ALTERNATE
TALES OF THE STAR FORCE
STAR BLAZERS---ENDGAME
Being the ninth part of THE
NEW COMET--- BY: Frederick P. Kopetz
This Act is being completed with the
Cooperation and Assistance of Derek A.C. Wakefield (as usual)---Freddo
Thanks to M.C. Crump (“Max Damage”) for
art contributed to this chapter….
Advisory Note:
This chapter contains some rather nasty violence and a torture scene near the
end that some might find disturbing...FREDDO
ACT THREE: BY THE
I. A SUDDEN DISTRESS
CALL
The Vicinity of Planet
Vendrava
Space Battleship Argo
Sunday, August 2, 2207
1550 Hours: Earthtime
The Argo, with
everything almost back to normal again, was now maybe 120,000 lightyears away
from Earth.
Commodore Derek Wildstar was currently
in touch with the Commander in code, explaining their predicament and need for
Aliscea.
“Hmm,” said the Commander on the Argo’s main screen. “Although I
understand your predicament, it is impossible to send the
“Why is that?” said Wildstar.
General Singleton said, “Captain
Venture found damage in the ship. It is in refit at an accelerated pace now on
Earth. When it is completed, she will be on trials for about a week before
being back at the edge of the Solar System again to await a rendezvous with
your ship and any other ships we can possibly spare to put back under your
command. Although we would like you and the Gamilons to try and attack the New
Comet before it reaches the solar system, the backup plan is to mount a defense
against the Comet at Pluto and let their advance fleet pass into the solar system
unopposed until Ganymede and Mars. At Mars, we are expecting that the bulk of
the Defense Fleet will take care of any Cometine ships we did not get at
Ganymede.”
“So it is impossible to get Aliscea to
us,” said Wildstar. Derek looked across the bridge and saw Nova’s face dropping
as she shook her head at Derek. Wildstar commiserated with a soft glance at his
young spouse.
“You will have to depend upon Sasha to
scramble their defenses to get a rescue mission into the Comet to save
Desslok,” the Commander said. “Luckily, Talan and Astrena have communicated
with us, and they hope to send a fleet to your area to meet with the Argo around Pentrava, 100,000 lightyears
from Earth. It is hoped that you can somehow attack the Comet nearby soon
afterwards.”
“Yessir,” said Wildstar as he thought, How can we surprise them with a fleet? I was
hoping to surprise them with two wave-motion gun hits, one after the other; one
to destroy the Comet field, and then another to finish the
“Anyway, our best wishes to you,” said Singleton.
He saluted Wildstar. Derek returned the
salute before the screen went dark.
Then, Homer turned around. “Captain!”
he yelled. “We’re getting a distress call from Planet Vendrava! They say
they’re Beemirans”
“A distress call?” asked Derek. “Any
enemy vessels around?”
“No, nothing,” Nova said after she
scanned the area. Sandor also scanned with the sonar, and he said, “No enemy
submarines spotted, either. I’m spotting metal, though. One crashed spaceship
on the surface. An old Telezartian Trader vessel.”
“Might it be the ship they were using?”
Derek said.
“It’s a recent crash,” Sandor replied.
Homer nodded. “The Beemirans have spaceships
now. They are saying their Beemiran exploration ship is down on Vendrava. They
are calling for food, medical treatment, and for repair equipment and tritium
fuel for the reactor on their ship. They say their vessel miswarped….”
“Any hostile action?” Derek snapped.
“None,” said Homer. “They say they are
by a freshwater lake. The climate is temperate, almost like a warm early autumn
day. I think it’ll be an easy mission.”
Derek sighed. “They’re using those old
Telezartian designs for their Trader ships. No wonder. Nova, do you think that
you and Dawn can go down and check the situation out and check for wounded? You
can have
“I can send Bando,” said Sandor. “Who’s
going to be in command?”
Derek stood up and said. “
“Derek, I…” said Nova.
“Nova, if you are going down there, I
will go with you,” he said. “I’m only
letting you go down there because you’ve been going rammy to get off the ship
for the past few days. Given how far along you are; if you have the slightest bit of stomach pain at all,
let me know and you are going right back up here. If you start going into labor
early or something, since you are more than eight months along now, I will stay
by your side and help you through it. Are we clear? You still have command of
your medical team, of course.” Derek hoped she’d accept this, aware that soon
he would have to start reducing her duty hours as she grew closer to her planned
due date in early September.
“Yessir,” Nova said, smiling a little
both at the fact that she was being allowed off the ship for a mission and at
her husband and commanding officer’s extreme protectiveness.
In the meantime, on the Eritz Gatlantis, Ekogaru, in Stovall’s
aging body, was busy muttering and lighting incense in the laboratory complex
he had demanded that the Cometines had to give him.
This lab had as its centerpiece a
3-deck tall Neutrino Analysis chamber, which was a large, tall round room filed
with sensors of various kinds. A field could be activated in this room for
Cometine scientists to open up dimensional spaces so that neutrinos and quarks
and other basic particles could be analyzed and worked with for propulsion or
weapons research. Sometimes, Ekogaru used the Analysis Chamber for its intended
purpose for regular (if bizarre) scientific research for his mad future schemes
and dreams…
…other times, such as now, he kept the
chamber and its Dimensional Controls for other purposes; such as contacting
other dimensions and other realms for purposes that could only be described as
unholy and demented.
The Dark Lord, in black robes and
nothing else, played with different machines and control panels as he mumbled
weird incantations and drew an upside-down pentacle in blood on the deck. The
blood was fresh, taken from a female prisoner that he had convinced Invidia to
give to him. Of course, he executed her at once for her blood and body parts.
In fact, her skull decorated a weird staff that Ekogaru bore. He also wore his
Crystal Sphere around his neck on a chain, along with a pentacle charm and some
bones.
“Spirits of the black, forgotten
dimensions, of the Thirteen Netherworlds, hear my plea!” intoned Ekogaru as he
placed burning candles at each cardinal point of the accursed pentacle. He knew
that the traditional practice was to place the pentacle rightside up for a
white or grey magickal working, and he knew that the Pellians had occassionally
used similar techniques in their rituals, which sought to call up good and
friendly forces. He was not meaning to call up anything good or friendly, with
this chamber suffused with the spiritual stench of the Dark Side. “I demand to
see the future whereas it concerns me and my Empire and my search for a new
host! This body is dying and I require another! Spirits of the night, forces of
blackness, unseen and unknown beings of the Shadows, hear my demands! I offer
thee the blood of a virgin I’ve sacrificed to thee! Dark Forces, come forth!”
Ekogaru ran to the controls as a mighty
power ran through his body. Laughing insanely, he used the Comet Empire’s
scientific means to open up a strange dimension that mortals were not supposed
to access at all. The weird technological sorceror laughed and cackled as he opened
a field and ran into the center of the chamber, smiling as a dark form with
burning green eyes came forth.
It was a spectral form of great power
and might that even Ekogaru feared slightly. “You who are held, speak unto me
thy Name!” roared Ekogaru.
“My name is Asmodai,” said the spectral
form. “Long has it been since I was before the Terrible, Nameless Presence, and
long has it been since the Great Rebel convinced me to join his worthy cause.
Your worthy endeavors have been noticed, Ekogaru. We shall serve thee in glory
someday.”
Ekogaru grinned like mad, remembering
his Demonology well. “I thank you, O Great One,” he said.
Asmodai replied, “You do not hold me. I
come of my free will. You seek knowledge. Be thee careful. You are at the point
of beginning to attain all that you seek, even though Invidia will not be a
worthy tool. She is no longer Black in Spirit. She is turning Grey. The Light
fights with the Darkness in her soul. We are close to losing her. If she is
lost to us, you must use her, crush her, and terrify her back into our ranks.
Also, the time comes when you will need to vacate this Body. Have you chosen a
New Host yet?”
“I have. I am wavering between two
Earthers,” said Ekogaru as he made two faces appear. “The one they call Bryan
Hartcliffe, and the one they call Gary Maples, Marine commander.”
“Use Maples, I counsel thee,” said
Asmodai. “He is more steady than the pilot, who is partially insane with drink
and who could turn back to the Other Side thanks to his love for that wife of
his and that rotten spawn of a child she bears.”
“How much of a threat are they?”
Ekogaru said.
“Not much, once you slay them,” said
Asmodai. “You will have a harder time with another mortal. This mortal
humiliated you the other day, Ekogaru. The Council does not like that. We are very disappointed in thee.”
“Who?” sneered Ekogaru. “Starsha? I
threw her around like a toy? Astrena? She is mighty but she fears me. Aliscea?
She knows how to fight, but her will for combat is beginning to corrupt her
soul at last. Sasha? She is a weakling.”
“None of them,” said Asmodai as he made
a familiar face crowned with blond hair appear. “This mortal is the greatest
long-term threat to us, I foresee. Why? Her will and her purity,” sneered
Asmodai. “For some reason I can’t comprehend, many higher forces have taken a
great liking to this Child. She has been touched her in some way. I do not know
how or why. If Power was ever to be conferred upon her, she would almost be as
much of a threat to us as Trelaina. Maybe more. The Higher-Ups love her for some disgusting reason. I
want you to see to it that she does not reach Earth alive to give birth to
those rotten children. If she does so, she would be a great threat to us. Is
this understood?”
Ekogaru bowed. “Yes, Lord. I thank you
for this intelligence.”
“Do not make it obvious, though. Make
it too obvious, and they will know what you are up to, Ekogaru. You have
over-reached before. Take a care you do not do so again.”
Ekogaru prostrated himself before this demonic
sprit and smiled. Then, with a roar, Asmodai disappeared.
II. A FIGHT TO REMEMBER
The Eritz Gatlantis
Between the Great
Magellenic Cloud
and the Milky Way Galaxy
Sunday, August 2, 2207
1610 Hours: Earthtime
Princess Invidia was not happy as she finished snapping
orders at Gorse over the phone and hung up.
She got up and walked towards a couch
in her suite and then sat down again. She felt cold, weak and tired for some
reason, as of something was draining its soul from her a just few minutes ago.
