Eden's Children (Earth Exiles Book 2) Read Free Page A

talker.
    Murph was Staff Sergeant Patrick Murphy in his previous life, a big man when he had been lifting weights, but a lot of that mass had disappeared in the intervening months.  He was dark as mahogany, and his previously shaved head had hair cropped short.  Murphy was a college linebacker and Joseph was a bouncer in Arkansas before they joined the Air Force.  Murphy was from Detroit, and Joseph was a big, blond, corn fed southern boy.  They used to be big men, with large, muscled chests and arms, though a bit soft around the middle.  They were a lot thinner now, lean muscle replacing the bulky muscle they’d once had.
    Mike, Everett and Tom started down the steps.  Murph and Joseph stayed on the wall.  Once they arrived at the bottom, Michelle walked past them.  Michelle had been a Senior Airman in the security police.
    “Hey Michelle, where’s Rob at?” Mike asked.
    “Don’t know, not my day to watch him,” she answered.
    Trevino was athletic, attractive, with long dark hair, Hispanic.  She and Rob were an item at the moment.  Mike wasn’t sure how long that would last.  Michelle didn’t take any crap from Rob, and he was notorious for his roving eye.  In the compound, that could be bad, since men outnumbered women.  Michelle kept Rob on a short leash, though.  A combination of indifference and passion kept him off balance.  It seemed to work.  Rob wasn’t used to women being indifferent to him.  The team put pressure on Rob to curb his roving eye as well, knowing that things could go bad quickly.
    Mike walked over to Matki, “Hey Matki, how are you doing?”
    Matki grinned, “I am doing well, my friend.”
    “You timed that one kind of close.  The Ancient was here a few minutes before you came back.”
    “You should watch that.  One slip, and it’s all over,” Tom pointed out.
    Matki waved off Tom’s concern, “I am too fast and too smart for that.”
    Everett walked up, “I’m pretty sure that’s what you thought when we first met.  Those grasnigs had other ideas though.”
    Matki’s face grew grim as he thought about their first meeting.  Matki made his appearance to the team with two ugly beasts called grasnigs chasing him.  The grasnigs were fur covered lizards, with hard, curved parrot-like beaks.  They were fast runners, and would have chased him down if Mickey hadn’t jumped in between them wearing mech armor, killing them and saving Matki.
    Matki replied, “That was a tough time, my friend.  There was danger everywhere.” Matki gestured to include them all, “You had stirred up the entire forest.  There was so much noise it was very hard to hear them.”
    Mike grinned, “So you’re saying it was our fault.”
    Matki grinned back.  Then his expression turned serious, “Of course it was.  It certainly wasn’t mine.”
    The team’s unique sense of humor had rubbed off on Matki.  Sarcasm had been hard for him to understand at first, but with his grasp of English, and the year he had spent with them, he was quickly beginning to master the concept.  He was also beginning to understand Texas Hold’em as well.  Too well, in fact, to the dismay of the team.
    “Well, Matki, what’s going on out there?” Everett asked.
    Matki motioned towards the back of the little courtyard behind the compound wall and started walking.  The trio kept up.
    “How far did you run?” Mike asked.
    “I had to run for a while.  I upset one of the dragon females.  She thought I was too close to her eggs.”
    “Were you?” Everett asked.
    That irrepressible grin crossed Matki’s face again, “Of course I was.  I got lucky though. The Ancient was coming out as I was coming in.  She had other things to worry about.”
    Everett, Mike, and Tom exchanged glances.  They couldn’t imagine being out there without mech armor on, not with two dragons in the area.  Matki was a formidable man, his short stature notwithstanding.  He didn’t even take a rifle out with him.  His