A New Reason To Fight: An Intergalactic Romance

by T. J. Brandow

  The computer said exactly what he did, but in her language, and her eyes went wide. Her jaw dropped open, and she gasped out a word.

  “How?” the computer translated.

  “The ship has been working all this time to decipher the data it got from your world,” Krai explained. “Radio transmissions and the few recordings that Nibido took of words being spoken around him while he was there. I also fed in the words you taught me, which I believe may have helped. So now if you wanted to, we could learn each other’s languages using the program.”

  “That sounds great,” she agreed.

  “But Jazz, I think there’s something I need to tell you, and I don’t know how you’re going to feel about it,” he added, sitting in the chair next to hers. “I didn’t think. I mean, here I am, a biologist and a zoologist, and I should have known better. I let the moment take me over, I suppose, but I want you to know I’m going to spend every moment I can making it up to you.”

  “Come on, Krai, what could be that bad?”

  “I should start by letting you know that sentient beings are not supposed to be collected. You were never meant to be on this ship, and for that I’m sorry. But I have enjoyed every moment since you awakened, and especially what we were just doing before we last slept. And that’s what I need to apologize about. I thought that it was improbable for us to conceive a child, so the thought of protection from it never crossed my mind. However, it did cross Nibido’s cognition, along with the idea that we might be poisonous to one another or exchange a disease. Thankfully, it appears that we are highly compatible, and there are no worries about those last two.”

  “But the other one?” she asked, one brow raising starkly. “The one about conceiving a child? Are you going to tell me that we won’t be able to? Because I’ve always wanted to be a mom someday, but I’ll totally understand if that’s not a thing.”

  “Actually, I’m going to tell you that we have,” he said, cringing slightly. “Apparently that is one of the highly compatible areas he was talking about.”

  She paused for a few moments, letting his words sink in. “And you can find this out that soon after we—and without even killing a rabbit or anything? But that’s impossible, isn’t it? Is that why that crazy robot stabbed my backside earlier?”

  “It is,” he said with a nod. “He now would like to complete a full exam of you and our embryo to make sure you would not be harmed if you should wish to follow through with the gestation. I imagine he could also terminate the process if you wanted him to do that instead.”

  The last words were said with extreme distaste, since he was also a part of the new person they’d just made, and did not care for such a notion. Still, it was her body, and she had not given him permission to use it in that way.

  “There’s no way I’d ever end a process like that!” she gasped, looking just as disgusted by the idea as he felt. He smiled, clasping her hand and giving it a squeeze.

  “Well, there is one good thing about not doing so,” he said with a smirk. “While you are gestating, we will not need to worry about another unexpected conception if we get in some practice for making any more children after this.”

  Jazz’s face was priceless. He could easily read the mix of emotions, ranging from agreement of the statement’s truth, anticipation for the sex he was suggesting they could have, and surprise that he was considering a relationship that lasted long enough for them to finish making one child and then start on another.

  “Jazz, it’s my fault you’ve lost the life you had before,” he said, drawing her into his lap. “I’m responsible for you now, and even if you never touch me again I will still take care of you and this child. But, I must confess that I would much prefer it if you decided to touch me again and again and again. Do you think such would be agreeable to you too?”

  Blushing slightly, she bent and kissed him fully on his lips, then cast him a shaky smile.

  “You didn’t ruin my life by taking me away from my world,” she told him. “My family was dead, and living on my own was just not working for me. If anything, Krai, you rescued me. And there’s no way I could ever be near you, raising your child, and want to be only friends.”

  “So, that’s a yes then?” he grinned.

  “Oh, yes,” she agreed, kissing him again.

  ELEVEN

  “Nibido has finished collecting the data from the Kumari system, which is the only other system scheduled for exploration on this run,” Krai explained to Jasmine over a meal a few days later. “We will be returning to Klibdow Space Station soon. So, I feel we need to discuss how this works.”

  “Works?” she repeated uncertainly.

  “We engage a drive that is even stranger than the one used from your system to this one,” he went on. “The sensations to your body will be unlike any you have ever felt before. Unfortunately, the device is calibrated to match Klibdow physiology, and will therefore not be completely compatible with your own. Hopefully, you will adapt to it or it will manage to adapt to you, since the request to make such an attempt has been fed in. However, with pregnancy in such an early stage and the nausea you’ve already begun to exhibit, I feel we may be wise to prepare for the probability that you may become ill.”

  “Well, that sure sounds fun,” she grumbled, then kissed his hand to soften the bite of her sarcasm just a bit.

