Page 65 of Made For The Alien Warrior

“It is a machine that can fly at incredible speeds and transform into a protective exoskeleton in the heat of battle.”

“Aww.” Sim-pony cooed as if his words had gone into one ear and out the other. She clung to Sida’s leg and smushed her mouth. “Aren’t you cute?”

Sida trembled in excitement.

Tiegan scowled. “You are not here to pet it.”

“Her.”

“It.” He slanted her a dark look. “I have already observed that Sida is drawn to you. But you must go a step further than that. To wear the zapten, you must become one with it.”

“You’re talking about the neural connection?” She swallowed nervously. “Leel said we had to be mates for it to work.”

“She is right in a sense. The zapten locks into a Plutonians’s unique neural frequency. However, you and I did not need to mate before our frequencies intertwined. You became tuned to my frequency when you suckled my lips.”

She tried to hide her embarrassment. “So I could summon Sida with my mind from that night in the bed?”

“Neh.”

“No?”

He shook his head. “You must be in extreme circumstances to be able to summon her without practice. We train with our zaptens as broods.”

“How do I catch up then?”

“I will tell you thatafteryou’ve mastered the art of the exoskeleton.” Pulling a comms bracket out of his pocket, he fashioned it on her wrist.

“What is this?” Sim-pony lifted the flashing device.

He placed his hand on her shoulders and nudged her toward Sida. “This will allow you to guide its movements without complications.”

“You want me to play the game on easy mode.” She frowned. “That’s not fair.”

“This is not about easy or hard. If I had more time, I would train you in the ways of combat before you ever stepped inside the zapten. This is simply a protective measure because we lack the time.”

Her eyes grew somber. “You’re worried about the Plutonians who hate us.”

“I worry over many things, Sim-pony.” He brushed his fingers over her cheek. “I want you to be safe. Your wellbeing means everything to me.”

She smiled softly. “I’ll be okay.”

“We need to take precautions to ensure this.” He fiddled with the bracket.

The moment the metal band settled on her skin, Sim-pony tapped it. “What does it do?”

Holos appeared above the bracket, floating in the air.

“Tap that symbol,” he said, pointing to the Plutonian word for ‘open’.

She did.

A mechanical buzz filled the air as Sida folded into itself, creating a Plutonian-sized husk with its ‘ribs’ torn open, waiting for its master to fuse to it.

“Wow.” Sim-pony jumped back, her eyes darting over the zapten.

“Here.” He tapped his own comms and metal shards from the zapten created a stairway to the ground. “This will make it easier to enter.”

“Do you normally need help to enter a zapten?” Sim-pony asked, giving him a head-to-toe scan.

---