CHAPTER EIGHT
LEUITENANT DEKARIO DUNDRA
“As for Commander Triq, if you feel that something is not right because he has not returned yet, then I trust you, Dekario, and your instincts. You’ve always had a way of knowing what Draqua are up to. I give my permission to find Commander Triq. You and Kavik take a small ship and go quietly spy on Commander Triq on Pacu without him knowing of your presence. Check on the Aeriwana Draqua hybrid situation and see if there is any news on it. I still have a feeling that something is happening on that front. Perhaps it is linked and you will suss it out this time.”
“I will leave right away, if you wish it,” I said to the King.
“Yes. Leave as soon as you can,” he responded.
As soon as he said it, my mind jumped to Reena. I didn’t want to leave her, not now. I didn’t trust that she would be safe in the village without me.
“Leave in the morning and tell no one where you are going. I will take care of your cover and send a false mission to the port to grant you a small, fast ship,” the king said.
“Yes, sir,” I said as I moved to the veranda and shifted. I ran fast and swan dived off the edge, my favorite thing to do, and flew straight to the tree huts to find Reena. I didn’t feel good about leaving her. I still did not trust that she was safe, but a mission is a mission. I had orders from the king himself, and if anyone was going to find out what Commander Triq was up to, it was damn well going to be me.
But I was not expecting Reena to be acting so odd when I visited her hut. She was nervous about something, but I did not know what. When she asked me to leave, I was very disappointed. Since I was going away, I wanted to spend the night with her. Who knew how long this mission would take? It could be a week or a month, and now I had to leave without being inside of her again. It was excruciating.
So the next morning I was in a grumpy mood.
“Make sure you check the fuel gages,” I said to Kavik.
“Yeah I already did it. I just told you I did a few seconds ago,” Kavik responded.
“Well, do it again,” I said angrily.
“What the hell is going on with you, Dekario? You are acting like an ass,” he said as he stopped working.
I stopped what I was doing and realized he was right. “I didn’t get a lot of sleep last night,” I said.
“Or maybe you didn’t get any Reena last night and now I have to deal with your sourness,” Kavik said moving to the back of the ship.
“Damn it,” I mumbled to myself. He was right, and I hated to admit that this human female was having this affect on me. I did enjoy her company and I wanted her as my life-long mate, but simply to mate. I was not supposed to be letting her have an affect on my work as a warrior. She was there to create my offspring and please me in bed, and now she was doing so much more than that.
“Ready for take off. Count it down,” Kavik said as he returned to the front of the ship and strapped in.
“Readying for launch,” I said as I focused on launching and not on Reena. It was hard but necessary.
We launched from Kelon and made our way to Tiok. We did not approach the village of Pacu. Instead, we entered the planet far from it and then when we reached a distance above the surface, we traveled along it, speeding toward the village of Pacu.
“I think we should park our ship outside the village, hide it. Then we will fly to the east end where Commander Triq normally lands as a base. We will see if he is there as he should be,” I said to Kavik
“Sounds like a good plan to me,” Kavik said.
A couple of hours later, we landed in a small rocky ravine and hid the ship in the deep water of the ravine creek. Then we were off to the village of Pacu where we landed over the port.
“Do you see it? Do you see the ship?” I asked Kavik.
“No. I don’t see it at all. There are only twenty or so ships in there. It’s not crowded, and there is plenty of room to land that Kiva that he’s in. He’s not here,” Kavik said.
“Shit. Then where?” I asked.
“Looks like we’re going to have to ask around and dig a little,” Kavik said. “I’ll be right back.” He flew off. I stared at the port searching for any sign of Draqua and didn’t see any.
“Here, you can put this on. Let’s get down on the ground,” Kavik said as he reappeared and handed me a long black cloth. Then he flew down the side of the wall and into the empty alley. I followed him down.
“Should we stay with wings?” he asked.
