Found (33 page)

“
Sssink or ssswim, my ssson. Only the
ssstrong sssurvive.” The AllFather laughed his high, evil cackle as
he watched Xairn flail in the deep rectangular tank filled with
black slime.

“
Please! Please, Father!”

He was only a child of seven or eight and he
had yet to get the size and strength he would attain as a mature
male. He had never been immersed in the thick, black liquid of the
drowning tanks before, though he had watched in horror as the
urlich were thrown in one by one during their training.

The modified canines the Scourge used as
scouts were forced to swim in the drowning tanks for hours upon
hours to prove their stamina and courage. The weaker ones died and
sank to the bottom of the black ichor. Their rotting bodies added
to the nauseating stench of the tanks and served as a warning for
others.

But not for me, Xairn thought wildly. I am
no urlich—I am his only son. Why? Why is he doing this?

It was a question he asked himself daily
aboard the Fathership as his father perpetuated cruelty upon
cruelty on the son he claimed to love. The worst thing was Xairn
never knew when the punishment was coming. Most of the time his
father ignored him completely but sometimes he would be kind and
almost loving for days. He would take Xairn around the ship and
talk to him about its inner workings, teach him the history of
their people and explain their hatred of the race-killing Kindred
who had doomed them to slow extinction after the abortive genetic
exchange.

Then, just as Xairn was beginning to trust
him, beginning to think that this time his father truly cared, he
would do something vicious and cruel, something Xairn could never
have expected. This time they had been walking by the urlich
kennels while the AllFather lectured him about the proper way to
train the modified animals. Then, with no warning at all, his bony,
scabrous hands had closed on Xairn’s arms and he had flung him into
the deepest tank.

“
Father, please!” Xairn flailed wildly at
the viscous black ooze that surrounded him. “Please, I can’t
swim!”

“
I know you cannot, my ssson.” The
AllFather could barely stop laughing long enough to speak. “But you
ssshall learn. Or like the weakest urlich, you ssshall die.
Remember, only the ssstrong are fit to sssurvive.”

“
Father, help! I’m scared! I can’t—” He
went under, his mouth filled with the noxious slime. Fighting his
way to the surface, he spat it out. His arms and legs were getting
tired—it was like swimming in glue. But he knew if he didn’t make
it out on his own, he would die in the tank. Die and sink to the
bottom to join the bones below. Summoning the last of his strength,
he somehow made his way to the side of the tank. To his immense
relief, the AllFather reached down and offered him a hand.

“
Come, my ssson.” His soft, hissing voice
was almost soothing. “You have proved yourssself. Well
done.”

“
Thank you, Father.” Xairn took the
offered hand gratefully and allowed himself to be dragged out of
the tank. He lay on his side on the cold metal floor, choking and
gasping, trying to get his breath. Over, it was over now. He’d
proven to his father that he could survive the tanks. Maybe now he
would be loved…

And that was when those same, bony, horribly
strong hands picked him up and threw him in again.

Xairn forced himself to look away from the
window which framed the cool, lapping blue waters of the pool. It
was nothing like the slimy black ooze of the drowning tanks aboard
the Fathership, but the thought of immersing himself in any kind of
deep water still made his flesh crawl.

He’d lost count of how many times his father
threw him into the tanks before he finally let Xairn come out for
good. True, he had learned to swim, but it had almost cost him his
life. He had been ill for days in the small, lying in the small,
bare cot he’d claimed for himself in a hidden corner of the vast
Fathership. He’d been half delirious with fear and loneliness as he
choked the black slime of the tanks from his lungs.

Visions of his mother, she of the beautiful
green eyes, had danced in his head. Xairn knew she couldn’t come to
him no matter how much he longed for her—but his father could. Just
one kind word, one gentle touch would have healed not only his
body, but his wounded young soul as well. But though he had cried
out for him, the tears sliding down his cheeks and wetting his
flat, thin pillow, his father hadn’t come to see him. Not once.

Xairn forced himself to stop remembering. He
was surprised at the tightness in his chest and the stinging in his
eyes. Why get upset about something that was in the distant past?
It’s over,
he told himself harshly, turning to pace the rest
of the small living space.
Why let it affect me now?

