ALTERNATE TALES OF THE STAR FORCE

STAR BLAZERS—THE ENTROPY WARS

By: Frederick P. Kopetz

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CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: A PANIFUL TRIUMPH…

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The White Orchid (An Ancient R’Khell poem)

She will not be of our line of descent

Stranger from a distant world

But she comes from the Root of our People

Reluctant warrior; daughter of peace

Daughter of healing with fire in her hand

She is a new star arising from the darkness

Rising twice-over from the dust of death

Ascending from a cave of night to the stars

And sitting up alive from her funeral slab

She arises clad in her own light.

In the most desperate of hours

A Queenship born in blood and falling on her shoulders

The unwilling queen shall bring peace to many

And she shall reconcile many enemies

And mother many worlds

And complete and seal the work of this Line at last.

Then the fire leaves her breast for another new age

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I. IN THE COUNTRYLANDS…

Unknown Place

Unknown Time

Derek Wildstar lay on his bed on the Yamato weeping as he thought of Nova hanging on her cross below.

Yet, as he wept, he fell into a waking dream, and found he was with Nova in the Void; in the Matrix.

It was as if they were together in their cabin, and the room filled with a soft, white light.

Nova was under him on the bed, naked.

They were making love; Derek on top of her, careful for her swollen belly.

Derek could see their bed, and he could see Nova. As she threw her head back, gasping with delight as continued to love her while he played with her breasts, holding them and kissing her nipples, Nova’s voice came as a whisper in her mind as she touched his forehead. Derek looked on, seeing her gasp with pleasure as tiny lights began to appear on her naked body, making her look startlingly beautiful, making her look as if she was clad in star flies and nothing else.

Derek?

Nova? Derek thought back. He was pleasantly surprised when she smiled at him and gasped, “I heard you!”

“In your…head?”

Yes, my love…Nova sent back. We had a taste of this when we defeated Ekogaru the first time. This is what Paul and Aliscea felt. Except that our bond is deeper. It is now, and it always has been.

Why? Derek thought.

Nova sent back, My Derek, we already were two in one before this happened. We are so much a pair that this comforts me even as I hang here in pain and thirst. Do not worry about me. I am all right.

As their erotic and psychic bond grew even more intense, Derek was startled to see the bed and the ship fading away…and it felt as if they were flying.

“NOVA! What’s happening?”

He was safe and warm in her arms as they continued to make love in the Void, freed from the constraints of gravity. Nova smiled at him and said, “This is new to me but fun. Look! Wave to the ship…”

“Okay, he said.” Then, he thought, WAVE TO THE SHIP?

Of course, Nova thought back as she touched his nose and curled her toes as she grasped him and their lovemaking went on and on. We’re outside! And I have to take you somewhere!

“Nova...can they see us out here…uh…?”

“Doing this? No, silly, we’re too far away. I…I…I…keep on doing that…press down on me harder! Harder!” she cried. “And put me in the buttercups and daisies in the new-falling snow…and make love to me in a meadow…”

Suddenly, Derek noticed a pale blue sky, and he felt himself and Nova landing in soft sand dunes that were strangely reddish in color. She laughed as she threw her head back as he continued to love her in the warm, delightful sand.

They kissed…they tickled each other, and Derek sped up the pace, kissing Nova’s neck, her ear, her nose, and playing with her breasts again as he felt his loins exploding with white-hot pleasure just as hers did. He felt the orgasm rolling through her as she screamed his name again and again….

And, suddenly, where they were turned much warmer as a Light came from Nova’s naked body and rolled over the sand dunes like a wave of light….

“L love you, I love you, I love you, Nova…what did you to me?” Derek gasped. “Oh, I love you so much!”

“I love you too, Derek,” Nova said as she kissed his nose and suddenly picked a flower where there had been none a minute ago.

Derek got up. He was shocked to see a meadow of grass and flowers (with a few bare sandy spots) where there had been none before. The air was warm, with just a hint of a cool breeze coming from somewhere as a few clouds gathered. Then, a light snow began falling that felt heavenly on their sweaty, naked bodies. Nova then smiled at him and gave him an innocent look that made him melt as she sat there in her skin. Derek wiggled his toes in the grass and found himself playing footsies with Nova as she giggled and then after he ran his toes over hers, she ran her soft toes up over his and up his foot right to his calf.

Then, Nova fell on her butt, crossing her eyes comically as she lay back in the grass and flowers with all of her charms exposed to him, just as unashamed as Eve on the first day of Creation. Then, she sat up, giving him a beautiful wide-eyed look as she struck a pose that mirrored that of her in her wedding gown. Only, of course, this time, she was in the nude, oddly enough, without her Royal Markings. Also, her pregnancy was not showing.

“Where’s the mark on your breast-your hip? And where is your pregnancy?”

“Faded, temporarily,” Nova said in their dream in the spirit world. “Give me a kiss, your love, your energy…shall sustain our children who are here; Starsha, Theodore, in my belly, and Anya, and Stephen, hanging next to me!”

“WHAT? They crucified them, too?”

Nova nodded. “Stephen is going. He may die. Indeed, he probably will die…but he will return to us….”

“HOW?”

“Seek me out in twenty-four hours, darling. Look for Narbash, the Orc Sergeant. He is outraged over what happened to me and he has given me water and food. He will help us…and…I love you.”

