The next morning, Tamar awoke to the noise of combat. It wasn't very close, but the sound was, to her, unmistakable. She rolled out of bed on instinct and looked towards the open window from which the majority of the sound came. Creeping forward on all fours, she stuck her head over the edge until her left eye was stuck far enough over to see down.
What she saw stole her breath. Twenty stories below, Malachi was grappling with three Saltek. He had stuck his wings into the building and was holding himself suspended in open space. The three huge alien warriors were clinging to him while trying to pull their huge curved blades from their back scabbards with one hand. With the advantage of both hands, Malachi pulled one off his waist and let gravity pull it to his doom. The other on his right leg was dislodged with a hammering kick that sent it pinwheeling downward where it smashed head over heels into the side of the building, leaving an orange smear to mark its passing. Tamar gasped as she watched Malachi smash his fist into the third's midsection. The next second, she watched it disintegrate into millions of pieces. Blinking, she couldn't quite believe what she had just seen. Millions of tiny spikes suffused the space around Malachi, making his silhouette seemed blurred from her distance.
Was this the same man who had been acting so strangely for the past two days? Same guy who couldn't put two words together correctly? The man she watched now was savage, confident, ruthless, calculating. Her mind raced. It had to be the same guy; he was in the same suit, and she had seen him step out into thin air with no apparent ill effect. But why did he act so soft and cuddly one second, yet as harmless as an atom bomb the next?
Her internal conversation was cut short when she felt as well as heard a heavy thud behind her. Turning over onto her back, she saw a Saltek marching towards her. It seemed to be fitted with some sort of climbing gear; it had just begun to detach its harness when a black figure landed behind it. Tamar was struck speechless. This was Malachi? The man who had gotten her a blanket and pillow so she would be warm and comfortable. This couldn't be. The man she saw now was savagery given form. His face was a mask of fury as he grabbed the cable the Saltek had used in scaling the building before the creature could detach from its harness. Pulling the line taunt, Malachi dragged the creature off its feet then began to spin. The spin accelerated it into a blur, the alien at the end of the line pinwheeling faster and faster until it smashed into and through one of the wall, caving it in and finally Malachi let it go. It went sailing into space, its weakening scream fading to nothing.
"The lady doesn't like to be touched." Malachi growled out from behind the broken wall. Then, without hesitation, he leaped back out into the open air.
Tamar had no idea what to think. She dove to the window ledge and looked down again. Malachi had his wings out and was spiraling downward. Coming to a stop near the ground, he dove into the building in a shower of glass. Seconds later, a heavy boom sounded from inside the structure beneath Tamar. She waited and sure enough, first one, then two, and then three four and five Saltek bodies flew out and fell to the ground. Some in different phases of dismemberment.
Feeling a soft impact behind her, she flipped over onto her back, knowing what she'd see. Malachi stood there dripping with orange gore, dirt, and an accumulated layer of dust. Before she could say a word, he rushed towards her.
Scrambling away from him, she came to the edge of the window and stopped.
"We need to go, now." His voice was low and lacked any of the emotion he'd shown before.
"Why would I want to go anywhere with you? What are you?" She backed as far away from him as she could without falling out the window.
"Right now, I'm the only way you're going to survive what's coming. We have three dozen of those things converging on this building as we speak. Either I get you out of here, or they kill you. We have no other options." Glaring up at him, she rose to her feet.
"I still don't like you, but you're right. So, how are we going to do this?"
He reached to scoop her up and, on instinct, her hand shot out to slap him across the cheek. It was like hitting a piece of concrete and received the same response.
"Fair enough," he responded. "But either that or on my back, you choose?"
"But you're filthy." She stepped back, her hands on her thin waist.
"Oh, now you worry about cleanliness, fine." He stepped away from her and before she knew what he was doing, she was crouching and choking on a cloud of smoke and ash. The cloud passed, and he stood before her, his suit shining in the rays of the afternoon sun.
"Better?" He asked as he spun to show her his back.
"How did you do that?" She asked.
"Fewer questions, more moving. Those things are entering this building as we speak."
"Fine, but you are going to answer my questions once we're clear, okay?" She told him while clambering onto his back. "And whatever you held me with when you brought me up here, don't try that again. I'll hold on by myself this time."
"Have it your way. But I must warn you, this is going to be a bumpy ride." Malachi told her while standing on the window's edge.
"I'll manage." Tamar flexed her fingers and her claws sprang to their full one inch length. A small hop, and she caught his shoulder with one hand, then pulled herself onto his back. With a feeling of profound satisfaction, she wrapped her arms around his neck and sank her claws deep into his chest, then pulled downward to secure her grip. He didn't even flinch.
She pulled again. Still no response. With a muted growl of frustration, she wrapped her legs around his waist, locking her ankles together.
"You secure?" He asked over his shoulder.
