As she observed him, her scowl faded to wide-eyed astonishment, and her grip on the table-leg slackened. “You’re not Dr. Nguyen.”
Asier stared. She’d known to speak to him in the trade language. Her relaxed stance indicated that she accepted he wasn’t a threat.
“Sofie?” he asked.
She smiled, but before she could say anything, the woman he’d crossed the universe for appeared in the doorway behind her sister. In her eyes, she held his heart, in her smile his soul, and in her arms—in her arms she held his child. The electron gun fell from his nerveless fingers.
He was vaguely aware of Sofie slipping away, leaving them alone together.
“Lyra,” he rasped. Pressure built behind his eyes, and a soft golden glow warmed the space between them.
She hurried to him, clutching the baby with one arm, reaching up with the other to spread her palm over his chest, directly over his heart.
“Asier,” she whispered. Tears streaked her face, even as she smiled. “You came for me.”
Always, he tried to answer, but couldn’t get it past his constricted throat. He folded her and the baby both into his arms. She was here. She was whole. He would make her safe.
“Would you like to meet your son?” Lyra’s voice was muffled against his jacket.
He pulled back and she passed the swaddled bundle into his arms. He looked down on his sleeping child. A round-cheeked, silvery face—so peaceful and trusting in sleep—with ice-white lashes and a cap of fuzzy white hair. Asier’s heart staggered.
“His name is Orion,” Lyra said softly.
“Orion Lyr-Asier,” Asier said proudly, his heart swelling to fill his entire body. Orion was a name from a human language, but it rolled off a Scaeven tongue easily. “How long?” he asked, his voice a barely coherent rumble.
“He was born three days ago. Emergency cesarean.” She stroked her hand low on her belly. “The incision is already completely healed,” she added, wonder in her voice.
“Our son did that for you,” he told her. The glow of his eyes grew brighter. He could barely speak past the tightness in his throat. “He made you stronger.”
Lyra wrapped her arms around Asier’s waist, cocooning the baby between their two bodies. He closed his eyes, savoring a moment he thought he’d never experience.
“Not to rush this heartfelt reunion,” Sofie’s voice cut in from behind them. “But the midnight rotation is due any minute now, and if we don’t go soon—”
Asier stiffened, remembering the urgency of their current situation. “What is this place?” He demanded.
“It’s a research facility owned by the university,” Lyra answered. She shifted, and Asier realized she had a pack slung over her shoulder.
“You’re a prisoner here.”
“We were about to escape.” Lyra reached out, taking their son—Orion—back into her arms. “Having you here will make things a little easier.”
Asier took the overwhelming emotional turbulence and confined it to a quiet corner of his mind to deal with later. Right now, he needed to be cold and sharp. He bent to retrieve his electron gun and glanced at Sofie. She still held the table leg, leaning on it as she waited for instruction.
“Keep that for now,” he told her. He had no other weapons to give to either of them, and Lyra’s hands were occupied with their son.
Their son.
Steadying himself, he glanced around the austere sitting room. “Where’s the shuttle transmitter?” He asked. “How did you get it to work?”
“Lyra fused it into the display screen’s interface,” Sofie answered. “Most modern entertainment units use Ravanoth tech.”
“Get the transmitter out. We can’t leave it behind.”
Sofie moved to the far wall, an empty white expanse. Kneeling in one corner, she opened a small panel, revealing a mess of biocircuitry. Reaching in, she closed her fist, and yanked out a multicolored snarl of circuits. In the middle of it all was the silvery flash of the RSP core.
Asier pulled out his comm, checking the movement of the other lifeforms in the building. A fifth entity had joined them, was headed towards them.
“The human whose shins you intended to shatter is almost here.”
Sofie hefted up her table leg. “I’m still up for it.”
“No,” he said, fighting a smile. Lyra had raised a sister just as ferocious as herself. Their son would be a hellion. He dialed the charge on the electron gun down just one more notch. “Get away from the door.”
Lyra and Sofie stood on either side of Asier. Through the sealed doors, they could hear the sound of the sanitizing mist. A moment later, the doors parted.
The man who entered never knew what hit him. He walked into the room looking down at his comm pad. Asier stunned him. When his convulsing body dropped to the floor, Asier hauled him away from the doors.
“Is there anything to bind him with?”
“Just take his ID key,” Lyra said. “Without it, he’ll be locked in here until the next attendant arrives.”
Sofie dashed over to the man and plucked his comm pad from his hands, as well as the identification card leashed around his neck.
“Let’s move.” Asier stepped into the vestibule, followed by Lyra and Sofie. Lyra pressed Orion’s face tightly to her body as the sanitation mist rained down on them, protecting him from the burning spray. The baby fussed and stirred, but didn’t fully wake. By the time the next set of doors opened, she’d gentled the infant back into sleep.
“We have to move quickly. Be as quiet as you can, but speed is more important.” Asier’s tactical gear rendered him invisible to video surveillance, but Lyra and Sofie would be fully visible. Whoever was monitoring the footage would notice them immediately.
Asier’s comm hacked through the locks again, bringing them, floor by floor, down to the ground level.
“It’s a good thing your Scaeven baby gave me super strength,” Lyra told him as they hurried down the steps. “Because he’s about twice the size of a human newborn.”
Asier resisted the urge to pull her in and kiss her. There would be time for that later. First he had to get her to safety.
On the ground floor, the two humans at the central work station were still there. They both looked up in alarm at the sound of three pairs of footsteps racing down the hall. Asier lifted his electron gun and knocked them both out with two closely-timed shots.
“Hurry!” He growled, turning down the long hall that led to the outside. The security grid would be another concern. Lyra and Sofie would trigger it, and he couldn’t predict what automatic responses might be triggered by the breach.
“I have to carry you both,” he said. It was a long shot, but if the grid was laid into the ground, keeping them high enough above it might prevent triggering it.
He bent, and scooped an arm around each woman. They braced themselves against his shoulders, linking their arms behind his neck. Lyra clutched Orion tight between Asier’s body and hers.
“Hold on,” Asier instructed, opening the door, and pushing out into the night darkness. They crossed the ground surrounding the facility without incident. He carried them across the auto lane and set them down deep within the shadowed cover of the tree-lined pedestrian path.