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33
TORUS
Torus began to feel like something was wrong halfway through ordering breakfast.
“Two café con leches and…” he trailed off.
“Yes, Sir?” the café worker asked respectfully. She was a small human female—even smaller than Molly. Her blue eyes had gone huge when Torus had first ducked into the door of El Guyo de Orro—The Golden Rooster—but she hadn’t asked any questions except what she could get him.
Now, however, Torus was finding it hard to concentrate. Something was wrong—he could feel it in the back of his head. It was like an alarm going off faintly but growing in volume little by little.
“Will that be all?” the café worker asked, looking up at him.
“I’m sorry—give me a minute please.”
Abruptly, Torus turned and walked out of the small café, ducking his head as he went through the door to avoid a collision with the doorframe.
Once outside and away from the loud Latin-flavored music that had been blaring in the café, he was able to concentrate and “hear” more clearly. Yes, something was definitely wrong. He could feel a sense of something coming from Molly—a sense of what, though? Whatever it was, it wasn’t good, Torus thought. He was too far from her—right on the edge of the TET’s range—he needed to get closer to feel what was really going on.
Rapidly, he walked down the beach away from the colorful little shack that housed the café. As he headed towards the bungalow, the feeling of unease got stronger. The closer he got, the stronger it grew. Something was wrong with Molly!
As soon as he got within sending range, he started trying to contact her.
“Molly, can you hear me? Little bird, are you all right?” he sent as loudly as he could. But he couldn’t hear any reply from Molly—nothing but the sense of wrongness that was growing every moment with every step he took closer to the bungalow.
The little Cuban café was only about a mile down the beach from their bungalow—a short walk for someone with legs as long as Torus’s. He had been moving swiftly but now he began to run—his strides eating up the distance rapidly.
As he ran, he kept calling.
“Molly? Molly can you hear me? Answer me, sweetheart—please!”
But there was no answer. In fact, he got a strong feeling that she had retreated somehow—maybe back behind the mental wall that Commander Sylvan had instructed them to build when he had first fitted them with the TET devices. The sense of wrongness, however, grew ever stronger until it was eating him like acid. Words were pounding in his brain with every step he ran.
Something’s wrong with Molly! Why can’t I reach her? Oh Goddess, let me get to her—let her be all right!
Torus saw the open door of the bungalow and heard the shouting of a human male’s voice almost at the same time. He put on a burst of speed and rushed into the cool dim exterior of the small house, determined to find out what was wrong with his Mate.
“Get out here, you bitch!” The male’s voice sounded familiar. There was a thud! and the sound of a door rattling in its frame. “Get out here and answer my questions!”
Torus felt the Rage come over him at once as he realized what was going on. Some human male had Molly trapped and he was trying to get to her—trying to hurt her or wound her in some way!
A curtain of bloody red dropped over Torus’s vision and a roar came from his throat as he rushed into the small hallway where the sounds were coming from.
The human male—it was the same one that had followed them the day before—looked up as Torus rushed at him. His eyes went from narrow and angry—filled with a mean kind of glee—to wide and frightened in an instant. He didn’t waste time trying to explain, instead, he turned and ran down the narrow hallway, which looped back into the food prep area,
Torus rushed after him, but his height was a detriment. The smaller human male was able to maneuver through the doorways without ducking his head—a move which cost Torus precious time. Before he knew it, the human male was out the back door and on his way to an Earth vehicle which was parked not far from the bungalow.
Torus still might have caught him if not for the shifting sands. The loose sand slid under his feet and the human was able to make it into his car and slam the door before Torus got to him.
Undeterred, Torus made a fist and pounded on the top of the car. It was one of those expensive vehicles he’d heard humans call a “sports car” but it was made of flimsy material. His first punch nearly caved the whole roof it. His second punch finished the job, making a huge hole.
“Hey, man—my car!” the human male who Torus now recognized as Mandrew Pate whined. “It’s a fucking Maserati—you can’t do this!”
“Watch me!” Torus growled and punched the driver’s side window. The safety glass was a tougher material—but it had been made to withstand collisions, not an encounter with an angry Giant Kindred in Rage. The glass spiderwebbed into a hundred tiny cracks and then shattered on his third or fourth punch.
Torus reached into the vehicle and grabbed the human male by the front of his shirt.
“Leave me alone!” The human tried to pull away. He was fumbling with the controls of his vehicle. “Let me go!”