"As I'll ever beeeeeeee!" The last word trailed off into open sky when Malachi leaned forward until beyond the balance point and they both fell into the gravitates embrace.
"He's gonna kill us both. I know he is." Tamar squeezed her eyes as hard as she could, waiting for the impact that would end it all.
Then, with a sudden jerk, her stomach was forced into her throat and they leveled off above the level of the lower buildings. Minutes later, their pace began to slow, their momentum played out. Tamar watched Malachi's head sweep back and forth and then lock on a five story flat roofed structure and they turned towards it.
They approached at a flat angle to the roof, then just as they swept over it Malachi flared his wings and they came to a sudden halt in mid air. For a few heartbeats, gravity warred with momentum until finally they dropped to the roof. The instant they were down, Tamar let go and bounded for the edge of the roof. She searched frantically along the side of the side, then sprinted for the other.
"You might not want to go down there just yet." Malachi warned as she passed him for the second time.
But Tamar kept searching until she came to what she sought. The fire escape was rusted and a few of its supports had pulled away from the wall, but she figured she could get down it before it collapsed. With a growl of triumph, she bounded off the roof and raced down the ladder. She was twenty feet from the ground when it began to tear away from the wall, so she just let go and landed lightly on her feet. Nimbly, she jumped out of the way of the falling metal. With a shrug, she looked up towards the roof and walked to the end of the alley. To her horror a Saltek stepped into the alley's exit. Its massive head turned towards her, its small black eyes going wide in surprise.
Leaping back away from it, Tamar didn't get far enough as the huge creature lept towards her, its massive hands descending to pin her to the ground. The sun was blotted out as a shadow passed before it and dropped towards her.
In the next second the Saltek, who stood well over seven feet tall, was reduced to a pile of broken bones and pulped orange flesh. Orange blood showered onto Tamar's hair and she gagged, tasting it on her tongue. Malachi stood from his crouch and gingerly stepped over the body towards her.
"You idiot! Look what you did to me!" She coughed, spitting orange gore into his face.
"Look, I told you, you wouldn't want to go down here. It was you who didn't listen to me."
"So, this is my fault?" She looked at him through an orange film. "You don't get to go around and tell me what to do. Who do you think you are?"
"I'm nobody." He stepped close to her and wiped some of the gore off her shoulder. "But if you would have listened to me, you wouldn't have to spend the rest of the day in your very own blood trench coat." He couldn't keep the humor out of his voice. The slight chuckle set Tamar's anger past the boiling point.
"You don't get to laugh at me. She jumped at him, claws extended, and ended up landing on the asphalt because Malachi was no longer in front of her. Turning on him, she lashed out again, and again he side stepped to her right side. The more he dodged her, the madder she became. Her strikes grew faster and faster until they were both moving at blurred speed. Yet still she never touched him, but neither did he strike at her.
Swinging a knife hand strike at his throat, Tamar put too much weight on her front leg and found herself falling over backwards as Malachi swept her leg out from under her. Before the jarring impact, she felt something soft arrest her descent and opened her eyes. She found herself an inch off the asphalt, held up by Malachi's outstretched arms.
"Let go of me!" She growled through gritted teeth. She struggled in his grip until he did let her go. She grunted when she hit the asphalt, then glared up at her tormentor.
"How did you do that?" She asked through labored breaths.
"Do what?" Malachi answered, already ignoring her and walking to the end of the alley.
"I never even touched you. I've never seen anyone move that fast."
"Well, now you have, live with it." He turned his head to look at her. "And the next time I give you a suggestion, following it would be a good idea. I can't go around saving your life all the time."
"You didn't save my life." Tamar spat.
"Oh yeah? Then what did I just do? How were you going to get away from that thing?"
"You didn't save my life!" She screamed at him. Her face rad, chest heaving. "You did nothing but delay my death."
"What?" He turned, genuinely puzzled.
"No matter how far, or how fast I run, either I get caught and brought back to the General or I run into a Rougarian patrol and they take me out. I knew I wasn't going to survive this when I escaped. There is no way this ends with my survival. I knew that when I escaped." She looked up at him, steel in her eyes. "But I would rather live free for a few weeks than stay in that lovely little piece of hell, okay? So just leave me here and be on your way. That's what you're going to do, anyway. Everyone wants something from me, a little piece of me that I never get back, so just go before there's nothing of me left." Tamar finished her tirade and slumped to the ground spent.
"Look, I don't know exactly what you've gone through, but I know what we're in right now. I'm not going to leave you here, alright." He placed his hand on her shoulder and she looked up at him, fire smoldering in her eyes. "So get over your self pity and work with me here or I'm going to knock you out and throw you over my shoulder."
Tamar shot to her feet. "This has nothing to do with self pity. I was stating fact, nothing more." She pushed past him, walking to the end of the alley.
"It sure sounded like self pity from where I stood." Malachi said, spinning to walk up behind her.
