Chapter Sixteen
There was a fleeting instant of inky blackness and poof! We were standing on the Spanish Trailhead. Toadstool-shaped rocks, and sculptured buttes marched like sentries along the cactus studded valley.
Kee-eeee-arr. Kee-eeee-arr. Kee-eeee-arr. The wind plucked at my hair as I watched a hawk circle overhead.
“Birdie,” Thor gurgled.
“It’s a red-tailed hawk.”
“Is that Mangas?” Hothar pointed to the top of a nearby mesa.
Silhouetted against the sky were eight Apache warriors on horseback. Two more horses grazed next to them.
“It is.” I would recognize his aura anywhere.
Thor clapped his hands. “Pache!”
“Pache!” Haki bounced up and down on my head.
I sighed. “If he poops in my hair, I’m gonna be pissed.”
“Tabors only poop once a month,” Hothar advised.
“Not helping.”
“I have never heard of a Tabor pooping in anyone’s hair,” Hothar said and teleported us up to the warriors.
Stripes of yellow, black and vermilion warpaint marked Mangas’s and his warriors’ faces. White palm prints decorated their muscular chests. They were all wearing cotton leggings with leather breechcloths. They would have been at home in the 1800’s except for their modern weapons belts and laser pistols. Instead of a Winchester lever-action rifles in the saddle scabbards, they had military grade laser rifles.
Mangas lifted his hand in greeting. “Yah-ah-tay.”
“Yah-ah-tay,” I replied.
Hothar asked on our mental link. “Yah-ah-tay?”
“It’s hello in Apache.”
“Yah-ah-tay,” Hothar said.
Thor stretched his arms out trying to touch Mangas’s black mustang. “Horsie! Ride horsie!”
“Give him to me,” Mangas said.
Hothar handed Thor over.
“Go fast,” Thor commanded.
I touched Thor’s leg. “You need to speak to him. Mangas can’t mind talk.”
“Go fast,” Thor said.
“No,” Mangas said firmly and settled Thor in front of him. “I brought Lakota for you, and your warrior can ride the blue roan.”
Lakota was a sturdy appaloosa mare and fast as the wind. She butted me with her head and nickered. “I know it’s been too long.” I petted her nose. “I’ve missed you too.”
Hothar eyed the roan for a moment, then picked up the reins and swung into the saddle.
“You know how to ride?” Or was that tingling sensation in my mind from him messing around in my head?
“You do. That means I do too.”
Did he seriously think accessing my memories would teach him how to ride? “There’s a bit more to it than that.”
“I am Coletti,” Hothar responded.
I guess that was a yes. Testosterone was the bane of my life.
Mangas grinned and turned his horse down a narrow path. His warriors trailed after him. I mounted Lakota and followed them. I could hear Thor chattering away, “Me like horsie! What on Pache face? Where battle suit?”
With the patience of Job, Mangas answered all his questions.
Haki crawled down my forehead and peered at me. “Me hungry.”
Of course, he was. “Look birdie.” I pointed at a roadrunner perched on a boulder with a lizard in its mouth.
He bounded back to the top of my head. “Birdie! What in mouth?”
“A lizard.”
“Me hungry,” Haki whined.
I rode into a cloud of gnats and tried not to inhale one. “Eat up.” I watched in amazement as his busy little tongue snagged every one of the insects. “Better?”
Haki asked hopefully. “Mealie bugs?”
“No mealie bugs.”
“Where they go?”
“They’re back at the base. You can have some for dinner.”
Several cottontail rabbits bolted across the path.
“Petkas!”
“We call those rabbits,” I said.
“Babbits?”
I shrugged. What the hell? “Yeah, babbits.”
“Why that Tabor no talk?”
An image of a tarantula formed in my mind. “That’s not a Tabor. It’s a tarantula.”
“He no talk?”
“No, he doesn’t.”
My curious magpie kept at it. “Why?”
“Cause he’s a spider.”