She was very relieved when the horrid
feeling passed and she sat on her couch in her suite in her white boots and a
red dress as she read through a printout of her newest attack plan in a red
notebook.
Now,
we have our forces searching for the Argo, she thought. My
remaining fleet forces under the command of Admiral Shandara are due to meet
with us within ten days at 10,000 lightyears past Balan, and then we are to
begin plotting for our last drive towards Earth, which will then be 64,000
lightyears away. At our warp rate, if the Argo, the Gamilons’ forces, or
the Rikashans or Radnar do not stop us, we should be able to throw all of our
resources at Earth in the beginning of their month of September…namely a total
of six hundred ships we have been able to draw together plus the power of this
Comet and my Fortress within. If we strike fast and hard, faced with this
power, even Earth will surely surrender to us and sign some kind of peace and
fall under my power. Then, I can start again with what is left of Earth’s
surrendered forces under my command, maybe four hundred new ships manned by our
new slaves from Earth…and we can finish what we began at Sanzar with over a
thousand ships while I rest in my new Palace on Earth. So why am I so worried?
A bell at the door of her suite buzzed,
and Invidia said, “Enter.”
Caella came in, in her usual long blue
dress and white sandals, looking very silly but very resolute at the same time.
“Cousin Princess,” she said. “You and I
need to talk.”
“I hope it is good,” said Invidia. “I
am a busy woman. I am plotting the destruction of the Earth forces.” She closed
her notebook. “Just a few more days, and they will be in our power at last.”
Another buzzer rang, and Invidia picked
up her phone. “Yes, Gorse?” she said. “What is it now?”
“Princess,” said Gorse’s voice over her
phone. “Per your orders, we found where Star Force went. The destroyer tracking
the Argo just tracked them right to
Planet Vendrava. It seems they are on some mercy mission and they are sending
down a landing party. Your orders?”
“Don’t attack the Argo yet,” said Invidia. “But, get me that landing party. Capture
them alive and bring them here. Then, I want them tortured until we know what
their attack plans are. Have our ship sneak a landing party in there so that
the Star Force will not know what we are up to…until it is too late.”
“Yes, Princess,” said Gorse. “I’ll send
them in at the planet’s night side. The Star Force is sending their party in on
the day side.”
“Good work,” said Invidia. “When you
have captives for us to torture for information, let me know.”
“Of course,” said Gorse.
Invidia hung up. “Minor business. Our
Captain by Vendrava is bringing me some more prisoners. I’ll have a little fun
in the torture chambers in the next day or two.”
“Torture, torture, torture. Is that all
you think of, Cousin?”
“How are we supposed to win a war? By
being nice to them and asking ‘please
surrender?’” Invidia snapped.
“Michelle told me you were using even
her to try to seduce Desslok. That is sick,” said Caella.
“It was to be a trick. She was meant to
feed him poison,” said Invidia. “I actually entrusted the slave child with a
mission. Yes, she failed, and yes, she is confined to her quarters without food
for a day or two, but that is a mild punishment. What did you do?”
“Heard her crying and fed her,” said
Caella.
“What?” Invidia said. “You try to win
her loyalty? I would have given her a banquet in the next day to make amends.”
Invidia got up and got her pointer and pointed it at Caella. “YOU are not to
interfere in my business again! Get out of my sight!”
“Freaky,” sobbed Caella.
“What?” hissed Invidia.
“You always were freaky,” sobbed
Caella. “Probably comes about because you are a half-breed!”
Invidia jammed her pointer into
Caella’s stomach. “Say that again and you will EAT this stick!”
“Freaky, freaky, FREAKY!” screamed
Caella. “You’re not one of us! You’re
not green, you’re ugly and pale, and you are a monster! That’s why I’ve decided
that you are better off DEAD! You are dragging our people down to Hell!”
Caella grabbed a loose blaster off a
table and she fired at Invidia. Invidia ducked the laser beam at once, and she
swung her pointer at Caella’s head.
Caella screamed, ducked behind a couch,
and fired two more shots at Invidia, missing her in her rage, but succeeding in
setting some curtains on fire.
Invidia howled and she hit Caella in
the head with her pointer. Caella’s head spun, but she got the weapon up again
and fired at Invidia.
Invidia ducked, getting a green laser beam through her
shoulder instead of her heart. She gasped, sobbed, and then she got a sharp
decorative dagger from off the wall. She stabbed at Caella with it like a wild
woman, and the blaster flew out of Caella’s hand as she took a stab wound in an
upper arm. The agony was incredible, and there was a lot of blood, but Caella
screamed and threw a book at Invidia’s face. Invidia caught the book in her
face and she fell back, stunned.
Caella used a sandaled foot to kick the
blaster across the rug, and she jumped for it, meaning to get the weapon to
just kill Invidia.
Invidia was on top of her a moment
later, reaching for her throat to strangle her. But, Caella screamed and
grunted and threw her off.
Invidia went for a panic button near
her phone to call her guards, but Caella fired again and hit her hand.
Screaming like a maniac, Invidia tore the phone out of its connector and threw
it at Caella.
Caella got in in the chest, and she
dropped the blaster. Invidia got at it, and with a laugh, she fired at Caella,
who was prostrate on the floor. But, she missed, and Caella kicked one of her
high-heeled shoes right into Invidia’s stomach, making Invidia drop the
blaster.
The two women wrestled and tore at each
other like maniacs, screaming as they did so. Caella’s hair was soon askew, but
she was desperate enough to grab Invidia’s long black hair and to begin pulling
at it. Invidia howled and raked her nails across her enemy’s face, drawing more
blood. A moment later, Caella bit Invidia in the hand, making her scream as
Invidia kicked at her and yelled, “Animal!
Do you have your rabies shots?”
ARTWORK: “Catfight”
© 2009 by M.C. Crump (“Max Damage”)
“I want you to die, you piece of shit cousin of mine!” Caella yelled as she kicked
Invidia right in the crotch.
Invidia screamed, and she got a heavy
dish and began to smash Caella in the head with it. Caella took two cuts in her
forehead, and the fruit in the dish flew everywhere. Caella then got a heavy
fruit like a grapefruit and threw it at Invidia’s face, screaming as she got
her tormentor by the neck while she was blinded by the juices.
Invidia was finally down. No matter how
hard she kicked at Caella, the woman would NOT break her stranglehold on her.
Invidia was forced into the rug on her back as Caella laughed and continued to
cut off her air supply. Invidia’s world began to go black as Caella laughed more
and spat a mixture of blood and spit into her face. “I hope you like being dead, Invidia!” she raved.
Invidia sobbed and felt around for the
dagger. I hope you like it when I kill
you, bitch! Invidia thought, being unable to speak now. My own flesh and blood tries to assassinate
me? If I live through this, I will have you stripped, lashed a hundred times on
the whipping post in public until all of them can see your bones in your naked
back and bare butt through the wounds, and then crucified for this!
Invidia felt for the backup panic
buzzer, but she screamed as Caella stabbed her through the hand with the
dagger, nailing her hand to the table and trapping her. Caella laughed, and she
stood back, reaching for the blaster as she aimed at Invidia’s face. “I always
wondered what your brains splattered all over the place would look like, Invidia!” ranted Caella.
Caella fired, but the blaster just
clicked in her hand. “Out of energy!” she ranted. “SHIT!”
“You wait until I get up,” Invidia
rasped. “I’ll rip your rotten damned head off myself!”
“No you won’t!” Caella screamed.
“Because before the day is over, I’ll be on Earth! WITH YOUR
Caella then leaped for the notebook.
Invidia tried to trip her, but Caella just kicked her in the side. Then, she
pulled another dagger off the wall and threw it at Invidia, meaning to get her
in the heart with it like she heard the Earth heroine had at Melezart.
However, she did not have either Nova
Wildstar’s strength, basic martial-arts knowledge, or good luck. The dagger
flew crazily and sliced Invidia in the face. Invidia snarled and tried to rip
her hand free, but Caella just got the notebook and said, “I’ll be back in a
few days, Cousin! LEADING THE ATTACK AGAINST YOUR
Then, Caella ran away as she just left
the hatch unlocked.
Invidia gasped and tried to struggle
away as, a moment later, Michelle ran into the suite, having overheard the
noise and breaking her house arrest to do so.
Michelle gasped at the destruction and blood
all over the place as she saw Invidia. “Princess!” she cried.
“Caella,” she gasped. “Bitch tried to
kill me and got our attack plans for Earth. She is traitor! She will defect to
the Earthlings! Free me so I can kill her!”
“I’ll free you, but I’m helping you to
Sickbay, first,” she said. Michelle then pulled the dagger out of Invidia’s
hand as tears ran down her cheeks. The Princess had treated her badly recently,
but Michelle knew she had messed up and that her benefactor needed medical
help.
Then, bandaging Invidia’s head wound
with a scarf, Michelle helped Invidia out of there. She met a guard on the way,
and a moment later, Invidia smiled as alert klaxons began going off.
They would get Caella soon. Invidia was
sure of it.
Duchess Caella ran and ran and ran
until she bashed on the door of her own suite.
Sakamoto was sleeping in there. He was
surprised when Caella slapped him awake and threw clothes at him. “Get up and
get dressed!” she yelled. “We are heading to Earth!”
“Earth?” he said. “My God! You’re all
beat up!”
“Does not matter now. They are after me
and want me dead. I can get treated in Sickbay on one of our own ships. But I
stole Invidia’s attack plans. See?”
“So, you are taking those to Earth?” he
said.
“Yes,” she replied. “Now, they might
change them, but I know of most of their alternate plans. In a sense, your
world will be warned. I have had enough of Invidia. I turn against her because
I want her dead. If we move quickly, we can get out of here….”
“Sounds good. I hope they don’t kill us
first,” said Sakamoto. “Where are we heading?”
“Dock Twelve. I have a destroyer
Captain there I know named Captain Vada who is a friend. If I get there quickly
enough, we can be on our way out in a few minutes…”
“Let’s get going,” said Sakamoto after
he threw clothes on over himself. Caella gave him a Cometine blaster she had
stolen, and soon, they were off and running, and they went down a lift just
ahead of a squad of Cometine troopers.
