Chapter 7

Xivthar watched her study her surroundings. She took in everything, her shrewd eyes seemingly cataloguing every detail. The Earthling female kept surprising him. Although he'd made a study of her home planet, especially the females of her species, who had always intrigued him, he'd never had a conversation with an Earthling. It was proving to be more difficult, and more revealing, than he'd expected.

When he touched her skin, tingles ignited in his fingertips. His species were able to sync their electrical impulses together during mating, and it generally started with a tingling in the fingertips. To experience something similar with a human female was astonishing. Exciting.

As the most powerful official on the planet, Xivthar could have had the female drugged and her knowledge extracted. He could even have resorted to torture. Instead, he was going to feed her dinner.

He'd brought her to his quarters and instructed her to seat herself at the table in his sitting room. It was smaller than his ornate receiving room, more intimate.

Xivthar stepped up to his food console and dialed up a meal comprised of several Zantharian delicacies. Soured urchin, sea cucumber salad, savory whelks in seagrass, and a sweet pearl inside a clamshell. He carried the plate to the table and set it before her.

"Eat," he instructed, pulling up a chair and sitting beside her.

Her green eyes narrowed. "How do I know you won't try to drug me? Or poison me?"

Xivthar sighed. "Why would I bother bringing you here if I wanted to harm you? I could have left you in your cell and instructed my loyal subjects to abuse you."

"Perhaps you're trying to butter me up."

"Butter you up?" The translation matrix was efficient, but it didn't always work on colloquial language.

"Trick me into liking you so you can take advantage of me."

"Take advantage?" The thought of what was under the flight suit made that a particularly enticing thought.

Something must have shown in his expression because the female frowned. "Take advantage of my knowledge."

She shook her head, tossing around the golden curls that had come undone from the contraption at the back of her head. Poking at the food on her plate, he caught her mumbling to herself. "I traveled 10,000 light years away to be molested by an alien pervert."

Xivthar reached over and picked up an urchin. He popped it into his mouth and chewed, enjoying the fresh, salty flavor.

"Not drugged," he said. "Not poisoned. Now eat. I have many questions."

"So do I." She picked up one of the urchins and took a tiny bite. She must not have found it repulsive because she continued eating.

"Me first, female." Her features tightened. Perhaps human females didn't like that designation. What should he call her then? "What's your name?"

She swallowed and picked up a cucumber. "Dr. Sylvia Cohen, professor of astrobiology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. My turn."

"That wasn't a question," he argued.

"It wasn't?" She smirked. "It sounded like one to me, and I answered it. My turn."

Xivthar shrugged. To say Dr. Cohen was challenging was an understatement.

"How do you speak my language?"

"Translation matrix on a planet-wide frequency. It instantly translates any language that has been inputted into it and beams it into your mind. We've input the languages of any off-world species we're keeping tabs on."

"Including Earth?"

"Including Earth," he replied. "Now you owe me two answers."

"I do not--Damn!" He could be as challenging as she could.

Xivthar watched as she proceeded to clear her plate. She made dainty little movements, as if she sought to understand each bite before she put it in her mouth. It was almost a shame to interrupt her. "How did your ship disable our shielding?"

She swallowed, using her napkin to pat at either side of her mouth. "I don't know."

He was expecting that answer. Without knowing her better, he was unable to determine if she was lying. It was time to start asking questions he knew the answers to as well, to gauge her truthfulness.

"When did your species develop faster-than-light travel?"

"2099. The first FTL flight circled Jupiter and returned to Earth in three minutes." There was no hesitation. Her answer fit the information from his own sources perfectly.

"My turn." The professor finished the last bite of pearl, a smile spreading across her face. The expression caused warmth to spread from his chest to his stomach and tugged at his sex, bringing it to life, as if it had some glorious chance of being used.

"How did you know what was wrong with me earlier? None of your subjects had any clue but you diagnosed it immediately." She tilted her head to the side, a long strand of golden hair dancing just beside her pretty face.

