Shades of Gray (4 page)

“We need to have a serious talk, Shaidan,” Kusac said, shivering slightly as he ushered his son into the lounge area of his quarters. He checked the thermostat, surprised to find it at the usual temperature; he hoped he wasn’t developing a fever. “Would you like a drink? A fruit juice or something hot?” he asked, before heading for the dispensing unit by the meal bar.

“A keffa, please,” the cub said, trotting over to the sofa and easy chairs. “Is something wrong, Father? I can’t sense your mind at all.”

“I’m just marshaling my thoughts,” he said, grabbing two mugs and sticking one on the dispenser pad. He programmed in a coffee for himself and a keffa for his son.

Behind his strong mental shielding, as he was now, he could only just sense Shaidan’s mind. “It’s not been easy for you, I know. From the beginning, you were thrust into the midst of an adult world. Just how much you’ve been aware of, I’m not completely sure, but it’s time you learned some of the truths and reasons behind what’s been happening around you.”

He found his son’s silence unnerving. Picking up the two mugs, he went over to join him.

Shaidan was sitting curled up in one of the easy chairs, his posture one of confusion and self-protection. Kusac sighed. As usual, he wasn’t handling this well, he realized as he placed the mugs on the low table and took a seat on the sofa opposite the cub. He lowered his shielding slightly in an effort to get closer to his son.

Head now bowed, Shaidan seemed to shrink even farther into the chair, his tail tip twitching erratically in obvious distress.

“You’re going to send me away as soon as they arrive, aren’t you?” the cub said finally, looking up, his eyes glinting with unshed tears.

“Absolutely not!” Kusac said firmly, holding his hand out in invitation to the cub. “You’re my son; you’ll stay with me until I can take you home myself.”

Shaidan blinked furiously, obviously determined not to cry. “You promise you won’t make me go with strangers?”

“I swear it. Come here,” Kusac urged, reaching his hand out farther toward him, remembering that though his son was physically ten years old, he’d been “born” less than a year ago as a result of the Directorate’s illegal genetic experiments. “I swear that while I still draw breath, you will never be sent to strangers.”

Shaidan slid off his chair and, taking his father’s hand, allowed himself to be pulled up beside him on the sofa. “Then why are you so worried?” he asked.

“I have some difficult things to tell you,” Kusac said, bracing himself mentally as he tucked his arm around his son. “You’ve been told about how the Directorate created you, but they didn’t just steal genetic material from myself and . . . Carrie,” he began, wishing it weren’t still so difficult to talk about her. “They also stole from Doctor Zayshul and combined it with ours to make you. As well as being a Human/Sholan hybrid like your sisters, you’re also a very little part Prime.”

“Why?” Shaidan asked after a small silence. “Why would they want me to be part Prime?”

“I don’t know,” he said, raising his hand to gently stroke his son’s head. “Don’t worry,” he reassured him. “It won’t make you look any different from how you do now. But like your hybrid genes, the Prime ones will be passed on to your own cubs one day. Doctor Zayshul is working on finding out how else it may affect you, and as soon as she knows, she’ll tell us.” He hesitated. “There’s something else you should know ...”

“About you and the Doctor?” asked Shaidan, burrowing closer to his side. “The other Sholan told me, but I could smell the scent marker anyway.”

“The Sholan in gray?” Kusac asked, trying to keep the sharpness out of his voice. “Do you know his name? Was it Vartra?” He’d long suspected it was Him, the Sholan Warrior Entity of Peace.

Shaidan nodded, snuggling even closer to him and wrapping an arm across his lap. “That’s what he said he was called. He said he couldn’t come to you any more, so he came to me instead.”

Kusac filed the information away for later. Now he had to finish telling Shaidan about him and Zayshul. Within days, Kaid and Carrie would arrive and expect explanations he wasn’t yet ready to give. The only thing that could protect his son from all the gossip and allegations that would shortly be flying around was the truth.

“What you don’t know is that the Doctor was forced, against her will, by the Directorate, to put the marker on me and that it was impossible for either of us to ignore it.”