“I love you, too,” Derek said.

The vision faded for both of them.

The reality was far more horrid for Nova.

This is a dream of mine come true, Nova thought as she hung in pain on her cross in the arena. No, not a dream…make it a nightmare….

Nova looked to her left.

Her son Stephen, with a days’ growth of beard, cruelly beaten and whipped, hung beside her on a cross he had been nailed to. Like her, he was naked, trembling with thirst and agony the blood and sweat in his hair made it appear black.

Stephen was dying.

Nova knew this, and she was trying to send as much of her life-force to him as possible.

Nova was also bathing the babies in her womb with her life-force, to keep them alive.

She was succeeding, so far, and Starsha was helping her.

To her right, Anya hung trembling on her cross, beaten as Stephen had been, and bleeding hard from many lash marks.

Nova had kept touch with Anya and had succored her as best she could.

However, she estimated that Anya would maybe live for one hour after Stephen did…and that Stephen would hang on for maybe six hours, when the twin suns of this cursed world would hang high in the sky.

A R’Khell priest, largely cyborgized, came to her and spat on her feet.

“You accursed pregnant whore bitch!” he yelled at her, raging in hate. “I sensed what you said to the Traitor Ekogaru before the crazy bastard killed himself! You will never destroy our world, you scum! You’re going to be up there until you’re a fucking skeleton! It’ll be funny to see the baby skeletons falling out of your tum-tum when you rot!”

“I’m going to outlive you,” Nova gasped. “You’ll be dead before your next sunrise, Priest.”

“Really?” demanded the evil priest. “Why are you suffering like that, you slut, if you can take care of me so easily?”

Why am I suffering like this? Nova thought. I know I need to rebuild my powers to…to...free the others and escape…but why? I’m in agony…I’m getting confused…maybe I’m going mad. O, Lord, save me from this pain!

Nova shut her eyes, and then, Queen Pellas appeared to her.

“You were correct,” said Queen Pellas. “You need to build up your powers. Ekogaru thought that Promecium would act according to her prior declaration, but she did not. You also need to have the R’Khells…many of them…in your favor, so that you can escape this…”

“Will they be?” Nova asked.

“Take a look around you,” said Pellas as she faded.

Nova turned her head, painfully.

To her shock, her utter shock, she saw some R’Khells...and even some Orcs…kneeling before her in the dirt.

She realized that they were praying.

Then, in an utter, painful shock, she realized that not only were they praying…they were praying to her.

The R’Khells and Orcs looked up at her and said, “Oh, High Queen…”

“Bringer of life…”

“” Preserver of peace…”

“May you live long…”

They’re praying to me? Nova thought. Lord, that’s a bit much, isn’t it?

“Why are you praying to me?” Nova asked an Orc sergeant who was kneeling before her, with, as she noticed, tears in his piggish eyes, as Narbash knelt beside him.

“You are the one promised to our people long ago; is that not obvious? Promecium has committed a sacrilege by crucifying you as you are; with young in your naked stomach,” Narbash replied. “My tribe-mate Hemdug agrees with you! Also, she has broken faith with you, many times. We do not support that.”

“Why is that a sacrilege?” yelled Anya from her cross.

“We Orcs are not mere brutes without spiritual beliefs, bitch!” snarled Hemdug. More gently to Nova, he said, “Narbash and I became what we are due to radioactive mutations in this harsh environment. There are also Lizardmen and other foul beings who mutated from animal forms. Legends say that we were once strong, regular humans, who were twisted by radiation and bred and tortured by the damned R’Khell priests, but Ekogaru himself, the Great Boss, actually cared for us. Therefore, to us, most of our tribes regard females bearing young with some reverence as life is precious to us, both by necessity and by Ekogaru’s command! A goddess bearing young whom even Ekogaru prophesied would come is a figure of reverence, fear, and power to us.”

“Would it grieve you to know that Ekogaru died in battle with me since Promecium usurped his throne and she forced him to do battle with me?” Nova said. “Would you be filled with fear if you knew Ekogaru granted me his knowledge and powers before he died, and that I have contemplated and now KNOW the secrets of this world…that its bones have been stripped out and replaced by metal? Ekogaru began to work, but Promecium has usurped it! You will need to flee from here if you are going to be saved from the oncoming destruction!”

“YOU are Ekogaru’s successor to us!” yelled another Orc sergeant as he and the other slaves yelled and cheered. “Command us!”

“The Priesthood…is sending reinforcements, and the time…is not yet ripe,” Nova gasped. “Bring me water and you will water my children here, too!” Nova snapped, her Voice even effective in her suffering. “Do this and I shall not forget you and I will bring you life and the right to live in my…my…Commonwealth. Orcs and other such beings as you,” Nova said as she saw a repulsive-looking green Lizardman kneeling before her “…will be granted your own world in my realm…a First Earth of your very own, not far from my Second Earth of Pellias or my own home, my Third Earth of Terra, my Earth.” Then, Nova screamed as loudly as she could, “New Pellias is NOW Pellias Reborn, by my Command! Water…I need…it,” she whispered.

Another Orc soldier gave her water on a sponge raised on a spear. He then gave drinks to Anya and Stephen while Nova wept, praying herself as she thought, O Lord Most High, You who Yourself suffered in this fashion under darkness into Death to redeem all, please hear my prayer, and let me gather my strength and live on to fulfill my Promises. So Mote It Be.

