HeartStorm (HeartFast Series Book 3) (23 page)

            Instead of answering, Star tried to sit up, when the doctor placed a hand on her chest and firmly pushed her down on the floor, flat on her back. "Nope. No getting up. Not until I've had a chance to examine you," the woman firmly ordered in that no-nonsense tone everyone was familiar with.

            "That...man... My baby."

            "He got away," another voice stated sadly. Morning Fire. Nearby but out of sight.

            Animator's face loomed in the distance. Star could distinguish tear tracks on the woman's face.

            "Star, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to—"

            "Hey." She managed to dismiss the woman's apology with a vague wave of her hand. "You didn't know, Ani. No one did. Ouch!"

            Devorah lifted her fingers so Star could see the red smears on them. "You're bleeding. We're going to put you on a mobile and get you over to the clinic so I can bandage that up. The rest of you!" She yelled over her shoulder. "All of you who got caught in that man's power, I want all of you over to the clinic for an immediate analysis. No ifs, ands, or buts. Don't make me come after you." She glanced back at Star and flashed her a quick smile. The woman was ruthless when it came to their health, but they didn't want it any other way.

            When the doctor rose to summon a hoverbed, Hunter took her place and placed a hand on Star's cheek. His deep blue eyes searched her face. "How badly did he hurt you?" he softly asked.

            "Actually, he didn't hurt me," Star told him. "I fell against the comm board."

            Hunter took a deep breath, and she could see him summoning his power. His ultimate hunting, tracking ability. But his eyes were still blue when he gazed down at her again. "I swear to you, Terrin, I'll find him. I'll find him and I'll bring him back here."

            "How?" Morning Fire interrupted from behind Star. "Say you find him. How are you going to contain him when he can slip out of that force field thingie?"

            "He got out of that force field thingie only because Animator somehow blocked its current, or its signal, or whatever," Provoker drawled.

            Commander spoke up from where he stood in the doorway. "Quit calling it a thingie. It's a Brotean Field, and it's my fault I didn't have the controls with me. I left them in the lab, thinking there would be less of a chance DiMackerlyn would be able to grab them and deactivate the net. I realize now that if I'd had the controls with me, I would have been able to redirect it after Animator dampened the field, and none of this would have happened."

            "Stop it. Stop the blame game right now," Deceiver ordered. "Mistakes happen, but we learn by them. We'll know better in the future. But at this moment I need for all of you who tried to pin the guy down to get yourselves over to the clinic so that Doctor Perlakian can give you a clean bill of health. No arguments."

            "You still haven't answered my question, Hunter," Morning Fire insisted. "What do you plan to do? Carry that field with you when you go after him?"

            The smile Star saw crawl over her husband's face sent cold dread into the pit of her stomach. This was the side of him that made her pity anyone who dared to stand in his way.

            "I don't need a Brotean Field to stop him," was all he would say before he was interrupted by the doctor's return.

            Star saw several of them move aside as the physician eased the thin metal stretcher onto the floor. With Hunter rolling her onto her side, Star felt the table slide underneath her, then slowly lift her to waist level to transport her to the clinic.

            Hunter brushed a few strands of hair from her face as he gave her a loving smile. "I'm leaving now to go after him. I'll find him, one way or another. I promise. The man obviously has to solidify himself in order to manipulate objects. I'll be waiting when he does."

            A pat on her boot directed her attention to where Deceiver was listening. "I've notified the SPF about his escape. They'll be scanning every ship and cruiser leaving this planet. We'll find him, Star."

            "What about my baby?" she whispered. Without thinking, she raised her hands to cup her face, when she smelled the rank odor still on her skin. She winced. Hunter saw her expression.

            "What?"

            She held out her hands to him. "I've never smelled a man reek like that."

            Hunter's eyes widened. "Reek? When you touched him?"

            "Yes. It was almost putrid."

            "Terrin, listen. Think back. At any time did DiMackerlyn touch you? Did he put his hands on you? Mark you with his DNA?"

