Purity Read online

  “It does kind of look like a T-rex,” Mom murmured and K realized she’d spoken the words aloud.

  “What is he waiting for?” she muttered, staring at the giant saurian which dwarfed even Boone’s big frame. Its scaly skin was a deep, purply-blue and its teeth, when it opened its mouth, were as long as her forearm.

  “I don’t know.” Mom sounded tense. “Shoot it, Boone,” she urged, as though his blurred figure on the screen could hear her. “Hurry up.”

  * * * * *

  “Shoot it!” Loki said, nudging him. “Come on, Boone, stop playing around.”

  “I’m not playing,” Boone growled, wishing he could take his eyes off the immense mountain of saurian flesh long enough to elbow his annoying pilot in the ribs. Loki was only making it harder to concentrate—as though it wasn’t hard enough already. The blast of pheromones Sweetie was emitting made him feel like he was going to climb out of his skin and a constant stream of erotic images was trying to take over his mind. He was in mortal danger but it seemed like his brain was more interested in replaying every porn vid he’d ever seen as a horny adolescent than saving his ass. Great, he thought angrily, trying to regain some control. No wonder Abrahams wanted someone else to do this—it’s fucking impossible to concentrate around this damn animal.

  “Shoot it!” Loki begged. “I swear to Goddess, Boone, I’m either going to come in my pants or shit them in another minute and I don’t know which. So shoot it.”

  “Lower your voice—Abrahams said she spoke Standard, remember?” Boone hissed. “And anyway, I’m trying to shoot but the trigger seems to be stuck.”

  “Stuck?” Loki squeaked. “I thought you tried it out already.”

  “I did—you saw me do it,” Boone snapped. “But for some reason it’s not working like it was in the lab.”

  Sweetie, who had been eyeing them with obvious interest, lowered her massive head with a snort. Boone was not encouraged to see that from the blunt base of her skull to the tip of her murderously sharp front teeth, her head was as long as he was tall. Not used to feeling like the smallest kid on the block, he thought, gritting his teeth when his mind wanted to show him a sexy porn star with K’s face and a killer body instead of the sentient eating machine in front of him. It’s no fun, is it?

  Not that he was going to have much time to dislike the new feeling if the trigger didn’t hurry up and unstick. What the hell was wrong with the damn thing? He worked it frantically but it stayed stubbornly stuck in the half-cocked position, refusing to move even a fraction of an inch.

  “Okay, to hell with the stunner, I’m going to blast it.” Loki drew the oversized pulse pistol and aimed with one trembling hand at the giant beast.

  “No, Loki, you idiot!” Boone protested. “Look in her eyes—she’s smart enough to know exactly what you’re doing and besides, a weapon that size is only going to piss her off.”

  “I don’t—” Loki began and then the saurian roared.

  * * * * *

  It was a deafening sound, even over the viewscreen. K had studied vids of Earth-that-was and the saurian’s deep, bellowing claxon seemed to draw notes from a lion’s roar, a steam train’s whistle and the warning call of a massive ship’s foghorn. The descending notes, filled with rage and hunger, sent a shiver down her back. For the first time, on contemplating a combat situation, she felt genuine fear instead of the cool nothingness of Purity. It was a horrible, clammy feeling that made her stomach tense and the palms of her hands sweat. Yet she knew what she had to do.

  “My suit.” She turned to Mom and gripped the other woman by the arm, heedless of contamination. “My suit, bring it to me!”

  “What?” Mom frowned. “Listen, young lady, don’t you think you’re jumping the gun just a little? Boone told me not to give it to you unless he died and he’s not dead yet.”

  “But he will be if someone doesn’t go help him.” K shook her impatiently. “Didn’t you hear Boone say the trigger was stuck? And Loki is no help—I knew he wouldn’t be. All they’ve got between them and that angry saurian is a malfunctioning stunner and a pulse pistol calibrated for Earth-normal humans.”

  Mom frowned. “I still don’t see—”

  “My gauntlets!” K shook her again. “They can bore a hole through solid plasti-steel. “Forget about the suit—just bring me the gauntlets.”

  “Oh!” Mom spared one last glance at the desperate scene on the viewscreen and raced from the room. In half a minute she was back, holding the two familiar black plasma gauntlets gingerly in one hand, as though they were poisonous snakes that might bite.

  She wasn’t far off in that assumption, K thought with some satisfaction as she strapped the weaponry on. The gauntlets covered her entire forearms from the base of her thumb to the crook of her elbow. Just feeling them against her skin gave K a thrill.

  Then their needles dug into her arms and she felt a rush of fear at the stabbing pain. Be calm, K commanded herself. Feel nothing. The gauntlets didn’t inject anything as the skinsuit did—they simply needed a neural connection to her in order to work properly. But could she work them properly, now that she was contaminated? Only a fourth class Paladin could manage the delicate and dangerous weapons and the black around her eyes had receded considerably, putting her back years in her training.

  K felt a stab of self doubt, sharper than the needles piercing her forearms, as she reached for the once-familiar link she’d had to her weapons. Before when she’d worn the gauntlets she had controlled them from a state of absolute peace and calm. Now her mind was in chaos and the semi-sentient weapons seemed to sense that. I will control them. I must, she told herself grimly. She looked at Mom. “I’m ready. Let’s go.”

  The other woman didn’t have to be asked twice. “Come on!” She led the way out to the Rough Terrain Vehicle, a small four wheeler kept for exploring alien planets, which was stored near the hatch of the ship. Grabbing the controls, she slung herself into the driver’s seat with surprising agility.

  K took the passenger’s seat, relieved that Mom was driving. She didn’t think she could have trusted herself to steer straight with the chaos going on inside her brain at the moment. She still felt dizzy and weak but she forced herself to sit up straight as Mom started the small but tough vehicle and they roared down the landing plank and into the arid Minotaur climate.

  K only hoped they were on time. Now that they were outside the ship, she could hear the angry roaring of the hungry saurian first hand, unfiltered by the viewscreen and Sweetie sounded very, very angry.

  Chapter Twelve

  So this is how it ends, Boone thought as Sweetie took her first snap at them. He dodged quickly to one side and Loki squealed and dodged to the other, both of them barely avoiding the glistening dagger-like teeth. The teeth in question clicked loudly on empty air and Sweetie snorted angrily. Boone had a feeling she was just playing with them at this point—like a hungry cat with a couple of luckless mice. In a minute she was going to tire of her little pastime and then it was going to be all over with.

  He cast a glance over his shoulder, wondering if there was any way to escape. Abrahams and a few other townsfolk from the settlement were watching avidly from behind the thirty-foot electrified perimeter fence but no one was rushing to their aid or opening the door in the fence, for that matter. Apparently they weren’t taking any risks that Sweetie might want seconds after she finished Boone and Loki off.

  “Abrahams?” he shouted, trying to back slowly away from the angry saurian as he spoke. “Trigger’s jammed on your damn stunner. Little help here?”

  The geneticist shouted something that Boone didn’t catch.

  “What?”

  “He said, ‘reason with her.’” Loki looked positively green with fear. They’d been in some tight spots together but Boone had never seen his friend so panicked.

  “Reason with her. Great,” Boone muttered. He wished he could think of words that might soothe the savage saurian but his thoughts were still occupied with erotic i