Page 42 of The Alien's Private Redemption

And not just them, all of their descendants on an alien planet, where they were forced to live in fear and hiding. He didn't know how Ushu had managed it but he was certain the ancient Dragor had manipulated the situation to his advantage at the first opportunity.

He had no idea when Ushu's ambitions had changed from experimentation to extending his own life but it made certain rumors and stories make more sense. It also explained his constant interest in the human women that the Chelion took as Mates. And their children.

The experiments on the children were the worst.

"Why did you tell me this now?" he asked.

"Because something, somewhere, went horribly wrong and I think your Mate may be part of fixing it," Ae-cha told him.

"How?" Zoric asked. "If her Uncle is like Ushu-"

"I don't think he is," she said. "I've been analyzing the memory and it doesn't feel like he's Dragor."

"What else could he be?"

She shook her head. "I don't know but I think it's important that we find out."

Zoric nodded. "I'm still not going to let you hurt Angela."

"I don't want to hurt her," Ae-cha told him. "I want to help her."

His gut told him she was telling the truth but their long history meant he couldn't trust her easily. She wanted an acknowledgement, some indication that he would help her. Instead, he asked something that had been bothering him for a while.

"Have you discovered what you’re a Remnant of?" he asked. "In all those records, have they talked about your people?"

"We've always been the Remnant of the Court of the Jade Princess," she told him. "We don't need new records to know that."

"I just thought you'd have more insight into why you're the Remnant of the Court of the Jade Princess, that's all. Ushu was fleeing something for the Elite to capture him, then land here. What was the Princess fleeing? How much of what we know is just our version of the story?"

Ae-cha looked uncomfortable. She hadn't enjoyed meeting Cooper or his human Mate. She certainly hadn't appreciated having someone from off the planet 'find' an ancient artifact that put him in the direct lineage of the Jade Princess.

Neither of them liked that their feuds on this planet may have been manufactured centuries ago on a distant planet as part of political games that had never mattered to them. Games that seemed to be continuing and reaching their intrusive tentacles back out to a planet that they'd never realized existed.

"If we find anything that might change what we know about our history, I suppose it will be of interest to both our peoples. I'll be sure to share it."

With that, she stood up and returned to her seat. Zoric turned to watch her go, only to catch movement from Dr. Torres. Dr. Phillips was reading a book she'd borrowed from one of the soldiers on board; apparently, they had a stash they traded around to get through the long hours between missions. Dr. Torres was laying still, like he'd settled down to sleep the way Angela had, but the movement of his eyes behind his lids gave him away.

With all the noise from the plane, he shouldn't have been able to hear Zoric and Ae-cha talking. They'd spoken so low, that they'd had to strain to hear each other, much less anybody else. Still, Zoric couldn't shake the feeling that he'd been eavesdropping. To what purpose, he didn't know, but the strangely scentless doctor made his hackles rise.

Zoric adjusted his hold on Angela and tried to get comfortable. He was tempted to try and sleep but it didn't feel safe for him to leave Angela unguarded. Instead, he studied what he could see from his seat.

The civilians who had boarded the plane after them were asleep in the same pose Angela had assumed and Zoric decided they had to be former military of some sort. They certainlyweren't groomed to what he assumed were a military standard, even if their posture proclaimed they should be.

Colonel Schuh was talking to some of the soldiers that had been helping them board and it looked like a casual conversation. Zoric was learning more about human body language and thought he could see the soldiers relax around the Colonel as the conversation went on. He couldn't hear what they were saying but it didn't seem to be a topic that he had to worry about.

Ae-cha was meditating and he had the feeling he could reach out and talk to her the way he had with his men when he was home. The almost subconscious buzz of a mind open to receiving conversation came from her direction and he was tempted to take the unspoken invitation and continue their conversation. Or maybe start a new one on a different topic. But he didn't. He wasn't sure if she knew she was issuing an invitation or if that was just how her people processed while they meditated.

Dr. Phillips looked like she was engrossed in her book but her thoughts were loud enough that he could tell she wasn't. Instead, she was blaming herself for becoming infected with the snake-thoughts that had pushed her to be less than professional. They'd never pushed her to do anything she hadn't already wanted to do but she usually held herself together better than that.

Zoric wondered if he should tell her she was projecting. Or that it wasn't her fault that she'd been targeted by whoever was infecting people with the brain snake thoughts. And that they actually appeared as snakes in the subconscious.

He didn't, though. He suspected she wouldn't want to hear that he could tell what she was thinking about.

Instead, he let his attention drift to Dr. Torres again. The neurologist was pretending to sleep in Zoric's blind spot. His presence almost unnoticeable except for the strange lack ofodor and the low buzz of a thinking brain. Dr. Torres wasn't projecting his thoughts the way Dr. Phillips was. In fact, if Zoric didn't know better, he'd assume Dr. Torres was deliberately shielding his thoughts.

Most humans didn't know how to shield their thoughts like that, though some of them did it naturally. They tended to be people who could hyper focus on a specific subject for years at a time, and who were occasionally considered a little odd. Which, he supposed, described Dr. Torres.

The metallic chamber of the cargo plane was a symphony of mechanical vibrations and sounds. The deep bass rumble of engines resonated through the frame, while the high-pitched whine of hydraulics created an ever-present counterpoint. Each shift in altitude brought a new chorus of creaks and groans from the metal structure. Cold air blasted from the vents overhead, creating pockets of chill that contrasted sharply with the heat radiating from the walls where the sun had been beating on them.

---