Galaxy Under Siege

by Tristan Vick

  The techno-phage circuit began to glow bright white as it fed the machine a malicious code to take it out of commission. The Centurion’s red eyes flickered briefly and then went dark as the whole machine slumped back down into its resting position.

  “That’s better,” Gaewen whispered, squeezing past the slumbering metal beast. She flipped over the card and pulled off the back side then slapped the second piece of techno-phage adhesive onto the prison cell doors. The locking mechanism whined in protest, but the virus won out in the end and then, with a noisy clunk, the heavy doors unlocked.

  Nervous that the rather loud door mechanism may have alerted the guards, Gaewen glanced back over her shoulder. When she was certain their attention hadn’t been aroused, she quietly slipped inside the prison.

  Quickly scanning the interior of the hexagonal waiting room, she found several smaller suites behind reinforced glass lining each opposing wall. Only one suite had any lights on signaling to her that it was most likely Zallek’s cell.

  Gaewen quietly went over to the access panel and typed in the security override code she’d stolen from the manufacturer of these prefab prison cells. If the code was valid, it would run a security bypass on a password reset. Then, even if the system required biometric data, she’d just input her own.

  After a retina scan and a finger print scan, along with her personally selected security code, the glass wall finally opened and let her into the holding cell.

  She turned off her invisibility cloak and, not seeing any signs of Zallek, casually walked toward the bathroom. Although there was no bathroom door, steam was billowing out of the entrance, alerting her to the fact that he was showering.

  Gerrard Van Zallek stepped out of the shower, rubbing his hair with a white towel. Stark naked, he stopped what he was doing and looked up only to find a strange, green-skin woman wearing heavy tactical gear standing in his private room, staring at his naked body. He smiled. “And who might you be, my precious?”

  “I’m Major Gaewen Feradorn. Senator Targon Van Morgan felt you needed to be extracted as discreetly as possible, so he hired me.”

  “So, you’re a Spook?”

  A “Spook” was a special operative who excelled at recon, extraction, rescue ops, and assassinations—if needed. The tech they used made them into veritable ghosts, allowing them to slip in and out of places undetected. And if Senator Targon had sent a Spook to collect him, Zallek took it as a bad sign.

  Was he being rescued or was this woman an assassin? Although Zallek and Targon were allies, he still didn’t trust the corrupt politician as far as he could throw him.

  “This spook is going to save your sorry ass,” she said, her eyes trailing down as she stole a glimpse of his male anatomy.

  “You like what you see?” he asked, turning slightly, so she could get a better look at his tightly clenched butt.

  Pretty enough, she thought, but she had no time for such distractions. “We don’t have much time,” she said with a crooked grin on her mouth. “Maybe a raincheck.”

  “I’ll hold you to it,” he fired back, his crooked grin growing into a full smile. Before he could finish wrapping the towel around his waist, however, Gaewen spun on her heels and hurried over to the ventilation duct. She swiftly drew out a small tool kit, fetched a power screwdriver from it, and revved the little thing in her hands as he watched.

  “What in the world are you doing?” Zallek asked as he began to dress.

  “The trick to getting in and out of a place undetected is to always leave a different way than you came in.”

  “I meant, won’t that trigger the prisoner breach alarm?” he asked skeptically, nodding at the vent.

  She pried off the panel and set it on the floor next to her, “I’ve already changed the security settings to your cell,” she answered. She pulled her cloak off, revealing the charcoal gray, skin-tight smart suit she wore beneath. It hugged her womanly form with the delicacy of a fine satin glove.

  “Impressive,” he said, making a double entendre about both her skills and her body. He wasn’t typically into the buff military type, but she was feminine enough that he couldn’t peel his eyes off her perfectly sculpted ass.

  After rolling the cloak up and fixing it to the elastic bands on her belt, she put back her tools and looked over her shoulder at Zallek. “Follow me,” she said, and then squeezed into the small crawl space.