At the lift, they were met by three
troopers, who promptly began shooting like mad at them. Sakamoto was hit once
in an arm, but he grimly fired back as he ran down a corridor with Caella.
After another lift ride, Caella grabbed
a phone receiver, punched in a code, and yelled, “Captain Vada?”
“Caella?” he said. “What is going on?
We are under a lockdown. They say someone tried to kill the Princess.”
“Yes, and that someone was I. I have an
Earthling with me. We have to flee the
“It won’t be easy,” said Vada.
“Everything is being locked down.”
“I have to get off here!” screamed
Caella.
“I said it would not be easy. Not
impossible, Duchess. If we run after hacking the computer and warp right away,
we may have a shot at it…get down here!”
“Coming…” said Caella. “This way!” she
yelled at Sakamoto. “Let’s run!”
So…they ran….
In the meantime, back on Earth, Karl
and Teri Forrester and their two children were in their apartment in the Tokyo
Megalopolis.
Teri ignored her children as they
played in the living room, and she opened up her e-mail, which she had not
checked for about two and a half days, ever since she and Karl had gotten to
“Yes? I was wondering why you looked so
obessesed. What is up?”
“Nova wrote back to us…at last…”
“Where is she?” asked Karl.
“I am about to find out,” Teri huffed
as she opened the note from Nova while Karl looked on. It read:
To: Teriforrester.
From: Novawildstar.
RE: What is going on?
30 July 2207
Mother:
Thank you for writing
to me.
First, I cannot tell
you exactly where I am due to Military Censorship. We are still in space.
I am on the Argo,
and we are still fighting a war with the Cometines to defend you and Father and
my brother and sister. Please keep this in mind from now on, and PLEASE keep in
mind I volunteered to be here of my own free will! Derek is not forcing me to
be here. In fact, he wants me home just as badly as you do!
I am well, and Derek is
being an absolute angel to me. He loves me and I love him.
He does not beat me,
make me wear a veil, and he seldom drinks sake.
Your suppositions about
my husband and Commanding Officer are ridiculous, out-of-line, and actually
obscene.
Were you not about to
be the Gradmother of my children, I would tell you never to talk to me again
like I told your sister Yvona. Remember HER, Mother?
However, because you
are about to be the grandmother of my children, I will bite my tongue because
you may still wish to see them.
IF you wish to see
them, you will write to Derek when you get this (you have his e-mail address)
and apologize.
You will also never try
to induce me to leave MY husband again and leave my children without a father.
If you ever bring this up again, I am no longer your daughter and you are dead to
me.
Oh. Take the cribs and
baby clothing and donate them to the Church. Derek makes more than enough money
to purchase me what I need. WE do not need them.
Apologize to my husband
and myself or you and Father will never see your grandchildren.
And stop treating me
like a child, for God’s sakes!
NOVA.
Karl read over the message from Nova
while Teri’s eyes got wider, bit by bit.
“I…can’t…believe…Karl…she would talk to
me like…” Teri said. “Such insolence!”
“What did you write to her?” sighed
Karl.
“What?”
“Our oldest daughter has a very long
fuse, Teri. You must have said something really nasty to her to set her off
like this. And can’t you tell she’s still in space? Probably in combat? I was trying to tell you that
before!”
“She’s comparing me to Yvona,” screamed
Teri as both David and Aurora stopped playing. “Karl, get her picture off the
mantel and break it…I…”
“I’ll do no such thing,” said Karl.
“Did you try to tell her to leave Derek?”
David ran up and said, “Mommy, why would
you tell Nova to leave Uncle Derek? He’s always nice to us and he’s cool! And
he makes Nova laugh all the time!”
“Your Uncle Derek is a very bad man!”
Teri snapped. “Nova’s about to have two babies and he’s making her stay in
space and fight!”
“I don’t think they have much of a
choice right now, Teri,” Karl retorted. “And she very clearly says she is out
there because she wants to be!”
“Why?” snapped Teri. “She must be
crazy!”
“You were never in the military! I was!” snapped Karl. “On a ship, your first
responsibility is not to yourself, or even to the Skipper, but to the ship!
This is wartime, Teri! Nova is just out there trying to do her job! They must
have gotten attacked again on the way home from Iscandar. That explains why she
didn’t write for days. All right, then. You like to write letters? Apologize to
her husband, for God’s sake! And to
my oldest daughter!”
“I will apologize to Nova, but not to him,” she said.
“All right,” sighed Karl. “I guess we
will never meet our grandchildren, then. ”
“What do you mean by that, you drunk!?
Always away on business! I bet you have some floozie woman on the side who
looks like our baby!” she yelled at Karl.
Karl just lost it at that point. For
the first time ever, he slapped his wife across the face and snapped, “I think
YOU are the one who’s been hitting the Scotch lately, Teri! NOT ME!”
“Mommy, Daddy, stop it!” cried
“And why are you running around in bars, Mommy?” yelled David. “Why can’t
you get your damn act together?”
“SHUT YOUR MOUTH AND STOP LYING!”
roared Teri. “Get upstairs now! You are getting your mouth washed out with
soap! Then you are getting fed castor oil or hot sauce!”
“You know they’re right, Teri,” snapped
Karl. “I know you have been in bars at night! And not with me, either, shooting
a friendly game of pool!”
“Where did you hear that?” yelled Teri.
“And what right did you have to hit me?”
“I heard it from the same people in our
firm who told me you were flirting with graduate students back in
“My baby would never dare raise a hand
to me,” snapped Teri.
“That is what you are missing, Teri!”
snapped Karl as David and Aurora watched, terrified, from near the top of the
stairs through a banister. “Our oldest daughter is twenty-nine years old and
she is no longer a baby! She is a very bright and mature young woman for her
age at whom the Universe has thrown an incredible amount of crap at in eight
years. And it has matured her, but not broken her.”
“She snapped at me!” said Teri.
“Teri, when your late sister Yvona was
alive, I know for a fact that Yvona told you to leave me several times over,”
Karl snapped. He continued with, “You resented it, didn’t you?”
“Yes, I did,” said Teri.
“I remember our old house in Boulder
before the bombings, and you two going at it like wild she-wolves with your
tongues while Hiram and I shook our heads at you two lunatics and we watched
little Nova watching you two through the banister with big wide eyes like
saucers like I know our two youngest ones are doing now. The difference between
you and Yvona used to be that you two would get mad, but your crazy sister
would call up to Almighty God and then go and drink while you’d do something
constructive with your anger,” Karl said.
“That’s right,” said Teri. “My sister
was going crazy for years. We should have noticed it.”
“Yes. Or, you used to be like that,”
Karl said.
“Used
to be?” snapped back Teri.
“You’re not like you were, Teri,” said
Karl with great anger and grief in his eyes. “You’re not quite the woman I
married anymore! You resented being told by Yvona to leave me. You told me you
hated her. Well, guess what. I think you are very close to having your oldest
daughter hating you now. You remember how you felt then. Now, think back to
those horrid nights, and put yourself in Nova’s boots. Or flip-flops because
she is heavily pregnant now. To her, right now, you are sounding a hell of a
lot like your dead sister!”
“I am not!” Teri yelled. “You are
filled with sin and vileness, Karl!”
“You are even
sounding just like her now, you hypocrite!” Karl yelled. “Your sister Yvona! She
wanted to keep poor Samuel practically in diapers all his life because she
wanted to possess him like a toy, and she scared away three of his girlfriends.
You were always possessive of Nova. Is it any wonder? She was like a doll. She
still is in some ways. But she has that bit of a tomboy in her that you always
hated. And Nova was lucky enough to fall head over heels with a man who will
stand his ground like a Samurai and tell you to go to Hell rather than be
scared away. You’re mad because you could never set Nova up with those jerky
kids in those pictures. She made up her own mind, and she made the right
chopice with Derek. If you ever meet our son-in-law again, Teri, I will not say
a word while he reads you the riot act that will be coming at some point. Why?
You deserve it. And you deserved it from our daughter, too. I want to meet our
grandchildren, Teri. I want apologies in the e-mail to Nova and to Derek before
you go to bed tonight. Are we clear?”
“All right, I’ll write the e-mails,”
said Teri. “I’ll write them. You rotten bastard…” she muttered.
Karl stood there, tapped his foot, and watched
as Teri pulled up her e-mail program, pulled up Nova’s and Derek’s e-mail
addresses, and began to write….
III. BY THE SHORES OF THE
Planet Vendrava
Sunday, August 2, 2207
1722 Hours: Earthtime
Nova Wildstar thanked the Heavens that
it was fairly warm on Vendrava and that the grassy ground was not rock-hard. It
had become impossible for her to put even her large space boots on over her
swollen ankles at this point, and her calves were a bit swollen, so she wore a
space helmet, regular gloves, her male-issue shirt, skirt, weapon, and sandals
on this mission. She was able to move well enough, but she was now very tired. Maybe I should have just stayed on the ship
after all, she thought as she trudged along beside Derek carrying her
medkit.
Not far away, Deke Wakefield walked
with Sasha. Dawn Hardy was not far away, along with two other medics.
“So where are we goin’?” asked Deke.
“I’m picking up the pain of those
wounded over that ridge,” said Sasha. They went up over a small hill and they
found it; a battered white and green Telezartian Trader spacecraft, near the
shores of a lake, surrounded by a small group of Beemirans, many of whom were
crudely bandaged.
A Beemiran male who wore a bright
yellow loincloth, booties, and a red sash over his upper exoskeleton came up to
Wildstar and said, “My name’s Captain Purvis,” in his nasal voice. “Glad to see
you lot here.”
“What happened?” asked Derek.
“Miswarp, and then we came out right
near this planet. The engine blew, and we just barely managed to re-enter
safely and we crashed,” said Purvis. “About half my crew’s already dead.”