"Which way?" She asked, not bothering to turn and look at him.
"It's clear to the left. Just stay low and work your way towards the subway station. If we can get under ground, we might be able to get under them without their knowing it."
"Fine." she gave him a wicked smile. "Try to keep up." And before he could remind her to take it slowly, she sprinted off to their left.
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"So what you are saying, Vapade, is that we've had sixteen Saltek life transponders go dark and you are just bringing this to my attention. Why has it taken over three cycles for this information to be brought to me?" Thargoan, crown prince of the Rougarian empire, rose from his command dais and stalked down the seven steps to the command deck of his carrier, the Ganthoric. Being of medium build for his species, he stood seven feet three inches in height. He had the stance and bearing of a natural born fighter, and his eyes took in everything at a glance.
Vapade, his flagship captain, bowed deep at the waist, his dark purple skin turning to a shade of lighter blue around his neck in embarrassment.
"My lord, these reports have only come to me within the last hour. I rushed the decoding, but these things take time, what with all the information this ship receives from the rest of the fleet."
I don't want to hear excuses. What I want to hear is what is being done to look into this incident. There is nothing on this mud ball." he swept his hand towards the main viewer, where a replica of Earth floated above the ship's control gallery. "That can kill one of our soldiers. Nothing. Now it appears that there is. We need to find out what that something is, now."
"Yes my Lord. I've already sent a full scanning team to the site. I've also doubled the contingent of Saltek in the area, with another battalion on the way there now. Whatever caused this will be found, rest assured.
"I'll be assured when we have dealt with whatever it is. You know my father is not a patient old Kothar. This mission has already run far over budget and is verging on running past its allotted span. If the first shipment is not on its way to the home world by the end of this cycle, things could become very complicated for us, understood?"
"Yes, my Lord, we will double our efforts." The alien hesitated, and Thargoan pressed.
"What is it Captain? We need have no secrets here."
"It's a fragment of a garbled message from one of the Saltek. It would seem it was killed as it was trying to send an encrypted signal to this ship."
"But is that not against protocol. No messages from the planet are to be sent directly to this vessel."
"I am well aware, my Lord. But it's the message that is of possible import, not the breach of procedure."
"And the message, Captain, what is it?" Thargoan was growing weary of his captain's hesitance, so he got right to the point.
"Sensor officer, bring up the part of message number five seven one that has been recovered so far." Vapade called down to one of the many sensor control officers that staffed the station's one level below the bridge.
"As you command Captain."
Seconds later, the forward wall of the bridge glowed translucent, and a grainy image of one of their massive warriors came into view.
"Its still alive, I repeat, it's still alive," the Saltek's massive head turned, looking at something out of the picture. "We thought it was destroyed in our initial assault, but I saw it with my own eyes. We need to...." The video faded to static and Thargoan turned to his captain.
"What is it talking about, Captain?"
"We have no idea. The rest of the transmission was so garbled that we might not ever recover it. But for this lone warrior to circumvent the chain of command, it must have been important."
"You are correct, Captain. Look into this further: you have whatever resources you need. Find out what our Saltek saw."
"Yes my Lord."
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"I thought I told you we needed to move slowly." Malachi slipped in behind Tamar as she peered down the steps of the subway entrance.
"And you always follow orders, don't you?" She replied, looking over her shoulder at him.
"Point taken. But in this instance, it's a matter of safety, not just obedience. If you wish to stay alive, would you please do what I tell you, at least some of the time?"
Tamar did a double take at him. Did he really just say please, to her? In all her life she couldn't remember a single person ever, ever asking her for anything, let alone saying please. Why did he have to be so damn nice all the time? It was starting to get annoying?
"I've never listened to anyone. Why would I start with you?"
Malachi stepped around her, leading the way down the darkened steps.
"Because I can see things you can't. I can do things you can't. To top it all off, I'm trying to keep you alive."
"Why?" The word came out before she could rein it in. It had been bouncing around in her head for the last couple of days.
"Why wouldn't I. Have things changed so much since I've been gone that it's wrong for a man to want to protect a woman?" He made it to the bottom and stopped, waiting for her to make it down.
"Are you kidding? Women don't need men to protect them." She called from where she was. "If anything, women have to protect men."
"From what?" Malachi asked.
"From themselves! Men are dumb brutish pigs that think of one thing and one thing only. If not for women, this world would be lifeless by now."
"Who in the world taught you history?" Malachi chuckled.
"I was instructed by the best minds on this planet. Every one of my professors were women of the highest leaning."
"I kinda figured." Malachi responded, rolling his eyes.
"What do you mean by that?" Tamar asked, running around, getting in front of him.
"Oh nothing. Now if we want to head north, we need to go." he spun his arm in a circle then pointed to his right. "That way."
