Finding Jess (First Wave) Read online

  Finding Jess

  By Mikayla Lane

  Cover Design by Humblenations.com

  Prologue

  Amun sat in the field covered in mud, struggling to stop the bleeding that was flowing out from beneath the medibands he was holding tightly to her neck.

  “Get me more bands NOW!!!” He shouted to Niklosi.

  “Don’t you dare quit fighting, do you hear me? You’ve been through far too much to stop fighting now.” He told her as he replaced the no longer functioning mediband around her neck with a new one.

  “Amun, I don’t think she’s still with us.” Niklosi laid a comforting hand on his friend's shoulder.

  Amun angrily shrugged off his hand. “No! I can’t lose her! Get me another mediband!”

  “Take her to ship.” Gibly said, stroking his furry face against her hand lying motionless on the ground.

  “That’s a good idea. There’s more equipment on the ship to help her with.” Niklosi readily agreed. There at least were other people on the ship that could get Amun away from her body, so they could prepare her for burial.

  “Yes. We’ll port to the transport ship, then Adaria. Hand me that last mediband. We’ll go as soon as it’s on.” Amun said holding his hand out for the last band and placing it around her neck.

  Niklosi watched sadly as Amun gently picked up Jess’s limp body and held her closely in his arms as he ported.

  Looking around the seemingly bucolic field and barn, he made sure that they were leaving no traces of their presence or the violence that occurred here.

  He pulled out a heat stone and bending down, held it to the edge of the large pool of blood where Jess had been laying, until the wind blew the now dust particles away.

  “She a brave girl. She made me a pretty.” Gibly said from beside him.

  “Yes, she was a very brave girl. We need to head back to the transport now. There’s nothing more we can do here.” Niklosi said sadly.

  This was not the way this was supposed to happen. They were not supposed to lose her. He kept going through the events in his mind repeatedly trying to figure out what they could have done differently to save her. However, he couldn’t come up with anything. They had no way of knowing what the Relians had planned to do, and he had no way of stopping it with just the two of them.

  The image of Jess’s throat being slashed open in front of them, the blood pouring from her neck before she hit the ground flashed through his mind like on a replay loop. The color draining completely from her face as, she tried to smile for Amun, his hands over her throat trying to stem the flow of blood.

  Watching as the beautiful girl who’d bravely saved their lives; mouthed the words “Thank you," then closed her eyes as she went completely lifeless.

  “We go now.” Gibly said bringing Niklosi out of his thoughts.

  Holding out his arms, he waited until Gibly jumped into them before porting back to the transport.

  Chapter One

  Two weeks earlier

  Amun stood beside Niklosi and Gibly watching the movements of the Relian camp, six hundred yards in front of where they were hiding behind some trees.

  It had been almost a year since they had first received the ancient distress signal that had brought them to this planet. Where they had found survivors of an outpost, they had on Mars centuries ago.

  Cari had been the first female child they had found of one of their survivors and a human woman. They learned of Jess, another hybrid child, from Cari when they’d rescued her. And after almost a year of tracking her, they had finally caught up to Jess in the hopes of rescuing her as well.

  Amun fingered the delicate anklet in his pocket; Jess had made it for Cari when they were both being held captive by the Relians. The ancient enemies of the Valendran people had followed the outpost survivors to the planet and had hunted them and their mates. Jess was captured as a small child, her parents brutally murdered.

  Amun was supposed to give the anklet back to Cari when he was done studying it, but hadn’t been able to part with it. He swore he could feel it almost pulse with energy, but no one else could feel what he did from the piece of jewelry. He felt the same way now. His body thrumming with energy in a way it never had before. He had to make a conscious effort not to storm into that camp and get her.

  She’d been all he could think about since Cari first told them about her. The thought of the abuse she must have suffered in the year it took them to find her, had driven him crazy. Right now, he had to focus; memorize the movements around the camp as they set up, find where they were going to put her.

  “There! She’s being carried by that big guy on the left by the barn,” Niklosi whispered.

  Amun immediately swung his gaze in the direction that Niklosi indicated, and sure enough; he could see her misshapen legs and her long hair streaming down the back of a large Relian with black hair.

  The man passed the barn and took Jess to an upright post that had been driven into the ground around fifteen feet in front of the barn. Leaning down, he tossed her onto the ground with a thud and tied her hands to the post.

  Niklosi looked at Amun to see if he noticed how strange it was for them to leave her out in the open like that. Amun stared raptly at the woman, but didn’t seem to notice anything other than her. He sighed heavily, wishing Balduen was here to handle this with him. Amun was too obsessed with the woman to be of any use to him on this mission. If it wasn’t for the female’s extensive injuries, he wouldn’t be here at all.

  He watched with detached interest as the female tried to shake her hair out of her face and looked cautiously around the area. She moved her lips as if speaking to herself, peering around at her captors behind her periodically.

  Stepping backward slowly from the tree line, Niklosi motioned for Amun to follow him. They strode silently back to the rest of the team, with Gibly taking up the rear.

