His Carnal Need (Xylon Warriors 2) (28 page)

“Why would Halah share anything with Rave? And how is it that Halah figured out how to do that, when we don’t know how? If she doesn’t use the tracker channels, how does she find a clear route for transport materialization? That’s ridiculously dangerous. Did you question Halah about the information after Rave told you?”

“No. I thought Rave made up the story. The idea seemed preposterous at the time. Still does.”

Daegal sighed. He was getting tired of these former Xylon Warriors who came to The Dome, pretending to be loyal, but never really switching alliances or sharing information that Marid desperately needed.

Their databases held mega-memory of personal information on current and former Warriors, but technically they fell far behind Xylon in their knowledge.

“Maybe Rave did speak the truth, after all. At least that would account for her disappearance. I screwed up by not following through. Xylon is more advanced, as is their Warrior Training. And Halah is an electronics genius, from what I understand.”

“Halah is a pain in the ass, is what she is. Monitor her closely. I want to know her every move.”

“Yes, sir.”

* * * * *

Kam stood at the door to the slave area. “Leila,” he called out lightly. “Wake up. Time to go.” A little at a time, Leila stirred. Carefully, she rose from the pillows.

Kam could tell she was trying not to wake Erik. Just as well, since he couldn’t accompany her.

Earlier, he and Halah had heard them making love. Impossible not to. Halah wanted to watch, but he’d convinced her otherwise. Erik and Leila deserved their privacy. Besides, he wouldn’t have been able to keep his hands off Halah if they’d watched what sounded like one hot fuck.

He waited while Leila pulled on her slave attire and adjusted her hair to cover her breasts. Sexy. He ached for relief. Once they returned to The Lair, he needed to attend a Joining Party just to clear his head and bodily urges, even though he normally didn’t care for the Warrior gatherings.

Leila walked up to him. She glanced over her shoulder at Erik, then returned her gaze to his. “I’m ready,” she whispered.

He led her into the living quarters, where Halah was clipping items to her belt. “You have to go alone with Halah. She can explain your presence, if you get stopped and questioned. Erik and I would attract too much attention and be harder to justify.”

Leila nodded.

“Let’s go,” Halah said. She looked over at Kam. “By the way, the door is rigged, so don’t get any ideas about sneaking out of here. It’s fitted with a tamper-alert beeper whose signal connects to my vid-cell. If you try to crosswire the pad, I’ll know and materialize back here before you can trip the system.”

“Understood.” He’d already seen the engaged alarm pad earlier and wondered if Erik might be able to bypass the codes.

“How are you feeling?” Leila asked her. “Do you want me to check the bandages before we go?”

“No. I’m fine. We need to get you in and out, and all of us off Marid before we’re discovered. I’ve been unable to connect with one of my contacts. Something’s wrong.”

“Serious?” Kam asked, concern building inside him.

“I don’t know. But I have an uncomfortable feeling about this mission.”

“You’re not the only one,” Leila replied, worry evident in her eyes.

“Let’s get this over with. Come on.”

After Leila and Halah stepped through the door, and the panel slid closed behind them, Kam saw the alarm reengage. He sat in front of the computer and fingered the disk he’d copied earlier. Too easy. The thought kept running through his head.

“Hey,” Erik said from the other side of the room.

Kam turned and watched him enter from the slave area, rubbing his eyes.

“What’s going on?” Erik glanced around the room.

“Halah and Leila just left for the lab.”

“What?” He looked toward the door. “Why didn’t you wake me?”

“You couldn’t go with them, Erik.”

Erik frowned, then after a moment visibly relaxed. “Yeah, I suppose not. Either one of us would look too suspicious out with her at this time of night. Or is it early morning now?” He yawned. “What are you doing?”

“Thinking we need to contact Braden. I was going to approach Halah after we had the sterilization formula in hand, but I think we need to be ready to go once that happens.”

“Agreed. Where would she hide a communication device? To reach Xylon and connect with Laszlo’s board, she’d need a powerful system, and in a private place, somewhere easily accessible to her, and where no one would overhear her, even if she had company, so she could communicate in an emergency, if necessary.”

The both stared at each other. “Her bedchamber,” they said at the same time.

“Let’s look,” Erik said.

