, so we’re not in danger of dying an old maid quite yet. Come, let’s go together.”
Following them out to the waiting ship, they fell into line behind Mamoru and Rose’s father, Ambassador Jefferson MacDowell III. That was a pretentious name, if ever there was one, Keiko thought to herself. Then again, her brother’s name was quite a mouthful as well. Leave it to the men with the most pretentious names to run the show. Hearing a gasp from several women tore her from her thoughts. Looking up, she caught sight of what the others had seen. It made her want to gasp as well.
Two of the most gorgeous men she’d ever set eyes on walked out of the ship along with the Candorian captain to greet them. The captain was hot in his own way. Being an aquatic species, his skin was edged in a reflective scale pattern around the edges of his face and he had a large fin sticking straight up, running from his forehead to the back of his head. He had impressive facial tattoos that made him stand out.
However, the two men at his side were absolutely stunning. They were close to seven feet tall, built like bodybuilders, and their skin was the most beautiful shade of dull pewter she’d ever seen. Their dark hair hung loose around their shoulders as spectacularly bright eyes admired them from a distance. She couldn’t help but smile when Rose murmured, hubba hubba under her breath.
When several women giggled, the men’s facial expressions went from admiring to almost blatantly aroused. Yes, this would be an interesting voyage. She could feel it in her bones. Having a well-developed women’s intuition would one day be her saving grace, she was sure of it. As handsome as the men were, Keiko found herself relieved when they looked over her in favor of the women with different hair color. Rose had long blond hair and Jennifer’s hair was a fiery red. They probably thought Keiko’s long black hair was nothing special, because it looked so much like their own.
Either that or they were under the impression she was spoken for. Norio hovered over her like a protective husband. Elbowing him back slightly, the captain reacted swiftly. Before she could object, the Candorian had Norio flat on his back with a large foot over his throat.
“Keiko, what’s going on here?” Her brother’s cold stare told her that she was messing up diplomacy.
“Norio was in my personal space. I’ve asked him repeatedly not to get so close that he’s touching me. He wouldn’t listen, so I elbowed him back.”
One of the Krylonian ambassadors stepped forward. “Is it usual for human males to refuse the command of a female?”
Rose broke in, trying to calm the situation. “Yes, it’s quite common. Human men often do what they think is best, regardless of how we feel about it. Norio is her assigned bodyguard. He’s probably really anxious having her around so many strangers.”
The captain removed his boot from the man’s neck. “You no longer have need to concern yourself with the imperial princess. I’ll assign her guards from this point forward, as she’ll be aboard my vessel. They’ll be guards that can follow directions.”
Mamoru held up a hand when it looked like Norio would object. “That will be much appreciated. The safety of the imperial princess is a priority for our house.”
The Krylon ambassador nodded. “I understand fully. You’ll have no cause to worry.”
Keiko wasn’t particularly impressed with the lot of them. Rose and Jen might be enamored with the aliens, but to her mind, they were similar in their thinking to human men. Not once did it occur to any of them to ask her if she wanted or felt she needed a protector. Nope, they just decided amongst themselves what was best for her. Somewhere in the galaxy, there must be men whose default position was treating women as equals, rather than fragile little china dolls.
Boarding the freighter, she was shocked to discover that a luxurious suite had been prepared for her and her brother to share. There were separate sleeping rooms, a large shared common room, storage compartments for their belongings, and even a couple of extra rooms for their attendants. The common room even had a tiny pool. Though it wasn’t large enough to swim in, the water was relaxing nonetheless.
Instead of feeling elated at being treated with the respect normally afforded a member of the imperial family, Keiko simply felt ashamed to be rolling in luxury while the other humans were packed in like sardines. It was a six-month voyage and there was nothing she could do, besides invite groups of them to her quarters to relax.
Mamoru insisted that they dress in traditional imperial clothing for all the formal affairs. He felt it lent credibility to their claim for leadership. Keiko could hardly argue with him, when it seemed that his instincts were correct. The Candorians were polite, accommodating, and even provided them with extra sets of clothing sewn by their tailors.
Keiko felt stifled, even though they hadn’t broken orbit yet. Mamoru was still waiting for the last of the humans to be evacuated. All the major cities were cleared of people and the Candorians had resorted to using their technology to scan the surface of the planet for the odd humans that had been surviving in the wild. They located several thousand and sent aerial drones to get close enough to latch onto them with a particle beam.
Keiko, Rose, and Jen had spent endless hours meeting them and talking to them
about relocation. Naturally, once they learned the planet was being scoured, they didn’t want to be left behind. It was mentally and physically exhausting, but it helped pass the time. The captain had assigned guards that were both lethal and obedient. No matter the request, they followed her orders like well-mannered foot soldiers.
Many humans chose to meet in the huge lounges and loading bays to watch the Earth get scoured for life. Keiko couldn’t bring herself to watch that, electing instead to hold up in her quarters with other like-minded people.
She didn’t have to wonder when the weapon had been discharged, because there was some kind of residual blowback effect that not only took out all the ship’s systems but also threw her forward face first on the floor. The impact must have knocked her unconscious, because she came to with people helping her to her feet.
Once her eyes adjusted to the light, she realized she was no longer in her room. Furthermore, she didn’t recognize any of the people in the room. Feeling like she would throw up, she couldn’t wrap her mind around the fact that one of the women looked like a much older version of herself. She had an older Krylon warrior at her side. Keiko staggered back a step, then another until her back pressed against a cold metal wall.
As her breathing slowed, a sharp metallic taste assaulted her taste buds. The room stopped spinning after a few moments, but the ordeal had taken its toll. Sliding down the wall to sit on the floor, she watched the older woman move forward. Kneeling in front her, she spoke calmly. Keiko knew she was speaking Japanese, but the words were muddled in her head, like an odd-words salad. She was saying something about time travel and interdimensional shifts. It was all too much. Feeling herself jerk violently, everything faded to black.
Chapter 6
~ Shar Jalon ~
Keiko’s Music Mix Six
Before he could get himself out of the science bay, a strange light crackled in the center of the vast room.
Celestial Mates Complete Series Box Set (Books 1-5) (Alien SciFi Romance) Page 44