  “They’re up to something. There’s no way that they normally put her out in the open like that.” Niklosi told the team.

  “You don’t know that! It’s the first time you’ve seen her," Amun argued.

  “Because it rained all last night and this morning, and she’s dry!” Niklosi countered angrily. When Amun didn’t respond immediately he continued.

  “There is something that doesn’t feel right. They’ve also been paying a lot of attention to that barn and the two buildings behind it. And there are only three, not the six that had escaped when we got Cari. I don’t like it.”

  “Niklosi, I don’t want you to make a move just yet. I don’t like it either. I want you to set up a video comm in a location where we can monitor the camp from here. Hold your position until further notice if you think you are in a defensible location.” Councilor Ivint Torenson said through his comm.

  The High Councilor had ordered the comm’s left open, so they could be monitored during the mission. Since his son mated with Cari and gave him twin great daughters, he’d become particularly interested in the retrieval of the woman who’d saved her life. They all had an interest in the unique women of this planet, as they were the key to the survival of their race.

  “I think we’re good here, sir. I’ll go set up the camera now. Crator and Simya take two other men and set up perimeter stones; the rest of you find defensible positions. Amun, help them.” Niklosi said heading back to put the video comm up.

  “I’ll go with you.” Amun said heading to follow him, Gibly trailing behind after him. Niklosi shook his head at the animal. Like Amun, he had no business being here. Not only was it his first time off Valendra, but it was the creature's first time on this planet.

  For the first two hours after he’d arrived with Amun, the animal had done nothing but follow Amun like an Earth pe
t and sniffed at everything it saw. There was no purpose for the animal to be here that Niklosi could see. However, the High Councilor had said that the animal had specifically requested to join the mission, saying that he felt he needed to be there when Jess was rescued.

  Ever since they found out that his kind, the Sibiox, was a sentient species from their own planet they had been finding ways to communicate with them and develop a rapport between their species. Even so, sending the animal on a rescue mission was a bit much in his opinion, and Amun wasn’t helping with his obsessive behavior regarding the female.

  Niklosi stopped in his tracks; he didn’t want to do this with the High Councilor and the other crew from the Adaria watching and hearing everything going on. Hell, with his luck they were watching it on their home world, Valendra. He damn sure didn’t want to embarrass Amun in front of anyone, but he had to get him under control.

  “No! You stay here and help them. This is my command Amun; I need you focused. She needs all of us focused.” He growled quietly to him.

  His words seemed to penetrate the fog over Amun where the female was concerned; he nodded and walked back towards the others, Gibly in tow. He waited a few moments to make sure they wouldn’t follow and headed towards the camp.

  He quietly set up the comm and looked at the girl one more time wondering what it was about her that drove Amun to act the way he had been.

  She was a beautiful girl; she had long, light blonde hair that fell down her back in tangled waves and snarls, light blue eyes and a painfully thin frame. She looked like she hadn’t ever been fed properly. He could see the hint of womanly curves and full breasts barely concealed by the baggy but short dress she was wearing. However, there was nothing about her that attracted him the way that Amun was. He found that interesting.

  He walked a distance back to his team before making sure that Councilor Torenson had a full visual of the camp before heading the rest of the way.

  Amun was nowhere in sight.

  *****

  Cari sat in a conference room on the ship Adaria and watched the video of Jess. She looked much thinner than the last time she’d seen her, if that was possible. However, she was alive. Tears ran unchecked down her cheeks as she scanned through every detail of the girl. Her hair was longer and tangled, and her dress was different and much bigger this time. But it was her!

  “It’s really her. I was so afraid she’d be dead before we could get to her.” Cari said on a sob.

  Scaden put his arm around his mate and held her to his chest as she cried. He was glad that the female was still alive, but very concerned about her condition. One look at the others in the room and he knew everyone was just as startled at how small and thin the girl was.

  She looked little more than a wounded child; her misshapen legs tucked underneath her small dress. The first glimpse of them before she hid them had caused shocked gasps from some of the crew. Cari had warned them about the damage to the girl’s legs, but they had been unprepared for the extent of the injuries.

  Jess had told Cari that in order to prevent her from escaping again they had broken her legs and not set them correctly so that with her rapid healing abilities, they would heal malformed. From what little Scaden saw; they did it dozens of times to both legs. He couldn’t imagine the pain she had endured and wondered at the strength she must have to have survived years of that kind of abuse.

  Cari had finally pulled herself together and accepted the tissue her great mother Councilor Lakatis handed her and wiped her face. She stared silently at the screen, watching Jess and the activity going on in the camp.

  “Have we heard from Balduen yet?” High Councilor Torenson asked his military commander.

  “No Sir, our last communication was when he said he was following a suspected hybrid down an alley in Knoxville.” Commander Reven Debreskii answered after checking the data screens again. He was starting to get worried about that boy as well.

  “Wait… what is she saying? Do you see that? She’s saying the same thing over and over again.” Cari said sitting up straighter and staring at the screen.

  Everyone watched the screen intently trying to see if Jess was speaking and if so, what she was saying.