  Zallek finished buttoning the collar of his copper colored shirt, leaving the top two unfastened so he could show off his chest. “By all means,” he said, gesturing for Gaewen to go on ahead of him, “after you.”

  A degenerate smile formed on his mouth and he licked his lips, admiring Gaewen’s tight ass as she disappeared into the ventilation duct.

  16

  After the giant Arkadian shrimp, the Bre’lal dancers, and dessert, Jegra felt it was finally time to give her closing speech.

  When it seemed that everyone was satisfied with the evening’s meal, she slid her chair back and rose to her feet. The delegation all stopped mid-sentence of whatever conversation they had drifted to in the atmosphere of celebration, and turned to hear what she had to say.

  “Ladies and gentlemen from all the esteemed worlds of the Commonwealth and beyond...,” pausing briefly, she brushed her dress down. She felt a little bit fidgety seeing as how public speaking wasn’t exactly her forte, but gathering her nerves, she took a deep breath and then continued on with her address.

  “I know we aren’t meeting under the most ideal of circumstances. I know that you have each experienced loss and sacrifice that very few people have ever been burdened with. But I want you to know something. As long as we face tomorrow together, there is nothing that can stand in our way.” She hiccuped in front of everyone, which drew a round of muffled snickers, and she blushed and excused herself. “Apologies, I may have been a little indulgent in my wine. Which means, I’m afraid, that it’s time I humbly retire for the evening. Please enjoy the rest of your evening at your own leisure and feel free to get to know one another. Mingle. Make friends. And we’ll convene sometime tomorrow after we’re feeling better and our hangovers have worn off.”

  There was another round of laughter and Jegra turned to leave. Only her Imperial bodyguards followed. Lianica, being ship’s captain, remained behind with the admiral to continue to get to know their new guests.

  Jegra paused at the doors, turned around and gave the Dagon salute. She was surprised when the Earth Martian delegation replied in kind and she smiled and bowed her head ever so regally.

  With that, she took her leave and stepped through the sliding doors. She paused in the empty opening, recollecting what Brei’Alas had warned her about, and was pleased to find that the lieutenant had successfully completed her mission.

  IT HADN’T BEEN FORTY-five minutes before Lieutenant Brei’Alas and the Imperial guard had rounded up all the names on the ship’s manifest and had placed them in the brig for safe keeping.

  Barrion was the last to step into his cell.

  “I’m sorry,” Brei said, raising her hand to the security glass. “If there was any other way...”

  “It’s all right,” Barrion answered. “I understand.”

  “I promise I’ll make it up to you,” she said in a voice that hinted at another round of intimacy between the two of them.

  “Oh yeah?” he asked.

  “Promise,” she answered. “Anything you want.”

  “Anything?” he asked, testing her sincerity.

  “I can’t make any guarantees, but I may have broached the subject with you know who and she wasn’t totally opposed to the idea.”

  “You’re kidding me,” he said, skeptically.

  Brei’Alas knew that the particular conversation she was referring to had been erased by the time reset and then sighed.

  “Of course, I’m kidding!” she laughed. She made sure to overdo it, bringing it full circle to that awkward and cringey moment she was so well known for. “That’s totally never
going to happen.” She snorted, for added effect and then batted her eyes at him.

  “Way to get a guy’s hopes up,” Barrion said disappointedly, puffing out a blast of hot air.

  “Just consider it payback for this,” she said, pointing at the welt on her cheek.

  “That’s fair, I guess.” Barrion crossed his arms and closed his eyes, recognizing he wasn’t going to win this one.

  “Chin up, lover boy,” she said, placing her hand on the glass again. “We’ll get through this.”

  He did the same. After a long pause, he said, “I love you.”

  “You’d damn well better,” she replied, slowly drawing away from the glass. “Because if you didn’t, I’d come in their and kick your ass all over again.”

  This brought a smile to his face and she turned toward the door. Once she arrived beside the guard, she glanced back one last time, offering a subtle wave goodbye before exiting the brig.

  The guard nodded at her as she passed him and Brei strode into the hall determined to bring Jegra up to speed about everything she’d learned from the time jump.

