Page 29 of King from the Sky

Emily felt both angered and flattered for some reason. It was true she was not that used to guys flirting with her, but given what she knew about this slime bucket flattery should have been the farthest thing from her mind and it wasn’t. Clearly, she knew she needed some professional help.

“You don’t get to ask about her. You don’t even get to acknowledge that she is even here,” Alex said. Emily could hear the rage welling within him. Hearing Josh mention Emily was obviously a sore spot for Alex. Emily beamed with pride and a little bit of fear. She had never had a man who stood up for her like that.

“Wow, you are touchy there,” Josh said picking up on the sweet button. Emily knew that Josh might try to exploit that weapon, but she was pretty sure the dick was not going to have a chance to.

“Why are we still talking?” Alex asked.

Josh smiled. “Oh, big brother. You have always been in such a hurry. You have to stop and relax sometimes. You really need to learn how to enjoy life instead of taking everything so serious all the time.”

Josh was playing with Alex now, taunting him. Emily had to smile because apparently Josh did not know his brother nearly as well as he thought he did. Alex had no ego about anything and he could not be goaded or taunted. The only time Emily had ever really seen him show any uncontrollable emotional reflex was when Josh had just mentioned her name. As much as it made her proud it also put a bit of fear into her heart. She did not want to be the reason that Alex got hurt if he wasn’t able to control the rage when her name was mentioned.

“And you have always been one to delay the inevitable. You tried to kill me. You are trying to interfere with this mission. Don’t you understand that if we don’t put the Seplika somewhere really safe then our planet is in grave danger? You won’t even have a kingdom to rule over if that happens.”

“Big Bro, you are talking about something that has a very slim chance of ever happening. Grandpa hid that thing on this far away rock in the middle of nowhere because he knew it would never be found. Now you want to go and mess that up? I mean, since you have it I’m going to put it somewhere safer, but really to go through all this trouble to fix something that isn’t broken is kind of pathetic. Especially when it’s about to cost you the throne.”

“They know where I am; they know I came back here. If something did happen to me then the kingdom would be yours anyway. That would make you happy.”

“Well, yeah of course it would, but it is unlikely. Unless, I make it likely. Hell, I decided to go one farther and make it damn certain. That is why I sent those morons after you. I knew I should have chosen better, but time was short.”

“I just hope you know what you are getting at. If you take the throne the same way you do everything else in life then it is just going to look like a joke and someone will probably assassinate you,” Alex said with a smirk.

The first rays of sun were now shining through the doorway and it was actually starting to get a little bit bright in the warehouse. Emily felt instantly better just knowing that the sun had risen. It somehow made everything less threatening and less frightening all around just by the fact that it was not all done in shadows.

“That may be, but I’ll take my chances,” Josh said.

He growled a low rumbling roar that sprung out of his throat like some inverted tornado and engulfed the entire room. Emily could actually feel the air whirling around her body from the force of the blast of his voice blasting through the air. In an instant Josh was flying through the air in full lion form lunging at Alex’s throat.

Alex was quicker and faster, in the blink of an eye he was flying through the air, also transformed. He caught Josh and knocked him to the ground before he landed right on top of him. Emily’s heart soared hoping that the fight would be a quick victory for Alex, but something told her not to count Josh out yet. He was the younger brother, but he was also power hungry and insane which in her experience always ended up being a great asset in any physical altercation.

Josh flipped backwards and knocked Alex off his back. Alex was catapulted through the air at least ten feet. Emily winced as she saw him land painfully on his back.

In a flash Josh was there biting and clawing at the back of Alex’s neck. She heard Alex letting out a few vicious cries of rage and a few whines of pain interspersed as he tried to gain the vantage point. Emily wished to hell that there was something that she could do to put an end to it all.

Alex twisted his body and jerked Josh’s paw hard over his shoulder sending the younger brother flipping to the ground. The concrete cracked beneath the impact and Emily staggered backwards from the force of the blow as if she were trying to stand up straight in an earthquake.