They both entered her room and glanced around the interior. Erik picked up a round throw pillow from a chair, then set it back down. “Strange room.”

“You noticed.”

“Everything’s gray. How could I not notice? Depressing. That woman possesses a scary psyche, in my opinion.”

Kam thought “troubled” more accurately described Halah, but he didn’t comment aloud. “How do you want to approach this?”

“Well, a control panel has to exist somewhere. You take that side, and I’ll take this side.”

* * * * *

Leila looked down each corridor they passed. Because of her slave status, they’d walked, but at least she got a good look at more of The Dome, which might prove useful to Xylon in the future. Everything she saw she tried to file away in her memory. She couldn’t believe how deserted the area seemed. Maybe a large number of soldiers and workers didn’t really exist in The Dome as they liked their enemies to believe. Interesting.

Halah led her into the deserted Med Lab. “If we’re caught and questioned, we’re here to get help for my wounds. And you, as my slave, simply escorted me, because I’m still not walking all that well.”

“Sounds reasonable.” She glanced around. Totally empty. The area held an eerie feel, very unlike her comfortable and caring setup of the Med Lab in The Lair. “Isn’t anyone at all on staff at this time? What if an emergency comes in?”

“There’s an emergency button. The formula will be under security. I’ll need to disable the system.” She made her way over to an area with lots of shelves and cabinets, all labeled. “This is where they keep the pills and shots. The more sensitive formulas are locked up.” She pointed to a large white unit in the corner.

“Refrigeration?”

“Partial, from what I understand.” Halah opened the alarm pad. She pulled some tools from her belt and went to work. “Keep an eye out. I can explain our presence, but I can’t explain tampering with the system.”

“Isn’t this place monitored?” She glanced around for vid-equipment and spotted a monitor in the far corner.

“I hacked into the computer system, and disabled all the monitors in this area before we left my quarters.

It’ll register on the main board, and they’ll send a crew to check out the malfunction. But we’ll be gone by the time they get here. Hopefully.”

Halah’s knowledge and abilities impressed her. “How did you learn so much about the workings of The Dome?”

“I made it a priority. Knowledge is power. An old, universal saying, but true nevertheless.” She closed the pad and punched in some numbers. The door clicked open. “We’re in.”

Halah opened the door and motioned for her to enter. “Find what you need and get out fast. I’ll stay by the door and watch for anyone passing by.”

* * * * *

“Found it,” Erik said, popping out of the bathing room. “I can’t believe it’s in her bath. Good cover. It’s behind one of the tiled walls. I’ll place a transmission to Braden.” Finally, things were looking up on this mission. Kam joined him in the bathing room. “How’d you find it?”

“These set of four tiles are a slightly different color. Very subtle. Almost looks like some damage occurred and the tiles ended up replaced. I pressed in on them, and these other tiles here slid back.”

“Slick. Can you work the board?”

“Yep. Just like Xylon. Halah must have designed and set it up herself. I wonder how she knew about Laszlo’s communication board and which channel to use to connect. Braden never did say. We just discovered the device ourselves not long ago. I’d love to question her about that.” He flipped some switches, engaged the scrambling feature, then found the proper channel. Erik frowned.

“What’s wrong?”

“Braden’s not responding to Laszlo’s channel. He should have it networked in to his vid-cell. I’ll see if I can contact the main control area. I’ll have to use voice transmission.” He switched the channel. “This is Class 1 Warrior, Erik Rhodes, contacting Xylon Control. Do you read?”

After some static, a voice came out loud and clear. “Rhodes! This is Torque. What the hell are you doing on this channel? You were supposed to—”

“Scramble your transmission, Torque.” The communication should be secure, but he didn’t want to take any chances.

“All right. Done. What’s going on?”

“We’re inside The Dome. We have the information on Daegal. Leila is at the Med Lab looking for the formula now. Where’s Braden?”

“He’s…unavailable at the moment.”

Unavailable? Erik looked over at Kam. Something was wrong. By his hesitant response, Torque obviously didn’t want to explain over the airwaves, and they didn’t have time to ask a lot of questions that didn’t directly relate to the mission. Nor was it a good idea to lose focus right now by concentrating on whatever problem had developed in The Lair. His need to return to Xylon quickly escalated though.

