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Chapter 4

After a few hours’rest and then picking up supplies for the recon mission, Hunter headed onto the small shuttle with Cleo.

They’d barely spoken since he’d laid everything out for her, and he couldn’t decide if that was a good thing. When Cleo had a lot of thinking to do, she went quiet.

Was she thinking about a future with him? Hunter believed she was, but would that be enough for her to put her fears aside and finally let him get close to her?

He ran a quick system check, then started up the engines.

Cleo appeared a few seconds later, and his heart kicked in his chest at the sight of her.

“Did you get any rest?” he asked as she settled in her seat.

“I had a nap, but I was too wired to sleep for long. Are we good to go?”

“All set.”

“Then let’s move out.”

“Yes, boss.” So, Cleo was playing the professional card and acting like they hadn’t dry humped each other on the desk a few hours ago. He could deal with that, for now.

Hunter steered the shuttle off the Apocalypse and plotted the course, before switching on the autopilot.

“We’ll start at the site that’s been identified as the biggest potential laboratory,” Cleo said. “Then we’ll run a scan over the entire planet once we’ve looked around, to make sure we haven’t missed anything.”

“Sure thing.” They’d gone over the mission plan three times, but Cleo loved to be thorough.

“And remember, we keep this low profile. We don’t want the Siblet to know we’ve discovered them.”

“You mean I can’t pound any into the dirt if they get in my way?”

“Only gentle pounding. And be quiet when you do it. We don’t want a whole army of Siblet coming down on our heads. And they’ll be jumpy. Time isn’t on their side if they want to complete their experiments to perfect this poison.”

“Got it. Silent killing only.”

Cleo flashed him a brief smile before her gaze shot away. “Use the cloaking on the ship now. We’re still half an hour out, but they might be searching the skies to make sure they don’t get unwanted attention.”

Hunter turned on the cloaking. It was still in an experimental phase and only worked about fifty percent of the time. He had to hope it would work now.

Cleo hummed with excited energy as they traveled, and Hunter loved to see her so passionate about her work. She never got like this around the paperwork. Most days, it seemed she was going through the motions, and making sure everyone else was happy, while neglecting herself.

It wounded Hunter to think of Cleo being miserable. He could make her happy, he just knew it. If only she’d drop her guard and let him in. She was fighting some demon she wouldn’t reveal, and until she killed that, he wasn’t sure she’d ever let him get close.

Hunter concentrated on the ship’s controls, counting down the minutes until they reached their destination.

He took the ship lower as they got to the planet, until they were coasting beneath the clouds, then set the ship down on a bare patch of scrubland.

“Let’s do this.” Cleo was out of her seat and striding toward the docking ramp. There was a bounce in her step Hunter hadn’t seen for a long time. He grinned. He was looking forward to having fun with his little human.

They collected their equipment and opened the docking ramp.

Hunter went out first and scanned around using night vision goggles, looking for threats. As he anticipated, the place was deserted. This wasn’t a tropical paradise planet you’d want to set up home on, but a land of gray bleakness, harsh winds, and unstable plate tectonics. Just perfect for a scumbag race like the Siblet to run their creepy experiments.

They took a few minutes to look around using night scopes and ran location scans to get an accurate picture of their surroundings.

“I’m getting the same results,” Cleo said as she lifted her night vision goggles. “The bulk of the activity is located in the east quadrant.”

Hunter lifted his head and breathed in deep. His muscles tightened. “Something is coming.” He pulled his weapon from his holster.