Discovery (25 page)

The Toyota whipped around a turn. From the pitch and twists the little truck made, Kent realized they were on the winding road to the top of Skinner’s Butte. The rain sheeted down so hard he wondered how Ben could see, since the windshield wipers did little to make visibility any better. How could a ship land so precisely in this slop? Airliners even had trouble on huge, long runways with fully automated systems.

Reluctant to let her go, he sat in the back with Povre and kept her firmly pressed to his body and his left hand pressed tight to a spot midway between her shoulder and collarbone. She felt limp and weak, and he worried, but she reassured him the energy discharge drained her, nothing more. As if she wasn’t bleeding all over him.

The vehicle came to a halt. The truck squeaked and bounced as Ben joined them in the back. He had a flashlight under one arm and a first aid kit beneath the other.

Kent snatched the light and brought it close to Povre’s wound. A long, deep furrow—she’d been grazed by a bullet. A scratch, sure, but a nasty and deep one…welling dark blue-violet blood.

“I’m sorry about what happened,” Ben said again, taking over the bandaging. “My friends managed to sidetrack the ETIS people, we sent the military somewhere else completely, and we thought we ditched the Feds.” He grimaced. “We thought wrong. We’re a younger group in this area and not very experienced. If only—”

“You did more than I could have. You did your best. We’re here, we’re alive. Povre’s alive. And she’s going home.” Kent let go of Povre long enough to squeeze the slender man’s wiry arm.

“I thank you too,” said Povre. “You took a big chance, Ben.” She stretched the short distance and kissed his cheek, conveniently close to her since Ben was applying a final strip of adhesive tape.

“Thanks, but I still feel bad. We didn’t count on them having dogs…or them having found some way to track Povre. I heard one of them mention a towel with blue hairs.”

Kent groaned. “The motel. The towels. The guy that came with Lynn, he must have taken one. I should’ve—”

“We can’t think of everything.”

“Kent will be in trouble,” Povre said, fingering the thick bandage. She rested her head wearily on his shoulder.

“No, I don’t think so,” Ben said. “The FBI is going to be embarrassed. They’re going to make up some story about a drug bust. The military will claim some anti-terrorist training maneuvers. ETIS, the people who want to contact aliens, aren’t fanatics and they might visit Kent later, just asking questions, but I doubt it. Like I said, my friends flummoxed them before they got near the campus. We’ve still got a few loose ends, so we’re going to do something we rarely do. Muddle up the situation. Kent will be just fine.”

Kent caught Ben’s glance.
Yeah, right.
“Don’t worry about me, Povre.”

“Let’s get you changed. You have her jumpsuit, I hope, Kent?”

By the time Kent helped Povre into the clothing she’d worn on her arrival, the rain stopped. Like some heavenly hand reached out and turned off a faucet, it just ceased to flow. Without a word Ben lifted the plastic sheeting and hopped over the side. Kent followed. He reached to assist Povre, who insisted she was capable of standing and moving on her own. She did appear more energetic, but Kent wanted to keep her close for personal reasons.

The world atop Skinner’s Butte was eerily quiet. The only sounds were those of raindrops dripping from the trees. At perhaps a distance of twenty yards all around them, the rain continued.

Like the Red Sea parting,
thought Kent, trembling. From being chilled and wet, from adrenaline letdown, from excitement and apprehension, he didn’t know. Maybe everything.

He had no idea what to expect. A huge mothership, causing snow. A blinding light leaving him with a sunburn. Tones singing a familiar pattern. None of that. All he had to do was yawn to pop his ears as the atmospheric pressure changed. And there, in the next blink a small craft, a sleek teardrop design no larger than a full sized van, hovered above the macadam surface of the parking lot for a few moments before settling gently.

Povre clutched him. He pulled her close, cupping her lovely face, wishing he could see her as beautifully blue as her nature intended instead of the artificial color he’d disguised her with.

“Povre, I’m sorry for what happened tonight with those agents. I wanted to kill them.” He swallowed a half-growl. “I still do.”

“Killing doesn’t solve ignorance,” she said, her voice catching. “I know not all humans are like that. I wish…”

He kissed her, ignoring the tears running down his face to hers. Ignoring the audience he sensed, not only Ben, but one other.

“You’d better go,” he whispered. “Have a doctor look at your shoulder.”

Povre brushed his tears aside, her fingers leaving the tiny shocks he’d become so familiar with in just three days.

“Povresle?” queried a new voice, one rough, husky. A stocky figure in a jumpsuit similar to hers.

Kent let her go, gave her a gentle little nudge. “Your dad’s waiting. Go to him.”

“H’renzek,” she gulped, and fled into the newcomer’s arms.

He couldn’t understand what they said to each other, but since lots of hugging and kissing was involved, it couldn’t be all bad. Then the one called H’renzek set her back a step, looked her up and down, and turned his head to send a deadly glare straight at Kent.

Whoa. Kent had to force himself to remain still and steady under that murderous gaze.

Povre clutched her father’s arm, talking quickly. H’renzek’s expression went from lethal to exasperated as he turned his head back to her.

His tone of voice, grumpy, stern, and Povre’s guilty reaction was enough of a translation. Ben chuckled.

This is it,
thought Kent as Povre backed away from H’renzek and turned to them.

She went to Ben first.

“Thank you, Ben Goldberg.” She took his hands, brought them to her heart, then her lips. She then flung her arms around him.

“Safe journey, Povresle.”

“Kent.”

He swallowed. “Safe journey, Povre,” he said, his voice catching.

He reached for her, for the last time. Kissed her breathless.

