The Alien's Back! Read online

  The Meldor, however, had reacted far better to being out of the tunnels than she would have expected. It had hesitated as she guided it toward an exit that had a gentler incline, allowing it to walk up out of the ground, but she had spoken to it softly and gently, encouraging it to go along with them. Finally it seemed to have given its trust over to her and allowed her to guide it up out of the ground and into the diminishing light of the day. It was when they approached the battlefield that she witnessed the intense reaction, but from a source that surprised her. The hybrids had been visibly afraid when they had seen the animal. Many had backed away from the fight and run from the animal, putting themselves in severe risk of being captured by the Valdicians and being put through reprogramming. Their training had taught them never to leave a fight until they had gone through all of their planned maneuvers for that attack. She could already tell by the way that the hybrids had run from the battle that they weren’t finished with their maneuvers, but were simply retreating.

  It would have made sense to her for the army of Denynso, Eteri, Irisa, humans, and Mikana to be startled when they saw the animal. It was something that none of them would have encountered before and they wouldn’t have known what to expect from it. This was a creature that only existed on Penthos now, though it had once thrived on another planet, and because it had been cast beneath the ground so long before it was unlikely that any of the species, even those that had been on Penthos before, had even heard of this being. To see something this large and visibly fierce would be unnerving for even the fiercest of the warriors. The reaction of the hybrids, though, was far more severe.

  This didn’t make sense to her. She had been through the training of the hybrid army on Penthos. She knew the hybrids were aware of the existence of the Meldor. Even those who had not been made privy to the sections of the tunnels that were now abandoned knew that the animal was beneath the quarry. They were told that this powerful animal was a weapon. They understood the danger that it posed to their enemies. But they shouldn’t have feared it for themselves. It shouldn’t have been so incredibly horrifying to them that they would leave their posts in the battle without regard for the goals that had been set out for them, set by the rhythm of the drums.

  Suddenly it occurred to her. That was her training. That was what she had gone through in the time that she had spent on Penthos before Ryan transferred her back to Earth and prepared her to fight there. That had been long enough ago that things may not be the same. Things might have changed. The only explanation for the way that the hybrids reacted to seeing the Meldor come toward the battlefield was that their training was different now that it had been when she was on Penthos. Instead of them thinking of this animal as a weapon that could be used to prevent the enemy from coming down into the tunnels and the bunkers that they contained, they thought of it as a threat. Rather than a source of protection, it was now a danger to them, something hanging over their heads to remind them every moment that they did not belong to themselves, but to Ryan and the bend of his whims. The change didn’t seem to make sense. Severine couldn’t understand why Ryan would shift the focus of that creature and the extensive, deep training that dug inside each of the people brought to Penthos and wired them to do just as Ryan wanted.

  The baby on Severine’s chest whimpered and she lifted one hand away from the Meldor’s fur to pat his back gently, soothing him.

  “We’ll be there soon,” she whispered to him. “We’ll be there soon and we won’t have to travel anymore tonight. You can have something to eat and sleep without being strapped to me.” She took a breath and latched onto the thick dark fur again, leaning down to kiss the top of the baby’s head. “I’m sorry that this is the way that your first few days have been. You deserve more to the start of your life than this.”

  There was a groan from behind her and Severine looked back over her shoulder to see one of the wounded men trying to lift his head from where it had been resting on the Meldor’s powerful side.

  “Rest,” she said. “If you move too much you might fall. We’ll be to the compound soon. They’ll be able to take care of you there.”

  Tapping her heels slightly again, she hoped to push the Meldor a little faster, though its huge size told her that it was likely this animal wasn’t able to move at a much higher speed that it already was. She wanted to get to the compound as quickly as she could so that these men could get to the healers. Ahead of her she saw the dark outline of the wall surrounding the compound. She had never been allowed beyond the barrier that kept this section of the planet set aside for Ryan when he was on the planet with them and the Valdicians that did his bidding when he wasn’t. She only knew that it was within the protection of that wall that he lived and planned their training. The massive gate was standing open and she headed toward it, stopping the Meldor just in front of it. The warriors who had run along with them appeared around them a few moments later and started to help the wounded off of the Meldor’s back. She watched as they carried the men into the compound and when they were gone, she encouraged the animal forward again, finally entering the compound.

  Ahead of her she saw what looked like a human woman. She was staring at the Meldor with fear in her eyes.

  “You don’t have to be afraid,” Severine told her softly, hoping to calm her enough that she wouldn’t incite the instincts within the animal that Severine knew were still there but hoped would not emerge again.

  The woman looked up at her.

  “Is this thing safe?” she called back.

  Severine patted the animal’s flank and it stopped walking again. She reached behind her back and released the fabric that held the baby close to her chest. Untying it carefully, she loosened the baby until he rested into her arm, then leaned down and carefully handed the baby to Rilex. Once the baby was safe, she swung her legs over to the side and carefully climbed down until she could jump to the sand in front of the woman.

  “This is a Meldor,” she told her. “I can assure you that it is perfectly safe.”

  “And who are you?” the human woman asked.