Walking back to the living area, he sank down
on the small couch and picked up the remote control for Lauren’s
flatscreen. The humans used such devices for
entertainment—projecting programs about everything from sporting
events to cooking techniques to fictional stories with idealized
endings. Xairn didn’t have much interest in any of it but there was
nothing else to do. He pointed the remote and clicked.

“…local girl disappeared from a famous
Sarasota landmark just last week,” a human male with perfectly
coiffed hair and brilliantly white teeth was saying.

Xairn frowned as a picture flashed on the
flatscreen. A human female who looked to be about Lauren’s age was
smiling in the picture. At first, he almost thought she
was
Lauren. The bone structure of her face was a similar pattern to
Lauren’s and she had lovely, creamy brown skin in the exact same
shade as Lauren’s too. The eyes were wrong, though. Instead of
Lauren’s arresting amber they were a dark brown and her hair was
much curlier than Lauren’s long black waterfall. Still, she looked
enough like the female he loved for Xairn to find the resemblance
disturbing.

He watched the report awhile longer and heard
more about the girl’s disappearance. “Found only her clothes,” the
human male was saying. “Her friends said she was with them one
moment and the next…she mysteriously vanished.”

Xairn jumped to his feet. Could it be? Could
his father be taking females that looked like Lauren to send him a
message? He ran a hand though his hair.
Surely not. He has no
idea where we are and no way to link to our location. I would have
felt him in my mind. It must be a coincidence. Another human must
have taken her and left her clothes behind. Right?

He wasn’t sure if he believed it or not but
one thing
was
certain: he couldn’t sit here idle while
Lauren was out by herself in the dim early morning light, alone and
unprotected. What if something happened to her? Even if his father
wasn’t involved in the other human female’s abduction, it proved
that there was danger on this tiny blue planet. Danger that could
neither be discounted or ignored.

Xairn had never been to Lauren’s place of
work, but he knew where it was located. She had pointed it out to
him when they drove through the circular shopping district near her
home. It shouldn’t be hard to find—especially with her sweet scent
still lingering in the air to guide him.

Quickly he pulled on some of his new clothing
and started for the door. He would be damned if he’s sit around the
living area doing nothing for one minute more. He was going to
protect the female he loved whether she wanted him to or not.

“It’s you again.” Detective Rast didn’t seem
particularly happy to see her. “What do you want?”

Nadiah took a deep breath. “I came all the
way down from the Mother ship to talk to you. The least you can do
is act like a civilized male.”

“And
I
came all the way over to the
damn HKR building because they called and told me it was urgent,”
he growled, crossing his arms over his broad chest and glaring down
at her. “So I repeat—what do you want? I thought you’d had enough
of me and my attitude—why are you even here?”

“I’m not here because I wanted to see
you,”
Nadiah snapped.

“That makes two of us, sweetheart because I’m
not interested in seeing you either.” He frowned at her. “Talk fast
or I’m leaving.”

All the way down in the shuttle from the
Mother ship Nadiah had prepared her speech. It was calm and
collected and designed to convince him that what she had to say was
true. But when she opened her mouth, all that came out was, “He’s
going to take another one.”

“Another one?” Rast raised one eyebrow at
her. “Another girl?”

“Yes. The AllFather is going to snatch her
from a dark place.”

He nodded. “Uh-huh and what else can you tell
me?”

Nadiah frowned and looked down at the scuffed
gray carpeting. “That’s all I got this time—I couldn’t even see her
face. Sophia woke me up when she heard me, uh, screaming.”

For a moment, Rast’s icy veneer almost seemed
to melt. “Screaming, huh?” he said softly. “Must have been some
nightmare.”

Nadiah looked up at him earnestly, her anger
melting away when she remembered the terror of her dream. “I felt
her fear. Her pain. He’s going to take her very soon—I’m sure of
it.”

Rast let out a frustrated sigh and shook his
head. “Look Nadiah, I believe that
you
believe what you’re
telling me—honestly I do. But I think maybe you should let it go
now.”