"You were hysterical, your pupils were dilated, and your pulse was racing. Not all of my scientists are as familiar with your planet as I am. I know that the Earth's atmosphere is similar to ours on Zanthar, but parts of our planet have higher concentrations of nitrous oxide due to our seaweed cultivation. This colony is surrounded by seaweed farms, making the amount of nitrous oxide in the area much greater than you're used to on Earth. I determined the cause of your behavior and treated you."

"Seaweed farms," she murmured, reaching over to finger one of the braids of his sarong. "The same seaweed you use to make your clothing."

His pulse picked up as he watched her delicate hand on his sarong. It was so close to touching his skin. He wanted to see if she could make him tingle in other places besides his fingertips, but the chances of mating with the pretty Earthling were slim. "Yes, and that's two questions."

Her eyes shot up and she dropped the braid. "No, it’s just one. I made a statement about the seaweed and you agreed. It technically wasn't a question."

Xivthar laughed. The female was clever, and far more beautiful than he imagined them to be.

His brother had worried that he might be distracted by this creature. How right he was to worry. She could have stepped out of his fantasies. An exotic female, small but shapely, with pale skin and fair hair, and eyes the color of the giant jellies his people revered. Her hips were curved and breasts heavy and beautiful shaped.

He'd always been attracted to the idea of mating with a human female, but had always considered it a dream that had little chance of coming true. Their planet's policy was never to interfere with less advanced races, and that rule applied to even the Supreme Regent. They could watch from afar, but never touch.

Oh, but to touch this female again, to feel her smooth skin. To see if those tingles traveled from his fingertips to his cock. Something told him that they very much would.

"Well?" she asked, her cheeks blushing red, and he realized he'd been staring at her. It seemed her species' skin was also sensitive to mood changes. Interesting.

"Why did your people send a ship to Zanthar?" It was a leading question, and one he hoped would help him determine her level of honesty.

"We'd sent out probes to this system years ago, hoping to find signs of life. Inhabited planets. One of the probes entered your atmosphere and took samples. It returned with evidence of certain microorganisms. Evidence of the life we'd been waiting for." She fixed her green gaze on him. "Looks like we got much more than we bargained for."

Indeed. She appeared genuine, and her answer was plausible. He had received reports of an Earthling probe entering the upper atmosphere a couple years ago, but he'd instructed his forces to keep the probe above their defense shield in the thermosphere where nothing lived. Someone must have made a mistake and never come forth with the information, or the pretty woman was lying.

"My turn. What have you done with my ship?"

Xivthar leaned back in his seat. His proximity to the Earthling was unsettling. He could smell her. It was warm and musky, and like nothing he'd ever experienced. She smelled of sky and sun, of the soil. He reined himself in as his skin color darkened to deep purple.

"Your ship has been pulled up from the depths and is currently locked away in one of our laboratories. The staff at the Ministry of Science are attempting to determine what could have caused the shield malfunction."

Her small ship should have been deflected by the shield. It should have been spotted long before it ever made it to the shield. Instead, it had crashed through the shield, disabling it, but how?

"And I suppose that means they're tearing it apart?"

"Not yet. Right now they're attempting to restore power so they can question the main computer."

"Poor Magnis. You won't be able to woo him with a warm meal. He doesn't eat."

Magnis? He opened his mouth to ask what she meant, but snapped it shut before speaking. There were more important questions that needed asking, and he couldn't afford to waste one. Time to shake things up and watch her reaction. "Are you working with the Hareema?"

The professor looked momentarily disappointed. Was she upset that he hadn't taken the Magnis bait? "I don't know who, or what, the Hareema is."

Could he believe her? She didn't seem to be lying.

"So you expect me to believe that you just happened to sneak up without my advanced defense net picking you up, then you blasted through the shields, managing to completely disable them by accident?"

"You can believe whatever you want, but the events happened exactly as you just described them." Her expression was placid, her eyes bright. Her words seemed genuine. Could he trust her?