“Yes, in case we need to get away quickly. These cloths are long enough,” I said as I draped the cloth on my head and then wrapped the entire black cloth over my body and tied it at the waist. The long cloth went all the way down to the ground. Kavik wore a dark blue one. We were now unrecognizable, and even the hump on our backs from our folded wings did not give us away as the various races you found on Tiok came in all different shapes.
“I say we talk to the port guard in case he has been here this trip,” Kavik said.
“Great idea. After you,” he said. A few minutes later we were talking to the port guard.
“You know Commander Triq. You have seen him here many times before. Now tell us, was he here these last few days and where did he go to?” I said to him sternly. The guard gave us a disinterested look and then ignored us.
“We are speaking to you,” Kavik said.
“I hear you, but I do not care to engage with you. I do not need to tell you anything,” the guard said. I looked at his blue skin and small stature. He carried a blaster gun at his side, and as soon as I eyed it, I thought of a way to encourage him to talk to us.
“I think you do care to engage,” I said as I used my mind power to lift his own blaster gun out of his holster and aim it at him. He stared with wide eyes at the floating gun aimed at him. I laughed.
“So what was it that you were saying?” Kavik asked him.
“How? Give me back my gun,” he said.
“Quiet now,” I said as I pushed the gun closer to him but not close enough for him to reach. He jerked back. “Just answer the question, and you will have your gun back.”
“Commander Triq was here,” he sighed annoyed. “He left three days ago and mentioned that he needed coordinates for Riqov,” the guard said.
“Riqov?” Kavik said.
“I know it. Let’s get out of here,” I said as I made the blaster gun fly far from the guard and then set it down on the ground.
“Shit,” he mumbled as he went after it. We walked back to the alley and disappeared into the crowd, making our way to the outskirts of the village toward the ship.
“What is Riqov? Where is it? We have never had orders to go there,” Kavik said.
“No, we have not. But the king had suspicions about it. He pointed it out to me on the map of Tiok and told me it was a possible headquarters for the opposition,” I said as we took off our cloaks along the side of the creek.
“The opposition? What is Commander Triq doing there then? You think he’s hunting down the opposition?” Kavik asked.
“No, I don’t. Let’s go find out what he’s up to,” I said as I dove into the water toward the ship. Kavik dove in after me.
A few minutes later we were flying low over the orange dirt of Tiok out in the outlands as we made our way to Riqov.
“What am I getting into, Dekario?” Kavik asked. “Tell me of this place.”
“It is worse that Pacu. It is more dangerous. There are few inhabitants, and it is complete lawlessness. I have not seen it with my own eyes. I only go on what the King has told me.”
“So how do we approach it?”
“There is an outcropping1 of rocks a mile outside the western side of the small village. That is where we will park and then we will fly the rest of the way ourselves. It is easier not to be seen that way. Anyone would recognize our ship as belonging to the king’s fleet so it cannot be seen. It will give us away, and Commander Triq would be warned of our arrival. We shall stay unseen as much as we can and just gather the information to see what he is up to.”
“I like this plan. I will follow your lead,” Kavik said.
When we arrived outside the small village, we took up positions on the roof of a building along the fence line. It was high enough to hide us.
“What do you see?” I asked Kavik as we both scanned the area with scopes.
“I see the ship. It is all the way on the north side of the village. See it?” he said.
“Yes, I see it. The courtyard next to it seems to have a lot of activity. I’m putting eyes on it. I see Nalox,” I said.
“I see him. I see him,” Kavik said.
“I don’t see Commander Triq or the new warriors Borvon and Yatew,” Kavik said.
“Neither do I. But… are those. Holy shit. It can’t be,” I whispered.
“What, what is it?” Kavik asked.
“The king was right. They do exist,” I said.
“What?”
“The hybrids. The Aeriwana and Draqua hybrids exist. Do you see? There are two of them standing outside that building at the entrance. I bet you Commander Triq is in there,” I said as I started to feel very, very angry. It was boiling inside of me.