Then, filled with new strength within as she felt young Starsha inside her echoing her prayer, Nova knew that she would soon be able to break the bonds of the damper on her neck. She then sent to Derek, Six hours, my Love! Do battle and come to me in five hours to free your children and myself. I now have many allies. I love you!

“I love you, too,” Derek sent back in tears.

Derek then grabbed his mike in his cabin. “Venture, this is Wildstar. I heard from Nova, and she has set up a chance for us to rescue her. In four hours, we will break this damned blockade and fight our way back into the orbit of R’Khell’eva. Then, we’ll get a landing force down there to rescue her and the kids and get them back to the ship.”

“Roger that,” Venture said.

As the red alert klaxons came up, Derek was preparing for the Yamato to advance.

He left Venture in command as he ran for his Cosmo-Zero.

He took off, and he then ordered the Yamato to advance as he and the rest of the Tigers advanced against the enemy.

And, advance she did, a moment later, with guns blazing.

The R’Khells were not expecting this sort of onslaught from the mighty ship, nor were they expecting a squadron of the Tigers led by Derek and his young son Alex to break off, attack one of the enemy carriers, and then streak right down towards R’Khell’eva itself.

And, in space, the Yamato fought on as she destroyed the enemy battleships and carriers that had made up the blockade.

Finding an opening in her foes, Venture warped the ship right into R’Khell’eva’ s atmosphere.

THREE HOURS LATER…

After heavy aerial combat, only Derek’s and Alex’s planes, along with four other Tigers remained from a squadron of twelve planes.

Derek and the Tigers flew in against anti-aircraft and strafed and bombed every emplacement they could find near the edge of the city before streaking in towards a runway, shooting down enemy planes as they streaked in under the enemy radar to a landing.

Derek was shooting at enemy troops as he cracked his canopy open and hit the ground running, pulling his peacoat on around him to keep out the dust of the dying sandstorm that was covering the accursed city.

In the meantime, on her cross, Nova was gritting her teeth in pain as she warded off the sandstorm with her energies as her powers increased, and she began to break the power of the psionic damper that they had placed around her neck.

She also felt Starsha’s power increasing inside her womb as she felt the creeping cold of death disappearing from her suffering body.

Why am I suffering like this? Nova thought as she gritted her teeth. Why are we all suffering like this?

Nova shut her eyes as something shimmered before her, and then, as she opened them again, the ghosts of Queen Pellas and Aliscea appeared before her.

“This is happened so that glory can be brought to the Most High and His Name,” said Pellas as Aliscea nodded. “You are but His Instrument, and we will be with you always, until the day when it is destined you leave your corporeal life.”

Another shimmer appeared in front of Nova, and a tall young man robed in white appeared before her. To her shock, she recognized him as Ekogaru on the other side, redeemed and at peace! “The day when you shall die and wipe out the last of my misbegotten works, and the works of my misbegotten successor Promecium is yet far off,” Ekogaru said. “A great imbalance has to be redressed, as I have just discovered, and to that end, in the same fashion that Pellas and Aliscea shall be with you, so shall I. But, be at peace. What seems to be ages in mortal time is merely an instant here in the Most High’s sight, and may His Name be glorified forever. I have granted you some of the strength I had when alive so that you and the babies in you can live. Take courage!”

Nova nodded as the ghosts vanished, and she felt the power of the psionic damper breaking, smiling as she realized that Ekogaru was among those who had freed her, along with Queen Pellas and the redeemed Aliscea.

The ground shook on R’Khell’eva as Nova suddenly realized that due to Promecium’s evil, the planet itself was dying.

II. LIBERATION…

Planet R’Khell’eva

Saturday, September 10, 2231

0952 Hours Local Time

Derek and the other pilots had landed on R’Khell’eva near the city’s edge.

Derek was separated from the others as he was in deadly hand-to-hand combat. He grappled with several R’Khell priests as they beat him.

To his outrage and shock, one of them grabbed his Star Force shirt and ripped it from his body under his peacoat.

Another one grabbed his boots, tore then off, and then forcibly tore off his trousers.

He got a bare leg free and, wincing as one bare foot hit the hot sand, he kicked a priest with his other foot as the madman ripped away much of his undershorts.

Another one yelled, “Look at him! Before we can sacrifice him to Promecium, we must circumcise him!”

“That’s only for my wife to touch!” Derek yelled as he struggled, left in only his ragged peacoat and the ragged remains of his undergarment, which just barely covered him like a very ragged loincloth.

Derek grabbed his sidearm and began to shoot.

He killed several of his tormentors, but he was about to be hit with several deadly energy bolts when the world around him faded away…and he found himself on the hill near where Nova and the others were crucified.

“Who brought me here?” he said.

“I did, Father,” said Starsha’s voice in his head.

“Starsha?”

“You know I live inside my mother’s womb,” Starsha said as a projection of her face appeared before Derek’s eyes. Alex and the other pilots appeared around Derek a moment later as some of the Orcs bowed to Derek.

Another brought a ladder.

“I am Narbash,” said the Orc. “I am about to free your beloved.”

Narbash climbed up the ladder, which was propped against Nova’s cross.

