Page 50 of Monstrous Baby
“At least the EMP worked.” The other human gave me a look that I could only classify as mercenary. As if he were counting every cent he would make selling off each body part. “That’ll be useful to know the next time we negotiate with their primaries.”
I barely resisted snorting with derision. Did they honestly think a crude EMP drone would be enough to knock out DSC? Already, the grid sparked and flickered as the Sirian cells regenerated the damaged synapses. Everything would be back online in five minutes. Tops.
“I don’t like it,” the military man retorted. “Let’s grab the woman and get out of here before more of the monsters arrive or these… things… wake up. We don’t know how long the pulse will knock them out.”
Snyder crossed his arms and nodded his chin at the tub—where I lay sprawled. “She’s under the turtle.”
Military man looked at my distended tongue and shuddered. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
Behind them, Snryx readied his battle implements. He could skewer them in seconds, so I wasn’t too concerned about the humans. The crashing thuds rattling the entire house were my primary concern. How’d the humans think they’d escape a BGR? Though the even more pertinent question hadn’t even occurred to them.
Where’s the rest of the squad?
Natalie’s small palm flattened against my underplating. I soaked in her warmth, wishing I could understand what she wished me to do now. Frustrated by the downed grid, but still grateful she was willing to touch me, even in this form. Much better than her shriek of terror the first time I touched her.
Her palm pressed harder, encouraging me to rise. Exposing her to these humans and the external squad’s threat. It didn’t make sense. Logically, the safest place in the world right now was underneath me, protected by my Nodo shell that stopped even Axxol’s jaws before. He knew all my tricks and techniques because we functioned as a whole unit, so it’d been easy for him to flip me aside. This other BGR wouldn’t know exactly where tounbalance me. He wouldn’t know about the previous weak spots in my shell barely fused back together.
Yet my mate pressed upward again, asking me to move. So I did.
As I straightened my limbs and lifted off the large basin, the humans recoiled, tripping over the implements Snryx immediately coiled around their legs. Their shouts of alarm were extremely gratifying despite the gravity of our situation.
Slipping out from beneath me, Natalie straightened proudly beside me, backing into my shoulder so I could defend her with both claws and fangs if necessary. “Gentlemen.”
The two strangers gaped at her, completely rattled. Snyder startled at my movement, and then slowly backed away toward the door. He understood exactly how much danger they were in now, though perhaps he hoped Snryx was still incapacitated. I’d never known our medic to have a perverse sense of humor, but he allowed the human to stumble back all the way to the door before wrapping an implement around his throat.
“For the record, EMPs don’t incapacitate dyni,” Snryx said dryly.
Truth—without giving away too much of the truth. A normal squad might very well have been incapacitated—because they relied heavily on the grid to function. They needed each other desperately to function as a cohesive unit.
We’d already experienced individual exploration and trials when Axxol broke the squad. We’d survived the silence after losing the grid temporarily. We’d separated and learned new ways to function independently. Even without the bonus of now having a mate, our squad was stronger because of our individual abilities that had been developed in those initial days on Earth alone. For the most part, I was fully functioning already except for the grid. I didn’t have specialized engineering like jumps,echolocation, or heat-sensing vision which might have gone offline.
Which only made me worry for my squad mates’ wellbeing. Most likely, they were engaged now with the attacking squad, outnumbered with a youngling to protect and no grid.
“Who are you working with?” Natalie demanded.
Evidently she stared directly at Snyder, who blanched under her scrutiny and disdain.
“We don’t have time for introductions,” the other human replied, though the man in military uniform gave him a narrowed look. “Unless you’d like to deal directly with Draco Sirius Command, you’ll come with us.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
“Look, miss?—”
She snapped her head to glare at the military man. “If you want to live, you’ll go back to your ship located approximately five kilometers off the coast from Livingston and never come back here again.”
The man’s eyes widened. “How could you know that?” He jerked around to glare at Snyder. “You betrayed us.”
“No, never,” Snyder babbled. “Like I told you, they can tap into anything electronic. The CPT must have tracked you somehow. I warned you the text was a mistake.”
Military man turned his attention back to Natalie. “Do you also know the hurricane is no natural storm? It’s an alien using winds to hide its approach. If we don’t get out of here, it’ll take you before DSC’s monsters can kill you.”
I didn’t have to sample the man to detect several inconsistencies if not outright lies in his language. I didn’t believe DSC wanted Natalie dead. Not yet. There were several potential species who might risk antagonizing DSC but not many. Would any of them be found here on Earth?
DSC had more important uses for her and our youngling before they’d terminate them. Besides, they could’ve obliterated this planet into dust from the beginning. Certainly, they had the ability to destroy everything in this solar system in countless different ways. If they didn’t want to answer the syndicate’s questions about why this particular planet had been destroyed, they’d simply trigger its star into a supernova core collapse.
Earth’s Sun contained billions of billions of tons of hydrogen, plenty of fuel for the star to continue burning for billions of years. Unless a Sirian crystal of appropriate size was accidentally on purpose deployed into its core. During nuclear fusion, the crystal’s piezoelectricity could convert all of that energy into?—
Natalie’s fingers wrapped around my dangling tongue. Frozen, I focused on her body language, trying to decipher what she wished of me.
