Tasha’s POV:

  I yawned on Taureen’s shoulder, glad that we had finished checking our last spaceship for the day.

  “Are you at the park yet?” I asked Keegan.

  “Almost there.”

  I rested my head on the edge of Taureen’s shoulder pad; it wouldn’t be long then. Once the children went off to play, we could wander away for some quiet time. Having kids made us realize how much we missed the ability to simply curl up and snuggle by ourselves.

  A distant siren made me lift my head and search for the source with narrowed eyes.

  “Is that coming from one of the spaceships?” I asked Taureen, who had also stopped to regard the distant cargo ship in the distant sky.

  A sudden blossom of yellow and orange flames erupted from the bottom of the largest spaceship. I jumped to my feet and stared at it with wide eyes.

  Before I could even ask another question, Vick checked his wrist comm. “They have no idea what’s going on. It’s a Brult ship. They never transport weapons or dangerous materials.”

  Taureen tapped at? his own wrist comm, searching for information with a frown. “Soranto and Tessa either just finished checking that ship or they’re still onboard. The emergency crews are already on their way—”

  Ignoring what else he was about to say, I desperately called out to my daughter, “Tessa! Are you alright?”

  My blood ran cold as it bounced back. She was either unconscious, heavily sleeping, or dead—and I had no way of telling which.

  “My calls aren’t going through!” I cried, letting Taureen and Keegan hear.

  “I can’t reach her either!” Keegan replied, equally as frantic. He would be able to see the spaceship from the park. Aeria and the two guards would be getting those updates just as quickly as Taureen and his two guards.

  Taureen was rapidly typing something into his wrist comm. “The shuttle they took hasn’t returned. Soranto isn’t responding to my calls either.”

  He promptly turned and began running back toward the main port building. My claws dug into his shoulder pad as I hung on and hoped that Tessa was alright. The flames had disappeared, and shuttles from the port below were racing up to the cargo ship. Some shuttles were dropping out of the cargoship—and promptly disappearing.

  I shared the mental image of the dozens of small, vanishing shuttles with Taureen, adding my feelings of confusion while trying to control the panic I was feeling. The Kymari’s invisibility cloaking technology was nothing new to me, but I had never seen a shuttle use it. It seemed dangerous to cloak something when at least a hundred rescue shuttles were quickly closing the distance.

  Taureen glanced up at the cargo ship. “Those aren’t Kymari vessels.”

  “They might have had hitchhikers,” Vick said, glaring daggers at the scene above.

  “I saw at least thirty before they disappeared. That is a lot of people and supplies to hide.” Taureen replied.

  “It’s a cargo ship.” Tran retorted. “Three-quarters of their space is filled with supplies and hiding places.”

  We were forced to slow down as we got closer to the building due to the sheer number of people also coming to help. Many were carrying weapons or heavy-looking bags. Smaller shuttles whizzed through the air above, landing near the building and letting more Kymari out. I kept trying to reach Tessa via the mindlink, but it still wouldn’t go through.

  My ear tufts pinned back, and I growled faintly at the press of people, but I wanted to know where Tessa was more than I wanted my rather large bubble of personal space left intact. Taureen flowed with the crowd, allowing us to hear the shouted instructions.

  “Fighters to the East Wing! Medical personnel down Corridor B! Other emergency responders to the Northeast Wing! All others to the West Wing!”

  The crowd barely slowed as they split up, leaving the person to repeat instructions to those now within range. Vick and Tran flanked Taureen as we went down a hallway.

  A female Kymari standing in the hall stopped us. “What skills do you have and how may they assist?”

  Taureen replied, “Fire lizard handler. Another handler was on the spaceship, and I am well acquainted with his bond animal if he is injured. My side guards can assist wherever their particular skills lie, but the bond animal will know them as well.”

  Her eyes flickered to me momentarily. “Your companion won’t be allowed near the spaceship until it is deemed safe and secure. If you wish to wait in one of the side rooms, we can keep you updated. Your guards can join the infiltration teams. There is nothing preventing them from changing their priorities if we locate the bond animal and its handler.”

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  Taureen turned to Vick and Tran. “Please keep me updated.”

  They nodded and took off at a run, heading through a different door. Shaking my head, I chittered and lashed my tail. Taureen stroked my shoulder as he walked down the hallway until he entered a small side room. He closed the door behind us.

  Finally, in the privacy of the tiny room with no observers, I screeched my internal anguish. I didn’t know if my daughter lived or not. It tore at me—and I couldn’t do anything! Pulling me into his arms, Taureen cradled me against his chest.

  “Can you hear her yet? Do you have any idea what happened?”

  “It keeps bouncing back! I’ve been trying non-stop. She was fine at lunchtime, but I haven’t tried to speak with her since. Keegan can’t get through either.” My worry and turmoil saturated my mindvoice.

  Taureen knew what the bounceback meant, and his jaw clenched with his own anger and pain. We waited in silence for any update or for Aeria to arrive.

  “We’re almost there! Where are you?”

  Taureen also heard Keegan’s voice and sent the directions to Aeria’s wrist comm. The deafening silence was finally broken when Keegan spoke again.

  “We’re outside the door.”

  I climbed up to Taureen’s shoulder as he opened the door to let Aeria, Keegan, and Dirk in. Rhay and Sadria were absent, likely on their way to the spaceship to try and locate Tessa and Soranto.

