Enhanced Read online

  “It is late—very late. But I hope not too late. So I hope, so I hope.” For some reason Yipper seemed anxious and preoccupied. He was wearing the bulky pouch he had brought with him from the medical barge and now he pulled a short metal tube out of it. It was only about a foot long and there were two sensor light disks, one on either end. It looked like a modified version of the emotion sharing contraption he’d put together in order to allow Six to share his feelings and memories with Mei-Li earlier.

  He hopped up on the back of the couch and shoved it in Six’s face.

  Six recoiled as both of the sensor disks lit up green and the machine hummed softly.

  “Hey, what do you think you’re doing?” he growled. Though he was grateful to Yipper for allowing him to bring Mei-Li back from her emotionless state, he still hadn’t made peace completely with the terrible memories which had been released as a result.

  “It’s all right. I’m here to help you bear them, remember?”

  Mei-Li slipped her small, cool hand into his and Six felt immediately better.

  “Yes, I remember,” he sent back.

  But before he could send more, Yipper was already shoving the modified contraption at Mei-Li as well. When both disks lit up green and it hummed again, he nodded to himself.

  “I knew it! Yes I did, yes I did and the soul finder confirms it. Two souls bound together as one—you are bonded, aren’t you?”

  “Well, yes,” Mei-Li confessed, blushing. “But how could you—?”

  “And when did the bonding take place? How long ago did you inseminate her and seal the bond?” Yipper demanded of Six.

  “That’s uh, kind of a personal question, Yipper,” Mei-Li protested, her cheeks turning bright pink.

  “But I must know. Please, Six, it is vitally important. Yes it is, yes it is,” the Tolleg insisted.

  Six frowned. “As Mei-Li says, it is difficult to say. It was not a sudden process. She took quite a long time ah…seducing me. I believe that is the right word, is it not?” he asked, raising an eyebrow at her.

  For some reason, Mei-Li’s cheeks went even pinker and he felt a wave of embarrassment rolling through her.

  “I suppose you could call it that,” she murmured.

  “Why are you feeling shame?” Six asked, completely perplexed. “It is true you seduced me but I am glad you did. If you had not teased me with your erotic black panties and led me step by step to making love with you we would not be bonded now.”

  “Six!” Now she sounded positively mortified. Which he still didn’t understand. Why should their love or the physical expression of it embarrass her?

  “As long as the bonding took place less than twelve standard hours ago we should be all right. Yes we should, yes we should,” Yipper chattered. He looked sharply at Mei-Li. “Where is the serum I gave you? I know you did not use it on Six but please tell me you did not dispose of it.”

  “It’s in here.” She found the small handheld bag she’d been carrying the night before lying by the side of the couch. Opening it, she handed the Tolleg a familiar looking syringe filled with dark blue liquid.

  “Oh good!” Yipper snatched the syringe from her hand. “Still blue means still good. Yes it does, yes it does,” he chattered.

  “Still good for what? Does someone else want their emotions removed?” Mei-Li shivered, obviously repulsed by the idea.

  “No,” Yipper said shortly. He was up on the back of the couch, right beside Six. “But other things need removing. Yes they do, yes they do. And there is not a minute to lose.”

  Then, before Six could register what was happening, the little Tolleg turned and stabbed him in the side of the neck. Pressing the plunger home, he injected the blue serum into Six’s blood stream, filling his veins with fire.

  * * * * *

  “No!” Mei-Li jumped forward as Six fell to his knees. But it was too late, the syringe was empty and the dark blue liquid was already coursing through the big Kindred’s body. “Six!” she gasped, pulling the needle out and throwing it away. “Oh no! Please, Six—please stay with me!”

  “Burns.” His voice was low and choked. “My blood…it burns.”

  Mei-Li turned on Yipper who now appeared perfectly calm.

  “How could you do that? Why did you take his emotions again? Why?”

  “I didn’t take his emotions, no I didn’t, no I didn’t.” The little Tolleg looked shocked. “I simply neutralized the pathogens in his blood. Yes I did, yes I did. Look.”

  He pointed at Six who was still on his knees, a look of agony on his face. In fact, Mei-Li could feel the pain he was experiencing through their link—a burning sensation that seemed to run through all his veins.

  “What pathogens? What did you do to him? He’s in pain!” Mei-Li exclaimed.

  “Just look at him,” Yipper insisted. “Look at his eyes. Look, look.”

  “Six?” Mei-Li took his face in her hands and stared down into his steel gray eyes anxiously. The right one remained normal looking but as she watched, something strange happened to the left. The scarlet ring which had been around the outer rim if the iris slowly began to fade. After a moment, it was completely gone and the left eye looked the same as the right with no trace of red at all.

  Yipper was also looking and he nodded with satisfaction at what he saw.

  “Good, good,” he said excitedly. “It worked. And if my calculations are correct, I was in time. Yes I was, yes I was.”

  Six shot out a hand and made a snatch at the little Tolleg but his fingers closed on empty air as Yipper skipped nimbly away.

  “What did you do to me?” he asked hoarsely. “I can still feel emotions but my blood is boiling!”

  “The pain will fade, yes it will, yes it will!” Yipper chattered. “And you will thank me later, Six. Especially if your bonding made Mei-Li pregnant.”

  “What?” Mei-Li felt her cheeks heating again. She hadn’t even considered pregnancy last night when she was trying to get Six to make love with her. In fact, the thought of birth control hadn’t crossed her mind once—all she’d been able to think about was how much she wanted him.

  Wow, I really wasn’t very responsible at all last night, she thought with a twinge of shame. But somehow she knew that if she had been, she and Six wouldn’t be bonded right now. She had needed to have him bare and fully inside her in order to make the connection possible. Strange but true.

  “Explain what you mean, Yipper,” Six growled, stumbling to his feet. “And further explain why you couldn’t tell me what was in the syringe before stabbing me in the neck with it and frightening Mei-Li half to death.”

  “Yes, you told me it was emotion blocker when you gave it to me,” Mei-Li accused him. “I thought when you injected him with it you were taking away his emotions again!”

  “I would never do that, no I wouldn’t, no I wouldn’t,” Yipper declared. “I knew that wasn’t the right path for Six. I knew the two of you belonged together—but I also knew that Six was a carrier of the Scarlet Plague.”

  “Gods, he’s right—the Plague.” Six went suddenly pale. “Why did I not think of that?”

  “But I thought that only affected someone with the carrier’s DNA,” Mei-Li said. “I’m from Earth and Six is from a whole other galaxy. There’s no way it could hurt me—could it?”

  “No, but it could hurt or kill any child the two of you conceived together. Yes it could, yes it could!” Yipper exclaimed.

  “Oh my God!” Mei-Li’s hand went involuntarily to her belly. “Oh no, what if I am pregnant?”

  “Even if you are, you and the baby will be fine. Yes you will, yes you will,” the little Tolleg explained quickly. “I have been working on a serum to eradicate the plague in carriers for years, ever since Six’s family came to the medical barge too late. Yes I have, yes I have.”

  “But why didn’t you tell me the serum was to get rid of the plague?” Mei-Li demanded.

  “Or tell me?” Six asked, glaring.

  Yipper’s eyes