“Is that why you and she quarreled a lot?” Shaidan asked in a muffled voice. “Why did the General make you return when he knew about the marker?”

“He needed my help, Shaidan. That was more important to him than anything else.”

“He shouldn’t have made you come back by keeping me. That was wrong.”

“It was, but sometimes desperate people have to do desperate things when they need help,” he said, responding to the underlying anger in his son’s voice by gently touching the edges of his mind. “As for you being here, I wouldn’t have been able to send you home with the other cubs anyway, I’d have kept you with me so we could get to know each other better. I want you to know that matters between the General and myself are now resolved, peacefully. We’re not exactly friends, but we are allies, on the same side now.”

He sensed the small growl of disagreement just before Shaidan uttered it.

“Pay close attention to me on this, Shaidan,” he said, putting his hand under his cub’s chin and lifting it so they were face-to-face. “You will be polite to him at all times, is that understood?”

“But he punished you—let you die!” the cub exclaimed, outraged, as he struggled to sit up.

“Shaidan! That’s enough,” Kusac said firmly, tightening his arm round him. “You’ve no idea how sorry I am that because of your telepathic abilities, you’ve been exposed to adult matters, but it happened, and it’s over now. Trust me, you haven’t the experience yet to judge the rights and wrongs of the situation.”

The cub muttered something so low he couldn’t catch the words.

“Do you understand me, Shaidan?” he demanded, taking hold of his son’s mutinous chin again.

“I understand you, Father,” the cub mumbled, giving up trying to pull away from him.

“It must end now, Shaidan. Kezule and I have learned to respect each other.” He smiled briefly, letting him go to ruffle the hair between his ears. “It may be a grudging respect, but it’s real. More, we trust each other now.”

“Then why did he let you die?” the cub blurted out.

Kusac sighed, and held Shaidan close again, pulling him onto his lap this time, wincing as the claw wounds down his side pulled. “He didn’t know that would happen. It was part of my healing process. No one realized how weak I actually was. I know you saved me, but Kezule did have the Doctor nearby on purpose. No one was expecting me to go into such a deep trance that I slipped into death.” He fell silent, resting his head on Shaidan’s.

“What was it like?”

“Unpleasant,” he said, wincing at the memory. “Full of regrets, not at all what I expected. When you reached for me, your fear triggered a response called a gestalt. That’s a special mental bond that exists only between Humans and Sholans who are mind linked. And because you and I were mentally linked, your cry for help was answered automatically by Carrie and your Triad father, Kaid. Ours is a special relationship,” he said, forcing the words out. “It only exists among the Humans and Sholans of our Clan. You’ll meet them soon . . . in three days to be exact.”

“Carrie—is she the Human?”

“Yes. She’s the one you saw in your memories, the hairless one like, but unlike, the Doctor.”

Shaidan pulled away from him and sat up, regarding him thoughtfully. “What about the Doctor?”

“That’s my private concern,” he said firmly, trying to meet Shaidan’s gaze steadily. “You will not worry about that.”

The cub nodded slowly. “Can you show Carrie to me?” he asked, eyes lighting up with enthusiasm.

Opening his mouth to say no, he found himself saying, “Why not?” Leaning down, he touched his forehead to Shaidan’s, and as he reached through his mental shields, he began constructing the image of Carrie to project to his son.

She was small, reaching barely to his shoulders—he could rest his chin on top of her head when he held her. Her long hair, the color of sunshine, was softer than any hair he’d ever touched before or since. Her fringe usually covered her eyebrows, and below them were dark brown eyes, ringed with amber—eyes that suddenly narrowed to the slitted pupils of a Sholan.

Sholan eyes,
he heard his son think.

Yes. The night she defied her father to be with me, she changed herself briefly into a Sholan. When she changed back, her eyes remained like ours.
Gods, remembering her consciously for the first time since he’d arrived here—what they’d shared and lost—hurt so much! And Kaid . . . It all came flooding back. Her scent, the feel of her skin, the sound of her voice, and his. Abruptly he pulled back from his son, shutting down the Link in fear the cub would pick that up too.