  “Any news?” Aeria asked.

  “Nothing yet. The city’s shields are set to activate at a moment’s notice, and the turrets are at full power.”

  An idea occurred to me, and I turned my head to look at Taureen with sudden hope. “Can you access Tessa’s tracker?” It would be able to tell us her vital signs and exact location.

  “The frequency is only keyed to Soranto’s wrist comm,” Taureen said, pressing buttons on his wrist comm again, “but, Soranto’s wrist comm will have some basic sensors. I won’t be able to access the information, but Adeline can request it from the medical groups.”

  Seconds after he sent the message, his wrist comm flashed. When he touched a button, Adeline’s voice came out. “Taureen, I was just about to call you. Have you heard anything?”

  “Just that Soranto and Tessa were on that spaceship. If I can ask, what is his wrist comm transmitting?”

  “They’re trying to tap into his wrist comm. There is some sort of interference with the signal and it’s causing a lot of problems. Can I wait with you or Aeria? I’m ready to kill something, and I need a friend to keep my feet on the ground before I use this fusion blaster on something.”

  Aeria took a step closer. “Come join us, Adeline. We’re in the main port. Leave the blaster behind. I’ll send you our exact location.”

  “Thank you, Aeria. I should be there shor— Oh! The message came in. He’s alive! His pulse is rapid and shallow; they aren’t sure if he’s conscious, but he’s definitely alive and stable. None of the other readings are coming through, so his wrist comm was likely damaged.”

  “We’ll see you soon then.” Aeria promised.

  The display on Taureen’s wrist comm dimmed as the call ended. I exhaled in relief. If Soranto was alive, there was a good chance Tessa was too. My worry flooded back as I wondered how close they had been to the explosion to damage Soranto’s wrist comm.

  “Tessa!”

  My call echoed back again. I closed my eyes, fervently hoping that she was okay. Taureen’s wrist comm beeped again.

  “We have an update.” He was quiet for a moment. His muscles tensed as he exhaled very slowly, as if trying to contain his reaction. That alone made me tense up.

  “What is it?” Aeria asked.

  “Not many details yet. They believe at least fifty Votaks arranged for a large shipment of ‘crates’ to be transported across the Kymari territory, which they hid inside the crates. They have some kind of stealth cloak that our scanners weren’t able to detect.”

  A growl rumbled through my chest at the thought of the white aliens. The Votaks were forbidden to enter the Kymari’s territory. The last time they had snuck into this corner of the galaxy, they had located Earth and wiped out humanity. It infuriated me that the Votaks had the gall to return—especially since they might have harmed my daughter.

  “Are they trying to track the shuttles?” Keegan asked.

  “Until they find a scanning frequency that can detect or bypass the cloaking shield—and one of the devices has already been taken for deconstruction—we won’t be able to locate them until they drop their cloak.” Taureen’s voice was tight, which didn’t ease my worries.

  His wrist comm beeped again. “They found Sipar and Drae. Sipar is badly burned and unconscious. He has at least two broken bones and several cracked ribs. The teams are rushing him to the hospital. Drae is conscious, although he has several deep cuts from flying shrapnel. He was trying to get to his feet when they found him, but he isn’t in good shape. Nothing about Tessa or Soranto yet.”

  Before I could reply, another beep heralded the arrival of more information.

  Taureen slowly spoke, as if in dread. “Soranto and Tessa…aren’t on the ship.”

  My eyes flew open. My voice was flat and enraged. “What?” Perhaps I needed to borrow Adeline’s fusion blaster.

  “They ran a bio-scanner; there is nothing of organic nature in the lower half of the ship that they haven’t located in person. Soranto’s wrist comm is malfunctioning, but it’s occasionally relaying his pulse. He isn’t on that spaceship, and they have confirmed that he hasn’t entered any port or hospital on this side of the planet.”

  My words came slowly, with a deadly undertone. “Are you telling me that those filthy vermin kidnapped my daughter and her handler?”

  “That is what they’re assuming. They’re trying to use the solar wind detectors to look for unusually tiny readings. It might give us another lead on where all those shuttles went.”

  I growled incoherently, wishing I could flame something—not only did they likely harm my daughter, but they had the audacity to kidnap her as well. If I ever found them, they would swiftly learn why it wasn’t wise to come between a mother and her child.

  Aeria’s wrist comm beeped. “Adeline is here.”

  She opened the door, and Adeline walked in. The fire in her eyes and her fluid movements gave me pause, silencing my growl. I hadn’t thought it possible, but now I wondered if her anger at this moment surpassed mine.

  “Did you see the last update?” Adeline asked, her tone slightly clipped although she was trying to be polite.

  “Yes. Have you heard anything else?” Aeria inquired.

  “Not really. I’ve alerted both his family and mine. Some of our relatives are border patrollers, so they’re coming as fast as they can. I’ve contacted almost everyone I know. It’s been centuries since a Votak managed to injure a Kymari—and I want to know how those pillaging thieves got their grubby hands on a cloaking device that we’ve never seen before!”

  “I think there are a lot of questions our fighters will be asking them once they catch one of them,” Taureen said firmly.

  “That had better be sooner rather than later.”

  I was fully in agreement with Adeline on that sentiment.