            "Yeah. He grabbed my wrists and forced me to let go of him. That's when he threw me away." Her voice hitched, and she realized the irony of her remark.
He threw me away. That's twice now. Twice.

           
To her surprise, her husband took her hands and raised them to his face. Closing his eyes, he sniffed her fingers, her palms, and her wrists. His nose grazed her skin where DiMackerlyn had clutched her, and he took long, deep breaths. This time, when Hunter opened his eyes, she could see the blackness starting to shadow them.

            "Darling, that's the greatest thing that could have ever happened. I have his scent now. I have his DNA, and now I have him. 'Bye, my love," he whispered, and vanished. His sudden departure shocked everyone. After a few silent moments, Devorah gave the table a little push.

            "Let's continue this in the clinic, shall we? Seeker, you're looking unusually pale. Do I need to summon a table for you, too, or can you walk?"

            At first, the slender woman nodded. Then she shook her head. She tried to answer when her knees began to buckle. Disaster caught her and lifted her into his arms. Sender was instantly by her sister's side, holding her hand.

            "What is it, Ana? You've seen something, haven't you?"

            Deceiver strode over to where the woman remained conscious as she leaned her head against Disaster's shoulder. "Seeker? Is there something you can tell us?"

            After a few moments, Seeker managed to nod. Once. "DiMackerlyn," she whispered in a hoarse voice. "I...saw... I heard..."

            "What did you see and hear?" Deceiver urged.

            A shudder went through the young woman. "I saw...a man's face. A name. Porith. Omand Porith."

            "Omand Porith," Disaster repeated. "Why does that name sound familiar?"

            "Wasn't Omand Porith an imperial judge in the tribunal? The one that died?" Blender supplied. "Could it be him?"

            Corona spoke up. "I thought he disappeared when the Ombitra attacked. I think his body was never recovered."

            "Too many people disappeared at that time," Condemner commented. "Too many bodies were burned beyond recognition. Burned or...disintegrated."

            Doctor Perlakian stepped forward with an angry glare and a toss of her head. "As I said earlier, let's take this to the clinic. You can chit chat all you want in there while I take care of Star's booboo and examine the rest of you. Now, get moving before I use my mother voice on you!"

            Giving the others a grin, Deceiver led the way out of the room and toward the medical bay.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Questions

            "All right! Found him," Blender announced from the comm board. Everyone turned to listen. All except for Doctor Perlakian, who had Seeker lying on "the slab", as they sometimes gruesomely called the examination bed.

            Blender continued. "If this is the same Omand Porith Seeker saw, he was one of the tribunal, just like we thought. During the reconstruction after the Ombitra attack, his home was discovered completely destroyed. No bodies were discovered, although the ashes of two possible human remains were found within the ruins. Those remains were assumed to be that of Porith and his wife, Julan. They were interred within their family mausoleum, as prescribed by his documented last rites."

            "Why assumed?" Sender asked. "Why weren't they positively IDed?"

            "Too many dead," Deceiver answered. "There were too many to properly identify. The ones the labs verified were the people out on the streets. The people in the stores or in the parks. Out in the public venues. The ones they couldn't identify any other way. Even narrowed down, the numbers were staggering. The labs are still processing remains. But those people they found in their homes, the officials assumed belonged there. Made their jobs easier, I guess."

            "What about family?" Disaster questioned. "Did Porith have kids? Any relatives at all?"

            Blender shook his head. "No mention of family, although Porith's wife had a sister, now deceased."

            Sender turned to her own sister. "Maybe it's a different Porith you saw."

            "Blender, project the guy's image," Deceiver ordered.

            A small holo of an elderly man wearing the robes of a tribunal judge projected over their heads. Seeker nodded. "That's him. That's who I saw."

            "The guy's been dead for over a year," Provoker quipped. "Maybe it was an old memory you latched onto."

            "No. When I touch someone, I get the most recent memories first. It takes longer for me to delve deeper to reach the past."

