Page 14 of Wrath

“Acknowledged.”

I disconnected from her mind, and quickly finished suiting up, wondering if instead of my standard leather uniform, I should strip and put on some weapon attachments to be ready for battle. I dismissed that thought. Assuming the Coalition crew was up to no good, they wouldn’t be so foolish as to try and attack a Warrior. Even without going into my battle form, I would easily wreck them.

I rushed to the bridge where I found Linette in her usual pilot seat and Myriam at the Science Officer’s position. Both women cast a tense look my way.

“Have they detected us?” I asked Myriam while coming to a stop next to her.

“No, they haven’t,” she answered. “They do not seem to be scanning for any ships.”

“Let’s make sure they don’t until we have a better idea of what’s going on,” I said. “Go into stealth mode and keep a lock on them in case they leave. Linette, how quickly can you get us there?”

“If I go at maximum speed, we could be there in thirty minutes,” she replied.

“Make it so,” I replied.

My eyes went out of focus as I concentrated on Ayana’s psychic signature. Legion’s mate was the only psychic female with an infinite range like us Dragons and Xians. As male-to-male psychic communication became extremely slow to establish the greater the distance, it had prevented us from hiring human males as Soulcatchers, Portals, or Shields, even though they all possessed one of those abilities, albeit to a lesser extent than the women. But thanks to Ayana, it was now possible for us to communicate with any of our brothers without delay, using her as a relay.

“Ayana,”I mind-spoke to her,“we have a situation here. A Coalition vessel has already landed at the secret base we’ve been assigned. Can you find out if Legion or Chaos are aware of this?”

“Shit, your base, too?”Ayana replied, dismay in her voice.

“Too?”I asked, my worry going up another notch.

“Doom contacted me a couple of days ago about a Coalition vessel popping out of nowhere to offer their assistance to transport the rescued Creckels back to Dreija,”Ayana explained.

“RESCUED CRECKELS?!”I exclaimed.“They found some alive?!”

“Yeah,”Ayana said, her voice softening.“Long story, but great news. I’ll catch you up on that later. However, turns out the two members of that Coalition crew were stealing bio samples, embryos, and all the Kryptid research they could get their hands on. On top of that, Steele got attacked by a Coalition crew trying to raid the base that was assigned to him. Something big is going down, and none of it good.”

“What?! When did all of this happen?”I asked, flabbergasted.

“Only a few hours ago,”Ayana said.“Legion and Chaos are still trying to sort out this mess. There’s a bunch of Coalition ships and crews that have gone missing, including resources and weapons. Chaos will send out a report shortly. For now, Legion says to handle that crew with extreme prejudice if needed. They should not be there.”

“Understood. I’ll keep you posted,”I replied before disconnecting from her mind.

I refocused on the females on the bridge who were looking at me expectantly.

“It appears Coalition members are going rogue,” I said in a somber tone. “That ship must not take off, especially not with those Jadozors. If they release those creatures anywhere, it will be a massacre.”

I called an emergency meeting on the deck. My team, thankfully already suited up, showed up within a couple of minutes. I briefed them on the situation, and the same anger reflected on their faces.

“Kwan, you will take the command of the frigate,” I ordered. “Once you’ve entered the moon’s atmosphere, you will remain camouflaged and out of detection range until I give you the go ahead to land. Linette, Varnog, Dread, and I will go down to the surface in one of our stealth shuttles. I want to get the jump on them. If we get detected and they try to take off, disable their propulsion system, but don’t blow them up. We can’t risk any Jadozor they might be carrying to be set free,” I added, looking in turn at Myriam and Kwan.

Everyone nodded.

“Myriam, as soon as we enter Narjin’s atmosphere, see if you can capture any signal from the ship or the base and hack into it.”

“You got it,” Myriam replied.

“Kwan, when our shuttle leaves, you will Shield Linette, Dread, and me,” I added.

She licked her lips nervously and nodded. This wasn’t the type of mission I had wanted for her first round. Although I believed there was nothing like baptism by fire, this mission could turn truly ugly. Ayana and Sabra had also faced such a brutal introduction to the Vanguard, but they hadn’t been in mourning.

“You’ve all got your orders. Let’s go,” I said, heading out with Linette, Dread, and Varnog.

We piled inside the shuttle, Linette taking the pilot’s seat after putting on her own armor. As the minutes slowly ticked away before the Defiance finally entered the moon’s atmosphere, the team and I agreed on our strategy.

As soon as the doors of the ship’s hangar opened, I felt the tingling of Kwan’s Shield wrapping around my psychic mind. Thanks to that protection, Dread, Linette, and I would be immune to any psychic disruptor that could be used either by the Coalition crew, or embedded in the wall of the base, as was often the case with Kryptid locations. Since reaching full maturity as a Scelk, Varnog’s psychic powers had increased, making him immune to disruptors. Although mating with Linette had also enhanced her powers, she couldn’t bypass disruptors but had gained a much longer range.

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