“Aeriwana, what? How can you tell?” Kavik sai,1 moving closer to me, looking through his scope.
“Look at the forearms, shoulders, what do you see?” I asked.
“Scale patterns…” Kavik said.
“Yes, and what’s missing?”
“Wings. Shit.” Kavik said.
“Exactly. The king said that the Aeriwana Draqua look exactly like us, but when they shift, they do not have wings, only scales and the strength of the dragon,” I said staring through the scope.
“What the hell is going on here?” Kavik said.
Then I saw Commander Triq emerge from the building. “That traitor,” I growled. I put down my scope and jumped off the roof.
“Dekario don’t,” Kavik said. But it was too late. I was heated, and there was no stopping me. The ass was not going to get away with this. I did not put any thought into it. I was in a rage, and I was going for him. First, this poor excuse for a Draqua attacked the human female that I love and then he turned out to be a traitor. It all drove me to the edge. I flew over the courtyard. “Triq!” I shouted, and as I did so, I used my mind to make every single Draqua near him float in the air. It took a lot of energy to do this, but being in such a rage helped.
“Dekario,” Commander Triq sneered at me.
“Traitor!” I shouted as I landed in front of him. He stepped toward me.
“Dekario, why have you come here? You know that now since you have seen too much, I cannot let you leave here alive,” Commander Triq grinned.
“I will be leaving alive, and I will be leaving with you in a cell aboard a ship. I will take you back to the king where you will be tried. The king already suspected that something was going on. He had his suspicions, and now you have confirmed them. You will pay for this!” I shouted at him.
Commander Triq growled in anger. He did not like this news that the king knew about him, and that meant he could not go back to Kelon, ever. He was now a homeless Draqua.
Whoosh. I turned to see Kavik flying fast past every single Draqua that I had suspended in the air. As he touched them, they went limp. This allowed me to let go of my mind control and the Draqua fell to the ground, paralyzed.
“I see you did not come alone,” Commander Triq said as he lunged for me. Bam! He knocked me back off my feet. We rolled across the courtyard, fighting. He punched me in the torso, but I was happy he came at me.
“Is that the best you can do, Commander?” I said arrogantly as I punched him across the face. He growled in response. He was heated, and I knew that at any second he was going to shift into dragon form. I punched him again in the ribs as hard as I could to try to stop him from doing this.
Blast! The sound of the blaster gun drew our attention from our wrestling match. I saw Kavik lying on the ground as blood oozed from his arm. I looked over at the source of the blast. An Aeriwana Draqua was holding a blaster gun, and now it was aimed at me.
“Good, Temuk,” Commander Triq said as he moved from on top of me and stood up. “Keep that aimed at this one.”
I sneered at this Aeriwana Draqua named Temuk. He grinned at me. I could see the mean that he harbored inside of him. The Aeriwana were a mean race of beings. They used torture and were more brute and primitive than any race we had ever come across. Crossing them with Draqua was a dangerous thing. They would have no compassion whatsoever. I looked at Kavik. His arm looked like a flesh wound, and that was all. He would be fine. But now Commander Triq had the upper hand.
“You think that you are going to get away with—” I began to say but then I was suddenly knocked out. I didn’t even see it coming.
When I regained consciousness, I felt tightness around my body. I opened my eyes and only saw complete blackness. Where the hell was I? What was going on? What happened?
“Kavik?” I said.
“I’m here,” I heard him say. He was very close to me. It was then as I turned my head that light hit my eyes and I could clearly see that I had a black cloth over my eyes. It was tight. I moved my hands, but I couldn’t. I struggled against rope realizing that it was tied around my entire body and a hard chair that I was sitting in.
“Shit,” I said.
“Yes, shit is right,” Kavik said. I groaned as I used my mind power to pull the black cloth from my face. It was tight, and it took longer than it should, but I finally got it off. I looked around the room. It was small and dark with one small window that was too small for us to squeeze out of, but it did let in a bit of daylight. Good, I had not been out long.