Nova knelt in the grass to look at a
Beemiran with a trembling hand. “Senses are off,” he whispered. “One of my
antennae got knocked off. They help us keep our balance…”
“This growth factor should help you
regenerate that,” Nova said as she carefully injected something into the wound
in his head portion where the antenna had been while Dawn helped hold him down.
“Sasha, get me a dressing from that box!” she said.
“Right,” said Sasha as she knelt down to help
Nova and Dawn tend to the injured Beemiran. Nova carefully tapped on his
thorax. “Anything hurt when I do this?”
The Beemiran nodded and thrashed as his
leg and bootie came up, and his bootie fell off, baring his clawed foot. “We
need to undress him for a full exam,” Dawn said.
Nova nodded and gently took his minimal
remaining garments off. Sasha gasped when she saw the Beemiran’s maleness out
in the open...his testicles, or what passed for them, were nearby in his lower
exoskeleton. Dawn and Nova got a cathether ready for him while another medic
ran over to check out another one. “Ma’am, this one has internal injuries,” he
called out to Nova.
Nova patted Dawn on the back and said,
“Finish up with him while I check this other one…” Nova ran over and knelt with
Derek to check the moaning Beemiran. He had lost an eye, and he had a big gash
in his thorax. The clear fluid that passed for blood for Beemirans oozed out of
him in gushers with each labored breath.
“…Not gonna make it, am I?” asked the Beemiran.
“I’ve treated worse,” said Nova as she tried
to be reassuring.
“My sword’s at my side. Kill me with
it, Earthwoman.” he gasped. “The pain’s too accursedly greatish!”
“We don’t kill wounded,” said Derek.
“Well, you serve the spirits by killing
me,” he said.
“Maybe we should have had Doctor Sane
come with us,” Nova said.
Derek and Deke tried to help him sit up
as Dawn sent Sasha over with a syringe of medication when everything went mad.
A green laser bolt went right through the
wounded Beemiran and finished the job that the crash had started. Body fluids
went all over Nova, Deke, and Commodore Wildstar as Sasha whipped her weapon
out.
“Get down!” Derek yelled at Nova as he unholstered his own
Astro-Automatic. Deke grabbed Sasha and helped defend her as four Cometine
troopers ran up.
Shots from Derek, Nova, Sasha, and Deke
knocked them down while Dawn screamed and got her own weapon out. Soon, Dawn
was helping the four of them in the firefight as Commodore Wildstar yelled into
his lip mike in his helmet, “Sandor! Forget
landing by the engine portion of the ship! We need backup! Cometines are
shooting at us!”
“How bad is it?” said Sandor. He then
heard Nova yelling, “Wichensky and Nakamura just got it! The remaining
Beemirans are trying to help us, but it’s a bloodbath!”
“I’ll be right there,” said Sandor. In
his landing craft, he yelled, “Hemsford! Get that squad ready!”
“Right, sir,” said the massive black
Space Marine. “C’mon, you guys! Lock and load! Time to dance!”
In the meantime, on the Eritz Gatlantis, Caella and Sakamoto had
succeeded in evading Invidia’s guards, and they were now down in the dockyard
levels.
Sakamoto could not read the alien
numbers, but Caella found Dock Twelve without much difficulty. She saw guards
around it, and tensed, ready to fire, but she relaxed when she saw three of
them saluting her. One came up to her and said, “Duchess, we are loyal to
Captain Vada. But you are now in command. Your orders?”
“Get us in there and take off before
the rest of them board your ship!”
“Of course,” said the Sergeant of the
Guard. Sakamoto did not understand what his exclamation, “Jara, Maglets tial Vikansha egra na talanadara!” meant, but
he guessed its meaning when a trooper near him saluted and snapped “HO!” and then said to him, “Come you
this way, Earther. Stay you close to Duchess.”
“You are now boarding the destroyer Vikansha,” said Caella as she and
Sakamoto ran into the white and green Cometine space warship. Sakamoto heard a
wind-like noise and then a sound that sounded like an old Diesel engine kicking
in, and Caella said, “We’re going to the Bridge, but you will secure for warp
shortly. We’ll probably have to warp as soon as we clear the Comet Field and
its gravity well. Doing that while evading pursuit ships will be the hard
part.”
A moment later, they arrived on the
bridge. A chubby Cometine officer with green skin, a mustache, and white hair
hugged Caella and said, “We are glad to see you safe, Duchess. We are heading
right for Earth in several warps. Get your guest secured for warp. Tell him my
name is Captain Vada and he need not fear for his safety from my men; he is a
guest of yours as far as I am concerned. You know how to work the restraints.
Orders?”
“The obvious. Get us out of here!”
cried Caella.
“We are prepping for launch now.”
Caella nodded and guided Sakamoto to a
pair of high-backed seats near a vacant bridge station. Sakamoto was helped
into the seat by Caella, who kissed him as she secured a number of belts that
were not that much unlike the warp harness on an EDF space warship. Sakamoto
heard orders being barked about, and then he heard a harsh voice coming up on a
screen as a Cometine officer of higher rank with a bearded face and
high-collared cloak of some kind on barked something very unfriendly-sounding
at Captain Vada. Vada barked a few things back, and then ordered his men to
“Release the coding!” in Terran Standard as Sakamoto understood it, followed by
something else he yelled in Cometine. A loud bang resounded throughout the
ship, and Sakamoto saw lights beginning to move through the bridge windows.
Caella looked at Sakamoto and said, “We
have an emergency override circuit we can use to break computer orders from
Central Command to stop our ship in an emergency. We can operate independently
for maybe two minutes now until they can lock back on to our computers and
order us to shut down or shoot us down. We should be on our way out by then.”
The destroyer began to move very fast.
It headed down off its runway and dropped quickly down past several levels as a
set of huge blast doors began to whir shut. The helmsman just got the ship past
the blast doors in time.
Sakamoto then recognized the huge
towers and transport tubes of the
The main video screen came back to life
as Captain Vada said, “Three more destroyers just left the docks and are a
minute away from us, Duchess. Orders?”
“Full speed, and warp when we clear the
Comet Field. Jump all overrides,” said Caella.
Sakamoto was excited as commands went
back and forth in Cometine on the alien vessel’s bridge. He felt the ship
speeding up appreciably as open space loomed through the central vortex of the
Comet like a vast tunnel entrance. Soon, they were one with the few stars in
that vast dark intergalactic gulf as Sakamoto beheld a glittering mass off in
the distance; the Milky Way Galaxy.
The Vikansha
picked up speed as plasma beams from the destroyers loyal to Invidia skipped
past her. One of them hit the ship. A few more Paranoia fighters appeared and
began shooting at the Vikansha, which fired back with its own short-range
weapons.
A few seconds later, there were more
harsh commands, and the stars suddenly streaked into multicolored bars of light
as the Vikansha was kicked into warp.
The space warp lasted for maybe thirty seconds to Sakamoto. It was a dizzying,
sickening feeling far worse than anything he had ever experienced on an EDF
vessel.
When they emerged from warp, he saw
they were in a small star system. Beside him, Caella smiled and said, “We are
now twenty thousand lightyears away from the Eritz Gatlantis. They might pick up on us and pursue, but not if we
keep moving. Captain?”
“We’re readying for a second warp now.”
“Good,” said Caella. “If we can keep on
warping, we should be out of here and in your Galaxy in a few hours…”
The EDF spacecraft carrier Shiryu was still on patrol in the Sanzar
System near Gamilon when Marine Lieutenant Gary Maples felt a cold but by-now familiar
presence forming beside him in his cabin. He was alone except for the cold
Presence.
“Maples,” said Ekogaru in a whisper.
“Remain here in this cabin, even if you must feign sickness. It is almost
done.”
“You mean, you have chosen me as your
next Host?”
“Yes, Maples.”
“You do me honor, sir. I feel some pity
for Stovall. Is he dead yet?”
“No. But he soon shall be,” said
Ekogaru in a dark whisper. “I will use him one last time, to capture some
prisoners.”
“And then?”
“Then expect me to bring you the Sphere
soon to finish this as I abandon your friend forever. I am sorry. He has grown
far too undependable and decrepit. He has not taken well to my presence…he
fights me too much. I pray you will not do the same.”
Maples nodded. Too bad, Stovall, he thought.
But, such is life, I guess.
Maples bowed to Ekogaru in worship,
accepting at last the offers of power, money, women, and so forth that he had
been making to him for days.
Ekogaru embraced him in a cold,
spectral embrace and said, “I shall return.”
“Thank you,” said Maples.
Then, the Dark Lord faded away.
Mick Stovall sat on the floor of
Ekogaru’s lab on the Eritz Gatlantis,
trembling as he tried to keep his meager bit of gruel down.
He now looked almost sixty-nine years
old. The presence of Ekogaru had now finally made him look like an old man.
“My youth,” he muttered in a fading
voice. “I gave it to you, Ekogaru, ya bastard. Yuh promised me power, wealth,
money, whores. Got all those, but I’m barely even able ta think for mahself any
mo’ because you are always in heah. In my head. And every time I look at myself
in the mirror now, I is getting older,” muttered the forner Marine Sergeant
whose education was abandoning him as his mind went. “Another month, and I
might not know who I am no more. You fucked me over, Ekogaru. You screwed me up
good, you lousy son-of-a…”
Gorse came in and saluted. “Lordship,”
he said. “Someone has just tried to assassinate Princess Invidia. She is now in
the
“I’m eatin’ my gruel,” said Stovall as
he played absently with the Sphere, just wanting to just smash it into the deck
for a moment and rid the Universe of the Dark Lord. If he had decided to smash
it now, the next thirty years of Galactic History would have gone very differently.
“Go away, shithead! Leave the little
Princess bitch to the doctors!”
“How dare you talk to me like that,
Lord?” snapped Gorse.
Stovall got up and walked over to Gorse
and slapped him. “Because I can,” he
said. “Got a problem with that?”
For a moment, Gorse was tempted to just
shoot Stovall right then and there. Had he done so, this also would have
changed history. However, thoughts of shooting him passed as a Black Presence
entered the room and entered Stovall, who passed into near-unconsciousness as
he gasped and his eyes rolled up into his head when the Dark Lord slid into
him. Stovall also aged three more years befor a shocked Gorse’s eyes, looking
about seventy-two now. But, Ekogaru made the dying body stand erect as he said
coldly to Gorse, “Like to try and shoot me now,
you green scum?”
