Chapter 21

Captain Jennifer Brooklyn ran a hand through her hair, her mind trying to decide what to do next. She risked a glance at the male beside her. He was devastatingly handsome, tall and muscled. His chiseled features left her a little light headed, and his smile had butterflies dancing in the pit of her stomach.

At the moment, his skin was midnight black, matching dark eyes that stared at her, filled with unreadable emotions. Zantharians, as she was learning, had skin that changed color according to their moods. Brook had seen him shift into many shades: green, yellow, red, and her favorite, deep purple. But never black.

Black indicated some type of mating frenzy.

She didn’t fully understand what it was or what it might mean, but that was namely due to the fact that Ontarii wasn’t forthcoming on information about it. He’d made the cryptic remark that he needed to mate his chosen female or die, then turned into the strong-and-silent-type.

Brook had gotten more than she bargained for. It turned out that Zanthar was teeming with life, including a dominant species. From what she could tell, Zantharians were a demanding, bossy, and brutally handsome lot, but that might just have been her experience with one Zantharian in particular. She needed to sort out her feelings for the handsome, albeit conflicted, alien commander as well. That might prove to be the most difficult of her tasks.

“Does this bucket of rust have external views? Maybe we can spot whatever’s attached itself to us.”

Brook frowned at his disparaging remark about her ship. The Earhart might not be the prettiest ship in the galaxy, but it was one of the only faster-than-light ships that Earth had. It had taken many precious resources and man-hours to build her; however, compared to the Zantharian flagship Ontarii was used to commanding, the Earhart probably looked like a jalopy.

“She does have external cameras, yes.” Brook walked to the console and brought up the outside view on the display screen.

There were several cameras stationed on the hull in order to get an accurate picture of the Earhart’s surface in case the ship was damaged during flight. Brook began slowly transitioning from camera to camera, looking for the stowaway.

“It must be somewhat large in order to affect the speed of your vessel.” Ontarii put his hands on his hips as his dark eyes scanned the screen in front of them.

The memory of those hands gliding all over her body caused heat to rush up her chest and coat her throat and cheeks. She pushed it away and concentrated on the task at hand.

“It can’t be that big. Our ship isn’t very large. Especially compared to your flagship.”

Brook risked a peek at him out of the corner of her eye. His face appeared as if carved from onyx. She couldn’t help but consider what had gone wrong between them after the most intense bout of lovemaking she’d ever experienced.

Maybe he didn’t enjoy it as much as you did. Maybe he finds you subpar.

That couldn’t be it. He had seemed to have enjoyed their time together greatly, if his moans had been any indication. Unfortunately, the minute their intimacy was over, and he’d realized that he had entered this so-called 'frenzy’, he hadn't been the same.

"Stop." His command brought her back to the present moment.

She refocused to see what he’d seen while she was lost in thought.

"There," he said, pointing to a shape on the very right edge of the screen.

She couldn't make out much, but used the console's touch pad to toggle the camera. The shape resolved itself into a small craft. It was oblong and couldn't have fit more than a few bodies. Maybe Hareema could make themselves smaller. Maybe an entire Hareema legion could squeeze itself into a ship that size.

A wave of fear washed over her, leaving her muscles tense and heart pounding in her chest. The Hareema could be anyone or anything.

How do you fight something you don’t understand and can’t detect?

"Let's go." Ontarii started toward the door, but was forced to stop due to it not opening.

She had sealed the bridge in their fight with her doppelganger earlier. Only her code would open the door.

"Hang on." She tried to think of a quick resolution, but weariness stifled her.

They knew at least one Hareema had already been present on the ship before the craft had attached itself to the Earhart's hull. Now there could be untold numbers. Not to mention the FIDOs roaming the halls, looking for intruders.

"We're wasting precious time," the major said, his impatience broadcasted in his jerky motions. He paced back and forth, running both hands through his tendrils as his eyes narrowed.

A moment ago he'd been cold to her, calm plastered over seething anger. Now he was agitated. She'd grown used to reading his moods from the color of his skin, but the midnight black he wore now revealed nothing.

"We can't just run out there half-cocked," Brook explained. "The Hareema could be anywhere, and the FIDOs are malfunctioning. Their laser beams could be more of a threat than the shapeshifters."

Ontarii scowled. "I had a run-in with your FIDOs earlier, and I took them out. Use your console to turn them off."

"I'm not sure if that's a good idea. The malfunction could work out to our advantage against the Hareema. Maybe the best course of action is to stay sealed in here and wait it out."