  There was a hint of protective aggressiveness in her voice, but Severine wasn’t intimidated. If this woman was already inside the compound it meant that she was one of the round that had been on Penthos while the rest were on Earth. She had a close connection with these people and would want to do what she could to ensure that threats were kept away from them.

  “My name is Severine,” Severine said. “This is my mate, Rilex.” She gestured toward Rilex, now cradling the baby to his chest and murmuring against his soft skin. “I have the trust of those who were on Earth. You can trust me. And you can trust the Meldor. It is just an animal. All it needs is to be taken care of, just like the men. Food, water, and rest. That’s all.”

  The human woman looked at the animal again and its head turned toward her. Severine could see the shift in the woman’s eyes as she looked at the Meldor, and she knew that this woman could see the vulnerability in it. She turned back to Severine and nodded.

  “Alright,” the woman said, gesturing to the cluster of buildings on the other side of the compound. “We aren’t using those buildings. They might have some things left in them, but they should be mostly empty. There is one that has double doors nearly the size of one wall, like it might have once been a barn or a stable. If it fits inside, it will be safe there. Bring it there and I’ll bring some water.”

  “Thank you,” Severine said.

  She rested her hand on the front of the Meldor’s neck and guided it toward the buildings that the woman had pointed out to her. She quickly found the one that she had described and pushed aside the double doors to reveal a massive open room. She didn’t know what it might have once housed, though she didn’t think that it was the barn or stable that the human woman had guessed. Ryan and the Valdicians would have no need for domesticated animals that they would need to house in this size of a building. It had to have some purpose at one time, but Severine didn’t know what that p
urpose could be.

  The human woman entered the building a few moments later carrying what looked like a bundled blanket under one arm and a large bucket in her hands. She rested the bucket on the floor several feet in front of the Meldor and Severine saw that it contained the water that the woman had said she would get for the animal. The woman stepped back and crouched down to put the blanket on the floor in front of her. Spreading it out, she revealed a pile of food that she had wrapped inside. Taking part of it, she held it out to Severine.

  “Thank you,” Severine said, taking the food from the woman’s hand.

  The woman nodded and tugged the corner of the blanket to draw the rest of the food up close to the bucket so that the Meldor could eat it.

  “I didn’t know what it would eat,” she admitted.

  The Meldor walked toward the bucket and dipped its head inside, drinking nearly the entire amount of water before lifting its head again and turning toward the food.

  “It seems that it likes it,” Severine said, her heart warming at the sight of the animal eating the food that the woman had brought for it. “I appreciate your help…” she hesitated and the woman looked toward her.

  “Elise,” she said. “My name is Elise.”

  “Hello, Elise,” Severine said.

  She could see the nervousness in Elise’s eyes when she looked at her and Severine knew that she could recognize that she was a hybrid. She didn’t know what to say to her to calm her fears and she knew that this was something that she was going to encounter well into the future, but this was not the time for her to confront it. At this moment all she wanted to do was pretend that the reaction wasn’t happening and move forward.

  “Do you know Azra?” Elise asked.

  Severine shook her head.

  “I do,” she replied, remembering the warrior from the brief time in the basement. “How do you know him?”

  Elise sighed and gazed out of the one of the double doors that was still standing open.

  “He’s my mate,” she explained. “I haven’t seen him since my shuttle brought him to Earth with Pyra and the rest. I’ve been so worried about him.”

  “I haven’t known him for long,” Severine said, “but what I have known of him, he is strong and well. He should be here very soon.”

  Chapter Three

  The battle had erupted into chaos. People ran past Maxim, seeming to not even notice that he was there as they left the battlefield. They were running in different directions, some backtracking and going the other way as if not knowing where they should go or what they should do next. There was a sense of terror in the air around him and the panic seemed to have shattered all of the structured, rhythmic control that the hybrids had when they marched into battle. Maxim stood in the center of the field, looking around himself frantically to try to find Aegeus. He had lost sight of him in the frantic reaction to the Meldor and hadn’t seen him since. He worried that he might be one of the men who had been swept off of the ground, too injured to walk, to bring back to the compound for treatment.

  Maxim spun around, rushing a few steps in each direction as his eyes took in each of the faces that he saw. Some he recognized, even if their names didn’t immediately come to his mind, and those that he didn’t know he could link to their side of the army by the way that they were dressed or who they were interacting with, helping him to decipher what was left of the quickly dissipating battle. Finally, he saw Aegeus across the field from him. His father turned toward him and their eyes met for the first time. Even from the distance, he could see the flicker of recognition, the slight change in the older man’s face that told Maxim that, at least for that moment, he knew that he was looking into a face that he had seen before. Maxim tried to take a step toward him, but before he was able to say anything or even reach out to him, his vision was obliterated by a surge of flame that seemed to burst up in front of him.