“Lord, forgive me, I…” said Gorse as he
bowed to the ugly form.
“Silence,” said Ekogaru. “Prepare the
torturers. I will bring you prisoners. After I do so, I will partially heal
Invidia. Then, torment the prisoners to your delight! Oh. You shall not see me
in this form again for long. Later this day, I shall be inside a new Host.
Another Earthling. This one is condemned to death, but he knows it not, the fool. Do not be surprised. Are we
clear?”
Gorse nodded.
At that, with a howl, Ekogaru departed,
fading away like a bad dream.
IV. CHAOS AT VENDRAVA
Planet Vendrava
Sunday, August 2, 2207
1740 Hours: Earthtime
There was a slight planetary quake as the
Dark Lord set foot on Vendrava a moment later near the scene of the battle by
the lake. As Stovall, deep in his mind, dimly apprehended what was going on,
Ekogaru walked towards the scene of the battle. He was smiling as he watched
the Cometines shooting down both Beemirans and Terrans in the course of the
battle.
Sandor, Hemsford, and some of his
Marines were helping the beleaguered group of warriors in the battle. Still,
Ekogaru smiled and laughed to himself when he saw Nova take a hit in her left
shoulder.
Nova fell screaming into Derek’s arms
as her shoulder began bleeding heavily. Derek embraced her hard and pulled her
slowly away as he continued firing to cover both of them.
“Where are you going?” demanded Deke as
he and Sasha were also trying to hold them off. Sasha’s weapon had just run out
of energy, so Deke was trying to cover for both of them. Somwhere in the
running and insanity, both Deke and Sasha had lost their flight helmets.
“Nova’s hit!” Wildstar yelled. “I have
to get her out of here!”
“I’m trying to hold them off!” Dawn
yelled as she found herself in the position of trying to defend both Sasha and
Nova. A glancing blow from a Cometine weapon hit a rock; the ricochet from the
exploding rock hit her hand and knocked her weapon from her hand.
Dawn sought cover with Derek and Nova.
A moaning Nova put up her head from Derek’s breast and shakily handed Dawn her
Astro-Automatic. “Use this, Dawn,” she whispered. “Give Derek your medkit. He
needs it for me….hurts…so much…”
A moment later, Ekogaru himself
appeared in their midst. “Oh, yes,” he whispered. “Are you scum having a nice
little party?”
“YOU BASTARD!” Wildstar snapped as he
hugged Nova even more tightly and held him off with his Astro-Automatic.
“You’re not getting Nova!”
“Misguided fool,” replied the Dark Lord
as the sky turned an unnatural dark shade of blue. “I’m not here for her. At least not on this trip. I’m here
for someone else!”
Sasha suddenly felt a horrid sensation
of cold and she shrank against Deke. “No,” she said. “Stay away from me!” she
snapped.
Deke’s anger quickly boiled over into
rage, and he snapped, “Stovall, Ekogaru, or whoever the hell ya are! Get out of
here! Or….”
“Or you’ll what?” said Ekogaru as he
raised his hand. Deke snarled as the weapon in his hand turned into a cucumber.
“Cumcumbers do not make very effective weapons!”
Deke howled like a wild animal as he
attacked Ekogaru with the cucumber in his hand. Something weird like white fire
shot from the Dark Lord’s hand, knocking a snarling Deke down in his tracks for
a moment as Wildstar shot at the Dark Lord, followed by Dawn.
Ekogaru laughed off the shots as he reached for Sasha.
With a hiss of utter rage, Sasha
extended her hands and fired pink energy and lightning at her tormentor.
The lightning hit the Dark Lord, and he
roared with rage as he was actually hurt by Sasha! He stumbled back, only to be
met with a stilletto jamming into his arm. Deke had gotten out his drumsticks
and had torn off the upper halves of them, revealing sharp stillettos. Deke was
stabbing him with one of the stilettos as he prepared to jam the other one into
his stomach.
Derek held Nova close, firing like mad
to cover their retreat as he clutched both Nova and the medkit close to him.
The upper half of Nova’s shirt was now soaked with blood. She had torn it open
as she clutched at her wounded shoulder herself with her right hand, trying to
stem the bleeding from her wounded shoulder with manual pressure. Nova had
ruthlessly pulled aside her bra strap to do so, not caring that she had just
torn her bra and had exposed her left breast in the act.
“Wildstar!” yelled Deke. “Back us up,
sir!”
“Doing what I can!” he yelled back as
he shot at Ekogaru and a stray Cometine, who fell screaming. “Nova’s hurt!”
“Leave her by a tree for a minute and
help me cover Sasha!” yelled Deke. “He’s comin’ right for her!”
“Are you crazy,
In the meantime, Sasha and Ekogaru
squared off. Ekogaru said, “I hope you are prepared for torment, Princess
Sasha! Because that is what you shall experience…torment!”
“I hope you are prepared to die like
Skaldart, Ekogaru!” hissed back Sasha. “I killed him, and I can kill you! You
are not immortal in that rotten body!”
“You lie,” said Ekogaru as Deke came at
him again with a stilleto. He stabbed the Dark Lord in the chest, wounding one
of Stovall’s lungs. Ekogaru gasped at the impact, but he ignored it. I only need this body for another few
minutes, he thought. Then I will
leave it and Stovall to
With a mighty, roaring paroxysm of
unnatural strength, Ekogaru used Stovall’s arm to fling
Deke felt the tree smashing into his
back, and then he saw Ekogaru embracing Sasha in a sick embrace right before
his world went black.
Ekogaru held Sasha. Both of them
vanished before the stunned eyes of the others.
“Sa…Sa…sha…” rasped Deke before his
head smashed into the tree. Then, he heard and saw no more for a while.
A screaming Sasha found herself in
Ekogaru’s arms on the Eritz Gatlantis
a moment later in a dark, miserable-looking room. She hissed, kicked, and
fought.
She felt the bite of a needle as
Ekogaru shoved it into a buttock in her blue Midshipman’s uniform. Sasha willed
herself to use her powers to burn out Ekogaru’s eyes, but, instead, she raised
her fingers and was shocked when nothing happened.
She also could no longer feel Deke.
Their bond was gone!
“What did you do to Deekee?” demanded
Sasha.
Ekogaru ignored her, and said, “Where
is Invidia, Gorse?”
“Sickbay, after that assasination
attempt!” Gorse replied. “Doubtlessly being held down by the doctors and having
her clothes torn off to be examined! She loves doctors so much!” laughed Gorse. “Lord, should we give them the orders to
have her meet an….”accident”… down
there yet so we can finally depose
her for your ends? She’s getting to be a liability rather than an asset to us
now. She is no longer a terribly effective puppet for us!”
“Not yet,” said Ekogaru. Sasha caught
this bit of intelligence and thought, These
people are controlling Invidia now! We were right! She’s just being used!
Sasha yelled at Ekogaru. “What did you
do to Deekee?”
“We killed him. Too bad,” lied Ekogaru
with a grin. “He must have died in the midst of the fighting along with
Commodore Wildstar. I’m going for Nova, next. You and your aunt are both
sentenced to prison, by the way, and you might receive the death penalty if you
fight me too much. What a shame, Sasha,” rasped Ekogaru as he spat blood out of
his mouth right on Sasha. “When I get Nova, those babies of hers will be
delivered prematurely at once and put to death. Right in front of her. Sort of
a shame, because she went through so much to carry them up to now, but I wouldn’t
want them to come into the world with their father dead, now, would we? Oh.
When she gets her Cesarian Section, we don’t use anesthesia. You might like to
know that for when we begin dissecting you. I will also bring you Deekee’s dead
body. Who knows? You might want to cuddle up to your dead Tiger as a bedtime
toy until he begins to draw the flies!”
“YOU BASTARD!” Sasha roared as she went
for Ekogaru like a wild animal with tears in her eyes, ignoring the arrival of
Gorse and about ten guards. The guards grabbed her, pulled her boots off, and
handcuffed her wrists and bare ankles. They slapped her and pulled her hair
while Gorse and Ekogaru laughed at her before they carried her out of the room
like a sack.
“The torture chambers for her,” rasped
Ekogaru. He leaned on his cane, smiled, and ignored the blood coming oozing
from his mouth.
“Goodbye, Stovall,” he hissed as he
teleported this dying body, for one last time, to Vendrava, disappearing before
a startled Gorse’s eyes.
V. THE BITTER DEATH OF MICHAEL STOVALL
Planet Vendrava
Sunday, August 2, 2207
1800 Hours: Earthtime
On
Vendrava, Dawn and another medic were both helping Derek Wildstar administer
emergency treatment to both Nova and an unconscious Deke Wakefield.
“I
wonder what sort of shape he’s going to be in when he wakes up,” Nova whispered
as she gritted her teeth, trembling and almost naked in Derek’s arms under a
tree behind some bushes near an unconscious Deke as Sandor and the Marines
finished off the Cometines a few hundred meters away and the battle petered
out. The torn, bloody clothing on the upper half of her body had been removed
so that Dawn and Derek could clean her wound, give her a tetanus booster, and
begin field-suturing and then bandanging the laser wound on her shoulder. Her
skirt and panties had been pulled down too so that her stomach and the
birth-area-to-be could be carefully checked by Dawn to see if the babies were
in danger or if Nova’s water had burst or if she was bleeding down there. Dawn
ran a stethoscope over her stomach while Derek finished the field-suturing job
himself. Dawn smiled, saying, “Nova, the babies should be okay.”
“Good,”
Nova whispered. “Nothing wrong? How’s Deke?”
Dawn
smiled and said, “Deke’s going to be fine. Those babies are okay, too. No
spattering or premature labor. Pull her skirt up, sir.”
Derek
kissed Nova and began to dress her again. She smiled a little in her pain at
Derek as he pulled her Star Force shirt off himself and laid it nearby as he and
Dawn and the medic began to bandage her upper body. “Thank Heavens you didn’t
lose all that much blood,” Derek
said.