She was breathing hard, and she winced and then cried out in pain as Narbash and another Orc pulled the nails from her hands and feet.

Derek was surprised as Narbash gently helped him bring a bleeding Nova down off her cross into his arms as she used her power to heal the nail wound in her left hand, and then her right hand.

Narbash helped Derek steady Nova in his arms as she shakily kept her feet up, well off the ground, until she used her power to heal the spike wounds in her feet.

“Derek, please put me down,” Nova said. “I…I can walk soon.”

“Nova this ground is hot and rocky. It’s hurting my feet. What about yours?”

“I..I can manage…I’ll have to heal Anya and Stephen when they’re brought down. Anya, first. She’s in very poor shape.”

Hemdug yelled, “Get some water! Her Majesty is a healer, they say.”

“Bring wine, food, and some sort of antiseptic, too,” Nova said to Alex as she recognized him there. Her son obeyed promptly.

Hemdug nodded and yelled at three of the Orcs and two Lizardmen in their own foul native language.

Derek helped Nova stand, and he helped her sit on a rough cloth as he ate some garlicy bread that tasted a bit like Indian Naan bread, and then fed some to Nova, who also took some heavily watered wine; wine (despite her pregnancy) to sterilize the questionable-looking water, and water to dilute the wine.

Nova screamed as Hemdug grabbed her leg and smeared some burning brown substance on her bleeding wounds.

“What the hell are you doing to her?” Derek yelled.

“It’s an antiseptic, Orc-Fashion!” yelled Hemdug. “It’s to salve her wounds!”

“But it’s hurting her!” Derek yelled.

“Not much worse than alcohol, Derek…and I can take it,” she said as she shivered. “Mama, mama,” groaned Anya as she was held down by two more Orcs. Nova crawled to her and Derek watched as she kissed her daughter, held her, and used her power to begin healing her as Nova used her senses to find and repair internal injuries and broken ribs in her daughter’s body.

Near the ground where the crosses still stood, Nova pushed Derek back gently as a terrible black gaseous cloud appeared.

Then, with spurs jingling, Promecium walked slowly towards Nova. “I wanted you dead, my dear. DEAD!”

Nova walked forward silently with the grace of a barefoot dancer towards Promecium. “As you will have noticed, your scheme, Promecium, did not work.” Nova took off the dead Matrix collar from around her neck and threw it at Promecium’s booted feet. It then fell down a small hole in the sandy ground.

“You don’t want my power, my eternal life, Nova?” said Promecium. “I can tell you have Ekogaru’s fire in you. Join with me and I will make you metallic, like myself, or even make you a new body of living crystal glass, if you would prefer. Your naked flesh looks lovely. Imagine how you would look, naked, but made of living crystal that would never die.”

“I would rather go naked as I am than accept anything from you,” Nova said. “Even now, Promecium, I want nothing from you.”

“Have you ever wondered what happened to your mother, Teri Forrester?” Promecium said.

“She was weakening and sick in bed when I last touched minds with her while I was crucified,” Nova said. “In fact, she had made her peace with God, and she was dying.”

“Dying,” said Promecium. “Lady, would you come here and have a talk with your recalcitrant daughter?”

Derek and the children looked on in rage as another black cloud appeared.

A woman in blue and grey armor that looked like, but unlike, Promecium appeared before Nova. She ignored her and knelt before Promecium on one knee. “What is your bidding, Your Highness?” she said in a firm voice that sounded like an electronic parody of…

…Nova’s mother Teri. She sounded that way, because the cyborg who knelt before Promecium and Nova was Teri Forrester.

But now…she was a machine like Promecium.

“MOTHER!” Nova roared in rage.

“Yes, I am your mother,” Teri said. “I witnessed the operation on my dying body. I wanted to let go…let go so badly, after she took me to her halls. The pain and agony in her Houses of Lamentation was horrendous. I wanted to die. I asked God to let me die. But, Nova, your God has other ideas. And, at last, I renounce Him. Because I have eaten of the forbidden fruit. I have eaten of the true Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. And behold! You will die! But I will live forever, my darling. Don’t you want this?” Teri said as she unsheathed a sword. “Choose our life, or just go ahead and die. How will you die? I’ll kill you myself! Just like I killed your whining younger brother David back on Earth!”

To Teri's shock, Nova did not either yell, cry, or step back. Instead, she wiped her mouth, coldly stared hard at Teri, and raised her right hand slightly.

Teri was then picked up by an invisible force and slammed against the ground hard enough to see stars; and the sword flew from her hand. Derek looked at his wife and sharply said, "Nova!"

"No, Derek, I don't believe in matricide, even if she deserves it."

"How did you get the power to do that?" roared Teri as she struggled to her feet, the gyros inside her new body shaken. "Contract with the Devil?"

“Like the sort that you have just signed?” Nova said as tears ran down her face. “No, Mother. Never. And listen carefully! That is the last time I will ever call you Mother. To me, my Mother is now dead. But why? What possessed you to defect to their side?”

“In pain…when you’re dying in agony,” Teri said, “You can realize all sorts of things. Over the years maybe I found my sister Yvona was right and you and Derek were wrong! I decided I had to be on the winning side after I talked to Stone at a cocktail party years ago! Then, you know, I slept with him. Over and over again. He was so strong. So sexy. Not like your weak mortal husband at all, and not like mine. That’s why I joined with Ekogaru and I helped plot his death."

