Birthright: Book I of the Temujin Saga Read online

  The stranger placed a hand on Alex’s shoulder. It was warm, far too warm. “Are you okay?”

  Alex recoiled from the man’s touch, his eyes focused on the glowing wound.

  “What?” The stranger looked down at his shirt. “Oh, this? No biggie.”

  Slowly, the stranger passed his hand over the hole and, when he pulled away, the wound was gone; even the cloth was seamlessly mended.

  “There.” The man smiled. “That’s better.”

  Alex pressed his back flatter against the wall and stared at the shirt.

  “What’s the matter, kid?”

  “Wh-who are you?” asked Alex. “What are you?”

  “Who am I?” The man seemed taken aback by the question. “You don’t know?”

  “I don’t think he does,” said another voice from the back of the alley.

  Alex flinched and looked toward the source of the voice just as two more men stepped out of the shadows. These men, like the first when he initially appeared, were entirely dry; their clothes were just beginning to show signs of moisture as the rain fell on them. The man on the right was dressed in khaki cargo shorts, a white T-shirt covered by an unbuttoned blue short-sleeved over-shirt, and scuffed white sneakers. He had an athletic build and his medium-length blond hair was a jumbled mess. Black sunglasses covered his eyes.

  The dark-skinned man to the left was dressed in blue jeans, a black T-shirt, black leather boots, and a red and black leather jacket. His tight, curly hair was cut short. He sported the slightest growth of beard, light stubble lining his strong jaw. Unlike the other two strangers, he appeared to be older, possibly in his early to mid-thirties.

  The older man extended a hand to Alex, who hesitated before taking it, and helped him to his feet. His smoky eyes surveyed the boy’s face.

  “He doesn’t seem to have any clue who we are,” he said finally.

  “Well, how can that be, Lomaant?” asked the rescuer in the gray shirt.

  “I don’t know, Mo,” Lomaant answered.

  The blond man removed his glasses and looked at Alex with deep blue eyes. “You look like road kill run over twice, kid.”

  Lomaant began brushing mud and litter from Alex’s clothes. “You’re a real jerk, Samrai. You know that?”

  Samrai shrugged.

  Lomaant picked a wad of chewing gum from Alex’s pants and flicked it at Samrai, who sidestepped it with casual annoyance.

  Alex felt claustrophobic between the three strangers. The heat radiating off their bodies was making him dizzy. “Who are you guys?”

  “We’re your backup,” said Lomaant.

  “My what?” Alex looked back and forth from one man to another.

  “Why doesn’t he know who we are?” asked Mo again. “I mean, we know all about him.”

  Samrai put his sunglasses back on. “Well, we’ve only been marinating in his brain for the past thirteen years, genius. Of course we know who he is.”

  His brain? Surely he hadn’t heard that. His head was pounding. The alley went dark as Alex’s eyelids fluttered and he fell, limp as a boned fish. Lomaant caught him and lowered him to the ground gently.

  Samrai scoffed, “Got the heart of a lion, this one.”

  Lomaant crouched beside Alex and checked his pulse. “He’s all right. He just fainted.”

  “We might as well pack our bags and go home right now,” said Samrai.

  “That’s not an option!” Lomaant stood and plucked Samrai’s glasses off his face to look him in the eyes. “I won’t hear any more of that talk from you. Got that?”

  Samrai snatched his glasses back. He waited until Lomaant turned his back and stuck out his tongue.

  Mo ran his fingers through his hair, spiking it. “Well, what do we do now?”

  Lomaant knelt beside Alex. “Help me pick him up.”

  “Why?” Samrai turned and walked toward the end of the alley. “You’re not crippled.”

  Mo sighed. “I’ve got him.” He crouched and grabbed the unconscious boy’s ankles. “So what’s the plan, boss?”

  Lomaant lifted the boy by the shoulders and led the way out of the alley. “We have to get him out of here before somebody comes looking for the person that kicked the tar out of Baxter and his pals.”

  As they walked, Mo tilted his head back and closed his eyes, letting the rain stream down his face. “Man, this rain feels good.”

