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  Kiel’s click-click as he walked down the floor offset with Kael-ven’s click-click, click-click of his four legs as the two Yollins passed the first set of guards.

  The first guards were there to make sure you knew and intended to be entering the Queen’s workout area. Ass-kickings, they would tell you, would happen after you passed this first post.

  The two Yollins spoke with the guards who told them to pause a couple of minutes.

  Two idiots would be coming back out, shortly.

  A few minutes before, two Wechselbalg had not realized that Eric and Gabrielle were an item and decided to say they were here to have a friendly spar with the Captain of the Queen’s Bitches.

  One of the guards had looked at the first Wechselbalg when they had approached, “I’m sorry, did you say you were here for a friendly spar with the Captain?”

  “Yes, she uh, she invited us,” The first stated and turned to his partner who shook his head vigorously in agreement.

  “Right,” the lead guard turned to his partner, “Felix, would you be so kind as to inform Gabrielle her friendly sparring match is here?”

  Felix was a better actor than his partner, Steve. He picked up his tablet and dialed the Captain’s number and informed her that two Wechselbalg were here for her, he looked at the time on the tablet, 3:25 PM friendly sparring match with them?

  The two Wechselbalg were passed through, huge smiles on their faces. When they turned the corner, Felix lifted up his tablet again and punched three numbers and waited for a response.

  A female’s voice responded, “Hello, Infirmary?”

  “Yes, this is Felix down in Queen’s Workout Area,” he replied.

  “How many?”

  “Two,” Felix replied.

  “Type?”

  “Wechselbalg”

  “Time?” She inquired.

  Felix replied with only a moment's hesitation, “I imagine about one minute after they start, so call it a couple more minutes?”

  “Oh, someone being stupid?” the voice said on the other side of the line, “I’ll have them right over, and I’ll get Peter on the line. When they get healed, he will be here to deliver his own punishment.”

  “Understood, thank you,” Felix hung up.

  Four minutes later, two Wechselbalg, each with two broken arms and two broken legs, whimpering as the blood ran down their heads, were being carried out. Felix put up a hand to stop the infirmary personnel. He snapped his fingers in front of the first guy that had spoken for the two of them. “Just so you know, in case you are wondering, there ARE no friendly matches down here. Everything is training as hard as you can. So, be thankful she only broke your arms and legs.”

  “Thankful?” the other guy asked, confusion in his voice as he spoke around a mouth and jaw just then starting to heal properly.

  Felix looked over at the other male, ‘Well, yeah. If she wanted, she could have killed you for unauthorized use of the Queen’s area.”

  Moments after those two were carried out, the two Yollins came in through the door. Kiel nodded to Steve and Felix and pointed his finger back towards the door, “Someone came in here for a ‘friendly’ match?”

  “Yeah, I can’t believe that is the third one,” Felix agreed and waited for a subtle green light on his desk to turn on. “You guys are good.”

  Kiel’s lips clicked together, “I wonder who could be whispering the rumor that you get to spar with Gabrielle if you use that code phrase?”

  “Or has been adding the picture of her on the back channels?” Kael-ven wondered aloud as the two Yollins passed through the security station. Steve and Felix both stared at each other before grabbing their tablets and started looking to see what the Yollin Captain was talking about.

  Five minutes later, Felix looked down the hallway towards the sparring rooms, “Son of a bitch…”

  —

  Bethany Anne entered a few minutes after Kiel and Kael-ven, “Sorry for being late.”

  Kiel looked at her feet, where a smaller, black version of Ashur was trotting beside the Queen, “Just curious,” the military commander asked as he pointed at her feet, “has Ashur been replaced?”

  “What?” She looked down, “No, this is Matrix, one of Ashur and Bellatrix’s children. Say hi Matrix, these two have the implants and can understand.”

  Matrix’s little bark greeting the two Yollins.

  “How does he have such ability to understand but is so … small?” The large Captain asked.

  “He isn’t that young, and he is a little small for his age, but dogs mature relatively quickly. I’m being told that Matrix is ahead of his siblings in some areas.”

  Matrix barked again, “Yes, not in size, unfortunately,” Bethany Anne agreed.

  “And Ashur is where?” Kiel asked.

  “Keeping his treacherous ass out of my sight while I cool down.” Bethany Anne replied, “this little addition to my menagerie isn’t my partner, he works with TOM.”

  That remark caused both Yollins to stop and blink for a few minutes before they turned to each other and then back to Bethany Anne, “You have a Kurtherian talking to an Earthling dog?” Kiel asked.

  “Oh please,” TOM’s voice came out of the speakers, “Not all Kurtherians are evil war mongers.”

  “True,” Kael-ven agreed slowly, looking at Bethany Anne and then the speaker, “But I’m not aware of any Kurtherians except those from the Seven who have slipped out of their genetic programming and killed another being.”