"You let him cheat you?" Nova said as she, the President and Prime Minister of Earth, stood there about to cry. “Ekogaru is dead, Teri. And I find it sick that you helped kill your own husband and my father. Teresa, you are a horrible person. I don’t know why I named my daughter after you now!”

Teri came up to Nova and slapped her across the face. “SHOW RESPECT, BITCH! CALL ME MOTHER!”

“What would you prefer I call you; Judas?”

Promecium tossed Teri her saber. She turned it on, and the evil laser sword burned bright red.

Teri screamed a roar of rage and swung at Nova, parrying a shot from Derek’s blaster with her metallic hand.

Nova jumped up and avoided her swing. When she landed on her toes, Nova thrust forward her hand and her own Crystal Sword appeared, burning bright and white. With it she parried Teri’s killing blow.

“You wanted to kill me,” Nova murmured in wonder. “You just tried to kill your own child.”

“My children are all dead,” Teri said. “In your war, your actions killed your younger brother, and in your hubris, I believe that your sister Aurora was crucified.”

“Promecium killed my brother, just as she killed my son, but the One brought him back to me. I think you’re lying about Aurora’s death…because I can still feel her!”

Derek had gone to Stephen, who was unconscious, and he was yelling at him and slapping his face to try to bring him around.

But Nova was still in deadly combat with her own mother.

Teri jabbed right for Nova’s pregnant stomach.

Nova parried the blow, and watched Derek trying to rouse their son.

“Derek, I’ll get to him,” Nova said. “I apologize…but I’m sort of…busy right now!”

Teri slashed viciously at Nova, and she took one of her hands off.

Nova screamed, but she held onto her sword with the other hand as she used her power to staunch the bleeding from the stump of her left hand. She stood on her toes, trembled, and reformed her hand before a shocked Promecium and Teri, and then, she blasted fire at Teri from her reformed hand; enough power to slam into Teri’s metal-booted feet and to melt them.

Teri fell to the ground as Nova ran towards her, hacking at Teri’s hand as she grabbed for her sword. Nova’s blow took Teri’s hand off.

However, Promecium blasted lightning at Nova as she picked Teri up.

Nova deified the lightning with an incredible effort, and she shot it through her sword back at Promecium.

The lightning struck Promecium with a thunderclap that knocked Nova down. It took one of Promecium’s legs off.

Promecium roared, and she held onto Teri and faded from the field of battle.

“Come back, you rotten COWARD!” Nova challenged as she tried to stand up. Then, she fell to her knees and made her sword vanish as she heard Derek crying.

Shaken, and very weak from her encounter with Promecium and her mother, Nova trembled as she crawled in the hot sand to her son.

Nova lay down beside Stephen and pulled him into her lap.

Nova felt for a pulse.

She found none.

“Stephen?” Nova said. She felt his battered bare chest. She felt no heartbeat.

“Nova, why aren’t you healing him?” Derek said.

“I can barely…breathe…dear,” Nova gasped. “That battle…took so much from me…I…”

Nova pulled her son’s eyes open. The pupils were fixed, dilated.

Nova began to sob. “No, no, no, please God, NO!”

“What’s wrong?” Derek said, thinking he knew the answer when he saw how still his son was.

“Derek…as best as I can tell with just my hands and senses…he has no vital signs. The energy of his soul is…gone…”

“GONE?” Derek roared.

Nova screamed and then she said, “Derek…our boy is…dead…”

Nova talked to Stephen. “I remember birthing you from my loins, putting you like this to my breast,” she said as she put his mouth to her chest after she shut his eyes. “Naked I birthed you, and now, naked I lay you…to…rest,” Nova said as she began to gleam slightly. She kissed her dead son and said, “Lord God, Lord of the Cosmos, please, either grant this boy rest or bring him back to me, whatever Your Will is…I will abide with it,” she said as she held her dead son and cried. “I can’t bring him back now, but…You can…I…”

Derek knelt with her and held her as Anya looked up from the litter the Orcs had put her on. “Mom, Dad, what’s wrong with Stephen?”

“He’s dead,” Nova sobbed. “We all got to him too late…” she said as her tears hit her son’s body. “He’s….his soul, Derek…I see it!”

“Where?” Derek said.

“My brother’s dead?” Alex said as he came up with a R’Khell priest and the items he had been sent to fetch. He screamed as his father nodded his head.

Nova addressed Stephen as she looked at something none of them could see. “What are you saying?”

Nova’s lips then murmured in a voice like Stephen’s “I…have been sent back…”

“Back from where?” Nova snapped.

“You know, mother,” Stephen’s voice murmured from Nova’s lips. “You were there yourself when your body lay dead. I have been given the option to return to my house. Will we win this?”

“We will win,” Derek said. “Stephen, if you can hear me, we shall win…”

“So be…” Stephen’s voice said from Nova’s lips as Nova then kissed her dead son full on his lips and held him close, shaking and shivering as energy flowed into her from another Source.

To everyone’s fear, the ground shook as Nova’s body began to gleam. Stephen’s still corpse shivered in his parents’ arms, and then his eyes opened and he said, “be…it…It hurts all over, but it’s done. I will live and fight. Mother, I will marry later on, bear children, but yet, I will only be back among you for a short time, since in seventy-eight years from now, mother, on a cold night, as I will lay withered and old, but you will look as young as you do now. Then, I will close my eyes again in Death, and return the gift of my life back to its Maker. Mother, Father, you two will have many more sons and daughters, the last child of yours being a Son of Iron, taken and raised by others, but to be birthed from your loins.”