  “Yeah,” said Lomaant. “A little cold, though.”

  Chapter Eight

  Alex opened his eyes and was instantly blinded by the light over his bed. He closed his eyes and pulled the Transformers comforter over his head. Bright spots swam across the insides of his eyelids.

  “Oh, thank God,” he said. “It was all a dream. I didn’t really spaz out in front of Crystal Hammond.”

  “No. That, you did do.”

  Alex ripped the covers back and saw the blond man from the alley, Samrai, lounging in a beanbag chair across the room.

  “Y-you!”

  Samrai gave him a thumbs up. “Nice sheets.”

  “How did I get here?”

  “We carried you,” said a voice to his left.

  Alex turned. The older man, Lomaant, leaned against the wall and gazed out the window at the falling rain. The leather jacket he had been wearing was gone.

  He turned to look at Alex. “How are you feeling?”

  “I’m okay.” He rubbed his side tenderly. “My ribs hurt, though.”

  “You sustained a lot of bruises,” Lomaant explained. “But nothing’s broken. They also loosened a couple of your teeth, but I wouldn’t worry about it. You were lucky.”

  “Yeah, lucky,” said Alex despondently. “If you consider freaking out while your dream girl is trying to kiss you lucky.”

  Lomaant shrugged. “I wouldn’t worry too much about that either.”

  “Sure.” Alex rested his back against the headboard. “You wouldn’t. You’re not the one who has to explain what happened.”

  “No.” Samrai examined a broken digital clock radio he found in the wastebasket. “Mo’s doing that.”

  “What?” cried Alex. “He’s talking to Crystal?”

  “No.” Samrai rolled his eyes. He opened the radio and began to poke at the wires with his finger. “He’s talking to the cops and your parents.”

  “The cops?”

  “Well, sure,” said Lomaant. “We carried you out of an alley unconscious and bleeding. What did you expect would happen?”

  Alex covered his head with his pillow and groaned. “Oh, God, my life is over.”

  “Not so long as we’re around,” said Lomaant.

  Alex pulled the pillow away and stared at the man incredulously. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  Before Lomaant could answer, Samrai tossed the reassembled clock radio to Alex. “There you go, kid. Good as new.”

  Alex turned the radio over in his hands. “The display is broken on this. It just stopped telling time.”

  “Not anymore,” said Samrai. “Oh, and you’ll have clearer reception now. Your antenna wire was loose.”

  “But you didn’t use any tools.”

  Samrai shrugged and reached for the Xbox beside the television set. “You’re welcome.”

  Alex almost protested, but saw no point in it. The game system had broken down weeks ago and his father flatly refused to buy him another. He’d be mending fences and digging up rocks in the south pasture from now until New Year’s to pay for another one.

  He heard footsteps on the stairs, and a moment later, both Mo and Mrs. Walker stepped through the doorway. Mo gave Alex a knowing wink and leaned against the wall beside Samrai, who by now had taken the outer shell off the game system and was prodding the motherboard with his finger.

  “Alex, you’re awake!” Janice wrapped him up in her arms. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine, Mom.” Alex hugged her back carefully, wincing as she squeezed his ribs. “These guys saved me.”

  “Yes, I know.” Janice smil
ed. “I can’t thank you enough for everything you’ve done, Dr. Lamont.”

  Alex looked up at Lomaant. “Doctor?”

  Lomaant smiled. “He’s going to be just fine, Mrs. Walker. All of his wounds are superficial. He just needs rest.”

  Janice ran her fingers over her son’s buzzed hair, careful to avoid a bandage on the left side of his head. “Do you need anything, sweetheart?”

  “I could use a drink of water. My throat’s a little dry.”

  “Sure thing, sweetie.” Janice turned to the others in the room. “Can I get you boys anything?”

  “Water would be fine, Mrs. Walker,” said Lomaant.

  Mo nodded. “Same.”

  Samrai looked up from his work. “Got any beer?”

  Mo scowled at his brother and stomped on his foot.

  Samrai winced. “Water would be just lovely, ma’am.”

  She smiled and went downstairs.