  Upon arriving at Jegra’s quarters she rang the doorbell and then waited. When there wasn’t any response, she reached out to ring it again, but before she’d even had a chance to push the chime a second time, the doors swiftly parted and a drunken Jegra swayed in the doorway.

  The empress had a very large bottle of pinot grigio wine in her right hand and her mouth glistened light golden with the sweet residue bedewing her lips.

  “Oh, it’s you,” Jegra said in a slurred voice, a half smile inadvertently forming on her face as if some amusing thought had occurred to her in that moment.

  Brei smiled. “Yes, and I just wanted to check on you and see if...”

  Jegra belched, interrupting whatever it was Brei had to say, the light scent of vitis vinifera grapes mingling with her sticky breath. Her sunken eyelids widened and slowly settled onto Brei. There was a moment of reflective thought on Jegra’s face, then, unexpectedly, she reached out and clasped onto Brei’s uniform. “You’ll have to do,” she said.

  “Have to do what?”

  “Quench my thirst,” Jegra replied, drawing her into her chambers and dragging her along behind her.

  As it dawned on her that the empress meant sex, she paused. “Are you sure, I mean, we could...”

  Before Brei’Alas could even finish her sentence, Jegra leaned forward and kissed her on the lips.

  Embarrassed, Brei drew back ever so slightly and was about to decline her offer as politely as possible when Jegra reeled her back in again. This time the empress’s tongue slipped into her mouth and was swirling about, doing a playful series of pirouettes with her own forked tongue.

  In her mind, she ran through every possible excuse to try and find the best way to rescind the offer without hurting the empress’s feelings when Barrion’s stupid lust-filled fantasy of the empress popped back into her head. Growing angry that her own boyfriend would rather sleep with Jegra than her, she said to herself, screw it and leaned into the kiss.

  If either of them was to bed the empress, it was going to be her. And why not? At least then she could brag about it to Barrion. And maybe then, the very idea of her having been with Jegra would get him equally as excited to be with her and her alone.

  She realized the rationale didn’t make much sense, but she was a little bit distracted by Jegra’s feeling her up and shoving her tongue further down her throat.

  Unable to back out now, Brei decided to embrace the moment instead of shirking from it. When the empress’s fingers slid down her arm, down her side, and then between her thighs, she leaned into the touch.

  Brei reached up and wrapped her hands around Jegra’s neck, and pulled herself onto her. Jegra moaned with a delicious kind of delight as Brei slipped effortlessly into her embrace, Jegra’s hands cupping the fullness of her perfectly tight ass.

  Both women stumbled through the room toward the bed, their clothes falling off one garment at a time as they hastened to the chase. Stumbling into Jegra’s bed together, Brei landed on top of Jegra. As they lay entwined, they paused and looked into each other’s eyes as if to take in the moment.

  “Are you sure about this?” Brei asked hesitantly.

  When Jegra’s lips spread into a welcoming smile, Brei smiled in kind and, as though an unseen magnetic attraction was drawing them closer, their lips crashed together again and the kiss was quickly followed up with sensuous moans which resounded throughout the royal suite.

  AT THE CRACK OF DAWN, Brei’s eyes snapped open and she looked over at the elegant woman sleeping next to her in the king-sized bed. “Oh, no, no no,” she whispered to herself. “What have you done, Brei?”

  Jegra slept peacefully beside her, one leg and one large breast peeking out of the silk sheets that only partially covered her nudity.

  Cautiously, Brei slid to the foot of the bed until, unexpectedly, she fell out and disappeared over the edge. She hit the floor with a thump and then popped back up, eyes locked on Jegra, fear building in her chest.

  “Don’t wake up, don’t wake up,” she pleaded in a barely audible voice. When Jegra didn’t rouse from her slumber, Brei let out a sigh of relief and slowly gathered her clothes.