Stephen then stood up.

The ground shook again. The Orcs and several human slaves cried out in fear.

Nova looked up at the sky, whispering some words that only Derek could understand through their bond, but Anya, who was standing nearby, heard her whisper, “Thank you, Trelaina. I understand.”

Nova, shaking as she stood there, said, “By sunrise tomorrow morning, Promecium is going to destroy this world. Anyone who wishes to leave with us is welcome to repent and come live with us on Terra, Pellias, or in the Pellian Commonwealth…”

“Mother, you need rest,” Anya said as she came over to hold her mother’s hand and help her father support her, in spite of the fact that she was shaking herself and still had nothing on but her own sheen of sweat.

Narbash said, as an olive-skinned human-looking man came up with some beast that looked like a donkey, “There is an oasis an hour’s walk away from this place. We can leave and go there. There is water, fruit, and some of the former priests who are now with us can give you good meat to eat. Sit on this beast,” he said after another priest put a white blanket on the animal for Nova. “I will guide you, along with your ship’s Captain.”

Nova nodded, and she allowed Derek and Narbash to lift her and place her onto the donkey. Her head swam as she held onto the animal’s mane, and the patient creature allowed himself to be led away by Derek on a halter.

FORTY-FIVE MINUTES LATER…

Anya was on the back on a horse on a soft saddle, clinging to the bare shoulders of the olive-skinned man who had brought the donkey. “You asked me my name,” he said. “I am known as Omer Zilina. I was one of the Dark Lord Ekogaru’s Priests. I left the order when I saw what Promecium was doing to him, and renounced my rank, position, uniform, and home. That is why I have only a rag on around my loins. I offered my service and loincloth to Her Majesty a while ago. She accepted my service but refused my garment. I would beg and crawl for the rest of my days to atone for what I have done. I enslaved men, women, and children. I brought Ekogaru human sacrifices to be burned. I killed in his name. Yet she told me I did not have to atone any longer. Why?”

“Our faith teaches that the Almighty already has atoned, and that He Himself became one of us and suffered death on a Cross and rose again from Death to both atone and give us new life,” Anya said. “I never believed that all that seriously until recently, when I have beheld the strength it gives my mother and how she performs wonders in His Name. Now, I do believe, and I’ve asked the Lord to forgive me for being an idiot for so long.”

“The High Queen is your mother?” said Omer. “Child, you are truly blessed. Tell me what it was like to be raised by such an angel.”

“She’s not an angel,” Anya said. “She is far from perfect, not to mock her. She has argued with my father, she has had stupid arguments with me and my brothers and sisters, and she’s been at times, moody, irritable, pigheaded, she has gotten drunk on occasion, sometimes spanked me for no reason, and she can be narrow-minded and awfully dogmatic as well as enjoying her candy a little too much. Yet, she’s consistently believed in God and tried to be guided by Him, and she’s made great sacrifices, such as dealing with a power she still does not quite understand, allowing herself to make sacrifices all the way to her own death…”

“So…it is true…she has died?”

“Yes, and was somehow brought back from the dead. Now, she’s not immortal. She truly bleeds, hurts her fingers and toes, and you see she’s pregnant.” Anya then looked at her mother…Derek was kissing her as they walked along, and it looked as if he had a hand on her breast and then…on other parts of her body. “She also likes to be with my Dad a bit TOO much. Mom, have you no shame? Get a room!”

Omer just laughed at that. “Well, it looks to me as if your Mother is just a healthy young woman who loves her husband very much. May the Most High bless her! Anya, I see you are an attractive young woman. Do you have a girlfriend or boyfriend?”

Anya laughed. “Girlfriend, NO. Not that it’s wrong-it’s not my choice. Boyfriend, not yet.”

“What do you do for a living?”

“I am the Yamato’s weapons officer. I must have killed a few thousand people in this war.”

“I know you did,” said Omer softly as he stroked her knee. “One of them was my brother.”

Anya sat bolt upright. “You…?”

“Yesterday, I saw your vessel fighting our ships. My brother Ilvan never repented. He was in command of the space battleship Chandar, which means “Demon” in my tongue. It was a bright red ship. You brought her down with two shots, and so, you slew my brother.”

“I’m sorry,” Anya said.

“It cannot be helped,” Omer sighed. “We have been at war,” he said as he stroked Anya’s knee. “Maybe now, we can learn to be at peace. Do you mind this?”

“No. It’s helping my knee. It’s…hurting because some of your brother priests had me nailed to that damn thing.”

“Thank you, Anya,” said Omer. “We have both wounded each other. Do you agree to a truce?”

“I agree…and would you mind something else?”

“What?”

“I had a boyfriend on Earth. We had a bad breakup right before I left for this mission. Would I appear too forward if I ask you to make love to me…if you’re allowed to?” Anya said.

“I would not mind that at all,” said Omer. “You have nothing on…I have almost nothing on. There’s no shame in that…as I said.”

Omer kissed the back of Anya’s head.

She turned her head and kissed him.

