Genus: Unknown Adaptation by Kaitlyn O'Connor Read Free Book Online Page A

thoughts and indignation that she thought they were incapable of defending themselves. It was difficult to follow her undisciplined mind for her thoughts leapt from one thing to another and back again at almost dizzying speed. It was the same with the other female, Sissy-except worse. It was easier to follow the thoughts of the males, but he had never had much interest in their thoughts-which only seemed to alternate between mating and whatever their business was at any given moment.
    Images flickered through Kate's mind of him and his pod mates cowering in a corner while the security team blasted them with their fire sticks and then a new image took the place of that where they were running and beams of fire were tracking their paths. Then that image was replaced with them leaping upon the humans and tearing at them with their teeth and hands.
    Those images were insulting in another way entirely, but they disturbed him on another level, as well.
    She still perceived them as beasts, even though he knew that she had realized that they were not. Despite the great care they had taken to prevent the human's 'eyes' from recording anything that might give them away, Kate had seen images on her machine that did. He had 'heard' her thoughts. She knew they were not mindless beasts!
    Why was it that she still imagined them as such?
    Not that he was above using whatever weapon he had at his disposal to protect himself. He could not use
    'things' as her people did. He had to rely upon his physical superiority for defense. He saw nothing wrong with it, but she did.
    It angered him. He had known that she would not receive him as a mate unless he convinced her that he was just as she was. That had always been the way of his clan. It was necessary to complete the gathering to align themselves in any case, but they had always gathered from the beasts of Mother Ra before, creatures far below them in intelligence that had abilities worth collecting. With them, it was easy enough to pass themselves off as being the same.
    The mating he had set his mind on would not be accomplished, he realized, if Kate knew what he was. It would not be enough to appear the same and align himself so that her body would be able to nurture his seed.
    Despite the fact that she had appeared to accept them and even to care about them-for she had nurtured them when they had needed it, protected them from real harm-she believed they were inferior beasts.
    He was so angry at that discovery that he almost missed the leap of her thoughts in another direction.
    She had, in fact, been vocalizing for some moments before her thoughts caught his attention once more and, at that, it was the emotion that caught his attention rather than the thoughts themselves.
    His heart leapt at the discovery that she was to be moved to the 'surface'-when he discovered what that meant. The rest of her thoughts confused him, but he realized finally that she was afraid because they meant to
    'detain' her on the surface and that it had something to do with punishment because she had tried to prevent the security team from slaying them.
    Rage and fear poured through him with the understanding that punishment meant harm. He did not know what kind of harm they had in mind, but he would not allow it. He was so unsettled by that discovery and the instinctive urge to rush to protect her at once, that it took all he could do to restrain himself and consider the situation.
    They would not harm her here. That would come once she had been taken to the surface and since he and the others must find a way down to the world below anyway, then he would need to wait. As little as he liked that idea, an attempt now would most likely result in failure and death.
    Closing his mind to Kate with an effort, he focused on trying to locate Dae and Rak within the space station. He did not think he would have been successful except that he discovered that they were also trying to locate him. After waiting until the corridor