Page 1 of BaOBy

Chapter One

BaOBy

BaOBy lay on his stomach. He was on the roof—hidden among the plants in the owner’s rooftop garden—watching the building across the street.

He’d been up here for hours. Days really. Any moment he could spare, he crawled onto the roof to keep an eye on her. He’d seen enough to know she was in trouble, but not what that trouble was or how to help. Bao wasn’t even sure what she looked like other than she had blonde hair and graceful movements, but that didn’t matter.

He was lucky several of the nearby plants were tall enough to block the sun. It didn’t get too hot when he was up here. But it was monotonous. He didn’t know why he kept coming back.

That was a lie. He knew why he was here. And he wasn’t happy with the answer.

BaOBy turned onto his back and closed his eyes. He was tired. When he wasn’t here, watching over her, he was following the Andaran. With the help of his brothers, he’d figured out that this man was in charge of the planet. Ruling as if he were a king or an emperor. Anything the Andaran said became law.

That was new. Bao figured the last time they stopped on Viant was about six years ago. At that time, the island was governed by committee. That was how most planets within the Galactic Alliance were regulated. Lots of checks and balances and group votes. The Father had a high-level position in Galactic politics. But he didn’t agree with some of their policies, so he created the Band of Brothers to… interfere when things went bad. To right the wrongs. He was pretty sure the Father would think this was wrong.

At some point, everything had changed on Viant. Bao could see the differences, and they weren’t good. Gone were the cheerful smiles and the feeling that people were doing exactly what they wanted to do. Viant had once been prosperous and free. It wasn’t anymore.

What BaOBy saw from his perch on the roof or when he walked the streets at night—was misery. No one was happy or healthy. They weren’t doing what they wanted, but what they were told. The Andaran drugged the very air they breathed to keep everyone compliant. Besides misery and the drugged stupor throughout the city, there was an undercoating of fear.

Bao didn’t like what he saw, what he heard, or what he felt. This was all wrong.

As the first of twenty cloned brothers, he had the most patience. He could sit up here for as long as it took to figure things out or follow the Andaran for a year to get answers. Something told him it was important. So, he’d sent the DoMicile into space without him. Kept just a few of the brothers with him because of their specialties. Now Bao waited—and watched.

When the Father created him, he infused BaOBy’s soul with a touch of every psychic ability and magical essence known. The Father soon realized this overloaded his senses and made him flawed.

All the BoBs looked the same, with two exceptions—the tattoo on their right arm and the color of their skin. They were humanoid with the addition of other species’ DNA that was intended to make them stronger… smarter… in many ways—magical. After overloading Bao’s psyche, the Father gave each brother a restricted mix of abilities and strengthened the emotional resilience in the later models. Each of his nineteen brothers received only one major ability and a few minor ones. He had them all.

Yet each of them had what Earther mythology referred to as an Achilles heel. It was different in each one, but they all had something that would sap their strength—that made them weak. Weakness could be fatal if not controlled.

Because the Father created Bao first, he had many weaknesses. But his major failing was the inability to walk away from injustice. And everywhere he looked on Viant, someone was being held against their will or being forced to do something they didn’t want to do. He couldn’t save everybody unless he took out the primary source of this misery.

Which meant he didn’t have time to concentrate his efforts on the house across the road.

But because the Father engineered BaOBy with ALL the master abilities, he could do a little of everything. He saw their future if he didn’t help. He felt every violation of their bodies—and every death—as if it were his own. What he struggled with at the moment was seeing what he could do to change their future.

He was getting a headache. If he didn’t stop running scenarios in his head, his nose would bleed. He knew he was more emotional than the others. All this misery… hurt him. Bao was also more dependent on routine than his brothers. He was more fragile than all of them. Sighing, he shifted his body, trying to get more comfortable. Something was digging into his upper back.

Bao took a deep breath. The overly sweet scent of the Viant Violeta reminded him that the Andaran drugged the air. While he had some natural immunity, it was obvious it wasn’t enough. Bao sent a mental call out to his brothers. Warning them all about how the scent made him doubt himself. He asked that they search the hover for re-breathers or find something in the markets they could adapt to filter the air. It seemed the longer they were on this planet, the more the scent affected them.

He needed to refocus. To forcefully push away his faults and remember what made him strong. They definitely needed air filtration.

One thing he was most proud of… was captaining their ship. The DoMicile was not just their home—it was their livelihood. Bao enjoyed managing the ship, the men, and the jobs they took. Homesickness overwhelmed him. He missed his ship and his brothers. Along the mental connection that tied them all together, he knew ReBOrB was worried about the woman he’d gone to rescue. Time had runout, and they planned to escape tonight. But Reb was concerned she hadn’t recuperated enough. Even though she’d been in the Viant Health Center for many days.

It was the same number of days he’d been on this roof. Bao reinforced his belief that Reb would figure it out. He wouldn’t allow the damn drug to take him down.

At the rustle of fabric, Bao’s eyes snapped open. He resisted the urge to sit up, trying to pinpoint the intruder’s location. His body trembled—his mating marks itched.

“I thought you were a prisoner,” he whispered. Bao couldn’t resist taking a deep breath, this time seeking the scent of his mate.

Catalina

She’d been a prisoner on this planet for years. Some of those years hadn’t been bad. Catalina had done the work she loved and been treated well. Not great. But she hadn’t been beaten. Or raped.

In the beginning, they gave her food to eat and a private, tiny room of her own. Her first owner listened when she told him she had trouble sleeping at night. Suggesting that if he gave her a room with a bed, a lamp, and a desk… she could work when she couldn’t sleep.

When her old master was forced to give her to the Andaran, her preference for working late into the night was seen as a benefit. So, nothing changed but the man holding her captive and the location of her room.

The Andaran gave her the title of assistant, but she was his slave. Cat started working for him before he came into power. Before he systematically destroyed the fifteen men who made up Viant’s Ruling Committee.

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