Prime Obsession(11)

She thought Iolyn might have choked back a laugh, but that could be static. The communications were still scratchy at times. “He’s trying to reprogram the last trap.”

“Reprogram? I don’t like the sound of that,” she said as she walked along the tunnel, trusting in Iolyn to warn her of any trouble ahead. “What’s wrong?”

“Three of the traps were sabotaged,” explained Iolyn. “We think so that we couldn’t use the tunnels to get out and make surgical strikes on the pirates. Wulf killed the traitor before he could shut down our other security measures on the engine room door.”

“O-o-kay. So, you’re telling me I have to work my way through three traps to get to you?”

“Yes.” That was Wulf’s voice. He was angry again. At her—or the situation?

“Ansu bhau, ” she swore. Seemed a fitting time for her first use of the Prime vulgarity. “Okay, tell me what is coming up, and how I can get through it in one fairly whole piece.” She patted her fanny pack. “By the way, this pack has ear-com units that are programmed for a rotating communication frequency. You’ll need them to bring my men in to help you—if something happens to me.”

“Nothing. Is. Going. To. Happen. To. You. Not while I live.” Ooh, now the grouchy brother sounded pissed. And damn possessive.

“Thanks, Wulf, I think.” She grinned at the camera. “That sort of sounded like a promise and a threat.”

“You are correct, gemate. I promise you will survive so that I might punish you for placing your life in danger.”

“Wulf? Tone, son.” A male voice admonished the very grouchy captain.

“Ambassador Maren? Is that you?” Mel asked as she turned left and climbed down a ladder to the level just above the engine room.

“Yes, my dear. It is.”

She smiled at the affectionate tone in his voice. “Am I nearing the first active trap?” All of a sudden, dizziness assailed her. Her breathing grew uneven as she gasped to take in enough oxygen to stop the vertigo.

“Uh, guys?” She coughed, her throat burning. “My breathing unit is going stale. Can I take it off?”

“After this trap, lubha. ” Wulf said, his voice now calm and all business.

His words, or his voice, steadied her. Her pulse rate slowed back to normal and her breathing eased. How weird. She hadn’t even realized she’d tensed up and exacerbated the situation.

Then the meaning of the last word sunk in. “I am not your little love, Captain,” she snapped. “I am not little and have never been any man’s love.”

“I am happy to hear that, gemate. And you will be small next to me.” Wulf chuckled.

Grouchy brother was laughing? Was this the same man who’d growled at her earlier?

He changed moods so quickly she couldn’t keep up with him.

“What’s so funny?” she snarled.

“Nothing, Melina—And my name is Wulf,” he admonished. Irritation definitely colored those last words, she noted. “Now, be calm,” he continued. “You need the breathing unit to get you through the next trap. It is poison gas.”

“Great. Does it poison on contact or just through breathing? Or both?” she asked, cautiously approaching a section of tunnel hazed with mist.

“Cursed independent woman, you must learn to trust me. I would never send you into danger unprepared,” growled Wulf, then he sighed. “It is only through breathing, lubha—keep the mask on. The trap is only ten meters long.”

“I don’t know you well enough to trust you,” Mel grumbled.

“Then trust me because I am an ally and fellow soldier,” ordered Wulf.

Mel nodded and sent him a snappy salute. She entered the mist and walked quickly through it bracing her hand on the wall for support since she was still dizzy and now seeing double. Her breathing unit wouldn’t keep her alive long in this stuff if she fell.

As she exited the mist, her knees gave way. She stumbled forward several more meters, then plopped onto the floor, catching herself on her hands and knees, before collapsing onto her stomach.

“Melina? What’s wrong?”

Wulf’s voice was filled with fear. That bothered her. He must never be scared—not a big strong Prime male. She would not allow that. As if she could do anything about it.

She would’ve shrugged, but it took too much energy.

Suddenly, her pulse accelerated as adrenaline poured into her system. It was as if Wulf’s fear had become—and exacerbated—hers, giving her the extra chemical boost needed to make it further away from the mist still trailing around her. That was crazy.

She had no connection to him.

Damn, she must be more light-headed than she’d thought.

Using the new-found reserves, she belly-crawled along the tunnel floor, putting as much distance between her and the poison behind her.

The tunnel whirled around her as if she was in zero gravity space. Her empty stomach heaved. She snatched the breathing unit off her face, then choked and gagged.

