When he returned to the dining room, most of the Preor were finishing their food and getting ready to leave. He organized a small group of warriors to start checking out the ship and a couple of others to head to the mainframe and try to fix Penelope.
Then he headed for the human quarters.
He was so angry he practically had smoke pouring from his nostrils. He found most of them sitting in a common area watching TV, and their eager smiles only fueled his rage.
One of you is a traitor. One of you has stolen my mate. He couldn’t stop thinking the worst of them, all of them. The second he let humans join his crew, disaster struck. It wasn’t a coincidence.
“Where are the rest of you,” he demanded, as he entered the room. The smiles dropped from their faces, leaving confusion and fear instead.
“Jeff’s in the shower,” the redheaded female answered. “I think Luke’s taking a nap. “What’s up?”
“I need you all in the main mess hall now,” he snapped. When one of the other females stood and put her hands on her hips, he let out a low, threatening growl, but she didn’t back off.
“What’s the meaning of this,” she yelled. “You can’t boss us around like your soldiers! We have rights, or didn’t you read the contracts we signed?”
“You have no benefits on this ship while treason is underway,” he shouted back. “To the mess hall for questioning now and think yourselves lucky it’s not the damned brig!”
The woman looked ready to protest some more, but one of the others shook her head. Jeff chose that moment to enter the room, looking relaxed in flannel pajamas.
“Hey, are we still baking cookies—what the fuck?” He looked around the room in confusion.
“He wants us in the mess hall. Or get locked up,” one of the women explained.
“Why?”
“My mate is missing,” Tyff said, barely refraining from roaring. “And I know one of you did it.”
“Whoa,” the redhead cried. Tyff didn’t regret not learning their names—obviously, they weren’t worth it. They were all just a great herd of troublemakers as far as he was concerned.
“Mess hall. Now,” he snapped. The woman made to protest, but Jeff shook his head and grabbed her hand.
“We are guests here, Julia. There has been a crime, and if we are innocent, surely we can answer a few questions?”
The others grumbled but agreed. Tyff held his temper in check as they prepared to leave, suddenly noticing that one was missing.
“Where’s the other one?”
“Who? Oh, Luke,” Jeff said. “I’ll get him.” Jeff disappeared into a side door as the others gathered by the door. A few seconds later Jeff returned, looking worried.
“Ah… He’s not there.”
Everyone looked at Tyff uncertainly. He glared at them.
“I suppose all of you know where he is, but you won’t say so,” he said, scathingly. They shook their heads and protested in a little burst of undulating sound.
“No way,” the brunette woman spoke over the others. “Of course, we don’t know where he is! It’s not a conspiracy! Goddamnit, you are fucking paranoid.”
“I have every reason to be,” Tyff said, dangerously. “I’ve had comrades injured because of the resistance. I’ve seen indiscriminate death. I have every right to be paranoid.” He wasn’t sure what the word meant, not exactly, but if it had something to do with hyper vigilance, he was owning that.
“He’s probably just taking a walk or something,” Julia said. “Maybe Renay is showing him around.”
“Penelope is disabled,” he said shortly, as if that settled it.
“Computers are unpredictable.” Jeff shrugged.
“Not this one,” Tyff muttered. “Enough. To the mess hall now, so I can make sure you are guarded.”
The female with the short black hair took a few short steps toward him and glared up into his face.
“Enough from you, asshole! You can’t boss me around like this. I didn’t do anything wrong!”
“Nance,” Jeff said, softly. “Let him put us under guard. Then we can prove we’re innocent.” He turned to Tyff, his face carefully composed.
“We are yours to command, War Master. Of course, we will obey your orders.”
The women made to protest but he turned to them with a look fierce enough to impress Tyff.
“Enough! It doesn’t matter what we believe about Luke, not right now. All of us know we are innocent. Don’t we?”
Nods went around the circle. Some of them looked grudging about it while others seemed relieved.
“Good. So, don’t worry. We know we didn’t do anything wrong. It does us no harm to comply, just like we would in a police investigation.”
As a group, they began walking down the hall toward the shared dining room. Tyff had organized his troops to meet back there, and a few would be waiting to receive the humans. He was very close to just tossing them in the brig and being done with it, but something held him back.
This older one, Jeff. He has some wisdom. I feel I could trust him. Maybe humans have to get later into their years to achieve anything like the maturity of a Preor.
When they arrived in the mess hall, his warriors were all there, talking with Vende and Dawn. He bade the humans to sit at a nearby table and went to his men, knowing they hadn’t found her yet.
This is going to be bad.
“We can’t find her, War Master,” a younger Preor said apologetically. “Without Penelope it’s like being crippled. We can’t even access the cameras. Everything is offline.”
“Luke was the tech head,” Nancy said. “But I’m okay with computers. I can take a look.”
“Not before you are questioned,” Tyff snapped. “You could be working with him!”
Nancy looked away, her shiny black hair falling over her face. Tyff almost felt bad for snapping at her, but it could all be an act.
He found his thoughts were narrowing, becoming simpler. Even if the humans did know something, he was unlikely to get it out of them before something happened to his mate. A sense of urgency was growing inside him, as if her life force were ebbing away and he was running out of time to save her. He resisted the urge to run madly around the ship or let his dragon tear through the walls.
I have to do something.
“Question them, Choler.” Tyff gestured at the table, trying to do the humans a favor by picking an agreeable Preor to interrogate them. He certainly didn’t trust himself to do it. “We need to find out what they know about this Luke and if they are in on a plan with him.”
“We’re not,” Julia muttered, but Tyff ignored her.
“I want rooms searched, one by one,” he said to his next higher ranked warrior. “Get everyone on it. Full sweep of the ship. Make sure everyone knows to look for Luke, as well.”
“Your will be done, War Master.” The young Preor hurried to follow orders.
“Vende, get into engineering and get Penelope back online,” he snapped. Vende nodded and left the room, leaving only Dawn standing beside him.
“You can look in the garden, Dawn,” he said, distracted. He just wanted her out of the way, really.