            "Speaking of delving, you're fine," Doctor Perlakian told her. "Provoker, you're next."

            "I'm fine, too," the man remarked sardonically.

            Devorah gave him one of her patented doctor looks. "I could have Bruiser place you up here."

            Sighing loudly, Provoker walked over to the padded table and stretched out on it. Corona picked up where they'd left off.

            "How could Seeker read the image of a man who's been long dead, if all she could glean were recent memories?"

            "Maybe DiMackerlyn was thinking about him?" Morning Fire offered.

            "It's possible," Corona conceded. "But, again, why? What's the connection?"

            "Seeker, did you find anything about my daughter?" Star spoke up from where she sat on the other examination bed.

            Seeker shook her head. "Sorry, Star. I wish I had, although..."

            "Although what?" Star prodded.

            The woman shook her head again, adding a half-shrug. "I don't know. Maybe that shock that went through us when DiMackerlyn used his ability affected my reading."

            "All right, Provoker," Devorah said, giving him a pat on the shoulder. "You're good to go. Animator? You next, but I doubt you'll come out as anything other than squeaky clean like the rest."

            Provoker sauntered over to where the display on the comm screen still showed the readouts from Blender's search. He rubbed his goatee in that way that caught Star's attention.

            "Provoker, you're thinking about something. What is it?"

            "What makes you think I'm thinking?"

            "Don't mess with me. I'm in no mood for it. You do that stroking your beard thing whenever you've got an idea formulating in your head."

            The man sighed loudly. "Well, I've been chewing over a few things."

            "What kind of things?" Deceiver urged. "Out with it."

            "Yeah, Provoker. Spit it out. Any little bit could help," Morning Fire added.

            "Well... All right. It may not mean anything, but let's recap a couple of things. One, we know DiMackerlyn had the little starlet. Yet, when the SPF caught up with him, he'd somehow managed to switch out infants. Which leads us to the possibility that, one, he switched the baby with someone else's kid because he realized he was about to get caught. Or, two, he'd already delivered the baby to whomever wanted her, and then grabbed someone else's kid to throw the SPF off the trail, knowing he was about to get caught. Am I making sense?" He looked to Deceiver for verification.

            "Deceiver." Blender redirected their attention to him. "When I notified the SPF, I sent them a vid shot and description of DiMackerlyn, but nothing about the baby. I mean, I gave them what information I had about the little girl, but..." He gave a woeful smile. "They knew they were looking for a newborn female infant. Nothing more."

            Deceiver waved the man off. "Don't blame yourself for the deception. Provoker, is that it? Is that all you want to share?"

            "Not quite. There's something else that puzzles me." The man pointed to the few Guardians who had tried to hold down DiMackerlyn. "He jolted us all pretty good, right?" When they nodded, he pointed to Star. "Were you? I mean, you said he tossed you away, but you didn't suffer like the others did, did you?"

            "I felt an initial jolt," Star admitted. At the memory, she closed her eyes and placed a hand to her temple. The medicated patch covering the wound on the back of her head was beginning to work its magic, making her slightly drowsy. "It was painful, but momentary. Why?"

            "She's of his blood," Sender reminded them.

            "True, true," Provoker continued. "But figure this out for me. Callie is only a quarter blood. When DiMackerlyn grabbed her, did she get shocked like Star was?"

            The HeartCrystal chirped, and Star sat up straighter. "If she'd been hurt, I would have known," she flatly told them. "Either Emma would have alerted me, or I'm certain Hunter would have felt her pain."

            "Sooo, she wasn't hurt," Animator softly concluded.

            "Which begs the question, why not? Why would Star feel pain, who is half blood, but not the baby, who is lesser?" Provoker challenged. "Furthermore, somebody please explain to me, if touching DiMackerlyn can cause such havoc, how was he able to snatch a second baby? A baby who has
no
blood connection?"

            Silence pervaded the clinic, until Doctor Perlakian slapped the examination table. "Just as I figured. You're clean," she informed Animator. "Wooly, last but not least."