Coletti Warlords: Reality Bites Read Online Free PDF Page A

send all of them there, but I could whittle down their numbers a bit. I quickly typed the coordinates into the transporter controls and hit the Send button.
    On the monitor, I watched the glittering blue beams take Jaylan and seven of his men to the land of the midnight sun. Hey, it was summer. They wouldn’t freeze. Too much.
    “You only delay the inevitable,” Jaylan snarled, fighting to stand in hurricane-strength winds.
    “Your defeat is inevitable, not mine.” I know it wasn’t real smart to keep taunting him, but it was sure a lot of fun. Plus, if I got him riled enough, he’d make a mistake.
    Boom! The building shuddered violently, and the power died.
    Well, damn. Time for the low-tech approach.
    The emergency lights came on.
    I hurried over to the armory and strapped on a pistol.
    His voice a menacing purr, Jaylan warned, “You injure any of my warriors, and I will make you watch as I kill the commander of Earth First.”
    My blood turned to ice. “You’ll never catch him.”
    “We tracked the transporter beam, and we now have the location of your Texas base.”
    Fear curled into me like a living thing. “You’re bluffing.”
    “I never bluff.”
    Shit. He probably didn’t. Grabbing a cell phone from the armory, I turned it on, but nothing happened. I tried another and another.
    “Your communication devices will not work.”
    Fuck. I had to warn Pops, but getting out of here wasn’t going to be easy. Grabbing a backpack, I stuffed it with smoke canisters, stun grenades, tranquilizer guns, and my newest addition, skunk bombs. They were guaranteed to clear a building within seconds.
    “You will immediately surrender to my warriors.”
    “Surrender is not an option.” I put a gas mask on and scanned the area. Crap, they were almost on me.
    “You have no choice.”
    “Wanna bet?” I clipped a bio jammer on my belt.
    The reinforced metal door shuddered violently. Jaylan’s warriors were good, but I was better. I pushed the timer on a skunk bomb.
    Bam! The door buckled, and I caught a glimpse of the smirking warriors.
    Flipping them the bird, I put the bomb on the command console and ran into the escape tunnel. The door slid shut behind me.
    Ten seconds later, a loud cracking pop sounded.
    “Wait for it. Wait for it.” The sounds of violent puking had me doing a happy dance. My eau-de-dead-skunk bomb worked like a charm.
    Jaylan’s dangerous voice rang in my head. “What did you do to my warriors?”
    “Me? I never laid a finger on them.” The sensation of a thousand burning fireflies suddenly boiled across my mind. My Siren senses only reacted this way when a horde of Tai-Kok came calling.
    Clutching my head, I fought back the growing agony. I had to focus. Central Command needed to know how many ships were coming. Fuck. If I dropped my shields for any length of time, Jaylan would own me, but if I didn’t, how many innocent people would die? Would the other Sirens sense them in time? We were Earth’s first line of defense. We kept the human race from becoming an all-you-can-eat banquet.
    Brutal images hammered my mind: Phoenix’s once-vibrant downtown area an incinerated ruin. Smoke billowing from the skeletal remains of skyscrapers. The screams of panic-stricken people and the moans of the dying. Butchered corpses littered the blood-soaked streets. A Tai-Kok ripping chunks from a child’s body.
    A sob caught in my throat. “Stop!”
    “You are a Siren. It is your duty to protect your people,” the warlord stated coldly.
    “Bastard. I know my duty, but I won’t be your broodmare.”
    “You would let them slaughter your people?”
    God, no. I still had nightmares about their attack on Phoenix, and the prick knew it. As much as I hated to admit it, he was right. I couldn’t take the chance of them getting through our defenses. “Stay out of my head, and let me do my job.”
    “You are my mate, and it is my duty to protect you.”
    The burning sensation grew stronger and stronger. The