  There was a moment of silence before TOM replied through the speaker system, “I blame my connection to Bethany Anne for that.”

  Kiel’s mandibles started chittering in laughter, “He has a point. There have been no Kurtherians who have had to undergo such a stressful existence inside of…”

  “Are you begging for another ass-kicking, Kiel?” Bethany Anne asked the taller Yollin. He grinned as well as he could and put up his hands while he shook his head in the negative.

  “Damn,” Kael-ven muttered, “Here I was hoping you would take her ire so the two of us would have a regular sparring match.”

  Bethany Anne smiled, raising an eyebrow, “I’m sorry, is the Yollin Revolutionary feeling a little putout?”

  “He should,” Kiel muttered, “Since working out with you, he has become more formidable in our matches.”

  “Oh?” Bethany Anne asked, turning to look at Kiel, “How so?”

  “He beats me about forty percent of the time, now,” Kiel answered, “I blame his improved abilities from working out with you.”

  “So, why aren’t you using your friendship to work out with the Bitches?” She asked Kiel.

  This time, it was Kael-ven who chittered his laughter, “Because they treated him like you do me, and it took him half a day in the Pod-Doc to recuperate.”

  Bethany Anne shrugged, “Pain is an excellent teacher.”

  “Yes,” Kiel agreed, “It taught me not to spar with Eric when he was upset about Gabrielle.”

  “Well, there is that,” she agreed, “human males are very protective of their females. Even females who can take care of themselves. I imagine someone slighted her and Eric did something. Then, she was upset with him for being a typical guy, and they got into a fight. He comes here, where friendly matches aren’t allowed, and there you go.”

  “Yes, there I went,” Kiel agreed while pointing behind him. “Straight into the Pod-Doc nursing both my wounds and my ego.”

  This time, both Yollins watched as Bethany Anne’s eyes displayed extreme humor, but her lips were compressed tightly together…finally, she lost it and started laughing, covering her mouth as she looked between the two Yollins.

  “At least the mouth now is in sync with the eyes,” Kael-ven commented, “otherwise, I was confused.”

  “Word,” Kiel agreed as his Captain turned to look at him. Kiel shrugged, “I blame William.”

  “Ok,” Bethany Anne finally got her humor back under control, “as funny as this shit is, and
it is funny, I need to learn how to fight a four-legged Yollin, Kael-ven and you are my only option.”

  “Lucky me,” he agreed. “Come, search the universe for other races, find their planet, meet them, and get your ass kicked all afternoon.” He turned to speak to Kiel, “Somehow, the recruiter I spoke with failed to mention that little bit of information when I signed up to lead the expedition.”

  Kiel shrugged, “You should have been with me for my recruitment meeting, a complete fabrication.” Kiel’s voice went an octave or two higher, “Superior exoskeleton, best in the galaxy.” His voice returned to normal, “What a big bowl of Bistek-barook shit,” he grumped

  Bethany Anne’s face scrunched up in confusion. “When did you two become Abbot and Costello?” she asked.

  “No idea what or who you are speaking about,” Kael-ven replied, “but I assume a certain fatality about one’s future brings about whatever,” he waved his right arm, “you speak about.”

  Matrix barked, and Bethany Anne looked down at the puppy, “You might be right Matrix. They just might be trying to delay the inevitable.”

  The two Yollins turned their head to look down and glare at the German Shepherd. Kael-ven spoke, “Traitorous canine, thy name is mud. You just wait until you are old enough to spar with her, you will understand, and I hope I’m here to see it.”

  This time, it was a questioning ‘yip’ Matrix barked out, and Kiel laughed without mirth, “See? Now you understand. Life seems funny now, but after this ass-kicking, you will know your future, and I will enjoy the thought of how my blood and pain will bring you fear.”

  Bethany Anne rolled her eyes, “Wow, who knew a Yollin could be such a Drama Queen?”

  The two Yollins turned as one and walked over to the side of the work-out room to grab weapons from the weapons rack.

  “At least I’m now Royalty,” Kiel quipped.

  —

  Matrix was sitting on the floor by the moaning Kiel, who was laying on his back next to the wall where he had collapsed just moments after placing his weapons back in the rack. “Stop licking me, Matrix!” Kiel moaned, “this is not helping my ego one bit.”

  Kael-ven was on the sitting couch the team had brought in for him to use, rubbing his back, “I appreciate the light workout today.”

  “I only wanted to think about how someone would fight something what, twice your size?” She asked him as she stretched on the floor. “So I needed to focus on determining your weak spots.”

  “Rumor has it three times my size, but we do not believe that statement. First, how would he be so big? Second, the King does not show himself outside of those who meet with him. Those who are willing to share agree he is three times larger than I am. But, could they be fabricating the truth so to support the rumor? No one knows.”

  Bethany Anne’s head looked up at the Yollin, “I’ve always wondered how you know if someone taps your natural armor, but it doesn’t cause you pain?”