“That silly.” Haki bounced wildly on my head. “What that? What that?”
“A butterfly.”
“Bufly. Pretty.”
“It is.”
After an hour of “what that?” I needed chocolate. Lots and lots of chocolate. Did the kid ever shut up?
Hothar rode up to me, gave me a chocolate bar and smooch. “I will take Haki for a while.” He reached over and plucked the Tabor off my head.
“Thank you. You’re a keeper.” I unwrapped the chocolate and took a big bite.
“What that?”
The Catalina Mountains were a maze of dirt tracks frequented by range cattle and the occasional adventurous hiker. I stuffed the rest of the chocolate in my mouth.
“A cow,” Hothar answered.
Haki giggled. “Cow go moo?”
How did Kaylee keep her sanity? Prickles ran up my spine. “My radar is going off.”
“Link with me.”
I joined my mind to Hothar’s and we reached out mentally. We could sense ten males moving in our direction.
“I have them on my scanner.” Hothar tapped several icons. “Four Earth First soldiers and six Legionnaires 3.2 klicks away.”
“And packing enough firepower to take out the entire mountain. Only a few people knew we were going horseback riding today. How in the hell did they find us? Do I have another tracker on me?”
Hothar scanned me. “The Central Command tracker is still active.”
“Dang! That’s gotta be how the Supreme One found us last night. How do we disable it?”
“I can jam the signal,” Hothar said.
“Do it.”
He hit an icon twice. “Done.”
“Only high-ranking Central Command officers have the access code to the female’s tracker database and you know what that means?”
Hothar scowled. “One of the generals is working with Earth First and the Rodan.”
“I’m sick and tired of them trying to kill us. I think it’s time we returned the favor,” I snarled.
“Why do they hunt you so aggressively?”
“Wish I knew.”
“What that?”
I glanced over at a skinny coyote. “Doggie.”
“Think. There has to be a reason,” Hothar said.
“I’m a Jones. That’s usually reason enough, but this does seem more personal.”
“Is it possible you angered one of the General’s military bedmates.”
I have myself a mental head smack. Dang. How could I have forgotten about “the incident”? “I tossed General Martha Douglas out of our house once.”
Hothar’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “With your telekinesis?”
“You got that right. Bounced her off her car a couple of times too.”
“What did she do?”
“I found General Douglas in my room wearing nothing but a smile and packing my stuff up. The bitch said she was going to marry Uncle Saul and I had no place in their lives. She had even enrolled me in a boarding school in Alaska.”
“Your uncle knew of this?”
“Are you kidding me? It was a one-night stand after he had imbibed too much celebratory champagne. I told Martha my uncle would never marry her ugly ass and to leave. She called me a bunch of names and swung at me. Not a smart move.” I rubbed my knuckles remembering the pleasure of breaking her nose. “I threw her out of the house and because she created such a ruckus, my neighbors called the police.”
“Did she get arrested?
I grinned. “You betcha. For indecent exposure and disorderly conduct. The arrest made the evening news. They even had a vid of her naked meltdown.”
“What did your uncle do?”
“He busted her down from a three-star general to a one-star and assigned her to Fort Collins,” I replied.
“She blames you for the General terminating their imaginary relationship and stripping her of her rank.”
“If she hadn’t threatened to kill me, my uncle would have let her keep her rank. I didn’t think she was stupid enough to follow through on her promise to end me.”
Hothar rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. “General Douglas has the resources to aid Earth First.”
“And the smarts to be the Supreme One.”
“I agree. I will inform the Battle Commander of our suspicions.”
“Good idea. Maybe he can arrest her before she sends more assassins. There’s nothing quite as vicious as a menopausal woman on the warpath.”
Haki the curious inquired, “What menopa?”
“It’s what makes a crazy lady want to kill me.”
“You no die!” Haki jumped from Hothar’s head to mine. “Me protect. Me bite. She die.”
