Mission: Planet Biter (Veslor Mates #4)(6)

She stilled, blinking at him. “Right. Not food.”

“We won’t eat you. We’re Veslors working with United Earth’s fleet. We received your distress hail. Do you understand?”

She bit her lip, letting her head rest on his gloved palm, and continued to blink rapidly as she stared into his eyes.

“You took drugs? What kind?”

Maith drew her attention when he spoke. The female whimpered, her body trembling, and she closed her eyes.

“Look at me,” Roth ordered firmly.

The female did as he asked, locking gazes with him again. He used his gloved thumb to gently caress her wrist, since he still held her fist in his grasp.

“We have come to help you. Do you understand?” Roth gave her fist a little squeeze, careful of her dainty bones. “We are real. I’m Roth. What is your name?”

“Vera. I’m Vera Wade. Please be real.” Big tears rolled from her eyes, sliding down her face.

His internal helmet communications kicked on and Clark Yenna, the human leading the rescue mission, spoke. “We’re finding bodies. Nine so far in this section we’re searching. It seems to be living quarters. Seven of them appear to be suicides, but two looked as though they stabbed each other multiple times with broken glass from a mirror until they each bled out. Has anyone found a survivor? Report.”

Roth looked at Maith. He wasn’t about to remove his hand from under the female’s head or release her fist. “Activate my coms.”

The medic reached over the female between them and touched the side of his helmet. Roth took a deep breath and began to speak. “This is Roth. We found a human female inside the security office. She’s mentally unstable and has admitted to being on drugs. We’re taking her to their Med Bay.”

Clark responded immediately. “Understood. I’ll meet you there. Anyone else?”

“This is Birch,” the other team leader stated. “We’ve got more bodies in the section we’re searching. Six so far. Some of them used furniture to barricade the doors from the inside, so it’s slow-going gaining access. One chick hung herself in her shower. Another guy looks like he smashed his skull open against a wall and just died where he dropped. This is some seriously wacked shit.”

“What in the hell happened here? No one remove your helmets or gloves,” Clark ordered. “Maybe they’re sick with some alien-world disease.”

“The surviving female admitted to being on drugs,” Roth reminded him.

“What drugs?” Clark sounded furious.

Maith answered. “Unknown. It’s why we need to take her to Med Bay. Should we fly her up to Defcon Red on a shuttle? My handheld scanner isn’t able to identify what’s in her system, but I’m showing high levels on an unknown substance.”

Clark uttered a curse. “I’m contacting Commander Bills to inform him of the situation. We’re not taking her anywhere until we know she’s not contagious or a health risk to anyone up there. Roth, I’ll meet you in their Med Bay. Maith, figure out what in the hell is going on.”

“Of course.” Maith cut coms for them both by touching their helmets.

Roth leaned in closer to the female. “I’m going to pick you up.”

Her eyes closed and her body tensed.

Roth gently released the female’s fist and eased his other hand out from beneath her head. It was easy to lift her. She didn’t weigh much. The thin shirt and matching print pants she wore were baggy on her, as if she’d possibly lost weight recently, or she’d borrowed them from a larger human. He turned toward the door.

“Gnaw, Drak, remain here and download any information you can about what happened to these humans. Transmit it to Defcon Red.”

Both males nodded.

The female in his arms opened her eyes and peered up at him. She slowly lifted a shaking hand and pressed it against his suit. “You feel real.”

“I am real, Vera.”

“I hope so. I don’t believe it, though. Nobody came. We hoped. We waited. Nobody came.”

Roth let Maith lead him to the research facility’s Med Bay. They’d gained access to a map of the interior once they’d breached the facility. The hallways connecting the pods were narrow, but the ceilings were high.

“What happened? Can you tell me, Vera?” Roth walked slowly, keeping a firm hold on the female in his arms in case she began to struggle. She wasn’t rational.

“We were all drugged,” she whispered, her hands rubbing his suit, from his chest up to where his helmet was attached. “We tried to figure out how it happened but everyone was going crazy. Seeing dead people. Bigfoot. They were killing each other, too, and had to be locked inside their rooms. They made me head of security. How crazy is that? I fly drones!”

Roth stopped, frowning down at her.

She nodded. “Yeah. I’m not security. Drone geek. I program them, fly them, fix them. I’m in charge of mapping the surface of the planet. That’s my job. Not watching people die. So many of them died… I tried so hard to keep them alive.” Her voice hitched. “They wouldn’t listen to me. I kept telling them to hold on. Hang in there. That none of it was real.” She started to sob. “It’s just the drugs. It’s not real.”

Roth shot a worried look at Maith, who’d stopped as well. “Move faster. She seems to be growing more unstable.”