They had an agreement

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Deep in Promecium’s lair, Teri Forrester screamed as robots operated on where her severed hand and feet had been. They worked without turning off Teri’s pain receptors.

Promecium, with her leg repaired, came up to Teri and slapped her metallic face.

“Your first damned battle and you failed me? You were supposed to kill the little whore!”

“I never fought in this way before-she is far stronger now than I told you. She was strong-willed as a child, but could be dealt with if she was spanked or scolded enough. She is past pain now! She amazes me, and she frightens me…”

“We hold the power of the fallen Dark Lord!” snapped Promecium. “The Machine will endure forever, and we will defeat all those who believe in a so-called god whom no one has ever seen!”

“If there is no God, why is the little whore who was my child still alive? From where did she gain that power?” said Teri. “Make them stop hurting me! NOOOOOO!!!!”

Promecium slapped her again. “Let the pain linger and remind you of your failures. We will soon destroy the R’Khells…all of them, and hopefully, the High Queen and her followers, when we unveil the great Project I finished under Ekogaru’s nose before he died!”

“Yes…I will aid you in killing them all…”

Despite her pain, Teri laughed.

III. FREEDOM…UNDER A THOUSAND STARS…

Planet R’Khell’eva

Sunday, September 11, 2231

0008 Hours Local Time

Derek and Nova had slept when they reached the oasis, which was called “V’Shala” or “Thirty-three Palms” in the R’Khell tongue.

There were thirty-three palm trees here, much in the way of food, and a desert stream and even a medium-sized lake.

Derek had thrown off his rags and bathed in the lake with Nova, tenderly washing the dirt and blood of her ordeal from her body. Even though Stephen and Anya protested, Nova then gently did the same for her children before they were actually able to take a swim. This surprised the R’Khells, for not many of them knew how to swim. Nova actually spent a little while giving basic swimming lessons, being quite appropriately undressed for swimming.

After a dinner and a strategy session, during which Nova used her power carefully to call the Yamato and to request that she land in the lake and cruise to a wooden quay she saw some distance off, Nova and Derek slept again.

When they awoke, the desert heat was fading, and a thousand stars had come out. They were lying on an improvised bed of several sheets and rugs, including one of Royal Blue that both the R’Khells and the Orcs insisted that Nova should sleep on with her mate, since she was a Queen.

The lovers came to each other for warmth, and soon, they were naturally generating warmth as they slowly made love in the night breeze, with Nova in Derek’s lap, receiving his body into hers.

Derek looked at Nova’s pregnant stomach as they made love. It looked a little bigger, and the lovers were overjoyed to see faint movement there, but movement, nonetheless.

Derek kissed her again as he continued to hold her as she moved up and down on him, riding him like a horse.

“Hmmmm…that feels so good,” Nova said. “Faster.”

“I’m afraid to,” Derek said softly. “Nova, twenty-four hours ago, you were hanging in agony on a cross, almost dying…”

“I daresay I need some time to recover,” she said.

“You’re going to need bed rest, as much as possible,” Derek said. “Doctor Bixley can do most of your medical duties for now. The war is almost over…”

“But Promecium is not defeated yet,” Nova said after a long period of lovemaking, during which they wrapped themselves in their covers.

As they lay there, holding each other, Nova said to Derek, “Do you think I killed her?”

“Who?”

“My mother,” Nova said, not meeting Derek’s eyes.

Derek made Nova look at him as he gently turned her face to his. “That mechanical thing we fought with Promecium…she was not your mother.”

“But she used to be,” Nova said.

“She was attacking you, me, and all of us. Her attack was part of why we couldn’t save Stephen and why he died until God’s Grace brought him back to us.”

“Derek, I wish I didn’t have to hurt her. And I wish I could have saved her.”

“Did you touch her mind?”

“I tried to…she shoved me out.”

“She made her own choices, then. Just like your Aunt Yvona did-remember her? And so she deserves what we’ll eventually have to give her and that traitor Promecium.”

“It still hurts, Derek. A lot. Your mother…turning you away like that. Hating you. Repudiating you…when you are only trying to do some good.”

“I know, Nova…I know that,” Derek whispered in Nova’s ear.

In the dark, Nova wept in Derek’s arms, and, thus, she cried herself into an uneasy sleep, tormented by painful dreams.

Not far away, Anya lay on her own pallet, gasping with joy as Omer made love to her.

This was not her first time, but it almost felt like it to Anya as Omer held hands with her, and their joy blew to its climax, and they cried out.

A moment later, Anya laughed as she heard another cry of ecstasy some distance away.

“That’s my Mom,” giggled Anya.

“What was she doing?” said Omer.

“The same thing we are,” Anya said as she fell asleep in Omer’s arms.

Nova did the same.

An hour or so passed for Derek and Nova.

Then, they heard a whine in the sky as they were forced awake from their dreams.

Both of them looked up and saw the Yamato cruising in for a landing against a cloudy night sky.

The sight looked reassuring, until both of them yelled when the ground shook beneath them.

The night sky lit up as they shut their eyes at a bright flash.

When they opened their eyes, they saw a mushroom cloud rising up in the distance.

The cloud came from inside R’Khell’eva, as both of them felt.

Nova yelled out loud. “Mark! Don’t land the ship! It’s a trap!!!

“How are you getting us out of here?” Derek yelled.