“You love them very much.”

“Yes,” he said, his voice low with emotion. “Yes, I do.”

He closed his eyes briefly, realizing he should have known they were so inextricably bound into his life that he’d be unable to separate them for his son. It was several minutes before he was able to continue.

“So among special people, Shaidan, you’re even more special. At the moment only the Doctor and we know about this. For now, I don’t want you to mention this to anyone. I intend to tell the others myself, in person.”

“Do we have to? I’d sooner no one else knew,” Shaidan said very quietly.

“Yes, we do. There’s nothing shameful about your heritage. Doctor Zayshul is a brave female—she’s saved my life several times, and at great risk to herself. Be proud of what as well as who you are. I am.”

“Are you?” Shaidan searched his father’s face, his voice as troubled as his expression.

“Of course I am! When I think of how you fought against the Directorate programming and had the courage to Link to me when I had died . . . It was a shock when I first found out about you, but no more than it was for you, I’m sure,” he said, leaning forward to touch the tip of his tongue to his son’s nose in an intimate, loving gesture. “You are my son, I love you, and you belong with me and your family.”

He watched the tension drop away from Shaidan as the cub relaxed, finally, against him.

“I wasn’t brave at all. I was so scared of losing you, that’s why I did what Vartra told me to do.”

“True bravery is being scared and doing it anyway,” he said. “And I’m sorry, but it’s going to be a bit longer before we can leave here and go home. Do you know about the new Emperor on the Prime world?”

“It’s all they’re talking and thinking about now.”

“Not all Valtegans are like the Primes. There are those called the M’zullians, who look like Kezule but are extremely aggressive and warlike. The new Emperor is from their world, and Kezule and I have to lead his people, with help from the Sholan Brotherhood that my crew and I belong to, to retake the throne for the rightful Emperor, Prince Zsurtul. Don’t worry too much,” he said quickly, feeling Shaidan stiffen again. “It won’t be a long mission, and you’ll be in no danger. You’ll stay here with Doctor Zayshul and the General’s daughter.”

“What if something happens to you?”

“It won’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

“No, I don’t, but it’s my job, Shaidan. It’s what we all do in the Brotherhood. Banner and I have to go to a briefing, so M’kou will be coming for you shortly. If it goes on too late, Jayza will collect you from the nursery and wait here with you until I return.”

“Have we time for a game of squares first?”

He checked his wrist comm. “Just about. Go fetch the pieces.”

They’d almost finished when M’kou, chief among Kezule’s many laboratory bred sons and daughters, arrived to take Shaidan down to join the other children.

 

M’kou picked his moment carefully, waiting until he and Shaidan were alone in the elevator before asking the question that had puzzled him for days.

“Shaidan, the day after your father was shot, when you and I were alone in the medic’s room, what happened?”

Startled, the cub looked up at him. “Excuse me?”

“I saw something . . . a dark shape, like a shadow, pick you up.”

Shaidan looked down at the floor. “I was scared for my father,” he mumbled. “I don’t remember.”

“Something, or someone, picked you up, I’m sure of it. You even spoke to it,” M’kou insisted gently.

“I don’t remember.” The words were more distinct this time.

“There must be something you remember,” said M’kou persuasively.

The cub looked up again. “I felt my father dying. I followed his mind and helped him come back, all right? It scared me a lot, and I don’t
want
to remember it.” The childish voice cracked, betraying that fear only too audibly. “You’ll have to ask my father about the Sholan—he knows him.”

M’kou was instantly contrite, reaching out to put a comforting hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry, Shaidan. You can understand I had problems believing what I’d seen,” he said as the elevator drew to a halt.

“I don’t know what you saw. My mind was Linked with my father’s,” said Shaidan stubbornly.

As the door began to open, the cub wriggled out from under his grasp, darted through the gap, and ran on ahead of him to the nursery.

M’kou followed more slowly, wondering if what he’d seen had been a manifestation of the mental Link between the child and his father or something very different. It seemed that he’d now have to ask Kusac.