“You bet she will.” I gingerly stroked his head with one finger. “You’re a big, bad warrior.”
Haki wriggled happily. “Me bad.”
Mangas and his men were about a five hundred yards ahead of us. It was time to let them know we had company coming. I threw my head back and yipped like a coyote.
“A useful talent,” Hothar commented.
I smiled as Mangas and his warriors wheeled their horses around and galloped back to us. I still had it.
“Wheeee! Do again,” Thor cried as they slid to a stop next to us.
“How many enemy warriors?” Mangas was all business.
Hothar touched his bracelet and a 3D image of the area formed in mid-air. “We have ten hostiles heading our way. I have notified the Battle Commander and we are to move to a safe location while his warriors deal with the soldiers.”
Mangas studied the hologram. “There’s a cave two klicks to the east with sufficient iridium in the walls to block their scanners. It’s also big enough to hide us and the horses.”
“Lead the way,” Hothar said.
Mangas kicked his horse into a fast trot and we followed him. I had to admire Hothar’s grim determination to stay in the saddle. The trail wasn’t an easy one. Our horses were part mountain goat as they climbed up and down the steep hillsides and jumped several narrow ravines. It had taken Uncle Saul a good two months to learn to ride one of Mangas’s feisty mustangs.
Twenty minutes later, Mangas reined his horse to a stop and pointed to a fast-moving stream. “We have to cross it to get to the cave.”
Haki stared down at the water. “Me no like.”
“It’s okay. Uncle Hothar is going to teleport you and Thor to the other side.”
“No!” Thor wailed. “Me stay with Pache.”
“A good warrior follows orders, or he does not get to see the dinosaurs,” Hothar told Thor.
Thor eyed his stern expression for a moment and held his arms out. “Me good warrior.”
Hothar lifted him off Mangas’s horse.
“That kitty? The image of a puma formed in my head.
Frowning, I glanced at over at a cottonwood trees and noticed a rather large mountain lion perched on a lower branch. “Holy crap! A cougar!”
Thor quivered in excitement. “Me pet?”
“No!” Hothar, Mangas and I shouted in unison.
His lower lip wobbled. “Me want pet kitty.”
“That kitty bites,” I said.
Hothar pulled his pistol.
“No kill!” Thor and Haki protested.
The mountain lion jumped down and disappeared into a thicket of creosote bushes.
“I have a feeling Thor inherited Kaylee’s critter control.”
“A useful battle skill.”
“Not for a toddler,” I retorted.
Hothar abruptly plucked me off my horse.
“Hey! I can ride across.”
“The Battle Commander has informed me of two Rodan marauders heading our way,” Hothar replied. He tucked Thor under his left arm and teleported us.
We popped in next to an outcrop of rock. The opening to the cave was partially hidden by some scraggly bushes.
My internal radar went off and I cried, “Incoming hostiles!”
A glittering blue light blossomed and five Rodan appeared next to the cottonwood tree.
General Douglas was one determined bitch. I hit them with my telekinesis, knocking them into the water. The monsters floundered around and were swept downstream. The water was only three feet deep which they would have known if they had only stood up.
Hothar released me and thrust Thor into my arms. “Get inside the cave.”
Dammit, I wanted to help but my first duty was to protect the children. I hurried inside and took cover behind a tumble of rocks. Kaylee was going to have an epic melt down when she found out I had put her kids in danger.
Kaboom! The ground shuddered under my feet and a war erupted outside. The sizzle of laser pistols combined with Hothar’s and the Apaches’ battle cries.
Thor pulled his sword. “Me protect. They protect.”
“They?” A low growl sounded, and I glanced over my shoulder. A black bear, a coyote, a bobcat and the mountain lion stood behind us. “Where did they come from?”
“I called them,” Thor said.
A slightly hysterical laugh broke from me. He was his mother’s son.
A large explosion shook the earth and dirt rained down on my head.
“Do your friends know of another way out of his cave.”