“It
could be worse. I still might need a transfusion back on the ship. Why’d you
take off your shirt, Derek?” Nova asked.
Derek
smiled at her as he sat there in just his “wife-beater” singlet-style
undershirt and said, “It’s for you. We can’t take you back to the Argo half-naked like this.”
Dawn
then turned to
“Good
enough for Nova, bad for Sasha. Ekogaru captured her, and
“Where
is she?” demanded Deke.
“They
say Ekogaru got her, and…”
Deke
sat up and grabbed Hardy by his shirt. “It’s all that damn Wildstar’s
fault…he…”
“Hey,
remember, Nova’s expecting!” said Hardy
Then,
cold laughter came from nowhere as Ekogaru reappeared before them in Stovall’s
body…for what would be the last time.
“
“Deke,
not now,” said Commodore Wildstar as he tried to hold him back. Deke just
shoved Wildstar away, knocking him to his knees in an utter rage.
To
Deke’s shock, Nova held him by the arm as she said, “Deke, Derek’s right.
You’re hurt, I’m hurt. Let others try to capture or kill him…you’re hurt bad!”
Deke
snarled at Nova and slapped her away. The wounded, pregnant officer fell to her
knees. “Deke! STOP IT!”
Ekogaru
taunted Deke, yelling, “Come on, you animal! Come and get me! I am unarmed!”
Deke
covered the distance, tackling Ekogaru with a vicious slam. Then, he kicked the
Dark Lord with a suddden ferocious onslaught, and he stared Ekogaru right in
Stovall’s hated face and then he stabbed him right in the throat with one of
his stilettos.
Ekogaru
panicked, roaring at the pain as Stovall’s jugular vein was torn open. He
reached for his Sphere, meaning to get his demonic spiritual essence out of
there, because
Then,
Nova saw the object, and as Derek screamed “NOVA!” she took one of the
greatest, most desperate risks of her life and she jumped for the Sphere like a
baseball player going after a ground ball, meaning, at great risk to her soul,
to just put her hands on it and throw it into a tree and shatter it. I could finish him, she thought with an
incredibly strong will. I could finish
him once and for all! All I need to do is break that thing, and then…
Nova’s
fingers brushed the Sphere, and she shut her eyes and recoiled at the horrible
cold while grasping at it as the Sphere faded away just as she opened her eyes.
Something like a cold wnd blew past as the Dark Lord’s spirit ran from there,
taking his Sphere with him.
On
the Shiryu, Ekogaru appeared before
Maples, holding his Sphere in his cursed astral hands.
“Lordship?”
said Maples.
“Touch
this,” said Ekogaru. “Touch this and give me a new home now! That bitch was
about to break this! She was five seconds away from killing me! A mere mortal!
I have lived for over three thousand years, and who has the will to try and
kill me? A damned pregnant woman with a wounded shoulder, that is who!”
Maples
touched the Sphere for the first time, and a weird sense that this would
someday be the death of him passed through him as he felt power that he had
never felt before.
Ekogaru’s
spirit faded away, and Maples grinned as he realized that the Dark Lord was now
alive inside him. Maples was both
horrified and gratified at being utterly possessed by the Lord Ekogaru, not
caring that his soul, like Stovall’s was now on the beginning of a long trip
into damnation.
Ekogaru
took over Maples and laughed in a low voice as Maples was suddenly aware that the
Dark Lord had abandoned Stovall to a horrid death at the hands of
“…it’s
over, Stovall,” said Ekogaru’s spirit in acid tones that only Stovall could
hear now as Deke Wakefield kicked him again.
“..what?”
muttered Stovall. “You…you betrayed me! Where did you go?”
“A
new and better Host,” said Ekogaru as he made an image of a laughing,
triumphant Maples appear to a dying Mick Stovall. Stovall just helplessly took
it as Deke stabbed him, two, three more times with a stiletto.
“Not
him!” croaked Stovall. “NOT HIM, LORD!” gasped Stovall as Deke kicked him right
in the crotch. “…have mercy,” he rasped.
“What
mercy?” roared Deke. “You had none for Sasha, you son-of-a-bitch of a thing.
You let Ekogaru ride you like a horse! Where’s that Sphere? Nova, ya break it
yet?”
“Almost,”
she cried. “He’s gone, Deke! I…”
“Gone,”
said Deke in an acid tone of voice. “Stovall, ya lyin’ piece of crap! Where is
he?”
“…gone,”
said Stovall. “Gone into the Cosmos. He used me…
Stovall
screamed, spitting up blood as
Stovall
screamed like an animal as
The
last thing Stovall ever saw was a vengeful Deke Wakefield as he stabbed him
again. “THIS one’s for the whole war and for Alex Wildstar and for Nova,
Stovall!”
“…mmm…mmmeeerrcy..I
was…being used…” mumbled Stovall. “But…I ain’t totally sorry ah hurt ya…
A
horrified Dawn, Hardy, Derek Wildstar, and Nova Wildstar watched as Deke
stabbed the dying form of Stovall two more times. Then, he howled and began
just stabbing the dying body like a pincushion as stab after stab went into
Stovall, causing blood to come out of him in six more spots like a dying
fountain as Stovall mumbled, “…not…bloody…at all…sorry, Wakefield!” as he felt
his labored heart finally stopping in his chest.
Everything
went black for Stovall as the last thing that he felt was stab after stab, and
the last thing that he heard in this life was
…as
a hole opened in existence itself and Stovall’s spirit was dragged into a black
void, like a black tunnel.
Stovall
saw a glimmering orange light. His ghost screamed in horror as he saw that the
light was being generated by a burning, raging Fire somewhere deep in the
bowels of the Universe.
He
was still screaming as his spiritual essence fell into the eternal Pit, and
Things with claws grabbed him and dragged him down into the Fire with them as
they laughed, screaming, “Enjoy now the
reward that Ekogaru and Asmodai have prepared for you! They never loved you,
Michael Stovall!”
Stovall
was no longer laughing.
He
was screaming as his eternal damnation began.
“Deke!
STOP IT!” yelled Hardy as a berveaved Wakefield continued to laugh, scream, and
attack Stovall’s corpse with his knives and his fingernails.
“Wanna
make sure he’s dead!” ranted Deke as
he threw Hardy aside. Then, Dawn grabbed him and said, “Deke, he’s dead now!
So, most likely, is Ekogaru. Going after him isn’t going to bring poor Sasha
back!”
Deke
lashed out as Dawn and struck her twice in the face. Dawn screamed and fell
back, stumbling as she tripped over her own booted feet.
Commodore
Wildstar tackled Deke, and he took three elbows in his gut, almost losing his
wind as he wrestled with the crazed
Nova
nodded and ran up with a syringe. She hugged the kneeling, raging young man
hard and said, “Deke, I’m sorry, but I have to…”
Deke
lost it and elbowed Nova, head-butting her right in her wounded shoulder with his
head as he turned and punched her in the mouth.
Nova
screamed, falling back as a tooth was knocked out.
Enraged
at the sight of his pregnant wife being assaulted by one of his own men, Derek
Wildstar lost it himself, and he threw a hard right right at
“NO!”
cried Dawn as Deke fell. Wildstar punched Deke in the head again, and, at last,
Deke felt and saw no more as he was finally knocked out by Wildstar.
Nova
looked at the inert form of Deke as she felt at her own bleeding mouth with disbelief.
Derek gently picked up his wife’s broken tooth and then looked from her to
Derek
then kicked Stovall’s body as hard as he could, and then he kicked the
unconcious
“You’re
taking me back to the ship, Derek?” Nova said.
He
nodded.
“I
don’t want to go on any more away teams,” she whispered. “I’ve…had…enough…”
“I
do not blame you,” he said as he hugged her, and touched her stomach. His wife
was okay. His babies were okay.
But,
Sasha was gone.
Derek
saw her blaster on the ground, and he began to just cry. “Sasha…my niece…Sasha!
Nova, how are we ever gonna tell Alex and Starsha this?”
“I
don’t know,” she whispered. “I…don’t know…”
Dawn
just cried, watching in disbelief as medics picked up an inert
Derek
walked Nova towards the Medical boat, just glancing at a pit a few hundred
meters away as smoke rose from it. At his orders, Stovall’s corpse was stripped
so that they could analyze the clothing and effects that he and Ekogaru had
worn together. The naked corpse was carried away by some Marines and thrown
into a pit, where Sandor and Jefferson Hardy oversaw the scene. The only
“funeral” that Stovall received was a disposal as a few Marines poured some
gasoline-like compound found in the Beemiran ship onto and over his body as
Hardy nodded and threw a burning torch into the mess, cremating Mick Stovall’s
rotten remains right out in the open, where they would burn into ashes, burned
flesh, and refuse in a few hours. The remains would receive no burial or
rememberance.
After
the dead Marines and Star Force members and the dead Beemirans were buried,
Commodore Wildstar headed back up to the Argo,
where he visited Nova as the time ticked over to 2000 Hours.
He found
poor Nova lying in Sickbay in a white nightgown receiving a transfusion. Doctor
Sane smiled at Wildstar and said, “We have a very lucky young lady here. I went over that shoulder wound again
and we implanted a false tooth into her so her smile will be intact. We’re just
giving her some blood so that the babies will not have any problems. But, other
than that, she’ll be back on duty again in a few days.”
Derek
held her hand, nodded, and kissed her, saying, “Are you in much pain?”
Nova
smiled weakly and said, “Some. But it’s not that bad. I still failed us, Derek.
I could have stopped Ekogaru. I could have gotten that Sphere…I…”
“Stop
blaming yourself. We may have done it after all. We called Iscandar,” said
Derek. “Starsha can’t feel Ekogaru any more. He might finally be gone…for
good…”
“He’s
not, Derek. That globe faded away from me…right as I was about to grab it. He
took it somewhere…”
“But
Starsha thinks he’s finished. Oh. We told her about Sasha, Nova…”
“Can
she…feel where he went?”
