“Perhaps. But we’ve other business to attend to now.”
“Right.” Part of her wanted to procrastinate a little longer. Fetching and carrying the fallen Gathendiens would likely make her back sting more. But what had to be done had to be done. She pointed to the holomap. “I’ll take these three. And you can divvy up the rest amongst yourselves.”
The men exchanged a look.
Srok’a cleared his throat. “Are you sure you don’t want us to fetch them all? Gathendiens are heavy grunarks.”
She snorted. “Something I learned when they thought piling on top of me would take me to the ground. Don’t worry about me. You just retrieve the others. I’ll be fine.”
An utter lie, as it turned out.
Simone left the others and headed for the three enemies she’d volunteered to retrieve. All were in the same general area, so she could’ve used preternatural speed and strength to nab them in one trip and return before the others even got their first Gathendien captive to the lab. Instead, she made three trips—each at a mortal’s pace—so she wouldn’t have to explain why her red dot on their maps seemed to travel at light speed.
By the time she made her third trip to the lab, dragging the last Gathendien by his boot, the wound on her back throbbed mercilessly.
Why the hell wasn’t it healing?
She glanced down at the arms left bare by the sleeves she’d cut short during her stay in the pod.
And why weren’t the lesser cuts on her arms healing? Almost all of them should’ve sealed by now. But the only cuts that didn’t still pain her were the ones Janwar had sprayed with that awesome imaashu stuff.
“Is that the last one?”
She turned at the male voice and found Srok’a walking toward her from another hallway.
Like her, he dragged a wounded Gathendien behind him.
She nodded, oddly short of breath. As they’d warned her, Gathendiens were heavy as hell, a result of their thick hide as much as their size. But she could lift an SUV over her head. Dragging one of these jerks around should’ve been easy.
Srok’a’s Gathendien growled something. Frowning back at it, Srok’a delivered a swift kick, then returned his attention to Simone. His brow furrowed as concern darkened his features. “Are you okay?”
She forced a tired smile. “Yes. It’s just been one of those days.”
Though he nodded, he watched her closely as they entered the lab.
Janwar motioned them over to the second holding cell. While the lab itself appeared to be as state of the art as the one on the Tangata, the cells looked almost medieval, the walls comprised of metal bars spaced too closely for an adult to fit through. She didn’t notice the high-tech lock beside each gate until Krigara picked up the severed arm of one of the guards she’d slain and waved the wrist in front of the pad. A clunk sounded as the gate unlatched.
Definitely high-tech.
Happy to hand over her burden, Simone stepped back as Kova and Srok’a hurled the last two Gathendiens into the cell.
Janwar’s eyes met hers. Then he dropped his gaze to her visible injuries and met her eyes again with a silent question.
She nodded, indicating she was all right.
Satisfied, he studied the dozen or so Gathendiens they’d captured. “That one,” he said after a moment and pointed. “He holds the highest rank.”
Silently, she applauded his choice.
Janwar stared at the group in the second cell as Kova opened the gate. “Give my friend here any trouble, and we’ll initiate a decontamination cycle on both cells.”
Simone didn’t know what that entailed, but it drove the Gathendiens to slide each other anxious looks. And when Kova boldly strolled inside, no one accosted him. When the Gathendien officer Janwar had chosen tried to clip Kova with his thick tail, Kova blasted a hole in it.
That ended his struggles.
Kova lugged the lizardman over to one of the operating tables on which Gathendiens conducted their twisted experiments.
Simone stared at it. The table boasted metal manacles the so-called scientists could clamp over wrists and ankles to hold their test subjects immobile. Another could be fastened across the forehead so those at their mercy couldn’t turn their heads away to avoid… whatever these bastards did in their quest to find chemical weapons that would induce genocide.
Janwar said Ava had been a captive of Gathendiens. As Simone watched Kova and Srok’a lock their prisoner in place with the manacles, she couldn’t help but wonder: Did Gathendiens do that to Ava? Did they strap her small, trembling form down and study her like a lab rat?
How? Had they hurt her? Cut her? How long had she been at their mercy?
And how had she survived it?
Fury roiled inside her. Her teeth ground together as she imagined her sweet, shy friend suffering who-knew-what horrors at the hands of those monsters and saw in her mind’s eye Ava struggling futilely against the restraints while those butchers—
Dizziness assailed her, so strong Simone staggered back a step before catching herself.
Show no weakness.
It had been the first lesson drummed into her by the Immortal Guardian Seth had assigned to train her after her transformation.
Give them nothing to exploit.
Aware of the Gathendien eyes peering at her with their slitted pupils, she casually leaned back against one of the lab’s cabinets and pretended to watch the show as Janwar began his interrogation. The pain in her back increased, distracting her as much as the damned dizziness. The burn in the wound steadily worsened until it felt as if someone held a fiery brand against her flesh. Then the heat spread, racing through her body like the hot flashes one of her Seconds had complained about.
Her stomach began to churn. Swallowing hard, Simone kept her expression impassive.
Her skin broke out in a cold sweat. The room began to whirl.
What the hell? Why was this happening? She shouldn’t feel worse. She should feel better. After all the blood Janwar had transfused her with on the Tangata, she—
Icy fear filled her.
The transfusion. There must have been something in the blood they had oh-so-generously given her.
Merde!
She glanced around surreptitiously, fighting down a burst of panic.
Janwar looked up and caught her gaze.
Hastily looking away, Simone straightened and turned toward the door. The dizziness that afflicted her grew worse with every step, making it hard to keep from staggering. But she kept her shoulders back and her steps straight.
Kova leaned against the doorway, arms crossed over his chest as he watched the activity in the lab.
Simone nodded as she passed him, affixing what she hoped was a bored expression on her face. As soon as she was outside the lab and out of view of its occupants, she lurched to one side and threw a hand out to brace against the wall. Her breathing grew ragged as she doggedly continued forward. She had to keep moving. Had to get to the transport.
No. The escape pod. Or… was it the transport?
She swiped cold perspiration from her forehead and rubbed her eyes in a vain attempt to clear her blurring vision.
She had to…
She had to get… somewhere.
Her knees grew weak, and soon one hand against the wall wasn’t enough to keep her upright. She had to lean her whole side against it as she doggedly forced one foot in front of the other, her clothing creating a swishing sound as it dragged across the surface.