“Let it go?” Nadiah frowned at him. “What are
you saying?”

“I’m saying that what you claim to be able to
do just can’t be done. And the bad dream you had—maybe it was just
that—a bad dream. Maybe it was caused by the bump you took on the
head.” His warm fingertips brushed over the tiny mark on her
forehead, causing Nadiah’s heart to jump. “Thought I told you to
get that looked at.”

“Don’t try to change the subject.” Nadiah
took a step back and put a hand on her hip. “Are you saying you
think I’m crazy? That I made everything that I saw up?”

Rast frowned. “Not on purpose, maybe. But
yeah, something like that.”

“How dare you say that to me? How can you
refute what I saw so easily?” Nadiah demanded. “You even asked for
my help. You asked me to touch her clothes and try to find
her.”

Rast threw up his hands. “Call it temporary
insanity on my part. I was desperate, all right? And besides, what
did you see—that she was dead, right? Anyone could have predicted
that.”

Nadiah was getting angrier and angrier. “What
about the giants I saw in my vision—the statue? That turned out to
be true.”

Rast shrugged. “I don’t know—the statue is a
famous local landmark. Maybe you were reading about Sarasota or
talking about it with one of your friends. Haven’t Sophia and
Olivia both been there at one time or another?”

“I have no idea,” Nadiah said coldly. “And I
also have no idea why you’re so anxious to discount what I’m
telling you. I
saw
the first girl taken and she was. I have
seen the second girl as well and she’s going to be taken too. Why
won’t you listen to me?”

“Fine, I’m listening.” Rast took a step
forward, frowning down at her. “Let’s review the facts, shall we?
You said the AllFather took the first girl—Tabitha Grady—up to his
ship, correct?”

Nadiah nodded. “Yes.”

“He transported her, tortured her, and killed
her there—up on the Fathership, right?”

“Yes, of course.”

“So she should still be missing, right?”

“Well…yes.” Nadiah frowned. “Why?”

Rast leaned toward her. “Because we found
her.” He frowned. “Found her body, anyway. So you see, Nadiah,
these fantasies you’re having
can’t
be true. Tabitha was
taken here on Earth and someone here on Earth killed her. They left
her body for us to find, right on the same spot where she was
snatched. End of story.”

“What?” Nadiah could barely believe what she
was hearing. “But…but it still could have been the AllFather. He
could have transported the body back to where he took her from
using the molecular transport beam.”

He frowned. “I’ve been looking into the whole
‘transport beam’ theory. I thought it could only transport living
flesh.”

“
I
don’t know.” Nadiah threw up her
hands. “Maybe he modified it somehow to send nonliving flesh
too.”

“Why would he bother?” snapped Rast. “What is
he trying to prove? All this time we’ve been at war with the
Scourge, they’ve never pulled a stunt like this. Why start
now?”

“But Detective—”

“No more!” His words were almost a shout and
Nadiah jumped at his angry tone. “Look, I’m sorry.” Rast stepped
back and pinched the bridge of his nose, as though trying to drive
back a headache. “I’m sorry but I don’t have any more time to
indulge your fantasies.”

“My
fantasies?”
Nadiah stared at him
in disbelief. “You think I
like
seeing the things I’ve seen
lately? You think I
enjoy
knowing that he’s going to kill
again and the only male who might possibly be able to help won’t
listen to me?”

“You
do
need help.” Rast gave her a
pitying look. “But not the kind I can give you. Go home, Nadiah.
Back to the Mother ship or wherever.”

Nadiah crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m
not leaving until you listen to me.”

“I’ve listened as much as I have time for.”
Rast looked suddenly drained. “Now I have to go tell Tabitha’s
parents that she’s never coming home. That she’s dead. All
right?”

Nadiah wanted to say more but it was clear he
wasn’t going to listen. Inside she seethed with impatience and
irritation. How could he be so dense? Why was he so set against
believing anything she saw with her gift? But as angry as she was,
she refused to lower herself any further. Slapping him last time
had been a mistake—it only dragged her down to his level. “Fine,”
she said tightly. “I’m leaving. Call me when the next girl is
taken. Maybe then you’ll believe me.”