Page 81 of Courting Mayhem

When he wasn’t looking, I changed his illusion to the wicked witch from Snow White; complete with warts, hooked nose and rotting teeth.

A particularly foul curse broke from Poppa Jacob. “Mallox has been kidnapping and cloning high ranking males for the last two years. He’s keeping them in stasis chambers.”

“Fuck,” Derek spat. “Any idea where?”

Poppa Jacob shook his head.“Some of the data has been corrupted. I’ll try to recover it.”

A perimeter alarm started flashing on my navigations console. That was impossible. Our ship was stationary, and my scanners were clear. “We have a problem.”

Derek turned to look at me. “What kind of problem?”

“Something planet size is a thousand kilometers from our ship but there’s nothing showing on the scanners.”

Papi Sten started laughing. “The Katanic’s found a way to cloak their entire planet.”

A hologram of Qa’a formed in mid-air. “You are circling our home world. Do not deviate from your current orbit or your ship will be destroyed.”

Derek stood. “We won’t deviate.”

“Gather your equipment and teleport to these coordinates. 331.1 Mark 241.2. Zosia will be waiting.”

“Do you want us to bring the children too?”I asked.

“Not until we know who plots against us.” The hologram vanished.

I grinned.“And the adventure begins.”

Kiri and Defne latched onto me.“No leave.”

“Uncle Derek and I are going to hunt down the bad people. I need you to stay here and protect Poppa Jacob and Papi Sten. Can you do that for me?”

Kiri’s branches puffed out.“We protect.”

Whoosh! Defne began doing laps around Poppa Jacob’s console. “How much chocolate did you feed her?”

I grimaced.“She nabbed a piece before I could stop her, but that was hours ago.”

“We’re locking up the chocolate,”Papi Sten said as Defne began zooming around his console.

“Hey, the kid is faster than an Askole, and once it’s in her mouth, forget about it,”I explained.

Derek shot me a narrow sidelong glance.“Get your equipment and report back here.”

I saluted him sharply and teleported to my cabin for my go bag.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter Seventeen

We teleported to a circle of white rock in the middle of a tropical rainforest. According to my readouts, the humidity was a hundred percent, and the temperature was a scorching 118 degrees. In case of an emergency the air was breathable, but ten minutes without armor and the multitude of critters would be chowing down. Thank the Goddess I was wearing top-of-the-line armor and the cooling system worked perfectly.

The dense foliage consisted of two-hundred-foot trees covered in inch-long spikes, vines with heart-shaped leaves, and huge mushrooms dotted with the grisly remains of dead insects. The wildlife was noisy as hell. Between the rackety croaks of giant frog creatures, the buzz of a zillion insects and the bellowing roar of Goddess knows what; I couldn’t hear a thing Derek was saying.

I switched to mind speak, “What did you say?”

“A swarm of Papilio Antimachus is about to attack.”

“What the heck are Papilio Antimachus?”

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