For the next few hours, they traveled in silence. Tamar's mind rang with thoughts of this man she was with. Even while walking behind him, she couldn't take her eyes off him. He moved with a liquid grace, seeming to flow over the ground more than walk on it.
The most disturbing thing about him wasn't his physical abilities. She had known of many men and had seen a few herself that had tremendous ability. As long as they were controlled and managed properly, they were fine. This man, on the other hand, was controlled by no one. He was under the management of no one, yet he behaved more strangely than any man she'd ever met. He was kind to the point of annoying, protective, as if she were fine china, and sometimes so goofy she wanted to hit him. If that was all there was to him, she would have left at her first opportunity. The only thing was, that was not all there was to him. She had watched with her own two eyes as he had ripped through four Saltek as if they were tissue paper. He had seemed so brutal. How could he be so lame at times, yet so warrior like others? It was as if he were two different people. One she really wanted to get to know, the other she just wanted to smack around a bit.
"Where are you from?" She asked when she could take the silence no more.
"I'm from a small town in the state of Michigan." He answered, then the silence returned.
"Where are we going?"
"Why so many questions?"
"Because I'm getting tired of having nothing to listen to. You were so talkative before, now nothing."
"I thought you liked your men dumb and silent."
"So, this is my fault?" Tamar stopped in her tracks, shocked.
"Yep." Malachi didn't even slow down, just kept right on walking.
"If you must know, we are working our way north. If we can get into the forests, we can turn west and make our way to the mountain. It'll take a few weeks with having to slow down for you and all. But we can make it."
Tamar shot forward. "Slow down for me! What do you mean, slow down for me? I'll have you know I can run at almost one hundred miles an hour. Nothing moves faster than I do, nothing." She pushed her face up, trying to look eye to eye, but with the height difference, she could only get to right below his chin.
"That's adorable." Malachi responded, then disappeared.
He moved so fast her eyes couldn't keep track of him. She whirled, trying to find him only to have him re-materialize right in front of her. The resultant gust of wind almost knocked Tamar off her feet.
"Like I said, you're adorable." He reached forward and pinched her cheek and shook it, like one would a child.
"What are you doing?" She shrieked, swatting at his hand and missing.
"The speeds I can move would have you hanging off me like a kite in a hurricane. Yes, one hundred miles an hour is impressive. But there is only one person who moves faster than I do now, and he's not on the planet right now."
"Don't touch me. No one gets to touch me now, nobody." Tamar dashed a few paces away and whirled around to face him.
"I've been touched enough in my life. Now that I'm free, no one gets to touch me without permission, NOBODY!" She screamed, spittle flying from her mouth.
"Oh calm down, I won't lay a hand on you if it's that big of a deal for you." Malachi responded.
He walked further into the darkened tunnel. Whatever had happened to this poor girl had to have been horrendous. She was strong, one of the strongest women he'd ever seen. Yet at the same time, she was strangely vulnerable, like a child making her way through the world for the first time. Navigating her mood swings and charming personality was going to tax his minimal interpersonal skills. As if this mission wasn't turning into a wonderful opportunity to gather intel, which it hadn't.
A slight noise off to his right caught his attention. He looked down into the lower right-hand corner of his heads up display H.U.D., and saw a contact was paralleling him out against the far wall.
What is she doing now? He wondered to himself.
Tamar was stalking him, thinking he couldn't see him and he was trying to figure out what would be better? Let her attack him and give her her pride in a surprise attack, or let her know that he knew where she was at all times. Much to his surprise, he came to the decision to let her have her fun. Besides, keeping most of himself a secret could come in handy later. So he continued to walk, at times casting glances to his right or left.
It took her three minutes to launch her attack. Sailing in a high arc, she landed on his back, but instead of sinking her fangs into his throat, she pitched herself backwards, used the momentum gained and threw him, spinning into the side of the tunnel. He hit with a resounding smack and sank to the bottom.
A broad smile spread across Tamar's face when she realized he wasn't moving.
"I knew you weren't that strong. You must have gotten lucky with those Saltek or something." She called to him while walking towards the spot she'd last seen him.
"Gotcha!" she yelled as she landed on the top of the rubble that had obscured her view, but he wasn't there. A gentle tap on her shoulder had her whirling around to find Malachi smiling down at her.
"How did you, I mean, I didn't see you move? You couldn't have gotten around me." Her attack was forgotten.
"I'm pretty quick when I want to be. Besides, I really didn't want to be thrown by you again." He turned and began to again walk through the almost pitch-black tunnel.
Tamar followed, her mind once again spinning with questions. How did he do that? Why wasn't he furious with her? Just what kind of man was he? She just attacked him, without provocation, and with completely ill intent. Yet he was walking away from her as if nothing had happened. Did he think he was so powerful that he didn't have to worry about her at all? Well, she'd find her opportunity soon enough to prove to him how wrong he actually was.
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