Only bile came up.

“Melina, lubha? Are you okay? Tell me!”

The command in Wulf’s tone raised the hairs on the back of her neck. Why did this man affect her so? She shook her head and gulped in the relatively fresher air of the tunnel.

“I’m … fine,” she gasped, swallowing the bile that still threatened to burn its way up her throat. “The air … in the unit … was bad—and I got … dizzy. Not … poison.” She struggled to sit, her back against the cool tunnel walls. “Need to catch my breath a second—I’m fine.”

She wiped her mouth on the back of her tattered uniform sleeve and reached for her water bottle, still attached to her pack. Taking a mouthful of water, she rinsed her mouth and spit, then took a couple of sips. Her stomach calmed down.



Closing her eyes, she reoriented. Taking slow deep breaths, she fully oxygenated her blood, which went a long way to solving her nausea and dizziness. After one particularly deep breath, she gasped and clutched her side.

The double-damned right side. Pirates, Parker and Antareans had all had their shots at that side in the last few months. She should buy regen table stock; she’d make a mint as much as she kept them in business.

The small human male in the tunnel had gotten in a good hit and sliced her there. She was bleeding. Damn, some of her dizziness might be due to blood loss. She surreptitiously looked at her right hand. Bright red blood covered her fingers and palm.

Yep, she was actively bleeding.

“Melina! Talk to me, gemate lubha.” Wulf’s not-so-dulcet tones echoed around the tunnel. Damn, the man could bring down a mountain with that roar.

“I’m just catching my breath, okay?” Mel stood up, sliding her back along the wall and using her strong and uninjured legs and glutes to push her to a standing position.

“Can’t a gal take a short break?”

“Take a break when you get to my side,” ordered Wulf.

 Bossy alpha-male.

“Yes, oh Obi Wan.” She saluted the camera and strode forward taking a right turn at the sign pointing to the engine room. “What’s up next in this Prime tunnel-of-horrors?” Wulf muttered as if he consulted with someone. “Huw and I feel you will need to shimmy under the lasers on your stomach. Can you do that, Melina lubha?” Concern in his voice now. Uh-oh, trouble ahead.

“Sure. But why are you afraid? I like your rude, conceited, angry tone of voice better, Wulf.”

Huw spoke. “Melina, we are concerned because you are bleeding.”

“Well, damn, I thought I’d hidden that fairly well. You must have very good cameras.”

“This is not a joking matter,” Wulf said, his words clipped and stark. He was afraid again—for her. “Can you make it fifteen meters on a downward incline? You’ll have less than a meter of clearance between the floor and the lower array of lasers.” Mel mentally did the math. Thank God, her ass was fit, round but tight. “Yes, I can do that. We trained to crawl under trip wires in booby-trapped forests. I was always the best at it since I was smaller than the men. But what will the last trap be?”

“Off—I hope,” Wulf muttered.

Mel laughed. “I think that sounds like a deal. Next corner, I think. I hear the sizzle and burn of the lasers.”

“One more thing, Melina,” Huw said. “There is a dead human and a barely alive Erian in the way. You’ll have to shimmy around them.”

“Ansu bhau. Well, it couldn’t be a piece of cake. No, never that,” muttered Mel as she turned the corner and spotted the Erian, eyeing her, a leer on his lipless hole of a mouth. The dead human was not a problem. He was definitely dead. No human could be laser-burnt like that and live. She shuddered.

The human lay just inside the trap. She might be able to use him to run interference with the lasers and the Erian.

“Okay, here goes nothing.” She pulled her knife out of its scabbard, just in case the Erian managed to reach her, and held it in her left hand, at ready. She needed her dominant right hand to help pull herself along the deck.

Getting on her stomach, she shimmied to the dead Terran. She shoved at him. Yep, she could move him. Alrighty then. Lifting the human up, she smelled his flesh burn even more and involuntarily flinched in reaction. Hell, he was dead and his thick body would protect her. Gritting her teeth against the smell and the slimy feel of the bodily gunk dripping off the dead man, she crawled under him and used his body as a shell. She’d once carried an injured Nowicki just this way through one of those booby-trapped forests she’d mentioned. Sort of on-the-job training, but the Prime need not know that. She got the impression they’d never reconcile women being placed into those kinds of dangerous situations.