CHAPTER 854
Iama'Juturi kept glancing up at the men and women moving through the mess line, her light green eyes searching for only one individual. Four days had passed since the incident on Twelve Alpha, and still the words echoed within her. It was not something she had heard in regards to her ever in her life. Her Pride had given her away with barely a pause, her family disowning her when the biogenic treatments did not fully succeed and she was left with her tail. They did not even try to keep her from being tossed away so callously and sent to Nefoa as a whore for the soldiers there. Iama had seen the true beast within her people then and instead of breaking her as it did so many other Kavalian females, it changed her. It made her hardened to events around her. She was willing to do anything sexually to get off Nefoa in the hopes of making an escape, and she had succeeded after a fashion. The Lycavorian King's attack on the outpost she had been sent to was a blessing from the gods that Iama thought had abandoned her. She now had what she had always desired. Freedom and a future. Even in just the few short weeks she had been among these Lycavorians she discovered her skills were very well received when it came to managing and cooking the meals they ate. No soldier, no matter the species, could deny they wanted good food to eat while deployed. It was a natural thing. What her mother had taught her was now paying dividends that she had never imagined. That she was actually using a skill she loved and in charge of the entire operation on a Lycavorian ship was beyond anything she could have dreamed. The entire crew of the ARC ROYAL were more than friendly to her in every way, treating her not as an enemy but as ally and to a number of elven and Lycavorian females she was fast becoming a friend. This treatment was not something she had expected at first, at least not until she had been among them for several weeks and came to realize they were nothing like what her people thought.
There were many handsome Lycavorian men on this ship and despite her background, which was not secret unfortunately; all of them had treated her with respect. Iama recognized the many lustful stares she sometimes got but the many rumors she had heard about how Lycavorians treated their females were all true. While the male crewmembers had given her enticing looks and coy words, none of them had pressed her very far to pursue something. Iama knew that while they found her attractive, and they knew her history, her tail gave them pause. Most of them anyway. There were several who did not seem to care about her meter and a half long tail and since the events on Twelve Alpha, Iama noticed they were becoming less reserved around her. She was a woman and she knew when a man wanted her and though Iama wanted to, she held back. She had no intention of becoming the ship's resident slut though she doubted that is what would happen on this ship. The next man who took her into his bed was the man she would remain with for the remainder of her life. The man that would be the father of her children and the man who would love her breathless every day. Iama was not stupid in any way, and she knew without question she wanted the boy/prince. Not because of his actions on Twelve Alpha in saving her life, but because her body reacted just being close to him. The manner of his birth and upbringing gave her pause however. She feared he would be like the many clone soldiers she had to endure on Nefoa. A child in the body of a man with no presence of mind at what he was doing aside from killing and trying to fuck her harder and longer than the last clone.
He hadn't eaten in the main mess lounge since the mission, avoiding her at every turn after she had called him a stupid child for his actions, even as he returned her lost data pad to her. He had saved her life and she had berated him in front of others, embarrassing him. He had been born using the Kavalian accelerated growth hormones and Iama had seen the results of their work. The majority of the Cloned soldiers she had been forced to bed with were nothing more than rutting animals with the minds of children. They looked at her with nothing more than lust in their eyes and they were less than gentle at times. She had expected him to be the same and given her new freedom she was not about to accept his lewd stares or actions. The only problem with that was he did not look at her with feral lust in his dark eyes, nor did he treat her as an object. From the first time she had seen him on Twelve Alpha and discovered who he was Iama had wrongly assumed he was the same.
You are not worth losing over some data pad!
He had spoken those words to her just after placing himself in extreme danger to save her from those disgusting creatures. He had not hesitated for even an instant and the look in his dark eyes as he protected her was something that Iama had never seen in a man's eyes before. For a fleeting moment, Iama had actually felt wanted and special. That look remained even after they returned to the ship, but seconds after she berated him when he returned her pad, it was gone. Iama didn't truly understand the concept of Mindvoicing, or how someone could be bonded to a dragon with their minds. She had not experienced it until coming to be among the King and the others. She watched them with their dragons and how they acted. They regarded them as family and dear friends and she could now tell when they were speaking to them within that realm she didn't understand. Being among them for this time had all but erased the inbred fear she had for them, but she did not go out of her way to be near them either.