  “Watch her movements. She’s looking around behind her at the people in the camp, then turning towards the woods and moving her lips or speaking something. She’s repeating it over and over again.” Cari said her suspicions rising as her gift began to form the connection necessary for her to feel Jess’s emotions.

  Her empathic gift strengthened since being with Scaden and giving birth to their daughters, Tessa and Amia. Uncle Randor had told her that was common for the couples that had mated on Earth. He was one of the original outpost survivors who had crashed here and had found a mate among the women, so he knew that it was normal for their gifts to become stronger.

  “You’re right Cari; she’s saying something and trying to make sure that none of the Relians see her do it. Would she know that we’re there? How would she?” Scaden wondered aloud.

  “I told her I would come back for her, but she didn’t believe me; or she didn’t think I‘d ever find her again. Would the Relians know that you sent a tracker after them when you rescued me?” Cari asked.

  “I don’t think they’d have the technology on the planet to detect a tracker.” Scaden began when Gracus added.

  “They don’t have the technology on the planet to detect it.”

  “She wouldn’t know we’re there. Maybe she’s just scared and muttering to herself then? Was her mind intact when you met her?” Councilor Torenson asked.

  “Yes, her mind was intact, and she was a fighter. Father, I know this sounds crazy, but she’s trying to tell us something. I feel it… I know it.” Cari implored her mate’s father to believe her.

  Ivint Torenson turned his back to his great daughter and thought about everything going on. Like Cari, he knew something was wrong here; he could feel it as well, and he didn’t have her gift. His mind just didn't figure it out yet, caught between this rescue mission and the now missing Balduen.

  “Can you tell what she’s saying? Our translators only allow us to speak and read your language; it doesn’t allow us to read the words from lips.” He asked Cari.

  “I can’t read lips either. Uncle Randor?” Cari asked the man who had saved her life as a young child and raised her after her parents were killed. It was his device that had sent out the distress beacon that brought Scaden to Earth.

  “I can’t read lips either… I have no idea what she’s saying. But I agree that she’s trying to say something to someone. The way she keeps looking behind her before repeating whatever she’s saying, is far too unusual.” Randor Macner agreed.

  “We need to figure out what she’s saying. Cari, can you read her at all?” Ivint asked.

  “The more time I spend concentrating on her the better I’m able to connect with her. If you give me a little more time I should be able to tell you more.” Cari said honestly. She was becoming increasingly nervous about the mission and Jess’s safety.

  “Niklosi, I want you to keep your team back and do not engage until I give the order. Make sure everyone stays alert; we can’t take any chances.” Ivint said into the comm, before cutting off his mike.

  “Understood, sir.” Niklosi replied heading off towards the camp to find Amun.

  “Did you see where Amun went?” He asked the first man he came across.

  “No sir, he was right here a few minutes ago.”

  This was just perfect. When he found the idiot, he was going to strangle him.

  “I’m going to check on the video comm and the camp, if he comes back keep him here.” He stomped off towards the Relian camp knowing he was going to find Amun there watching the female. And sure enough that’s exactly where he found him and Gibly a few minutes later.

  “What the hell is wrong with you? I told you, specifically not to do this! I’m tempted to report this to Councilor Torenson and have you removed from this
mission!” Niklosi growled quietly at Amun.

  “You don’t understand… something is wrong here. She knows we’re nearby. I don’t know how but she does, and she’s trying to tell us something.” Amun argued turning back to watch his brave girl. He knew with every part of his soul that he was right; she was trying to tell them something. And she knew he was here.

  Niklosi sighed, the fight gone out of him at Amun’s words. Obviously, there was more to his feelings for the female than Niklosi had first thought. After what his friend and commander had gone through to prove he should be with Cari, they had all vowed to be more understanding if one of them found their mate.

  It was becoming clear to Niklosi that this was one of those situations. Although happy for Amun, he cursed the timing because having him acting like this on a mission could put them all in danger; even the female. They couldn’t afford to make a mistake. Drawing a deep breath he tried to calm and center himself before continuing.

  “Ok, what makes you think that she knows we’re here?” He asked with surprising calmness in his voice.

  “Watch her… just watch her, and you’ll see what I mean.” Amun said never taking his eyes off of his beautiful Jess.

  Niklosi let out another sigh, and figuring a few minutes of watching the girl wouldn’t hurt he stepped up beside Amun and Gibly and looked across the field at the female.

  She had been able to get all of her tangled hair out of her face now, and he could clearly see her mouthing something. Hearing something behind her, she stopped and whipped her head around to look behind her before turning back around and mouthing something again.

  Looking up he could see her eyes moving slowly along the tree line where they were hidden behind the thick foliage. A shiver ran down his spine at the thought that somehow she did know they were there. Did she have some gift she didn't tell Cari about? How could she know they were there?

  The longer he stood there and watched her, the more convinced he was that she not only knew they were there, she was trying to tell them something. And by the way, she continued to check on the Relians behind her; he knew it wasn’t good.