Ontarii shook his head. "Ridiculous. We must take action, not sit up here like cowards."

Brook looked closely at her handsome companion.

His body was visibly trembling. He was extremely upset, which was nothing like the man she’d been dealing with thus far.

Ontarii was not afraid to express himself, but he’d kept a cool head through everything they’d faced so far. Why was he so disturbed now?

You’d be disturbed too if your life came down to fuck or die. Brook swallowed. The mating frenzy. Of course.

Taking a deep breath, she pitched her voice low and soft as she moved closer to him and placed a hand on his arm. “Ontarii, take a deep breath, and let’s think about this.”

His face warred with emotions, but she wouldn’t let up. He finally relaxed a little, taking deep breaths through his nose, which caused his wide chest to rise and fall rhythmically. The tension seemed to dissipate a little as she stood there, refusing to let him go.

“You said you ran into the FIDOs. What happened, exactly?”

His muscles stiffened, so she began to rub his arm, trying to soothe him. It seemed to have the intended affect.

“Your Hareema twin freed me from the airlock and told me the robots had malfunctioned. Then she led me to the cargo bay and when they spotted us, they began firing on us. I zapped them with my bioelectricity and it knocked them out.”

Brook nodded. It sounded like what had happened when they’d turned on her earlier as well. “I don’t understand how this malfunction started. One moment the FIDOs were obediently following me around, the next they were shooting at me.”

She thought through what had happened, talking out loud while she did. “I entered the cargo bay and discovered what I thought was my engineer going at the escape pod hatch with an ax. Then the FIDOs started in on their ‘Intruder alert’ shit and targeted Talia.”

“But not you?” Ontarii’s voice was rough. His eyes were watching her hand as it slowly slid up and down his arm.

“Not at first. It wasn’t until Talia jumped on me.” In fact, even then they hadn’t fired on her. Even after it had transformed into Brook’s double. Then the thing had kissed her and—

“Wait!” Brook thought the kiss had to be significant. What reason would an alien imposter have to lock lips with a spaceship captain? “They didn’t start to target me too until after that thing kissed me.”

His arm turned to stone.

Brook was so surprised that she stopped rubbing and looked up at him.

“It kissed you!” Ontarii’s face was a mask of hate. He grabbed her arms and squeezed until it hurt. Brook didn’t cry out, though, not wanting to show weakness. “You let that thing put its lips on you!”

“I didn’t let it, and technically, it put my lips on me, since it was wearing my face at the time.” Her joke fell flat. Like pancake flat.

His eyes narrowed, his grip tightening until she couldn’t help letting the pain show on her face.

He must have seen her expression because he dropped his hands immediately and turned away. Brook watched as he struggled to get ahold of himself. After a few moments he turned around to face her. His expression was neutral, his breathing less rapid.

“So the Hareema kissed you, and then your robots could no longer differentiate between the two of you?”

Brook nodded. “That’s what it seemed like.”

He adverted his eyes from her. “This could be the break we’ve been waiting for.”

“What do you mean?”

His emotions were flitting by so fast, she couldn’t keep up.

I guess that’s why they call it a frenzy.

“We’ve never been able to track Hareema when they’ve taken on a form. We can get trace DNA from their actual shape, but that doesn’t help when they’re not in their gelatinous form.”

He paced in front of her, his huge body taking up so much space that he’d only get a few steps before having to turn around again. “It seems like your FIDOs are able to sort Hareema from human.”

“I don’t know how,” Brook said, scratching her head. “I mean, we didn’t even know they existed, so how could they be programmed to differentiate? If your people don’t even have that technology, and you’re light years ahead of us, then how can our robots do it?”

Ontarii shook his head. “I’m not sure, but they could tell you apart until that kiss. Maybe the Hareema was passing on some of its DNA to you to confuse the FIDOs. And it worked.”

The kiss! Could that have been the reason for it?

“How can we be sure that it isn’t just a malfunction?”

“I don’t know,” Ontarii replied. “But if they can, that technology will be priceless.”

He moved back to the door, then gestured at the console. “Open up. We’ve got a new mission.”

“What’s that?” Brook moved to the console, but didn’t release the lock on the door.

“We’ve got to find the FIDOs and see if this is just a malfunction, or if there’s something more to it.”

Brook couldn’t find a reason to argue, so she hit the control to release the door. It whooshed open, and with a deep breath, she followed Ontarii back into danger.