  Alex waited until her footsteps faded away to ask the question that had been weighing heavily since he regained consciousness. “Who are you guys?”

  “I told you,” said Lomaant. “We’re your support.”

  “Support for what?”

  Mo and Lomaant exchanged glances for a moment before the latter answered. “We’re not entirely sure, to be honest.”

  “We were hoping you could tell us,” said Mo.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Alex shook his head. “Where did you guys come from?”

  “Replodia.” Samrai replaced the top of the game system and plugged it back in.

  “Rep— R—” Alex shook his head. “What?”

  “Replodia,” said Lomaant. “A planet located in what you would call the Sirius star system.”

  “Planet?” asked Alex. “Star system?”

  Samrai switched on the reassembled Xbox and began to play a game of Halo. “We’re aliens, kid.”

  “Wait…” Alex pointed at the television. “That was—”

  Sam cut him off with a dismissive wave. “Yeah, yeah. You’re welcome. Stay on task, kid. Aliens in your bedroom, remember?”

  “But you look just like humans,” said Alex.

  Lomaant was confused. “What else should we look like? Did we choose the wrong forms?”

  Choose? They chose their bodies? Then that meant….

  Alex pointed at Lomaant. “You stole those bodies! You killed humans for their bodies and took them over.”

  The visitors all stared at each other in stunned silence and then burst into raucous laughter.

  “Look, kid,” said Samrai, “if I wanted to steal someone’s body, I’d have found myself a smokin’ hot chick so that I could touch my own—”

  “Samrai!” Mo snapped, cutting his brother off.

  Samrai shrugged. “Well I would.”

  Lomaant walked toward Alex with his palms facing outward in a non-threatening gesture. “We haven’t stolen anything. These are our own bodies. We’re able to change our forms to best suit whatever environment we’re in… to blend in. That’s all. Look, Alex, all we know is that we’re here to back you up and will receive further instructions.”

  “From who?”

  “We don't know,” said Mo. “Our programming indicates there’s an underground facility somewhere nearby. Some kind of command center. We should find our answers there.”

  “Programming?” Alex finally left the safety of the covers to sit on the edge of the bed. “So, you’re, like, robots or something?”

  Samrai grimaced. “Don’t insult me, kid.”

  Lomaant sat on the bed. “Typically, Replodian operatives are purchased or leased by governments that require the use of our special ‘talents.’ We can be programmed to be medics, spies, scientists, assassins, soldiers, bounty hunters. The possibilities are practically limitless.”

  “So what does all of this have to do with me?” asked Alex.

  “If the government in question elects to purchase a Replodian in its larval stage, then the larvae require a host organism in which to grow until they reach maturity,” Lomaant explained. “This ensures that the larva will be able to adapt to the host’s environment properly. Apparently whoever purchased the three of us saw fit to implant us inside your body before you were born.”

  Alex’s stomach was doing somersaults. Inside his body?

  A moment later, Mrs. Walker reappeared with four tall glasses of ice water on a tray. The Replodians took their glasses and thanked her in turn; Samrai expressed his gratitude with a mere grunt.

  “It’s the least I can do for the men who rescued my baby boy,” she said.

  “Mom!” Alex whined. He was tired of being fussed over like an infant. “I’m thirteen. Just because some sweaty mouth breather and his trolls ganged up on me doesn’t mean I can’t take care of myself.”

  “Alex Walker!” exclaimed Janice. “Show a little appreciation.”

  “No, no, Mrs. Walker,” said Lomaant. “It’s fine. He’s right. The odds were simply stacked against him, that’s all. Mo only helped out a little.”

  Mo grinned. “You should have seen him. He knocked out the punk’s front tooth.”

  “Well…” Janice turned toward the door. “We’ll just see how tough Baxter Franklin is when the police come to his house and charge him with assault.”

  “Yeah,” Alex muttered. “That’ll help.”

  “I’ll be downstairs if you boys need anything else,” said Janice.

  The men listened for her footsteps to fade and — satisfied that she would not return — simultaneously plucked the ice cubes from their glasses and tossed them into the wastebasket. This simple unified act unnerved Alex enough that he jumped out of bed and started pacing.

