Daughter of Destiny (4 page)

"No, really?"

Zane smirked at Coran’s
sarcasm as he loosened his death grip on the controls. He
re-checked his instruments to make sure the stealth modifications
were working properly. If he attracted unwanted attention while on
a covert op, Coran would never let him live it down, not to mention
General Xu.

Long-range sensors showed a
small image of a planet with swirls of blue and white interrupted
by brown and green landmasses. The readings indicated no suspicious
chatter emanating from the planet's communication
satellites.

"So, if you weren’t
sleeping, what in quasars were you doing?"

"A sensitive on the target
planet contacted me."

Coran cursed in their
native Truscan and then switched back to Standard. "Is our mission
compromised?"

"Of course not. I'm not
that stupid."
I hope.
"The contact was brief. Most likely
she didn’t say anything more than a greeting." Zane's heart thumped
and his stomach knotted at the lie, but he refused to admit to
Coran that he’d already merged with her. Even though they exchanged
nothing more than linguistic information, it wouldn’t take much for
her to figure out none of those languages were spoken on her
planet.

"Most likely? That isn’t
very reassuring."

"It’s the best I can do
without talking to her again." Another pang of guilt stabbed at him
as the woman’s knowledge rattled around in his head demanding that
he analyze it. With an eye watching the computer guidance system,
he let his mind sort out the information he gained from the
telepathic encounter. In the middle of his routine check of the
fusion reactor's temperature, understanding of her main language
clicked into place. He translated what she shouted at him while he
practiced thought casting the day before. Zane bit his lip to keep
the grin from blooming on his face.

Coran heaved a sigh. "Do
you think the entire population is sensitive, or is this woman an
unfortunate anomaly?"

Thinking of the
'unfortunate anomaly' and the strong sense of attraction he felt
the moment they connected, Zane stared at the readout without
seeing a thing.

"Is something wrong with
the reactor?"

"What?" Zane shook his
head. "No, I was just thinking."

"About how to deal with a
sensitive population?"

"Huh? No, I doubt that, but
I can ask her next time."

"Absolutely not! It’s
against regulations!"

Zane snorted. "Like I care
what regulations say out here in the middle of nowhere?"

Coran swiveled his seat to
face away from him. "I don't know how you ever made
captain."

"I made captain because I
know when to follow rules and when to use my own brain. Blindly
following protocol can get you killed." Zane winced right after the
words left his mouth.

Grief shadowed Coran's
scowl. "So can ignoring them," he snapped back. "I don't want to
take you back to Yopmar in a stasis tube."

"No one's dying on my
watch. Not this time." The specter of Rhea's memory hung between
them. Zane stared at the instrument panel for a whole minute before
saying, "We need intel. Command should have sent an entire squad
for this mission, but I don't see one. Do you? The list of info
they want isn't going to happen without some help. If we screw this
up, people could die."

"And tossing regs out the
window isn't screwing up? If Karglock hasn't broken the encryption
on the data he stole from Gaza station, it's only a matter of time.
There isn't a single sign of space travel in the sector. Earth is
an easy target just waiting for someone like Karglock. IGCF sent us
for intel; not to make first contact. I'm working on half a dozen
different data mining programs."

"Your programs can only do
so much, Coran. The subtleties of face-to-face interaction have to
be explored by a person, not a computer. Why do you think they sent
me?"

"Honestly, I figured they
sent you to pilot and shoot anything that attacked us."

"You only got your orders.
As the commanding officer, I got yours and mine. Want to know what
my orders say?"

"What?"

"Infiltrate alien world by
any means necessary to achieve mission goals without compromising
the secrecy of the mission."

Coran stabbed at the
controls in front of him and then leaned back in his seat. He
rubbed the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger.
"Why did Command only send you and me? If Earth is so blasted
important, why not send a fully equipped squad? What kind of
planning is that? Help is non-existent out here."

"They aren't going by the
regs on this one, Coran. We aren't talking about some random
populated pre-warp planet, but the lost home world of several
million humans. If fewer people know about this mission, there's
less chance for civil unrest."

Coran stared at his screen
for a long moment. "And if we die?"

"Better two dead than a
whole squadron. There'll be less questions."

Coran let out a stream of
ugly Truscan curses.

"Now you get the picture?
This is big. Earth's discovery has the potential of tearing the
Confederacy apart. "

"So what do they expect us
to do?"

"We have sixty revolutions
of this planet to find out what the
kraghk h
as happened for
the last few thousand years and provide a full assessment of
culture and technology. Easy, right?"

"Of course," Coran said
with equal sarcasm. He shoved away from the computer console and
stood. "So we use the sensitive. Just make sure it's one that's
useful."

Zane chuckled as he stood
as well. He patted Coran on the shoulder. "Welcome to covert
ops."

"I don't recall signing up
for this."

"You're in IGCF, Coran. You
signed up for whatever they want you to do."

Zane walked past Coran
ignoring the mumbled curses. His friend possessed a streak of
naiveté to not catch on before now that working with a covert ops
soldier generally resulted in assignment of riskier missions. In
fact, Zane preferred not having a whole squadron underfoot. Despite
the limited resources, more hands also meant more lives to keep
safe.

He detoured to the
engineering portion of the ship and glowered at the small alcove
termed "engineering." The designers were either a very small
species, or found a sadistic pleasure in making the operator work
the bank of diagnostic computers, secondary controls, and the
control panel for the fusion reactor in a space barely bigger than
an average human male. Zane's taller than average height required
contorting into painful positions to work in the cramped
space.