“The only thing I can do!” Nova cried.

She clapped her hands and reached out with her power, and everyone in the oasis, sleeping or not, a total of fifty-nine souls, found themselves inside the Yamato, some stretched out asleep in their rugs and blankets in the lower landing bay.

Nova used her power and clothed Derek and herself in fresh uniforms.

The ship shook under them as people woke up screaming at their sudden change of venue.

“Anya!” Derek yelled. “Get something around yourself and get your boyfriend to help you get this bay cleared!” he yelled as he gently kicked the two lovers awake. “Stephen, get a uniform on and get to Bridge Number Two!”

“What…is that infernal shaking?” yelled a random Orc.

“Turbulence!” Nova snapped.

Derek yelled, “Get your men in a platoon in case we have to repel boarders! Narbash! How many are there?”

The Orc leader said, “Forty-two who can fight; twenty-five Orcs, thirteen R’Khells, the rest of ‘em are Reptilians! The ones I didn’t count are the women, children, and the aged, all of Reptilian, R’Khell, and Orcish ancestry, garn! Our damn females have buns in their oven, along with the Reptilian bitches!”

“Excuse me, scum?” yelled a female Reptilian. “We bear eggs!”

“You damned Mutant shits!” yelled Narbash.

“Shut yer piehole, smelly one!” yelled back the Reptilian woman, who threw a rock at Narbash.

It missed him and hit Nova in the head.

“NOVA!” screamed Derek and Omer together.

“I’m all right,” she said in rage as she wiped blood off her forehead. “I survived a cross, only to get beaned by this rock?” she yelled as she threw it back at Narbash with wrath on her face. “Enough rock-throwing! You people have to work together if you expect us to get out of this alive!”

Venture’s voice came over the loudspeakers. “Altitude, forty thousand! Fire and explosions have just come up from R’Khell’eva in five more places! Captain to the Bridge!”

Nova grabbed Derek’s hand and winked.

They were on Bridge Number One a moment later. Nova ran to the radar while Derek ran to the conn.

“What’s the picture here?” Derek yelled.

Nova said, “Derek, I do not know how to tell you this…R’Khell’eva is coming apart!”

“WHAT?” he said.

“This is the tactical,” she said as she put several graphics up on the main. “Sandor, it looks like R’Khell’eva’s core has just solidified into cold ferrous metal. I see tha, and I can pick up three hundred protrusions coming from it, along with a framework.”

“Yes, and that explains the weird seismic activity,” Sandor replied. “There are several huge power sources in the core and inside the protrusions.”

“The surface of R’Khell’eva has turned to magma and is boiling,” Nova said as tears ran down her face. “There must have been three billion people left on that planet, on the surface, anyway. They’re all dead now.”

R’Khell’eva was literally glowing beneath them; the entire planet was melting, and parts of the surface slid away and evaporated.

In a moment, a strange skeletal structure began to appear in the midst of the gasses and molten magma, and flames.

Derek hissed and ground his teeth when he recognized what the vile monstrosity was.

Venture blasted the Yamato away from it, full speed, until they were five hundred megameters away from it.

The structure turned slowly, its black form illuminating with endless multi-colored lights that winked on around it.

Everyone on the bridge recognized it at once.

“A new damn Fortress?” said Anya as she showed up in uniform.

“Tell us how, Nova!” Eager said.

“He told me that Promecium had buried the Phased Density Cannon and the Entropy Weapon,” Nova said.

“Who?” Derek said.

“Ekogaru, before he died. But not even he knew that Promecium could reactivate its healing matrix. He told me she can’t fire the prime weapons, yet…but…”

“But she rebuilt his damned Fortress!” Derek said.

“Yes, out of the substance of R’Khell’eva, and the bodies and souls of those she just killed, Promecium has built a NEW Technomugar Fortress,” Trelaina said as she appeared.

“Do you know how we’re going to stop that thing?” Mark cried as he grabbed her hands.

Trelaina sobbed and shook her head.

“I have…ideas…” Nova said.

“Well, put on your thinking cap, dear,” said Mark. “As you can see, it’s advancing right towards us!”

“First, get us away from it!” Derek said.

The Yamato turned, and then Derek nodded. “WARP!”

The Yamato slammed into warp.

The space battleship emerged from warp a few minutes later.

“Warp completed,” said Venture. “I….”

Nova then looked at her radar and screamed. “NO! Please God, NO!”

Derek said, “Nova, is it what we think it is?”

She nodded in rage as the New Fortress emerged from warp behind them.

Cataracts of energy and missiles flew from the construction as Homer received a message.

“They just sent a few words,” Homer said.

“What did they say?” Sandor said.

Homer played the recording. A cold voice said from the Bridge speakers, “This is Promecium. I have just killed four billion people. It does not bother me. My prime weapon will be ready in five days. I now know where both Terra and Pellias are now. You could not hide them from me. Will you surrender now, or will you meet me at your world in five days?”

“Does she want an answer?” Derek said.

“Yes,” said Homer.

“Tell her we’ll be waiting for her there in five days…with every ship we have! We will deal with her once and for all!” Nova said.

“Response sent, and acknowledged,” said Homer.

The Fortress then warped out.

“All hands,” said Derek. “We are heading back to Earth. There, we shall make our last stand!”

TO BE CONTINUED….