“I love you. Be safe. Be happy. I’ll never forget you. Don’t forget me.”

“Never,” she sobbed. Her eyes were so dry they didn’t even reflect light. Her fingers tightened on his sleeves as he set her back a step. “No.”

“You have to go, sweetheart. You’ll only die here. And that would make me very unhappy.” He kissed her forehead softly. “They’re waiting for you—and I don’t know how long we’re going to be safe here. Go.” He once more turned her back to her father.

The stocky Sirgel guided her toward the ship. With a very human-style swat on her backside, he sent her up the ramp. Other willing hands helped her inside, and a joyful voice said “Povre!” and Kent heard Povre respond “Jenn!”

Then H’renzek swung toward Kent, his gaze intense, sharp. For a moment Kent thought Povre’s father was going to haul off and punch him. Instead, the Sirgel held both his strong six-fingered blue hands out, palms turned upward.

Kent covered them with his. The alien’s grip closed with painful strength and the now-expected electric zinging was on a level subtly different from Povre’s. Then Kent tried not to react in surprise as H’renzek touched Kent’s clasped hands to his heart and then to his lips, the same way Povre had done with Ben.

Lowering his gaze to Kent’s knees, he inclined his head in a curiously formal, regal manner.

“
Jasr’re ene.”
The alien’s shaggy haired head came up. His features, rugged and male, were handsomely arranged on his triangular face. “I thank you for my daughter’s life and well being,” he said, his English thick but comprehensible.

“I want to go with her,” Kent said.

H’renzek let out a soft sigh. “This is impossible.”

“I love her.” Kent couldn’t believe his voice came out sounding so pitiful, but he couldn’t help it.

“Noticed fondness, I have,” responded the man with a wry grin. He released Kent’s hands. “I…am sorry.” He sounded genuinely sympathetic and his dark indigo eyes reflected the merest flashes of midnight blue under the street lamp lighting the parking area. “Take you we cannot. It is forbidden.”

“It amounts to abduction, Kent, and their laws forbid it. Even if it is of your own free will.” Ben covered for the Sirgel’s limited English.

“Abduction? That’s ridiculous!” Kent nipped back more hot words. Now wasn’t a good time to argue. “I understand.” But damn it, he didn’t. Or didn’t want to. “Don’t be too hard on her, H’renzek.”

The tough face softened. “I wish you well. Would more humans be like you, our people could be friends, allies.”

“I’ll pray for that day,” Kent said softly. “Safe journey, H’renzek.”

The Sirgel nodded, the light silvering flecks of gray in his shaggy black hair. He turned and went to his ship. And just as silently as it arrived, it was gone, and the rain pounded down on Kent and Ben.

Kent raised his face to the storm, letting the rain mix with his tears.

H
’RENZEK'S WAYWARD DAUGHTER SPOKE
little on the return to the ship. He personally dressed the long, shallow wound on her shoulder, a cut on her arm, and the small nicks on her long fingers. He shuddered when she said the humans’ dogs had attacked her. Flashes of his wife’s mutilated body rose before his eyes and he had to shut them tight. He crushed his daughter to his chest and thanked the Goddess she was whole, and beyond her scrapes, exhausted.

The official pronouncement of her penalties, for disobeying orders, breaking the rules, causing so much trouble, could wait. She knew what they’d be, so did everyone else. No sense in telling everyone what they knew already. Those aboard the ship, however, were glad and relieved to have her back.

H’renzek tucked her into her sleeping cubicle as if she still was a small child, and sat near, holding her hand.

“I never told you how your mother died,” he said. “You never asked me.”

Povre’s fingers tightened over his. “I wanted to,” she said. “But every time a chance came—”

“I know,” said H’renzek. He’d turned her off, changed the subject, and said he had to go. For two decades, not counting any time spent in stasis. “Twenty-two waking years ago, on the world we designated R459—”

“I know that much, Father.”

“Hush.” His eyes burned, and he blinked to bring back the moisture. “This is the only way I can speak of it.” With his free hand he smoothed her hair.

“Your mother was part of a scientific surface team, just like you. And like you, the lure of natural beauty and prospect of discovery overcame caution. I was not the leader for her team.”

Povre nodded.

H’renzek wanted to hold her the way he did when she was smaller, hold her and never let her go.

“You were watching me.” Her gaze dropped to the surface of her sleeping mat. “As I recall, no one else would,” she mumbled. “Too much trouble.”

He shook his head and placed a finger on her lips so he could continue. “The civilization,” he almost choked on the word, “of R459 was fairly close to the technical levels of the world below. Only, they knew for certain intelligent life existed beyond their solar system. They’d been visited long before we ever came. Unfortunately, the experience was horrible, and the people quickly decided anything foreign or alien, anything at all, was evil. The entire social structure centered on a xenophobic outlook. Natural aberrations and mutations among animals and plants—even among their own kind—on their world…all destroyed the instant they were spotted. We found out about this peculiarity too late, of course.”

He closed his eyes again. Open or closed, it didn’t matter or help. He kept seeing Silpova’s mutilated body and the expression of terrible pain and horror death left permanently etched on her delicate features. Looking at his daughter—her daughter—listening to her report earlier, made the memory all the more clear.

“Silpova went with a partner, a Folonar botanist, but left him and stumbled into a group of natives out hunting. Unlike the humans, the people of R459 do not resemble us so closely. Since we’d never visited that world before, we didn’t know what to expect…”

His daughter’s bandaged hands gripped his to the point of pain as he filled in all the details for her. It hurt to say it, hurt her to hear it—he could see that. He should have told her sooner.