  “So let me get this straight,” he said. “You guys are aliens?”

  “Sí,” said Samrai, returning to his game. “Yea-ah! Suck it, Red!”

  “And you’ve been sent here to help me fulfill some great purpose?”

  “Well…” Mo took a moment to down his drink in one long gulp and set down the glass. “We think so, at least.”

  “Our services don’t come cheap,” said Lomaant. “So it must be important.”

  “Why can I hear you in my head?”

  “We’ve been gestating inside your body since before you were born,” explained Lomaant. “We are all linked to you telepathically.”

  “So you can also hear me?”

  “Sure.”

  “Okay,” said Alex. “Prove it. What number am I thinking of?”

  Alex stretched out with his mind. ::Sixty-nine.::

  Samrai smirked. “Pervert.”

  Alex jumped and stared wide-eyed at the blond Replodian.

  “Oh, I’m sorry.” Samrai turned to fully face him and met his gaze. ::Pervert.::

  Alex took a step back and stumbled onto his bed.

  “Proof enough for you, kid?” asked Samrai.

  Alex nodded slowly. “You’re really telling the truth.”

  Mo and Lomaant nodded. Alex opened his mouth to say something but was cut short by his mother calling from the bottom of the stairs, “Alex, honey? Crystal’s here.”

  “Oh, no,” Alex hissed. “What am I going to do? What am I going to tell her?”

  Mo shrugged. “The truth?”

  Alex threw up his hands. “Oh, yeah, right! That’ll go over real well. ‘Hi, Crystal, these are my new friends from the planet Replodia. I only freaked out on you when you kissed me because they were talking to me from inside my head.’ You expect me to tell her that?”

  “Okay…” Samrai turned and pointed at Alex. “When you say it, it just sounds weird.”

  Mo shrugged again. “Hey, I never said exactly how much of the truth to tell her.”

  Lomaant slapped Alex on the back on his way to the door. “You’ll be fine. We’ll see you in the morning. We’ve got a busy day ahead of us, so get some rest.”

  Alex sat on the bed. “Right.”

  Mo grabbed Samrai by the collar and jerked him out of the b
eanbag chair. “Come on, dipstick. We’re leaving.”

  Samrai’s arms flailed as Mo dragged him from the room. “All right! All right! I’m coming!”

  Alex found himself alone with the ominous sound of Crystal’s soft footsteps ascending. He quickly wadded up his comforter so she wouldn’t see the design. Three raps on the doorframe signaled her arrival.

  “Knock knock.”

  “Hey! Come on in.”

  Crystal walked around the bed and winced as her eyes fell on his face.

  Alex’s shoulders slumped. “That bad, huh?”

  “Your eye looks like it really hurts.”

  He reached up and touched the flesh around his left eye. It was indeed bruised and swollen.

  “They kind of failed to mention that,” Alex grumbled.

  ::Sorry,:: said Lomaant’s voice in his mind. ::It’s really not as bad as she’s making it out to be.::

  ::Shut up,:: Alex hissed mentally. ::Just shut up!::

  Crystal sat on the bed next to him. “You really had me worried back there.”

  “Yeah. I’m sorry about that. Look, Crystal, there’s a perfectly rational explanation for why I ran off.”

  If only he could think of one that didn’t involve alien kung fu masters from the planet Replodia in the Cereal system.

  ::Sirius,:: Samrai corrected him.

  “I know,” said Crystal. “Your mom told me everything.”

  “She did?” said Alex, suddenly very nervous. “What did she say?”

  Crystal scooted a few inches closer to him. “She said that Baxter and his idiot friends were teasing you from the bushes and were saying all kinds of nasty things to you about us and that you went to chase them off.”

  “Oh,” said Alex. “Right. That’s exactly what I did. Those guys were driving me crazy.”

  Crystal took another not-so-subtle scoot in his direction. “She also said that when Baxter told you he was going to ‘do things’ to me that you knocked out one of his teeth.”

  Alex puffed up his chest at the mention of the one accomplishment he could actually take full credit for. “I sure did. I nailed him good.”