I pointed at the hogan.
Whoosh! The warrior raced over to it and vanished inside.
General Jones popped in with an enormous gray Tabor perched on his shoulder.
Gee. Monument Valley was suddenly a popular place.
“Grampa Bey!” Oola hopped up and down on my head. “Me lost mama.”
The Tabor jumped off the General’s shoulder and scurried over to me. “You were told not to leave the nursery, Oola.”
“Me was hungry.”
“Bey will stay with you until we have the situation under control,” General Jones stated and teleported away.
Like I needed a guard? I stared down at Gramps. What did one say to a Tabor? Did I talk about the weather? Ask about his family? Did he consider Earth spiders kinfolk?
“I was raised in a jungle and find Arizona extremely barren. My family is doing well. Comparing us to Earth spiders is like comparing humans to apes.” Bey’s tongue shot out and snagged a fly.
“Oh. Okay. So, not to be rude or anything, but do you spin webs like our spiders?”
“We do.” Bey crawled up my chest. “Would you like a demonstration?”
“No! That won’t be necessary.” I gingerly touched his leg. “Uh. If I have to fight, you’re kinda in the way.”
Bey moved to my shoulder. “Better?”
Before I could think of a good answer, the crawlies hit me. I groaned when ten red dune buggies appeared out of a cloud of dust. Each had a machine gun mounted on top of the roll cage. The roar of their engines was deafening.
“Those humans wish to capture you and seem unaware that your mate is nearby,” Bey commented.
“The Red Kings are a few fries short of a happy meal.”
“You need to summon your mate,” Bey added.
I snorted. “Not a chance. They’re mine.”
“We warriors,” Oola chirped.
“And I don’t need a penis to kick ass.” I raised my arms and chanted, “Sepulcrum ibidem solus novum. Vem Hum. Domum rotundam!”
A bank of black clouds gathered overhead. Bolts of multi-colored lightning erupted in the cloud-shrouded sky. Cracks of thunder reverberated off the buttes.
Bey wrapped his legs around my neck. “What are you doing female?”
“The name is CeeCee and, duh, I’m summoning a storm.” The wind plucked impatiently at my hair as I shouted, “Miraculin. Vivtorie construxit!”
An enormous rain bomb dropped from the clouds and hit the dune buggies like a sledgehammer. I caught brief glimpses of the vehicles flipping end over end.
“Wheeee. This fun,” Oola cried.
The outflow winds pelted us with sand and debris. I ducked several flying branches.
“You and Kaylee have much in common, you both act without thinking,” Bey sniped as he webbed a slew of tumbleweeds rolling toward us.
Jake growled in my head, “Now the entire galaxy knows what you’re capable of.”
“I am a police officer. It’s my job to stop bad guys and I will not apologize for doing that.”
“Kill the storm, buttercup.”
“Crisito deo ojo mirabilis visio.”
The clouds dissipated revealing turquoise skies. Wrecked dune buggies littered the valley. The Red King thugs hung limply in their safety harnesses. Huh? They actually buckled up.
Bey resembled a drowned rat.
Oola giggled madly. “Wheeee. Do again. Do again.”
“You okay Bey?” I wiped the muddy red dirt off my face.
“No. I am not.” Black fangs erupted from Bey’s soggy fur. “You are a menace.”
I glared at him. “And you aren’t bullet proof. Those dune buggies were armed with machine guns.”
“I would have stopped them,” Bey retorted.
“From two miles away? I don’t think so. Why don’t you join your Coletti friends in the hogan and stay the hell away from me?”
“I cannot.”
“Why not?”
“I am to guard you against further kidnapping attempts,” Bey replied.
“Can you stop a transporter beam?”
Bey climbed on top of my head. “No. Where you go, I go.”
Fuck. It was like wearing a thirty-pound fur hat. For a moment, I considered zapping the old fart, but I didn’t want to hit Oola.
“Your display impressed Sariel and now he wants permission for his warriors to court Dragos females,” General Jones groused.
Ooops. “That other Askole warrior is Sariel, the Askole High Commander?”
“He is.”
“Well, color me surprised. Anyone got handcuffs? We need to arrest the Red Kings before they can rabbit.”
“Stay put, we’ll handle them,” Jake ordered.
I gave him a mental salute. “Yes, sir.”
General Jones, Jake and four Coletti warriors teleported to the wrecked vehicles. They quickly cuffed the thugs while Trayon and Sariel zipped after the ones making a run for it. In a very short time, sixteen Red Kings had been arrested and transported back to Zarek’s warbird.
I mentally scanned the area. How was Cantor going to react to his henchmen being arrested?
Jake teleported over to us and smirked. “I see you’ve met Bey.”
“Yes, I have, and unless you want me to zap his furry ass, you’ll get him off my head.”
“Who that?” Oola wanted to know.
I shifted one of Bey’s legs and looked. Officer Yellowhorse was speeding down the dirt road in an official Navajo Police Department jeep. “That’s a Navajo police officer.”
“What he do?”
“He protects our people from bad men,” I said.
“Like Grampa and my daddy do?”
“Yes.”
Officer Yellowhorse pulled the jeep to an abrupt stop and eyed Bey warily. “Lily Begay called to report an intruder.”
“It’s been handled, and the Askole will pay for the damages,” Jake said before I could answer.
Yellowhorse nodded and pointed to the wrecked dune buggies. “Those belong to the Red Kings.”
I smiled. “They did. The Red Kings are in custody.”
A pleased smile crossed Yellowhorse’s face. “Good to know.” His smile faded. “Johona Claw asked that you call her. She might have information on the alien killer.”
“Is she smoking peyote again?”
Yellowhorse shrugged. “She claims it’s her right as a shaman.”
“Shaman, my ass. I’ll call her when I get time. Any problems I need to know of?”
“Billy Nez was arrested again for stealing sheep and there was a bad accident on Route 160 at milepost 150. The idiot was doing over a hundred miles an hour when he hit a pothole, lost control, and plunged off a cliff. The medic said the victim’s in
