Shielder — A new Science Fiction Romance (Book 1, Shielder Series) Read Online Free PDF Page A

suppose the Controllers have a
galaxy-wide sanction out for your capture? One with a reward of
five thousand miterons attached?"
    At the mention of the Controllers, a shiver
racked Nessa's body. Nathan wasn't unaffected either; apprehension
flitted across his face, but rapidly changed to arrogance. "Just a
little misunderstanding, McKnight. I'll be free very quickly.
You'll regret the day you crossed my path."
    "I'll have no regrets when you suffer a
slow, painful death," McKnight growled. Grabbing Nessa's arm, he
pivoted and marched toward the end of the corridor, dragging her
with him, heedless of her stumbling gait.
    "Getting pretty desperate, aren't you?"
Nathan sneered after them. "I didn't think females were your type.
She's pretty scrawny, but she doesn't look like a boy to me."
    McKnight stiffened. He held his silence, but
sped their pace. Breathless, Nessa noted two more brig cubicles as
she bumped along behind him. A prison ship! This must be a
Controller prison ship. Which confirmed McKnight was one of their
designated agents.
    He halted before the panel next to the
airlock, the same one he had demanded she enter when they boarded
the ship. "You still need to go through decontamination, along with
your possessions. All of them. Wait here." Whirling, he strode back
down the corridor, entering the area Nessa had just vacated.
    Having never experienced decontamination,
she stared at the panel warily. A flashing light a few feet to the
right of the panel drew her attention to a computer screen inset in
the wall. The screen displayed a spacescape. Curious, she touched
the screen. Instantly the image rippled, replaced by a gallery of
holograms. Faces—rows of faces. Beneath each hologram were listed
physical characteristics of each person, their last-known location,
and the reward offered for their capture and delivery to the
Controller prison base on Alta. At the bottom of the screen, a map
depicted the entire quadrant, with flashing cursors on the
last-known locations.
    The full implication of the data hit Nessa
just as the panel down the corridor slid open. Frozen with horror,
she stared at McKnight coming toward her, the heavy plexishield
case containing Turi resting easily on one arm.
    The prisoner in the brig, the computer
information, McKnight's sense of urgency, all pointed to one thing.
He wasn't just a designated Controller agent. No, he was something
far worse.
    This man was a shadower. A bounty
hunter.
    And in this quadrant so cruelly ruled by the
Controllers, Shielders were those most frequently hunted.
     

CHAPTER THREE
     
    Holding the lanrax against her chest, Nessa
rocked back and forth on the bench. She buried her face against the
creature's midnight blue fur as it chattered softly. Observing the
decontamination chamber from the cockpit viewer, Chase was oddly
reminded of a mother and child. Preposterous. The lanrax was an
animal, not an infant.
    Yet as he watched the seemingly mutual
exchange of comfort, Nessa's frantic plea echoed in his mind. You don't understand…he's all I have! A vision of her eyes,
huge and dark in her pale face, flashed before him; eyes that had
briefly opened a doorway into a well of loneliness and pain.
    He knew pain when he saw it. Knew it
intimately.
    How it felt, more shattering than a laser
blast to the gut. How it tasted, the bitterness of despair and
impotence. How it smelled—most especially how it smelled; rancid
fear, charred and decaying flesh. How it looked, contorting
once-beautiful faces as death's merciless claws ripped the soul
from the body.
    Chase leaped from his seat and pivoted away
from the images on the view screen—and in his mind. This ragtag
pilgrim was of no concern to him. The whole universe was filled
with unfortunates. He had no time for any of them.
    Yet Nessa's mutilated leg, her seizures, her
obvious poverty, continued to haunt him. He'd been tempted to
jettison her tunic, a pitiful excuse for even a rag, along with her
boots, which were