Page 9 of HaL

“Jade, I will contact you once I have located her.”

She tries to say something back, but the signal cuts out. I see streaks in the sky above me, and I realize they are not meteors entering the atmosphere. That’s a space war going on right outside my atmosphere. Flashes of weapons fire illuminate the sky.

I hit the communicator once again. At first there is nothing but static, until the signal suddenly solidifies.

“Father, this is HaL. Were you aware that one of the human females was abducted? And that my least favorite brother is currently fighting for his and his mate’s lives against a Korgon ship that I am sure is twice the size of his?”

“HaL, I only found out a few moments ago myself that SiN and Jade had been exposed, but EvO just relayed back that he and Destiny are only a few tics away and should be within firing range soon. I was aware that they were tracking the ship they believed had taken the female, but I’ve not received a status update on her yet.”

“Apparently, she was able to get into one of their pods and ejected it successfully, only for Hallister to be the closest planet. Oset and I are heading out to see if we can locate her. I don’t have to tell you her odds, even if she did survive the initial entry to Hallister, Father.”

“All you can do is your best Son, leave the rest to the Lord of Light. When you find the pod, contact me through SCOUT and let me know her status, one way or the other. We have a leak somewhere, and I need to secure it before we can share any more information. Strength and honor.”

Father’s words run through my mind, but that is an issue we will deal with at a later time. Climbing inside the land speeder, I hit the button for my communications expert.

“Bane, I need the coordinates for the disturbance, and have maintenance do a perimeter check of the compound. That explosion really shook us up out here in the docking bay.”

“Working on them now, HaL. That impact really banged up some of the outer sensors, and I am having a hard time pinpointing the cause. The visuals I’ve been able to pull from the outer range surveillance show a huge fireball heading straight for the Cordilleran summit. The sound we all heard a tic ago was it simply entering our atmosphere.”

“Frack … it had to go to the most unstable area in this region. Keep me updated.”

“As always. And be informed, part of the maintenance crew is heading out to check on a rockslide triggered by that shock wave.”

Oset is already sitting inside his craft waiting for my signal. I motion for him to follow me, as we both lower the glass canopy enclosures that provide us with wind and debris protection. The instant I clear the mountain’s entrance, I push my speeder to full throttle. Something deep inside me is urging me to go faster.

Bane keeps adjusting the final coordinates on my holopad, but I don’t feel like I need them as the ground flies by beneath the huge sleds that glide effortlessly across the frozen tundra. We are not in the gliders long when I start to see smoke in the air. Leaning heavily to the right, the speeder follows my guidance as we fly over the steep ravines and hills that seem to be doing everything they can to hinder my forward momentum.

I throttle up and over an embankment, blind to what’s on the other side, only to slam on the sled’s brakes, sending my machine sideways as I try to steer it out of the huge crater dug deep into the ground below us. Large snow mounds have been pushed up by the heat of the pod’s impact; some are already collapsing, making it unsafe to use our crafts any further.

Picking up my range viewer, it takes me a tic to find the pod in all this chaos, but when I do, my heart stops dead in its tracks. I am out of the glider and running just as Oset clears the embankment behind me. I hear him call out my name, but all I can see is a patch of red in front of the pod.

My heart knows without a doubt who is lying face down in that snow, and I push my immensely large form to run at a speed it is not built for. I am grateful for the thick fur covering my body as I slide down the icy embankment because I feel chunks of hair being ripped out along the way. ‘You are going to make it,’ I keep repeating to myself as the distance feels like I have run halfway across this planet.

Hitting my knees, I grab her small form, flipping her over onto her back. My eyes notice everything all at once. Frostbitten, bloody cheeks, hands that are turning gray, and when I pull her out of the snow, I can see that her feet are solid blue. But this is not the worst of it, as one arm hangs against her chest at an unnatural angle. However, it is the frost around her nose and the thin red streaks freezing on her skin that has me gathering her into my arms as quickly as possible. Thankfully, I can still feel her heart beating against my own, slowly but still fighting.

“Hold on, little Roja.”

Oset is at the top of the ravine with a rope in hand. His aim is true, and I catch it on the first try. With his help, we are both quickly pulled up and out of the crater.

“Is she alive?”

“She lives. Destroy that pod!”

I do not wait to hear what he says, as my legs are already running toward the glider that thankfully is still running. The protective, insulated hair that shields me and my kind from this harsh environment suddenly grows longer, curling around her small body as it instinctively works to insulate what my inner beast is trying to protect. My body already knows what I have not comprehended yet. Dawn is my MATE!

With one arm, I vault into the seat. I push the glider to max speed, and the canopy buzzer warns me it is not fully closed as we clear the embankment. Just as we top it, it finally latches. At least she is now shielded from the wind, but the only heat in here is me, and I fear that is not going to be enough.

“Bane, send a squad to Oset’s coordinates to help him dismantle that Korgon pod. Then take the Mammoths and have them fill in the crater. I do not want there to be a single scar upon the ground to show that Pod landed here.”

“Confirmed. The males are gathering their gear now.”

“Also, have the med bay prepped and Troza ready to meet me the moment the glider docks. I have precious cargo on board, fighting for every breath.”

“Was one of ours hurt in the impact, HaL?”

“No, it is the human female … but she is top priority.”

The glider sputters once when I burst through a huge snowdrift, but I push it harder when I hear the rattle that suddenly comes from Dawn’s tender lungs.