“What happened, Kavik?” I asked him.
“Commander Triq got the upper hand on us. They took us prisoner. We’re tied up in a small room below the building we saw Commander Triq come out of,” he said.
“And your arm?” I said looking over at him.
“Surprisingly, they tied a bandage around it,” he said.
“That doesn’t surprise me,” I said.
“What do you mean?” he asked.
“The Aeriwana are known for getting their prisoners in the best shape possible before torturing them,” I said, turning around the room as much as I could toward the door.
“Shit. That’s good news,” Kavik said. “First a laser blast to the arm and now I’m going to be tortured. Perfect. Thank you, by the way,” he said.
“Why are you thanking me?” I said.
“If it wasn’t for you being so hot headed and rushing into this I wouldn’t be here right now. I would still be on that roof gathering intel as the King commanded. But no, you can’t control your temper, and you had to rush in. Now we’re tied up and ready to be tortured,” he said.
“Noted,” I said. “I did rush in a little prematurly, but you are right. You know me well. My temper got the best of me,” I said.
“Well now your temper needs to get us out of here,” he said.
“Yeah, what are we working with out there?” I asked.
“It is not good. After you went cold, the Draqua he called Temuk was joined by ten more Draqua of the Aeriwana kind. We are outnumbered for sure. I think two are posted in the hall outside the door and the rest are in that courtyard,” Kavik said.
“Those are not good odds,” I said.
“No, they are not,” I said.
“Well at least we found out that Commander Triq is with the opposition,” Kavik said.
“Yes and no,” I said.
“What? What do you mean? We caught him in the act,” Kavik said.
“We caught him disobeying orders and using the King’s fleet to do his own bidding, whatever that may be. But the opposition is split. There are those that oppose interbreeding of Draqua with any other species, and that includes Aeriwana. But then a sector of the opposition split off and are for this Aeriwana interbreeding in order to use the Aeriwana hybrids as warriors to win against us. It is a complex mess. So it seems that Commander Triq is with this sector of the opposition that supports Aeriwana breeding, but that’s not the classic stance of the opposition that we went to war with years ago. There is so much more going on behind our backs than we know. If I would have to make an assumption, I would think that Commander Triq has taken it upon himself to carry on the work of the sect of opposition that breeds Aeriwana and Draqua and he’s creating a small band of them. He has delusions of grandeur. It seems with this complex, he is half way there,” I said.
“But how? How did he do this without us knowing? It seems impossible. You and I have been on his missions to Tiok for almost two years now,” Kavik said.
“Yes, but think about the strategy of those missions. We were always sent out on patrol together. One warrior would be left to guard the ship along with Commander Triq, who always said he had business to attend to. He would leave on his own. We were gone from sun up to sun down, and he would return to the ship later than us. That entire time we thought he was out doing the king’s business that us lowly warriors were not given access too, but instead he was out here. He was in this village creating all of this,” I said.
“The bastard. He used us,” Kavik said.
“Yes, he did,” I said.
“What do we do now? How do we get out of here?” Kavik said.
“You don’t!” we heard Commander Triq’s voice yell out as the door opened. I glared at him as he walked in with Temuk. Temuk carried a device that looked menacing. I was sure that it was some sort of Aeriwana invention, which meant it was for one thing only: torture.
“You will not be leaving here alive, unfortunately for you,” he said as he walked in and stood in front of us. Temuk stood beside him, and his eyes glowed almost yellow. His grin was wide and psychotic.
“What the hell are you doing here, Triq? What is all of this?” I sneered at him. “Are you doing this breeding? Are you crossing Aeriwana with Draqua? Who are you working for?”
“That is no concern of yours. But I have realized something that didn’t hit me until a few moments ago. It is why I have come to visit you now,” he said to me.