  The heat of the flame caused Maxim to take a step back and he raised his hand up to block the glare from his eyes. He had been so startled by the sudden flames that he hadn’t processed the scream that was pouring out of it. It cut through the clamor of the melee around him now, slicing through the thick air so that it rang in his ears. Maxim forced himself closer to the flames that were now creating what seemed like a wall across the battlefield and realized that it was made by three people, their bodies engulfed in flames as the ran frantically back and forth across the desert sand. Maxim’s stomach turned and he felt horror rush up in his chest. He turned around desperately and rushed to the nearest warrior, one of the very few that were left on the battlefield.

  “We have to help them!” he said.

  “What do we do?”

  Maxim dropped his sword to the ground and began to pull off his shirt. The warrior mirrored his action and soon the men around them were doing the same. Maxim took the small pouch of water that he had on his hip and doused his shirt, the sprinkled more on his body. Bracing himself against the heat, he ran toward the flaming figure in the center of the wall. He dove toward him and felt the flames licking at his skin as he passed through the fire. Soon his hands hit the man and the shirt that he held out covered part of his skin. The force of his body forced the man out of the row of fire and onto the ground. Maxim covered as much of him as he could with his shirt and started forcing him to roll, scooping up sand and burying him in it to suffocate the flames.

  On either side of him he could see that the other men were doing the same. One of the warriors came to his side and started using his own shirt to continue dampening the flames on the man that Maxim had brought to the ground. His skin was still stinging from passing through the fire but the intense heat had begun to dissipate and he could no longer see the bright light from the corners of his eyes, telling him that the wall of flame was no longer there. He looked to either side of him and saw that the other men were on the ground, rolling and digging down into the sand to try to put out the remaining flames.

  Finally there were no more flames on the man and Maxim carefully turned him over to see his face. He worried that he hadn’t gotten to him fast enough, that even with the effort that he had put forth to save him, that the flames were too intense, too quickly and he didn’t survive. Relief washed over him when he saw the man grimace as grains of sand fell away from his face. It was an expression of agony, but to Maxim it was a sign of life. To experience that pain, the man still had to be breathing, his heart still had to be beating, and for as long as that was happening, there would be a chance that he would be able to pull through. For him to truly have a chance, though, he would need to get to the healers as fast as possible. There was no way that they were going to be able to carry them. Their skin was too fragile and the time it would take to get them there might kill them with all of the breaks that they would need to take to change how they carried them. They needed another way to bring them to the compound and to the healers who were waiting there.

  “Azra,” Maxim called to the warrior helping another of the men nearby. “Do you know where Jacob is?”

  “I’m here. What do you need?”

  Maxim turned and saw the human man coming toward him.

  “Do you know how to operate the vehicle that Jonah and Rain built?” he asked.

  “I can only guess,” Jacob said. “I didn’t know of the technology when they were building it.”

  “Tell me what you know,” Maxim said. “Hurry.”

  Maxim listened intently as Jacob told him the basic way that he thought that the vehicle was used. He nodded.

  “Thank you. Is it close to here?”

  “It shouldn’t be too far.”

  “Help Azra watch over the men,” he said. “Find any water that you can and pour it over their skin. Don’t take their clothes or robes off of them. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  Maxim stood and started running in the direction that he had seen his father coming. He pushed his feet harder and harder with each step, reaching inside of himself to find the power that his ki
nd had given him. He rarely used the impossible speed that flowed through him, never finding the opportunity when he had truly needed it. Now, though, he knew that it was the only thing that was going to give those men the chance to live. He forced himself faster, finding the limit to his speed and breaking it, pushing his muscles beyond the boundaries that they had ever reached, until the world around him blurred with his speed and he barely felt the ground as he ran. He had to get to the vehicle that those who had come from Earth had left behind. It would bring them to the compound far faster than their feet could, not just helping them to save those men but also getting the vehicle out of the reach of the hybrid army.

  ****

  Aegeus felt his mouth go dry and his pulse pounding in his temples. He tried to process what he had just witnessed, but he couldn’t seem to wrap his mind around it. For a moment, he thought that he had been looking into the eyes of his son. The man had been standing several yards away from him and he only had the chance to see him for a brief moment, but there was something within Aegeus that told him that he had just seen Maxim, though he couldn’t be sure. He tried to calm the burst of excitement that he had felt when he first saw him. He didn’t want to build himself up too much only to find out that the man who he had seen was not actually his son.

  But his face had been so familiar. It had seemed so right. In the young man’s eyes he had seen the eyes of his firstborn. Aegeus still remembered the first time that he had seen those eyes, just moments after his wife brought him into the world. He had prepared for a baby that was screaming, angry at the sudden change in its existence. Instead, he saw a face that was serene, disciplined in a way that usually only came with many years. Those eyes had stared up at him, reaching out to him in a still, unwavering way that connected with Aegeus instantly, and overtook everything within him. He knew in that moment that he had a son, a gift that was unlike anything that he had ever been given, anything that he had ever experienced. This child was his legacy and would be the greatest pride that he had ever felt. When Kyven was born, he loved him deeply and was proud to have another son, but Maxim was set apart. Those eyes were like his father’s, as if the gaze that Aegeus had seen the moment that Maxim was born had spanned the generations and linked him to the greatest man Aegeus had ever known, a man who Maxim would never have the opportunity to meet.