“Do you have Josella?”

“There’s a hitch. We had her contained, but she escaped. I just got the word from Pitch. They’re looking for her, though so far, nothing.”

“Why would she run?”

“Hell if I know. When I had the chance to get off the Sand Moon, I took it. No telling what’s going through that female’s mind.”

“What am I supposed to tell Halah?” He hadn’t planned on this turn of events.

“It’s your call.”

Erik thought a moment. “All right. We’ll tell her we have Josella on the Sand Moon. We just won’t tell her that we don’t have her precisely located or secured until the last second.”

“We’re going to betray her trust,” Kam muttered, weariness lacing his voice.

“We don’t have a choice, Kam. If we tell her now, she’ll turn us over to the Egesa.” His responsibility consisted of getting what they had come for and making sure everyone returned safely. He intended to do that job.

“We’ve registered some suspicious troop movements on Marid,” Torque transmitted. “They seem to have pulled back from whatever they were doing, but I don’t like it. Get out of there as soon as you can.”

“Exactly our plans. We’ll be coming in on a Marid orbiter.” He looked to Kam for confirmation. At his nod, Erik continued, “Ours was damaged and has been salvaged and probably gutted by now.”

“Understood. We’re closed down to non-Xylon flights, but I’ll have our trackers watch out for you.

Transmit your identification code on our emergency channel as you approach orbit.”

“Will do.”

* * * * *

“Got it,” Leila told Halah. “Marid’s equipment is archaic, but this looks to be the formula. The compound contains the basic elements common to our protection fluids.” The solution had better test correctly. A mistake was not acceptable. A second mission to The Dome would prove too dangerous to arrange right now. “It’s not their protection formula, is it?”

“I don’t think so. A component to break down the main ingredient is present. I’ll need Lair equipment and time to study the compound better. But I can’t find anything else of interest in here, so I’m fairly certain this is it.”

“Does the formula require refrigeration?”

“No, we lucked out.”

“All right, let’s get out of here. Let me have the vial.”

“You?” Suspicion immediately took hold.

“Where were you planning to hide it?”

Hmm. “Good point. Here.” Even though she knew it best to give the vial to Halah, since she had no place to carry it herself, she still handed over the formula reluctantly.

Halah slid the vial into her belt. They closed the unit, and she reset the alarm pad. “We’re ready to go.”

A sound of boots along the corridor stopped them.

“They’re here to check the malfunction,” Halah whispered. “Sounds like two of them.”

Her heart racing, Leila moved to dart out of the room.

Halah grabbed her and pushed her against the wall. She planted a kiss right on her lips.

Leila froze, so stunned by Halah’s actions she couldn’t react.

When Halah brushed aside her hair and squeezed her bare breast, male laughter floated to her ears.

Halah stepped back, false surprise on her face. “Isn’t there any place private these days?” she barked at the men who stood there grinning at them.

“Try your quarters,” one of them suggested.

“That’s so boring. I’m looking for a sexual kick. Something different. Certainly, you understand.” She grabbed Leila’s hand and grinned sexily at the men as they passed.

Their loud laughs followed them down the corridor.

As soon as they got out of range, Leila pulled away from Halah and wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. “That was disgusting. What happened to the ‘seeking help for your wounds’ plan?”

“Oh, you probably loved it.” Halah chuckled. “Besides, it worked well. They didn’t even think to question us. So, don’t complain.”

* * * * *

Erik studied Dak as he paced back and forth, while they waited for the women to return. The man had appeared in Halah’s quarters without them noticing or without him tripping the alarm Halah had rigged up. He must have materialized in, which meant he and Halah were closer than he’d thought for her to allow him access to her entry code. Dak told them that two ships were ready to go—one for him and Halah and one for the rest of them.

Erik couldn’t wait to get out of The Dome and off Marid, though he and Kam harbored a bit of concern about the data Kam had retrieved from the computer. Kam had told him how easily he’d broken the passwords. This whole thing might be a setup. But at this point, instead of giving Kam more time to poke around The Dome’s system, he simply wanted to get the formula and get out of there. The formula itself was more important than the information on Daegal and The Dome, in his opinion.