“She
doesn’t know, Nova,” said Derek. “Deke’s still out cold. Maybe it’s better this
way. Word’s already going through the ship how he attacked me, you, Hardy, and
Dawn when he was losing it.”
“Are
you doing anything to him, Derek? Maybe we…”
“Nova,
I’m not charging him with anything. I talked to my brother a little. Consort
Mode. Remember? Deke couldn’t help him. I asked Doctor Sane to try to keep him
sedated. Or in restraints, at least. He’s not to be charged with any
offenses…but he’s not in his right mind. He’s in a room by himself under guard.
He’s being guarded because I’ve heard a few crew members want to get him…for
what he did to us. Especially you.”
“All
for me?” said Nova as tears filled her eyes.
Derek
nodded. “This crew’s adopted you, Nova, my love. Both because you’ve been with
us so long and because you’re…well…”
“Going
to be a mother in maybe three or four weeks?” Nova said as she patted her
stomach.
Derek
nodded with tears in his eyes. “I almost wish I could hurt
Nova
sat up more, twinging as some pain went through her mouth. “I wish I could hurt
him,” she muttered. “The last thing I needed now was oral surgery. I can have
only milkshakes for about two or three days now until that implant takes…”
“Well,
I’ll make sure you drink them,” Derek said as he held his wife.
“I
love you, Derek,” Nova said.
“I
love you too,” Derek replied as they
embraced.
VI. THE SPHERE OF JOY
The Eritz Gatlantis
Between the Great
Magellenic Cloud
and the Milky Way Galaxy
Wedenesday, August 5,
2207
0934 Hours: Earthtime
Princess
Invidia also was in pain as she dressed with Michelle’s help. She had just had
three doctors put to death, and she was filled with rage with Caella’s
defection.
“To
make things worse, Michelle,” she said. “Ekogaru came to see me.”
“Him,”
Michelle said as she shivered. Michelle now wore a Cometine uniform tunic and
skirt with her sandals; Invidia had given her the Imperial Rank of Duchess to
replace Caella, and she had given her an Imperial Commission with the rank of
Lieutenant. “I hate him, Invidia. What did he want?”
“He
wanted me to kill Sasha. I refused. I also gave orders that she is not to be
raped or significantly harmed, other than being given a drug so that her powers
will be kept in check. It’s my guess she’s doing well…enough. Even though I do want her tortured.”
Michelle
nodded, saying nothing. “I’ve increased the guard around your quarters,
Princess. I’ve also heard rumors that Gorse might…”
“Have
your troops investigate him, and have him put to death if you find anything.”
Invidia sat up, smiling as Michelle zipped her boots closed and put her cape
back on her. “Go and guard my quarters. I am checking on Sasha now.”
“Must
she be tortured?” said Michelle.
“Do
not oppose me,” said Invidia. “You know we have to get information out of her!
At least…I am more humane to her than Ekogaru would be…”
“Yes,
Princess…”
“Why are you doing
this to me?” gasped Sasha in the near-dark Cometine examining room as two
doctors and six of those horrible green-skinned guards in the blue uniforms she
had come to hate were examining her again.
“What did Iscandar or Earth ever do to you?”
she sobbed. “Your dictatorship is trying to conquer us!”
“SHUT UP!” roared the guard as he slapped Sasha across the
face and then helped another guard throw her against the bed.
“Not again, please,”
she said as she saw the needle coming for her. She felt dizzy, sick, horrible,
and very tired, since they had fed her nothing in two days, barely had let her
sleep, and had only given her enough water to keep her alive.
“You’re getting two shots, darling Princess,” leered the
guards as they forced her to bend over the table with her bottom in the air.
It was particularly humilating since, for this exam, like
the others, she had been stripped totally naked. Again.
They had let her wear the blue Midshipman’s uniform she had
been captured in. It almost hurt her now because she was mildly chafed and she
hadn’t worn underwear for about a day now. Now, her bra and panties were gone,
her wedding band was gone, her picture of Deekee and her gunbelt were gone. Her
only possessions now were her one-piece uniform and her boots.
“How much, Doctor Gonzlat?” snapped one of the guards as he
slapped Sasha’s bottom and then began swabbing it with a very cold solution
that somehow burned.
“Eighty shagat,”
said the nasty, bearded Cometine doctor. “We need her synapses short-circuited
enough so she can barely see the other side of the room, let alone the future!”
So
that’s it, Sasha sobbed to herself as she was held down again for the
large needle. They’re interfering with my
mind! That’s why I can’t feel Deke or call to Mother or anyone else with my
mind for help!
“We scanned your shriveled brain the other day, bitch!”
hissed another one of the guards as he began to lewdly caress her buttocks. “We
know you like magic mushrooms. And sex,” he leered as they laughed. “A Gamilon,
an Iscandarian, your pilot, even your uncle, it doesn’t matter to you, does it? You want it so bad,” he hissed
as he snuggled up to her and began touching her in a very lewd and sick fashion
as he prepared to open his trousers while the others laughed. “Time for your
medicine!” he said as his friend gave Sasha the needle.
Sasha screamed, burying her face in the bed and crying as
the drug ran through her system. “Now your tetanus shot,” said another guard as
he injected Sasha with something that hurt so much it almost made her pass out.
“Now for your third medicine dose,” the first guard said as
he cuddled up to her while two others held Sasha down. Sasha felt his bare
thighs and heard rude laughter as she tried to push herself up on her arms to
fight off the Cometine guard. “You like blue? Let’s see how you like green, you
stinking Gamilon-lover whore!” he said as the others laughed and he prepared to
force himself upon her…
“YOU ARE NOT TO DO THAT!” barked a deeply accented female
voice as Sasha heard booted feet coming into the room on the metal deck.
“Princess!” said Doctor Gonzlat as the men (except those
holding down Sasha) turned about and saluted Invidia.
“She is royalty,”
snapped Invidia. “Not a common Earthling wench. If we had captured the other
female, too, the one who almost finished Ekogaru, you could have had all the fun you wanted! Instead, she and
the insane pilot got away from us and, the Dark One said he permitted Wakefield
to kill Stovall’s body right as he abandoned it.”
Sasha smiled at that. Nova
got away from them! Sasha thought So
I didn’t hear her screaming in here the other night and they didn’t kill her, or
Deke! Thank Destiny! She got away! And so did Deekee! Way to go! Maybe I’ll get
rescued!
“What are you
smiling about?” hissed Invidia as she crossed her arms while holding her
pointer. “Guards, let her go! Prepare the room for her! I want to talk with her myself, first! I want only you and you
in here with me. The rest of you, go!”
“Yes, ma’am,” said Gonzlat with a laugh. They left Invidia
alone with Sasha and two guards.
“I’m smiling,” said Sasha. “Because I know my stay here will
be very short. That’s because your Dark Lord messed up and didn’t get my
husband or my auntie. What a shame, Princess!”
“You lecture me
when you are a prisoner at level Five and you are naked?” hissed Invidia.
“When did you develop this drug of yours?” said Sasha as she
stood up and tried to look as regal as she could in the cold room with nothing
on.
“A bit more than a year ago,” said Invidia. “We originally
intended it to be used on Trelaina if we ever saw her alive again to blunt her
cursed mind-energy. She has not shown up to test it on, so we wanted to see how
it would work on your mother. You have proven to be a fine test subject. The
Comet Empire will compensate you for your services and offer you permanent
asylum with royal rank if you will cooperate with us and tell us what trap they
are laying for us at the Sol System. That is where we are going next. We were
delayed at Iscandar thanks to stinking Desslok, so we will go after your other
homeworld directly next. Like to see me crush the Earth with this Comet?”
“Why invade if you’re just going to kill everyone?” said
Sasha. “I don’t get that part,
Princess. Isn’t that…sort of bent in the head?”
“You do not call me crazy! They surrender or die. Enough
crap from them,” snapped Invidia. “The gloves come off now.”
“Too bad that we got your buddy Skaldart,” said Sasha with a
smile. “Was he your latest boyfriend?”
“SILENCE!” screamed Invidia as she used her pointer to poke
Sasha hard in the stomach. Then, with a whistling sound, she cracked Sasha’s
bare side with it. As Sasha stumbled and fell, Invidia slapped Sasha’s back
with the stick, causing a bloody welt to rise up. Then, she cracked her on the
buttocks, nice and hard. Sasha would see bruises on her body a few hours later.
Invidia then smiled and nicely worked the high heel of one
of her boots into Sasha’s hand as if she was putting out a cigarette butt,
causing Sasha to weep in pain.
“That’s the way prisoners should look…broken!” snapped Invidia as she breathed in and spat a huge wad of
saliva onto Sasha’s naked back. Invidia then picked up Sasha’s uniform off a
table and sniffed it while Sasha looked on through tears of rage. “This thing
is getting ragged, and it stinks. So
do the boots,” she said as she sniffed the inside of Sasha’s dark blue cadet
boots. “Your feet smell, Iscandarian
floozie. Like the rest of you.” Invidia threw the uniform at Sasha.
“I haven’t had a chance to bathe for days thanks to your
goons, Invidia,” sobbed Sasha. “Where do you hire your help from, anyway? The
scum of sixty planets?”
“Not important! Put this rag back on your smelly carcass,
and the boots and get decent. Then my
guards will bring you to the other room. You are about to experience a little
bit of technology exchange with the Black Nebulans that will make you give up
your haughty airs! Forever!”
“What?” sobbed Sasha. “Electrocution by those
machine-freaks? Crucifixion? Burning alive? Just kill me and get it over with
if that’s what you want!”
“No, I won’t kill you,” said Invidia as she knelt by Sasha
and cradled her face in the heel of her hand and wiped away her tears. “Big
girls do not cry, Princess. Talk to me now, and I will spare you the Sphere of
Joy.”
“Here’s my answer,” said Sasha as she struggled up; and spat
on Invidia.
“BITCH!” screamed Invidia as she slapped Sasha again. “That
is it! Guards, make her get dressed. Then, we ready…the Sphere of Joy for this
one.”
The guards laughed.