“What is that? That you are a traitor that will die at the hands of the Draqua? The very beings you swore and took an oath to protect as a commander? Traitor,” I said angrily. He growled. He did not like this. He punched me across the jaw. My head snapped to the right. Then I turned and looked at him as blood fell from a split lip.
“No, you arrogant fool. I have realized that if you are here, then who is watching over that fine piece of ass of a human female, Reena?” he smiled.
“Don’t you dare touch her!” I shouted at him as I tried to get up from the seat. I was in a blind rage where all I could see was red. Just hearing him say her name had me in such a fury that I could not control. I could snap his neck with my bare hands. He laughed a hearty laugh.
“I thought that might get a rise out of you,” he said with a grin. “She is all alone without you to defend her. She is just waiting for me to take her. I am going to enjoy it more now that I know how much she means to you. It will only make taking her that sweeter of an accomplishment for me,” he said.
“No! No!” I screamed at him as I struggled to get out of the chair.
“Temuk,” Commander Triq said. Temuk walked up to me and placed a rod against my arm. A bolt of electricity shot through my body, then it stopped. “Agh!” I screamed from the pain.
“Temuk here prefers electrical shocks as his favorite form of torture. I don’t agree with it, but that is why Temuk is here. He rather enjoys doing it,” Commander Triq said. “The great thing about Temuk and those of his kind is that they are not around very long. This means they live their life with the best attitude. They don’t give a crap what happens to them. They are all in for a mission.”
“What do you want with us, Commander Triq?” Kavik said trying to pull the focus off of me.
“I do not want anything. You should have never come here. Coming here means the end for both of you. But at least I get a very tasty human out of it,” he said.
As the bolt of electricity held my muscles in a spasm, I still tried to get loose. I struggled in the chair. I was beyond angry as I thought about Commander Triq trying to push himself onto Reena. I would die for her, and now I was not going to be there to protect her.
“Ready my ship. I am going back to Kelon to get something that is rightfully mine. Watch these two. Do what you what you want with them. Have your fun if you must, but don’t kill this one yet. I want him to have to watch what I am going to do to the human female. That will be the best torture of all,” Commander Triq said as he turned toward the door.
This was enough. I’d had enough. I stood up with the chair still attached to me. “You fucking traitor! Stay away from her! Don’t touch her! I will kill you!”
Another bolt of electricity shot through me, and I fell to the ground in convulsions. My tongue was limp in my mouth, and I could no longer talk. I heard Commander Triq laughing as he walked out the door and down the hall. I willed my body to move, but it would not. I tried to use my mind power to raise me off the ground, and it did not work. I tried to use it to stop Commander Triq in his tracks, but it didn’t work.
“Dekario…Dekario?” I heard Kavik say, but I could not answer him. I moved my leg to push myself on the floor, but I could barely move it. I heard a sinister laugh and knew that it was Temuk’s laughter. Then another bolt of electricity hit me, and my body convulsed violently until suddenly I blacked out.
When I awoke, I was on the floor still. It was darker in the room, with a small light burning in the corner. I coughed as my dry throat got used to being able to swallow again.
“Dekario?” I heard Kavik say.
I tried to answer but only coughed more and more.
“When you are done coughing, I could use a little help here,” he said. I swallowed as much spit as I could and moved my head toward Kavik’s voice. He was on the ground tied to his chair, and he was on top of Temuk.
“What the hell?” I said in a scratchy voice.
“The bastard is paralyzed, but as soon as I stop touching him he will only be paralyzed for ten minutes or so, so I just stayed on top of him. But I’m getting exhausted. This is a lot of energy use for me,” Kavik said.
“Impressive,” I said.
“Yes, but exhausting and I don’t know how long it will be before his buddies come looking for him,” Kavik said.
“All right, give me some time here. I need to get out of these restraints,” I said as I rolled over. The metal restraints holding me were strong, and I could not bust out of them, especially in my weakened state.
“Are there keys on him for these restraints?” I asked Kavik. Kavik looked over him and then said, “It looks like there is something in his gun holster, but I can’t reach it.”