Josh was starting to get up, but he was definitely moving slower. Alex didn’t give him time to breathe a second. The older lion was on top of him, his jaws gnashing and tearing at Josh’s head and the back of his neck. His paw was wrapped strongly around Josh’s neck and Emily could see that he was pulling hard as if he were trying to choke his brother.

Josh began to thrash and move wildly; trying to use every last ditch effort he had in him to get out of the vicious rear choke hold that Alex was applying. The more Josh struggled the tighter the hold seemed to get and to add insult to the injury Alex continued to bite and gnaw at the young lion’s head drawing heavy gashes and blood.

Emily turned away from the gore and for a moment she thought that Alex might be going too far. She knew that Alex would never forgive himself if he killed his brother in a rage. His brother needed to be locked up, not murdered. Alex was good and just and Emily knew that he didn’t have it in him to take his life, no matter how deserving.

But she knew that she couldn’t interfere. She was afraid that if she even said anything it might enhance Alex’s rage. She realized at that moment that she really had never communicated with “Lion Alex”. She really did not know what he understood or what his reasoning abilities were like when he was fully in that state.

Suddenly Alex stopped applying pressure. He roared loudly at the silent and still lion that was lying in his arms. Alex moved his arm and let Josh slump to the floor. Emily could see his chest rising and falling rhythmically; Alex had not killed Josh. She knew that he had wanted to, but she knew that Alex had a better heart in him than that.

As he came forward to her she watched him transform back into her beautiful Alex. She was now totally used to it and it was actually kind of a beautiful thing to watch. When she first saw it the sight had frightened her senseless. She had to laugh about those moments now.

Alex wrapped her in his arms and held her close. His warmth was so sweet and inviting. The relief that was moving throughout her entire being at that moment was the most insane high she ever could have imagined. It was like every ounce of adrenaline had just been switched on and given orders to invade every single cell in her body. Her whole body was twitching and tingling with happiness.

“I know the secret now,” Alex said. “Josh was right; it has to be a king’s blood. That is the only way to open the magic of the Seplika.”

“Your grandfather planned all of this didn’t he?” Emily asked.

“Yeah, he did. He sure did.”

Alex took his thumb and bit into it gently, allowing the blood to just come to the surface of the wound and applied the pressure to the flat space on the Seplika right above the keypad. The red light from before was now turning purple as Alex started to type in the numbers.

This was everything that he had worked for. It was everything that his grandfather had dreamed of and it was going to put everything right for his people. Emily knew that Alex was going to find a way to destroy the Seplika so that his planet and his people would never be at risk like they had been for all these years. But first he had to find a proper place to hide it where it would be unable to be touched by anyone but him.

When Alex finished typing in the code all of the lions on Earth were going to be changed back into their true hybrid selves, but all of them had spent their lives as lions. They were not going to have the faintest idea how to become functioning humans. It was a disaster waiting to happen. Emily realized right then that she had to stop Alex from doing this.

Emily grabbed Alex’s hand as he brought it down to type in the final sequence of numbers. He looked up at her with a look of confusion and concern spread across his handsome face.

“What is it?”

“You can’t do this. These lions will never be like you. They have never been given the ability to reason and to communicate or conduct their lives like people. That is not something that someone can just learn. You have to be born to it. They are born to being animals. I think it will be doing all of them a great disservice to do this.”

Alex stood up and looked her in the eyes. Emily could see in his eyes that he knew she was right. He looked back at the Seplika with a steely, cold look of regret and almost shame. What had he been about to do? Emily could see the thoughts forming within him.

“You’re right. What have I been thinking? I can’t do that to them.”

“Right; you have the Seplika. Take it and hide it. Find a way to destroy it so that it can’t be used to harm your people ever again.”

Alex pulled her close and kissed her sweetly. Emily felt bad in a way for crushing the dream that Alex had carried with him for so long, but she finally helped him realize what the mission he was following really was; it was to destroy the Seplika and it was to find her. As cheesy as it sounded to even think that, she felt it was true. If it wasn’t for the mission that brought Alex there she never would have met the man of her dreams. She never would have had the most amazing adventure and realized what she was really capable of and how strong she could become.

She liked to think that she found happiness, but truthfully happiness found her.