Welcome Resort, Planet Ussed, 4th Quadrant
Earth Year 2437
THE BINARY SUNS shone brightly over a tropical paradise people spent a fortune to visit. Zehn understood the draw, but then, he’d been born in Ussed’s western cradle, on blessed barbarian lands. Yet even the East promised true beauty.
At the offworlders’ Welcome Resort, dense, flowering maffet trees provided a canopy around the luxury getaway. Fountains of clear water turned from lavender to blue when the wisps of clouds shifted, blocking the rays of one sun. Overhead, masses of bright color cawed as they flew by, the gentle ondi birds always a sight.
Zehn drew in a breath and sighed. The sweet scent of honeyed flowers and urgan rum tantalized guests to venture onward. He wouldn’t have minded joining them, but he had duties to keep him busy.
A multitude of visitors crowded the courtyard. They came from all corners of the Five Galaxies, some humanoid, others not. Zehn understood their many languages, courtesy of the resort’s translator subtrans education packs. He hadn’t been thrilled to use alien technology, but in order to work in the resort, he’d had no choice but to undergo communication training. And he had to admit it helped.
A giant red, slug-like creature slowly scooted by him, her eyes blinking in a rhythm that mesmerized if stared at too long. “If this isn’t the most gorgeous view! Tal, are you seeing this?”
The grumbling Felcan male with her waved tentacles in the air and snapped back, “Of course I’m seeing this, female. I have eight eyes.”
She ignored him, oohing and aahing over the landscape as she left a trail of ooze in her wake.
Another female, this one likely Venetian with her mostly humanoid appearance, green skin and overlarge eyes, ogled Zehn and his partner, Lore. “Oh, I’m taking in the sights. Loorie, Babrea, are you guys seeing what I’m seeing?”
The women with her tittered and drew closer.
“I can die happy now. I’ve seen a real barbarian.” The redhead sighed.
Barbarians, he’d been told, were an exotic treat all their own. Zehn exchanged an amused glance with Lore but said nothing. As security for Welcome Resort, he and his partner were required to patrol, look tough, and take care of problems.
The females could stare all they wanted. Felcan ooze didn’t qualify as something he needed to handle. On cue, a discreet clean-up team hustled to wipe down the area with a purifying mist, then hurried back into the resort to make room for more new arrivals. The females gradually drifted away.
Zehn and Lore had been stationed in the visitor transport dock, where the newly arrived landed or teleported in. Personally, Zehn disliked the mass of chaotic energy from the ships and teledecks. The planet had enough vitality without needing artificial bursts from offworlder tech. Such advancements, though deemed necessary by the offworlders, didn’t do anything but pollute the planet, in Zehn’s opinion. Ussed didn’t stand for it either, as evidenced by the lack of “advancements” on the known regions of the world.
Welcome made use of an invisible dome, what they called their tech barrier, to allow technology inside the resort.
Outside Welcome, alien tech didn’t work. Meaning no phasers, vid calls, or space-jumping, thank the Maker. Though rightly called barbarians, in some ways Zehn and his brethren were far more civilized than half the creatures arriving on Ussed to vacation.
Ah, finally. Lore, sounding eager, sent the telepathic message, nodding to a hulking Earther stalking a pair of Taethen. Trouble. Something to break up the day.
Not smart of the human. Though the Earther had more muscle mass, Taethen fought dirty. Half as tall as a barbarian, strong, blue, and prone to invisibility, the Taethen were known to pull pranks on those they considered inferior.
Zehn liked them. Then again, he’d never been the butt of a Taethan joke.
“You. You stole my passkey,” the Earther shouted. “I want it back.”
“Earthling, you lost it fairly in our game.” The smirk on the Taethen’s face was clear to see. Despite his blue skin, white head feathers, and large black eyes, the Taethan had a humanoid shape. “Come now. Did our play not make your transfer to the quadrant pass swiftly?”
Thinking they’d need to protect the human from the Taethens, Zehn nodded to his partner, then watched as Lore moved to deal with the situation.
The Taethan male subtly flanking the human didn’t get far. The human turned and shot him with a phaser.
His partner looked horrified. “You killed him.”
The Earther shook his head. “He’s stunned. But if you don’t give me back my passkey, I’ll kill him dead.”
Is there any other way to kill someone than dead? Lore sent him.