  He shrugged, “I can feel the punches and occasionally if you are trying to get my attention the blunt force spread across my muscles underneath hurts, but nothing like a concise punch.” He lifted his left hand to play with his jaw, making sure it was still in place and working correctly from her last punch.

  “Well, without seeing if I can cut you up,” she started.

  Kael-ven interrupted, “Yes, I do appreciate the queen’s magnanimous decision not to use me for that particular research project.”

  “Keep interrupting me, and we shall see,” she replied, “and who is teaching you magnanimous?”

  Kiel’s voice groaned from the side of the room as he pointed up to the nearest speaker, “Blame Meredith,” he called out.

  “Meredith?” Bethany Anne spoke, and the EI answered.

  “Yes?”

  “What are you teaching the Yollins?”

  “The appropriate history that might provide insight on how a new Yollin government might be created once the current administration is replaced,” the EI replied through the speakers.

  “We are studying both Monarchies and Dictatorships,” Kael-ven replied, “Magnanimous decisions for those vanquished was a point of discussion between myself and Meredith.”

  He smiled as Bethany Anne shook her head in resignation.

  Few hundred yards inside Entrance 1 - Dulce Lake, New Mexico

  This time, one of their trips to track down rumors seemed a little different to Jesse. The light from his flashlight hit the far wall and traversed back and forth across the rocks on the cave floor. A scratch on a rock caught his attention, and he turned his flashlight back over to see a relatively large boulder. He called out to his two friends Edward and Colin to hold up a moment.

  Getting close, he could tell that the scratch was recent, it wasn't something that had been around for a long time. Further, something very hard had to have been used to create such a gash in the rock. He took his hand out of his glove and touched the stone’s cut.

  It was sharp.

  He looked at the angle, slashing downwards, and wondered what it could have been. He turned and allowed his flashlight to travel back towards the opening and then turned back around 180° to consider where, if something, in fact, was moving, would he find the next mark?

  He started walking towards his two friends, a feeling that this time was different. Alien TV, a very small YouTube channel, might have unearthed something real. His flashlight continued traversing across the floor. Unfortunately for him at the moment, it missed a few footsteps imprinted where something heavy had to have passed.

  So far, he hadn't noticed the non-human tracks next to the human ones.

  Aboard the G’laxix Sphaea - Earth Orbit

  Captain Natalia Jakowski stirred her hot chocolate while she dialed up her favorite strike team. Secretly, she was wondering what the two guys would use as an excuse to try to not head down to Earth this time.

  Further inside the ship, Samuel was having a conversation with Richard when the captain of the ship's voice came over the speakers, “Boys?”

  Richard rolled his eyes. the Captain of the ship couldn't be more than in her late thirties, and that was probably giving her a few years and she called them boys? “Yes, Captain?”

  "We have visitors in the Dulce Lake base. I need you two to go down, acquire information and confirm what is going on. I have been in communication with ADAM and from the information he has, I understand we might have a few civilians poking around.”

  "Civilians?” Richard questioned, "I don't remember our contract stating that we needed to help civilians, do you Samuel?" He looked over at Samuel who had a smirk on his face.

  Richard winked at his friend.

  The Captain replied, "I believe the contract, if that's what you would like to call it, is between you and Gabrielle. I don't think I need to be the lawyer in this little discussion. Would you like me to get Gabrielle on the line, boys? I understand she's going to be coming through the ship here shortly? I can certainly ask her to pause for a moment and speak with you if you require clarification, Richard.”

  Richard's eyes grew large, the smile dropping off of his face. “Noooo Captain. Let's keep Gabrielle happy and not bother her with trivialities, shall we? She might be on a date with Eric. I don't suppose we can get a pod out of here relatively quickly? We would like to head down earth side and perhaps get a bite to eat before we rush over to New Mexico.”

  "Richard, what kind of food are you talking about? We have both human food and blood, although I was under the impression that you don’t need blood anymore?”

  "Well, to be truthful," Samuel jumped in, “blood is a bit of an acquired taste. It is rather similar to always having your mother's cooking at home. You don't like it that much when you're always eating it ... but after you go away to college for a few years, even the worst of mom's cooking tastes delicious.”

  "I would have to take your word on that, Samuel. My mother happened to be a chef for a local hotel. Therefore her cooking was always delicious. For me,
I went the other way. I got into eating too much Taco Bell at college, and although it was unhealthy as hell, the grease was damned delicous. Now, I understand Gabrielle is going to be here in ten minutes with the Queen? So, did you want to get on that Pod before they arrive or are you planning on being here during the lockdown when the queen comes?”

  The two vampires reached over and grabbed their backpacks and quickly made for the door, Richard yelling back over his shoulder, “Captain, I don't know why you are still talking? There's nobody in the room at the moment. Those two individuals happen to almost be to the pod bay.”