Four bumps on the head,
three scraped knuckles, and a bruised elbow later he concluded,
after a few adjustments, that all systems were operating at peak
efficiency despite their near miss with the asteroid. Satisfied
that nothing required his attention, he retreated to his bunk,
bending down low to drop onto the less than comfortable surface.
Zane emptied his mind of the minor aches and sought the human
woman’s psyche.

Coran put his faith in Zane
and he refused to violate that trust by mixing personal interests
with the mission. The woman could prove of genuine aid, teaching
Zane crucial information faster than Coran could piece together
facts from their alien computers.

And if she jeopardizes the
mission, I'll neutralize her.

With his walls firmly in
place, Zane called to her. The passage of time meant nothing in
this state. A minute or an hour, he knew no difference. Memory of
her became his reality as her presence filled his mind. The soft
feminine touch both soothed and aroused. For a moment, he forgot
everything but her.

Heat.

Desire.

They beat at him, called to
him. He caught flashes of pale skin and gold hair beneath him. The
feeling of skin on skin breezed into his mind and then vanished.
Unlike before, his surroundings remained insubstantial. He
attempted to bring things into focus, but wisps of movement teased
him. Tingles ran down his spine as her hands swept through his
hair. He reached for her and his hands went through her fuzzy
image. He frowned and it dawned on him why she didn't respond and
the surroundings possessed an ethereal quality. She was dreaming.
Mala omea, what a dream!

Like ice water dousing him,
his surroundings solidified into a barren room with stone walls. A
door stood open, but an energy barrier shimmered across the
threshold, reminding him of a force field, but without the
requisite equipment anchored on the wall. The woman stood before
him wearing a long white coat which hid her figure. The swells of
emotion he sensed moments before vanished.

Zane extended a subtle
probe to determine her reaction to his intrusion into her dream. He
hit an invisible wall. Awake and alert, she eyed him with an
emotionless stare. Wary, he continued to test the blocks, but he
couldn’t even see them! He tried to recall a single person with
such advanced skills, but failed to think of even one.

"Yes?"

"I didn't mean to wake
you."

A moment of silence met his
comment and it dawned that perhaps she took that the wrong way. He
gathered his thoughts, trying to pull the correct words together to
explain when she answered.

"What do you
want?"

"My name is Zane. I want to
meet. Where can I find you?"

"My name is
Katarina."
Again there was a pause, as if she were weighing her
answer.
"I live in Memphis, Tennessee in the United States of
America."

A series symbols appeared
in his head.

"That's my email address.
Email me."

Before he could protest the
stone room vanished and he found himself alone in his head.
Telepathy could be as casual and distant as talking to a stranger,
painful and intrusive in the wrong hands, or the most fulfilling
bond that could ever exist between two people. Until now he never
experienced more than a friendly chat, but even their brief
conversations affected him in ways he did not expect.

Is this some sort of
mental chemistry?
Common sense told him to walk away and find a
safer, less complicated person to aid him in fulfilling the
mission.
As if I ever do the safe and easy thing?
He opened
his eyes and winced at his raging hard on.
Katarina, I hope
you're worth the trouble.

***

Katarina flopped back into
her pillows and allowed a moan to escape as she considered
finishing manually what the dream started. "This is so not fair."
Her body ached and throbbed with unfulfilled need. Teenage boys had
wet dreams, not grown women. The contrast of over a decade with
little more than vague interest and the consuming need demanding
satiation tested her. Painful and sharp in its intensity, she could
not push it away like the pounding ache of a migraine.

Heat and desire gripped her
so intensely she panted. Katarina tossed her head on her pillow and
glanced at the clock. "Two in the morning. Ugh." Her arms and legs
trembled and the ache inside her refused to fade. "Fuck," Katarina
muttered and pressed her hand over her heated flesh. An image of
Zane rising over her and entering her crystallized in vivid detail,
sending her straight to climax.

The orgasm eased the
firestorm of pent up desire, but true satisfaction lay beyond her
reach. Katarina punched her pillow into a more comfortable shape.
"He's gonna pay for this." That image remained seared in her mind
with a clarity that told her it was not imagination. She didn't
experience precognition often, but it always left her feeling
trapped by fate.

She flipped onto her
stomach, hating that her body gave her no choice.
Or did he just
turn this on? Maybe when I go out tomorrow I'll feel like this
toward any man.
She called to mind a number of good looking men
she knew of and better than a cold shower, the image of other men
doused her desire.
Well, fuck.
She stared at the ceiling in
the darkness and debated whether to run from fate or embrace
it.

***

Sunshine spilled into the
room and assaulted Katarina's eyes. She tossed a pillow in the
general vicinity of the window and then burrowed under the covers.
Laughter sounded and the pillow she just threw plopped on top of
her.

"If you want to sleep all
morning, don’t blame me if all of your coffee relocates to my
kitchen." Naia's footsteps receded.

Katarina lifted the pillow
enough to croak out, "Touch my coffee and die."

She hauled her tired body
out of bed and Naia's sunny smile greeted her as she trudged into
the kitchen. Already dressed, Naia's put-together look made Katina
scowl. She couldn't recall how long it took her to fall asleep. In
the early morning hours, as night gave way to dawn, she accepted
that she lacked the strength to fight whatever drove this insane
reaction inside her.