Iama glanced up and her eyes opened wider as several bodies shifted out of her line of sight and she saw him. He was sitting at a table within the lounge near the door with his sister and the huge Kavalian she knew was his sister's husband and mate now. Their union had been the talk of the ship before Twelve Alpha, and for the last three nights she had had to listen as her friends kept discussing Fedor Leonidas and what they would do to him in bed. She was silent and only replied when asked a direct question about him, but knowing that so many females also desired him made her very sad and very jealous. Iama blinked several times not understanding how he had passed her in the line and she had not seen him. Then she realized that his sister and Miseo must have gotten him a tray of food when they went through earlier. Iama stared at him from across the large room. He was reading from a data pad as he shoveled forkfuls of eggs and sliced meat into his mouth, Eirene and Miseo sitting beside him and whispering to one another as they shared a mug of coffee. He was sitting sideways to her and Iama could see he wore standard gray fleet fatigue pants and a dark gray t-shirt that conformed to his upper body like a second skin. She could just make out the bottom of the tattoo on his upper right arm and Iama blinked wondering what it looked like. Holstered to his right thigh was a K12 KM. It was the first time she had seen him in four days and Iama felt her heart flutter ever so slightly. Iama could not deny that he was gorgeous in every way, even more handsome than the Lycavorian men who had shown an interest in her, but he was still just like the cloned soldiers who had undergone the same type of accelerated growth. His mind was still that of a child's. Wasn't it? Julie had said they were no longer children… and though she didn't really understand why, Iama wanted to know if that was true.
Fedor paged down on his pad as he stuffed another mouthful of eggs and the delicious sliced meat into his mouth and began to chew. His personal pad was almost an exact duplicate of his MedwanGai's pad. It was of Pralor design, nearly fifty more of the unique pads being discovered on SPARTA'S WRATH. His father had begun calling it a P1 and that designation had stuck with his mothers and the others of his family. Only seven were active outside his family to include his Uncle Danny. Andro had sent twenty of them to the ARC ROYAL in the last supply shipment before they had left the Alpha Quadrant. He and Eirene were still learning to use them because they were so much more advanced and could do so much more than a normal data pad. They were encoded to each individual user and no one else could access the information on them without authorization from the primary user in the form of a biometric scan of additional users added to its core data base. At the moment Fedor was accessing additional files added to the P1 by the Avatar Avi and his counterpart 341 before shipping them to the ARC ROYAL. His father had told Eirene and him of the hulking Avi and all he had learned from him through the years and Fedor wanted to meet him.
Fedor had shown an incredible aptitude for engineering and building while Eirene had been blessed with inherent skills in piloting that no doubt came from their mother. The Chief Engineer of the ARC ROYAL, a grizzled and weathered human of nearly seventy years of age, had been allowing Fedor to poke around the ARC ROYAL's engine design. The man knew a gifted engineer when he saw one and he had complemented Fedor many times on his ideas and encouraged him to continue in the field. Fedor had every intention of doing just that for he knew that they would not always be fighting in their lifetimes. He leaned over to his sister as his brow furrowed.
"Eirene… I can't get the primary flow regulator to adjust for flow rate and temperature." He stated lifting the pad to show her the engineering problem he was working on as part of his classes.
Eirene glanced over at the pad. "Did you compensate for the increased heat caused by Quantum induced fusion?" She asked.
Fedor hissed at himself. "Jeez! How stupid can I be?" He muttered as he tapped the pad. "That's the first thing Wayonn taught us."
Miseo grinned. "You should have seen me trying to complete the problems my father gave to me in regards to Aerodynamics and Magnetic Tri-Cobalt Inducer Systems. I thought I was going to pull my hair from my head."
Fedor looked at him. "You don't have a lot of hair to begin with Miseo." He said with a smile.
Miseo chuckled. "How true."
Fedor turned back to his pad but looked up when the shadow fell across the table. His heart skipped a beat when he saw her there and then her sweet kiwi scent began to swarm around him.