“I’ll check,” I said as I looked at Temuk’s boot and pulled out the contents of his boot holster using my mind power. The keys rattled as they came out. I moved them in the air to Kavik’s restraints behind his back. “Hold steady,” I said.
Then I moved the key into the slot and turned it. The restraints fell from Kavik.
“Thank you,” Kavik sighed. Then he pulled off his restraints and rolled up from the ground. He grabbed the keys and moved over to me. I looked at Temuk still paralyzed on the floor.
“You said we have ten minutes or so before he comes to?” I asked.
“Yes, unless I hit him with another dose, but I think I need my energy to help us get out of here,” he said as he pulled the restraints off of me. I groaned as I got up.
“You all right?” he asked.
“Yeah, I think I will be alright, but that electric device really knocked the shit out of me,” I said.
“Yeah, he got me once, and then I charged him and paralyzed him. Once was enough for me. I knew it hit you good cause you’ve been out for a while,” Kavik said as we pulled Temuk’s weapons from him and tied him in the restraints.
“How long?” I asked.
“Almost two hours I would guess. Maybe longer,” he said.
“Shit. That means that Commander Triq is two hours ahead of me. We need to get out of here now,” I said as the rage came back to me as I remembered that he was going after Reena.
“Yes, we do,” Kavik said.
I grabbed the electrical device and pointed it at Temuk. I was ready to do to him what he had done to me and enjoy it.
“Don’t do that. It will bring him out of paralysis and he will shout and such. We have about another seven minutes of him being unable to move and I think we should take advantage of it,” Kavik said.
“Shit, you are right. Damnit. I was going to enjoy that,” I said moving to the door.
“How many?”
“Two was what I saw when Commander Triq walked out. One of the right and one on the left,” Kavik whispered.
“I will take the one on the right,” I said.
“I got the left. Then we head straight down the hall. It opens out to the courtyard and we can shoot straight into the air from there,” Kavik said.
“Good. We will split up from there and head back to the ship. Remember where it is?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Good. Shifting,” I said as I shifted into dragon form. Kavik did the same.
“Go,” I said as we quickly pulled open the door. I took out the guard on the right with an electrical shock from the device. Kavik hit the other guard on the head with the blaster gun. Both guards fell to the ground. We looked around. It was quiet. The maneuvers we used to take out the guards did not cause any commotion. The door at the end of the hall was closed, giving us plenty of cover.
“Go,” I said as we quickly walked to the door. Bam! I kicked it open and flew straight into the air. Kavik followed. Then we heard the commotion and shouting below, but it was commotion of them trying to figure out what was going on. No one looked up and in no time Kavik and I were well behind the wall of the building with plenty of cover.
“I’ll go right,” I said.
“I’ll go left,” Kavik said.
“Stay low, between buildings,” I said. He nodded. Then he flew in the around toward the outside of the small village and I flew around the outside of the other. As soon as I was out of the village, I headed toward the ship. I looked behind me and didn’t see anyone following me. I looked across in the distance and could see a black dot traveling at the same speed as me. It was Kavik. I looked behind him, and his tail was clear. We were not being followed. Minutes later, we arrived at our ship.
“Anyone follow you?” Kavik said as he landed next to me.
“No, you?”
“No.”
“Let’s get ready for launch,” I said, anxious to get going. Commander Triq was in a ship that was faster than the ship that we were in, and he had a couple of hours head start. This was not working in my favor. I worried that he would harm Reena, but I worried more that he would kill her because she would fight him as much as she could. I had to get to her as fast as I could.
“Counting down!” I shouted.
“Wait til I am buckled in at least. Shit, I didn’t get to do the proper checks,” Kavik said as he quickly buckled into his seat.
“There is no time for it. Launching,” I said as I hit the lever forward and pushed the ship straight into the air. We moved straight up into the sky and into the blackness of space.