And now, while I worked, Seth was heading out with ReCon 3 on a mission. I monitored his activity, could hear the reports from the communication station across the room. I would know instantly if anything happened to ReCon 3 or Seth. I realized I would be spending a lot of time in this room, waiting for news when one of my mates was out on a mission.
How I had fallen in love with both of them in just a few days? I couldn't begin to explain, even to myself, but I had.
I craved their touch. I craved Seth's intensity and Dorian’s protective embrace and not because I felt it—them—through the collars. I raised my fingers to mine. I had become addicted to their strength, their dominant alpha male attitudes and to the way they touched me when we were alone. The way they made me feel. I had never known anything like it. And I knew instinctively that I never would again.
They were mine, just as I was theirs.
A strange humming in my head pulled me from my wayward thoughts and I focused all of my attention on the task at hand, scanning for high frequencies and trying to decipher any communications I might come across.
But this wasn't stumbling upon anything. This was like a cannon blast in my head and I doubled over in pain. Crying out, I bent over on top of the control panel, everything spinning and cutting into my mind like a tornado of sharpened blades slicing through my skull.
Every eye on the room turned to me in surprise, but I could not lift my head. The pain was building, not receding, like a dagger had been shoved through my ear drum into the center of my skull.
“Commander Phan?”
I tried to lift my head, tried to sit up straight, reached for the NPU attachment on the side of my head and covered it with my hand before Commander Karter could take it from me. “No. Don’t touch me. “
The commander stood before me, hands on his hips, no hint of amusement in his face. “Talk to me.”
I tried, but the problem was, I had no idea what was going on. It was as if I had suddenly stumbled into a Hive communication hub. So loud and so filled with traffic that it was like standing in the middle of a rock concert. Except I couldn't plug my ears. And I was standing right in front of the speakers. “It's loud.”
“Commander Karter, medical needs you.”
Commander Karter turned and nodded “Put it on screen.”
A Prillon warrior I did not recognize filled the display. His green uniform the only indication of his rank. Behind him, a human woman, a doctor in a dark green uniform and Atlan mating cuffs, was trying to calm an Atlan that I had never seen before.
The doctor on screen wiped his brow. Panting as if he had run a marathon and was out of breath. “The Hive is doing something, Commander. Warlord Anghar sat bolt upright from a ReGen pod, screaming and clutching his head. And he’d been unconscious.”
I wedged myself up onto my elbow for a better view of the Atlan. The pain inside was like a knife in my skull, but no longer a surprise. I could endure.
Commander Karter studied the doctor and the Atlan and I wondered if he worried the warrior would turn beast. “How much Hive tech is still inside the warlord?”
“I've taken out everything I can,” the doctor said wearily. “He'll have to live with the rest...”
“Is he himself? Am I looking at Warlord Anghar, or am I looking at a Hive Drone?”
The doctor shook his head and ran his hand through his auburn hair. “I don't know, sir. He's been unconscious in the ReGen pod for two days until now. He popped up and scared the hell out of all of us. No one has spoken to him yet.”
“Can he hear me?”
The doctor nodded. “I'll put you on, sir.” He turned away from the screen. “Warlord Anghar, the commander would like to speak with you.”
The Atlan lifted his eyes to the screen and it seemed that everyone on the command deck was holding their breath, waiting to see what we would be dealing with. A sane man? Or a beast that could rip the entire ship apart. His hands were fists at his sides. “I hear you, Karter.” His voice was a deep rumble, but sounded sane.
Commander Karter leaned forward, as if he could get closer to the Atlan. “Excellent. Be on the command deck in five minutes.” He turned to me, narrowed his gaze. “I want you in my office, now.”
He walked into the officers’ meeting room. I rose to follow, but dizziness swamped me and I had to stop for a moment. Palms on the control panel, I regained my balance as the Prillon warrior next to me stood and held out his hands to assist. But I waved him away.
“I'm fine, thank you...” I took three deep breaths and ignored the pain. I walked into the meeting room and took a seat next to the commander. We waited in silence at the large oval table until the doctor and the beast known as Angh entered the room. The Atlan barely cleared the doorway, he was so big.
The commander indicated that the warlord should sit at the opposite end of the table. Before I knew it, the room filled with other warriors I did not know, but whose command insignia made it clear that they were the commanding officers for each section of the battlegroup crew.
/> Conversation flowed around me as the doctor gave the warriors in the room an update on the warlord’s condition. He was remarkably quiet for an Atlan. Well, any alpha warrior, really. It only went to prove to me how much the warlord had been through, or how much pain he might be in. The doctor mentioned that a large number of Hive implants had been removed, but a few remained and could not be taken without endangering his life. He would be transported to the Colony as soon as arrangements could be made and transport codes approved by Prillon Prime. The Atlan warlord was clearly not happy about it, his hands in tight fists on top of the table. But like all warriors banished to the Colony, there wasn't a damn thing he could do about it and we all knew it.
I, too, had a variation of Hive technology implanted in my body, but it was Coalition controlled, specially modified by the Intelligence Core, and, at the moment, driving me completely insane. Luckily, despite the constant buzzing, the pain had faded to a dull headache. Yay, me.
The commander must have said something to the doctor when I wasn’t looking, for he walked over to me and placed an injector to my neck. Within moments, the pain was gone. I breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you, Doctor.”