"Good morning." Iama spoke softly as she stood there with her hands behind her back. They couldn't see that her fingers were laced together and the whites of her knuckles were showing in anxiousness as she stood in front of him. "You… you have not taken your meals here in the main mess lounge these last few days. I was wondering why."
Fedor looked at her, resisting the urge to scoop her into his arms and kiss her. He took a deep breath which didn't help since her scent was heavy because she was so nearby. "Why would it matter where I eat?" He finally stammered out the words.
"It is my job to insure that everyone eats healthy. The foods you eat directly affect how your mind matures." Iama responded with the first thing that popped into her head. She mentally berated herself for saying something so stupid.
Fedor tore his eyes away from her angelic face and returned them to his P1. "I'm eating fine." He hissed softly.
"Julie Collins told me that you were the boy/prince while we were on Twelve Alpha. That you and your sister were birthed using Kavalian accelerated growth hormones." Iama said trying to think quickly. "When we returned I told your mothers I would see to it that you ate healthy so that you are able to reach your full potential." She motioned to the tray of food in front of him. "There are no fruits on your tray. The enzymes in fruits stimulate the growth of synaptic brain cells."
"You don't say." Fedor spoke failing miserably at trying to push her scent out of his head. "I don't like fruit."
Iama's brow furrowed. "Who does not like fruit?" She asked surprised. "Your sister seems to like fruit." She said motioning to the half eaten orange colored apple on Eirene's tray. "Perhaps you should take after her."
Fedor looked up. "I don't like fruit." He stated again. "Now is there something else you wanted or can I get back to my studies?"
"I would be happy to help you." Iama offered. "Rudimentary mathematics can be very taxing on developing brain cells of those who were born with the growth hormones."
Fedor's eyes grew a little wider. "Rudimentary mathematics?" He gasped. "Do… do you think I am stupid or something?"
Iama looked confused now. "The physical skills and aptitude always mature the fastest in Kavalian clones. They need to undergo months of rigorous schooling to be able to function even remotely like an adult."
"And now I am a child as well as stupid." Fedor snapped.
"You are only weeks old." Iama said. "I think that qualifies as still being a child. Why do you think I call you boy/prince?"
"Well… I guess that means I'm batting a thousand." Fedor snapped unable to hide his anger any longer. "I'm stupid and a child. Great." Fedor picked up his P1 as he got to his feet and looked at Eirene. "Pen gur men forn proir arande. Miseo." (I will see you later sister.)
Eirene reached for her brother as he turned quickly and left the mess lounge. Her dark eyes glared at Iama now and she turned back to Miseo.
"Miseo!" She gasped.
Miseo didn't hesitate for her knew how tightly they were connected as twins. "Go! Go Eirene!" He spoke to her.
Eirene didn't hesitate then and she bolted out of her chair and followed her brother. As she passed Iama her fangs flashed into existence and her eyes changed. "Upaee!" She growled as she moved by her.
Iama watched her exit and then turned her eyes back to Miseo as he rose and towered over her. "I am correct." Iama said as he moved in front of her. "You should know I am correct better than most. You are Kavalian."
Miseo looked at her. He was not angry at Iama, for she truly did not know or understand what he did about Eirene and Fedor or the effects of Mindvoice and Etheric abilities. Eirene had also told him that Iama's kiwi scent called strongly for her brother. Miseo knew her background and knew she would not trust easily nor would she be able to find the strength to thank a man for saving her life after all she had endured.
Miseo finally nodded his head. "Yes… it's true for the Kavalian clones." He spoke. "Fedor and Eirene are not clones however Iama. The sooner you come to realize that the better." He began to follow Eirene and stopped directly flanking Iama and turned his head. "You should know… the rudimentary mathematics you think he was working on…" Miseo waited until she turned to face him.
"Technically if he was in school… he would be in his second year at a higher university. The rudimentary mathematics you think he was studying… it was actually Phased Quantum Mechanics." Miseo told her seeing her light green eyes go a little wider. "We are in a very different world now Iama'Juturi. Nothing is the same as you and I once knew it. I suggest you keep that in mind before insulting a Prince of the Lycavorian Union again."
Iama stood there with wide eyes as Miseo turned and left the mess lounge.