A few minutes later, Sasha was dressed again. She was led
into a dimly-lit empty room with black walls, and left there, alone as the
guards left. There was no way out.
Sasha heard a sound like a motor, and a shield came up at
the high part of the room, near the ceiling. The room seemed to be three or
four floors high, like the Zero-G Combat Room at the Academy, but the only
thing Sasha could see was a dimly glowing red-lit window too high for her to
reach, about ten meters above her head. Sasha could see figures moving in the
room behind the window, but nothing else.
“Are you comfortable, Princess?” said Invidia’s voice over
hidden speakers.
“No,” yelled back Sasha. Sasha heard dim laughter and then
she heard Invidia saying. “You will feel better soon,” said Invidia as Sasha
gasped as some kind of hazy field formed beneath her booted feet. She nearly
stumbled as she saw that the field was lifting her off her feet as the control
room window blanked out.
There was a low, gentle hum, and Sasha almost fell down as
she floated two meters off the floor, then, three meters. The field was jostled
as dim laughter came over the speakers, and Sasha cried out, thinking she was
going to be dumped onto her head for fun.
Instead, she fell on her bottom against nothing as a light
grey energy ball slowly surrounded her, cradling her in a soft sensation that
felt weird but somehow pleasant.
If
there was no torture involved, this thing would make a great amusement park
ride, thought Sasha.
“Commander Talnaz, explain the principle of the Sphere of
Joy to Princess Ensign Sasha Wakefield of Iscandar and Earth,” said Invidia.
“Yes, Princess Invidia,” said a bald-headed Black Nebulan.
As he began to speak in a deep, harsh voice, a weird chord came over the
speakers and then evil-sounding piano music began to play in the background.
“Our late Holy Leader Skaldart invented the Sphere of Joy as a means of
variable persusasion of prisoners like yourself, Sasha. We can be kind to you,
amuse you, cause slight discomfort, or major discomfort. Or, we can make you
feel like you are dying. Or, we can just kill you. You are nothing. We are in
absolute control of you, every sensation, every thought. I have broken people
stronger than you in the Sphere, Sasha. You might be amused by how we begin,”
he said as he worked a switch.
Lying in the field, Sasha gasped as she felt a new field
tickling her, and then slowly ripping down the bodice of her uniform, down to
her navel. It felt like a claw going over her suddenly naked stomach in a sick
version of a caress.
Sasha then saw, with some feeling of disorientation, that
little bits of her uniform that had been torn away floated up and disappeared
into the field, crackled a little with purple lightnings, and then faded into
nothingness.
“We can do that to you,”
said Invidia. “It is called matter-energy absortion. It can be fine. We can do
your body like that. Slowly. Exquisitely. We can start with your eyelashes.
Your eyebrows. Your hair. Your teeth. We can be gentle. I can take your
fingernail and toenail polish off you, carefully. Then we can take off all of
your clothes. Or we can be rougher. We can start with the layers of your skin.
We can cause pain, or we can slowly skin you, cell layer by cell layer. Then,
we can go down to the subcutaneous layer. Take every little bit of fat from
you. Your blood and lymph would float in the zero-gee field. All around you. Or
we can start with a limb. Nice and slow. Strip it down to the muscles. The
bones. I took a Terran pilot’s leg off last week, in just that manner. He
talked at last when the next thing we began to sear off were his genitals.”
“Do what you want to me, I won’t give up or betray my
husband or my mother or my other loved ones or my friends,” sobbed Sasha as she
began to cry. Her tears ran down her cheeks in the field and slowly floated off
her cheeks.
“Tell us what Dawn is planning,” laughed Invidia. “We’ll let
you go and put her in here instead. Maybe we’ll even let you play with the
knobs up here in the control booth. You don’t like Dawn Hardy much, do you?
Because she was once with your Deekee?”
laughed Invidia.
“I like you even less,”
hissed Sasha.
Sasha gasped as an invisble finger went up one of her
nostrils and ripped. She had a slight nosebleed; but the blood just floated up
and away as it hissed into nothing.
“That hurts,” she whispered.
“Ready to relent?” said Invidia over the speakers.
Sasha shook her head fiercely as her hair flew around her in
the field.
“Talnaz, level Two,” said Invidia. “Begin stripping her.
Just caress the epidermal nerve endings a little…”
“Yes, Princess,” said Talnaz as he watched a series of
readouts of Sasha’s body on his console and then flicked more knobs.
Sasha closed her eyes, gasping as the field turned into
something like a light grey cloud, lifted her higher off the deck, and threw
her back on her bottom.
She
cried out as something in the sphere began to attack her uniform, tearing it
away from one breast, baring her back, exposing her buttocks, her upper legs,
and then her womanhood.
Then, something like an electric shock hit her right in the
navel as she screamed and the field ripped more of her uniform off, bit by bit.
It tore it to rags, and ripped it remorselessly off her body as the weird hum
increased. Then, Sasha felt burning sensations on her back, her thighs, her
breasts…her genitals.
She flipped her hair around and began to moan as she felt
burning, pain, and something that felt like it wanted to break a rib right
inside her suffering body.
Then, Sasha screamed as she felt something like an invisible
hand tweaking her left nipple. It was followed by a sensation that felt like
cold water thrown against what she saw was her shamefully exposed womanhood.
It felt horrible.
It felt hellish.
“Ready to talk yet?” said Invidia.
Can
I think of anything false to get out of this? Sasha
thought. No. I won’t give them the
satisfaction! I’ll die first. Deke, I love you! Please hear me!
“Sasha?” said Invidia.
“Go to hell, Invidia,” gasped Sasha.
“I’m picking up an echo on her heartbeat,” said one of the
doctors in the control booth. “It’s faint. Also an echo on the EEG. Very
faint.”
“Strange,” said Invidia as she looked at the controls and
looked at Sasha screaming. “Level Three, Talnaz. Cause her all-over pain.”
“Yes, Princess,” said Talnaz.
The pain let up for Sasha in the Sphere, but then a new pain
came when something like purple lightning appeared at the edge of the sphere
and hit her 
bare
skin right above her womanhood.
“NOOOOO!” screamed Sasha as she felt like she was on fire,
there.
More bolts came, and then, there also came an even deeper hum
that assaulted the bones as well as the ears as the field grew more chaotic. It
ripped away the rags of her uniform and her boots in about ten seconds.
The field then left her totally naked, and it tossed her
around violently as more of the lightning came, faster, faster, faster, burning
Sasha’s skin all over; behind her knees, her bottom, the backs of her hands,
her buttocks, her back, her stomach, the soles of her feet, the tips of her
toes, all felt as if she was being boiled alive. Sasha screamed, and her eyes
bugged out, her vision blurring as the field even assaulted her eyes, making
her feel as if soap was in them, and then went into her mouth, causing a horrid
sensation on her tongue as she screamed that made her think she was being
force-fed the very hottest variety of Tabasco sauce possible.
The naked, suffering Princess was thrown around, and she
screamed and said, “No more, please, no more. NO MORE! I’ll tell you something!
I’ll talk to you and…”
“Too late,” laughed Talnaz. “We know you are lying. Invidia
is signing your death warrant now. The actual damage will start at Level Five.
Which limb do you want burned off you first? Or do you want your spleen torn
from you?”
Sasha cried, gasped, and screamed “DEEEEEKKKKKEEEE!” as loud
as she could manage.
On the Argo,
He had come around the previous day.
Wildstar had talked to him, but only a little. He was being
kept in Sickbay, under guard, under confinement, “for medical reasons”.
He felt like crap.
Dawn had come to see him. They had argued, over Sasha and
his vengeful attitiude. The argument had ended with Dawn slapping him across
the face. Then, Hardy had come to see him. It had barely gone much better, but
Jeff, at least, did not hit him.
Nova had not been in to see him yet; and she had not visited
him to nurse him (at least while he had been conscious). He was dreading
meeting up with her again.
Then, there had been dreams. They were all of Sasha. Now, on
the Argo, Deke Wakefield’s latest
dream turned into a nightmare as he saw Sasha in his dream in the sphere,
naked, in pain, screaming, gasping, nearly going into an asthmatic seizure for
the first time in her young life.
“Sasha!” he screamed at the top of his lungs.
“Deeekkeee?” came a
strained, pathethic thought to his mind.
“You’re alive!” said Deke out loud.
“I’m in the
“We’re coming, Princess,” said
Sasha screamed in his mind and then went silent.
Deke began to dress. He knew what he had to do.
Now.
Right now.
In the control room, Talnaz said, “The drug didn’t work all
the way! She gave out a modified alpha impulse. She needs nothing at all to
kill us like Trelaina. I would stamp her out NOW!”
“NO!” said Invidia as she grabbed his hand.
“What?” said Talnaz. “She is dangerous! She is recovering
her energy…she…”
“We’ll drug her food,” said Invidia as she turned down all
of the knobs and slid down all of the sliders. Invidia was able to read the
medical readouts herself. “I don’t need Doctor Travata to interpret that. She
is royalty, and…”
“WHY THE HELL ARE YOU STOPPING IT?” said Talnaz.
“We could use her offspring. It must be allowed to live,”
snapped Invidia. “So must she for the
moment.”
“Offspring?” said Talnaz.
“That Princess is about..one…maybe…two…weeks pregnant,” said
Invidia. “The fetus inside Princess Sasha…we could use it for our own ends.
Doctor Gonzlat, take Sasha to a new cell in the upper detention block. No. Make
that a secure suite. Clothe her in a regular private soldier’s uniform and see
to it she has food, drink, and rest. Administer more of the drug in her food. I
will try talking to her again, soon.”
“Yes. Princess,” said Gonzlat. “Troopers! Get her in a
blanket and get her out of there!”
“Yessir,” said Gonzlat.
“We’re not done yet,” said Invidia. “Talnaz, ready the
Sphere for our next guest.” Invidia then hit a button. “Eqal, when I give the
word, bring Desslok out of high security. Bring him to
“Yes, ma’am!”
At that, Invidia smiled.
TO BE
CONTINUED….
To Return to the Introduction to The New Comet, click here