Thor’s face scrunched in concentration. “Yes.”
“Then get us out of here.”
The critters disappeared into the blackness.
Wazzock’s piss! I couldn’t see six inches in front of me.
I reached out, trying to feel my way.
“Kitty help,” Thor said.
I flinched when the mountain lion gently took my hand in her mouth and pulled me forward.
“She no hurt,” Thor said, patting my cheek.
“As long as she knows I’m not on the dinner menu. We’re good.” After what seemed like an eternity of stumbling in the dark, I noticed sunshine ahead of us. Oh, thank God.
The mountain lion dropped my hand and I practically ran toward the light.
A shaft of sunlight shot through a hole in the ceiling of a large cavern. White cactus-like growths grew around a small spring bubbling out of the wall.
“Pretty,” Haki cooed.
I noticed a bunch of ancient petroglyphs on the walls. “The old ones must have lived here.”
Kablooey! The floor bucked beneath my feet and the passageway collapsed behind us.
Dang! Another minute and General Douglas would have succeeded in killing us. I looked around. The only way out was up a narrow ledge that ended at the opening in the roof.
Thor wriggled. “Down. Want down.”
I cautiously put him on the floor and watched as the critters surrounded him. The first one that tried to eat him was getting bounced off a wall. To my relief they seemed to like Thor petting them.
Haki scurried down my body and went to make friends with a bunch of daddy long leg spiders. The daddy long legs scattered up the walls. I’d run too if a giant spider was coming my way. The baby Tabor seemed to think it was a great game and chased after them.
I linked with Hothar and through his eyes I watched as he hacked his way through the Rodan soldiers. When the last one fell, I asked, “Mangas and his men?”
“They live.” Hothar surveyed the area. Dead Rodan and Legionnaires littered the ground.
“You did good, Hot Lips.”
Poof! Hothar appeared in front of me. Lifting me off my feet, he kissed me like a starving man. I wrapped my arms around his neck, enjoying the feel of his mouth on mine.
Thor tugged on my jeans. “Go pee pee. Pweeease.”
Hothar broke the kiss and leaned his forehead against mine. “Duty calls.”
“He’s brought a few friends with him,” I said, pointing at the menagerie of critters. When Hothar’s hand dropped to his pistol, I added, “They’re friendly.”
“Friendly?”
“Yep. Thor has been petting them.” I slid down his body.
With a sigh, Hothar picked Thor up and walked behind a big boulder. “Go pee pee.”
I laughed when Haki and all the critters followed them.
“Go pee pee Thor,” Hothar repeated.
“Dada goes pee pee with me.”
“Figures.” A faint zzzzzip was followed by liquid splashing against the rock. “Can you go now?”
“Me can.”
“On the rock. Not my boot.”
“Kitty go pee pee too,” Haki giggled.
I snickered at the image of the bobcat pissing on Hothar’s left boot.
My amusement died when a seriously pissed off Zarek teleported into the cavern. “Did General Douglas escape?”
“She did not.”
I let out a huge sigh of relief.
Hothar kept a careful eye on the Overlord as he guided his little charge away from the pool of urine.
“Geepa!” Thor hollered and rush over to Zarek.
Zarek scooped Thor up and held him tightly. “How is my little warrior?”
“Me ride horsie. Monsters come. Auntie Casey throw them in water.” Thor gestured to the critters. “Wanna pet friends?”
“Maybe later.” Zarek’s cold gaze settled on me.
I held my hands up. “What could I do? He has Kaylee’s ability to summon animals. Without them, we would have died in the cave in.”
“Rocks fall down. We hide here. Kitty go pee pee on Hoot boot. Can I paint face like Pache?” Thor babbled excitedly.
“Ask your mother.”
Haki scurried up Zarek’s body and hopped on Thor’s head. “Go see dinosaurs now?”
The Overlord ran a gentle hand over his head. “Yes, you can.”
Hothar and I exchanged horrified looks. Now?