He wanted to, wanted to believe that she was the plucky young scientist out on her first adventure, who had fumbled her way into a situation outside her skillset. Not only would it mean that there was no Hareema invasion force parked behind one of Zanthar's thirteen moons, but it would also leave him free to explore his connection to this female.

Chimes sounded from the console on his desk. What a time for an interruption.

He pulled up the display and frowned when he saw his brother's face. "What do you want?"

"Our security team orbiting Cnidaria has stopped a Luthurican freighter."

The Luthuricans had rocklike skin that could withstand extreme temperatures and harsh conditions. They hailed from a binary system several light years away from Zanthar, but their trading routes ran through this system.

"A scan revealed that it was carrying traces of Hareema DNA. Major Ontarii questioned the captain and crew, and according to his report, they found one of their crewmen dead and shoved into a storage crate. The body had been decaying for weeks, but the problem was that the captain had seen the same man that very day."

"A Hareema infiltrator."

"Exactly. The captain thought the stowaway had to have come on board during their last shore leave on a gas giant in the same solar system as Earth."

"Did Ontarii capture the infiltrator?"

"No. He'd disappeared two days before the security force stopped the freighter."

"Or he'd started posing as another crew member. Maybe even the captain himself."

His brother scowled. "Ontarii initiated strict confinement protocols, and ordered his men to remain in pairs at all times, per standard protocol."

"No DNA tests?"

Drake's coloring was a mixture of yellow and orange. Anger and fear fought for control of his brother's demeanor. "The Luthuricans' exoskeletons are too tough to penetrate. They're working on a way to take a sample, but until they figure it out, no DNA testing is possible."

"Dammit," Xivthar growled softly, his complexion turning yellow. "Institute standard protocols planet-wide. No one is to be alone, and hourly electrical exchanges are required."

"Understood." The Minister of Defense hesitated.

Xivthar lost his patience with his brother. "What?"

"Has the Earthling female given you any information?"

So his brother knew he was with her, and he obviously didn't approve.

"I was questioning her when you called."

"Has her DNA been tested?"

"Yes, the scientists confirmed her species when they first took her into custody."

"That was nearly six hours ago. If the Hareema have infiltrated us, she could have been replaced by now."

Xivthar frowned. "You're right. I'll have her tested again."

"We need to know how she took out our defenses. If she doesn't talk soon, we'll have to resort to other means. And if she's Hareema..."

"I'll deal with it."

Xivthar waved the display away and focused his gaze on the female. The display had been set to his ears only, so she wouldn't have heard the exchange. There was no time left for back-and-forth. Perhaps her tactic had been to delay him all along so the Hareema forces could gather.

They couldn't have sent a more suitable agent, he thought. She was made for me.

An exotic Earthling female. It appeared his fetish for human females was the worst kept secret on Zanthar. And maybe the whole system. If Sylvia was really Hareema, it would be easy to find out. All he had to do was shock her.

She'd held up her palms earlier to show him her burns, which had disappeared. Maybe they had healed quickly, or maybe she'd been replaced by one of the Hareema who hadn't replicated the burns.

The Hareema were insidious. They hailed from a planet on the outskirts of the system, a planet that wasn't too different from Zanthar. In its real form, a Hareema was a seven-foot tall rectangular jelly. Not very threatening.

However, it was rare to see a Hareema in its real form. The jellies had the power to replicate any living creature for short periods of time, usually between six and eight hours. The Hareema then had to return to gelatinous form for several minutes before it was able to transform again.

This special skill made the Hareema especially adept at defeating a civilization from the inside out. Many planets had fallen to the Hareema Empire, but not Zanthar.

The Zantharians' ability to emit powerful shocks of electricity worked against Hareema physiology. It forced them to return to their original form. This ability, and a strong planetary defense plan, had kept the Hareema at bay for centuries.

But now it seemed the Hareema had discovered Earth. They planned to use its people as a means of penetrating Zantharian defenses. And Xivthar planned to stop them. By any means at his disposal.