  She dressed hastily, forgoing her underwear, as she scurried toward the door, threading one leg into her dress at a time only to freeze halfway across the room when she realized that she was forgetting her shoes. She twisted her head back around only to find them laying by the end of the bed. Rolling her eyes, she tiptoed back the way she’d come.

  Careful not to make any sound, she slowly squatted down and retrieved her pumps. As she was down there, however, she felt a strangely uncomfortable feeling between her butt cheeks. Reaching a slender hand down between her legs, she reached up the opening of her dress and felt around until she found it. Plucking it out, she held up a butt-plug and looked at it with a petrified sort of amusement.

  For the life of her she couldn’t remember getting into anything as kinky as this. But, in her defense, she had helped Jegra finish off five additional bottles of white wine.

  Not knowing what to do with the rascally thing, she set it neatly on the small round table next to the entrance that contained an ornate vase and beautiful floral arrangement. Then, slinking up to the door, she glanced back one last time to catch a glimpse of the sleeping empress before slipping out of Jegra’s chambers.

  Relief washed over her once she was standing on the other side of Jegra’s door. Through the thin fabric of her dress, the coolness of the wall felt good against her back as she leaned against it. It invigorated her and she looked up at the ceiling lights and took in a deep breath.

  Her body ached in all the right places, and she couldn’t help but smile. This wasn’t a walk of shame. She liked the empress. Almost as much as she liked Barrion, if she was being honest. And, last night they’d shared a moment.

  In her mind, even if Jegra turned out to be a little too drunk to remember much of anything, let alone who she’d done it with, Brei had no regrets. She’d fulfilled a long-standing fantasy. And she wouldn’t take it personally if, after last night, the empress wanted to keep things strictly professional.

  “No regrets,” she repeated to herself. Sauntering barefoot all the way back to her quarters, a light bounce in her step the entire way, she realized she was still beaming with the aftereffects of the prior evening’s lustful affair. Pausing at her door, she quickly composed herself before entering her quarters.

  The doors parted and she entered the chamber; a shaft of light cut across the room and lit up Barrion’s sleeping face . Being roused awake, he looked up at Brei with weary, half-opened eyes that showed he was barely awake but, lucky for her, still mostly asleep.

  “Where were you last night?” Barrion asked, stretching his arms over his head and letting out a yawn.

  She tossed her high-heels on the floor. “Oh, you know,” she sighed, “I just got back from the empress’s personal cha
mbers.” A sly grin formed on her lips as she heard herself say it but she tried to keep it subdued.

  “You two have a meeting or something?”

  “No,” she said, looking right at him. “We fucked.”

  “Ah-haha-ha,” he laughed drearily. “Good one.” Not believing her, he rolled over and went back to sleep, snoring as soon as his head hit the pillow.

  She rolled her eyes and then went into the bathroom to take a shower and freshen up for her morning shift.

  17

  The escape plan was simple. First, they’d make their way to the boiler room where they’d escape through the large fans that cooled the boiler and regulated its temperature. Once they were out in the open, they’d use her invisibility cloak and tread through the long central pool which didn’t have any pressure sensors. Upon reaching the rear exit, they’d then make a mad dash across the place lawn to the only segment where there was no wall—the part where the palace lawn met the desert.

  It was rumored that the empress hadn’t wanted any palace wall at all but was talked into it for security reasons. Even so, the Southern Reach that overlooked Arena City remained completely open. All it had for protection was a high-powered energy barrier which abdicated the need for any physical wall in that section.

  As such, Gaewen had set up a field disruptor when she’d first broken into the palace grounds. If the energy barrier was activated, it would part the energy shield like an umbrella parting a waterfall, splitting the water like a curtain.

  Once through the energy barrier, it was a clear shot across the dunes to her ship. They’d need to double-time it so as to avoid any teleport locks, but she had some scramblers to help mask their bio-signatures and avoid any teleport snares they might happen to run into during their escape.

  If all went according to plan, they’d be out of there in fifteen minutes tops. What she hadn’t counted on, however, was being teleported into a holding cell opposite Zallek’s before they’d even reached the end of the ventilation duct.