Zehn shrugged. Perhaps on Earth they rejuvenate somehow? He’d have to ask the new humans now part of their clan about their Earther practices. Or maybe he could ask the beauty he and his partner had been carefully monitoring for the past two months. He wondered how long she planned to ignore them and couldn’t contain a grin. Stubborn and not quite as shy as she pretended, Mandy of Earth intrigued him like no other.
Lore agreed. Yes. She’s the one. He stepped in, grabbed the fallen Taethan, and handed him to his friend, who staggered under the weight of the unconscious male. “Give the Earther back his passkey.”
The offended, conscious Taethan shook his head.
Lore narrowed his eyes. “Now, or I’ll do it for you.” Large, menacing, and his chest markers swirling with warning, Lore gave the impression of eagerness to follow through on his warning.
The Taethan looked as if he wanted to argue, then smartly handed Lore the key.
Lore turned to the human. “Here. Now prepare to leave.”
The human blinked. “Leave? I just got here.”
“You were told no weapons of any kind. The sensor should have registered this yet did not. Why is that?” Lore turned the small phaser over in his hands. “Perhaps because—”
Look out, Zehn shouted.
But Lore had already turned and shielded himself from a second phaser attack. The xechelln hide covering his forearms repelled the blast shot by the human’s associate. The blast did nothing but get absorbed into the arm-bracers and dissipate.
Zehn would have rendered his partner help, but if a warrior was so weak as to not be able to defeat a human, what good was he?
Lore must have caught some of this thoughts because he smirked before striking the unarmed human, rendering him unconscious. Then he lifted the male and tossed him into his compatriot. Lore made short work of the remaining man, disarmed them both, then handed them over to the Welcome security bots that dragged them away.
The entire process took little time, but they’d managed to draw a crowd regardless. The many tourists had stopped to stare, so Zehn took the opportunity to ask, in a loud voice, “Does anyone else have weapons they wish to declare?”
Three visitors willingly handed over a few items before the area cleared up. Welcome’s guides ushered everyone away from the transport dock into the resort with smiles and laughter. With the exorbitant fees the resort charged, their guests expected top treatment. Apparently a fight, with barbarians no less, had just cemented Welcome’s reputation as the destination place to be.
A few females came closer to Lore, chattered and flirted, and stroked his arms with invitations for later play. Lore didn’t respond, though he did keep the notes handed to him, and Zehn noticed more than one woman leave with a dash of hope in her eyes.
When Lore rejoined him after disposing of those notes, Zehn shook his head. “Not nice, teasing the visitors.”
“Why not? It’s all part of the ‘Welcome Package,’ so I’ve been told.”
Zehn frowned. “By who?”
Lore nodded in the direction of the administration building. “The supervisor. Franklin.”
Zehn didn’t like the small man, but he’d been told to behave himself if he wanted to continue serving as resort security. Since he and Lore needed the human female to come to them, they needed time to court her properly.
Because of the East-West Treaty signed hundreds of years ago, western foreigners could not be attacked or kidnapped without repercussions. In return for leaving the rest of the planet alone, the westerners received barbarian protection. All three tribes rotated members in and out of the resort. But Zehn’s clan, of the Cloud Tribe, was located closest to the resort, thus many of their members had offered their services to keep the peace between offworlders and the native barbarian population.
Zehn would much rather have abducted the female and returned with her and Lore to their village. But the resort had already lost two human females to Zehn’s clanmates. He and Lore had to be very careful about their interactions without drawing suspicion about their activity.
They’d already decided on Mandy of Earth as their bond-mate. They just needed to show her how much she had to gain by joining with them. Clearly her ties to the resort had nothing to do with the people, since she buried herself in the admin building and didn’t leave it until the suns set. Her pattern remained unchanged, and Zehn knew the time had come to let her see their true intentions.
“No time like the present,” Lore said as their shift ended.
Zehn nodded. “But we must be subtle. She’s smart.” He glanced at the administration building. She’s watching us.
I’m still not sure how she’s avoided us so long. Lore gave a rare grin. She’s a good choice for a mate. A real challenge.
Zehn nodded, then frowned as he studied his bond-mate. You’ve gone too long without warring. Your energies have surged to excess.
I can handle it.
So Lore liked to think. Mm-hmm. Zehn sent Lore a mental image of what he had in mind, saw Lore’s eyes glow with a familiar heat, and knew the time had come.