  “The time frame in Klibdow units is meaningless to you as yet, so I looked up the approximation of time based on that of your world,” Krai continued. “In-ship hours using Earth time, you’ll feel as though two weeks have passed. Outside of this ship, however, the time stretch on Earth will have been more like two hundred years. And, so you know, you’ve already been away so long that roughly three hundred or more would have passed there since the point of your departure time.”

  “I don’t care,” Jasmine shrugged. “I’d rather begin to learn about my new home. About how many years passed there, and how long are the days, the weeks, the months, and the years?”

  “Klibdow takes much longer to pass around its sun, and there are very long stretches between night and day. It is currently on daylight seventeen, hour seventy-four of two hundred. When the sun sets at hour two hundred, darkness hour zero will begin, and elapse two hundred hours as well. Also, each of our hours hold one hundred minutes, which means an even longer stretch of time than you are visualizing with your sixty minute hours. Something like two of your weeks for each phase, with three hundred full cycles to make our year. Why would your world choose such mathematically inaccurate and cumbersome numbers anyway?”

  “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I wasn’t around for that one.”

  Krai chuckled. “No, I don’t suppose you were. But I have been thinking. We need to move the translation program into a handheld for you, and direct it to translate all spoken words for you. Nibido has devised a little earpiece that you can wear, and we could find a way to strap the thing onto you so it doesn’t have to take up your hands.”

  “What a very thoughtful idea,” Jasmine replied. “It’s sweet, Krai. But I’m still working on learning how to communicate without it.”

  “Yes, and I’ve been learning your words, too,” he added, winking at her. “Though I think I miss trying to find words when we don’t know what they are.”

  “Like eeb, eeb?” she teased.

  “That one, I intend to keep,” he said, grinning slyly.

  “So, two weeks, huh?”

  “Yes, and we will be strapped in the whole time,” he added. “You’ll require devices to eliminate the other wastes too. I hope that does not embarrass you? They are discreet, and only required during the jump phase.”

  “Well, I was beginning to wonder how that worked, to tell the truth,” she chuckled, blushing.

  “There will be no discomfort,” he added. “After a bit, you completely forget they are there.”

  “So, I take it there won’t be another clean-up gel session until we arrive?” she teased him.

  “No,�
�� he said, grinning. “Though I really think we should clean up before it’s time to go. We do have to get those devices into place somehow, don’t we?”

  Jasmine laughed at him. “Yeah, I suppose we do.”

  *****

  Jasmine was asleep when the ship slowed back down to normal speed, but she cracked her eyes open to discover that Krai was already moving about the cabin. She found herself missing his warmth, and thought maybe if she stretched good enough he might come back to bed with her.

  The effect worked, but only partially. He stepped back over and caught her hand, giving her a little tug. “We should get cleaned up before we arrive at the station, Jazz. First impressions are important, after all.”

  “You sound a little worried,” she said as she padded along at his side toward the cleansing station.

  “Well, I am a little,” he admitted. “Pulling a sentient off her world and impregnating her might be frowned upon. In fact, I might even be disallowed from going out again. But even if they did do that, I’d still have a job down on Klibdow as the one to document all of our finds.”

  “And they’re not going to have a problem with me?”

  “That’s just the thing,” he said. “To my knowledge, no sentient has been removed from their world—ever. It’s considered rude. There may be a whole lot of questions. In the end, though, I am sure they’ll allow you to remain with me, especially if you tell them that’s where you want to be. Unless you have changed your mind?”

  “And why would I have done that?” she scoffed as he tugged her dress over her shoulders and tossed it aside.

  “Well, I mean, you promised to touch me again and again and again, but I have not had you for two whole weeks. That’s a very long time, don’t you think?”

  Jasmine chuckled as he tugged off her underwear too. “Oh, that’s right. Especially if you were to calculate it in real time. We should do something about that.”

  “Should we?” he teased, chuckling when she tried to figure out the trick to opening his suit but took a few moments to puzzle it out. Once she had him free, he shucked off the garment rather quickly, revealing just what he thought of the idea as his cock sprang free.

  “Oh yeah,” she said. “I really think we should.”

  *****

  Several hours later, the pair were fully clothed as they stood by the main window and watched the massive Klibdow Station come into view. Krai couldn’t get enough of watching Jazz in the first place, but watching her face light up at her first glimpse of a space station was absolutely priceless.

  “Did you remember to slip your communicator back on?” he asked her for about the third time in as many minutes.

  “Yes, it’s on, Krai,” she chided him. “Stop being so nervous. That’s supposed to be my job right now, isn’t it? Why am I feeling just fine?”

  “Because I’m nervous enough for the both of us,” he teased her. “Whatever happens, Jazz, I will not let them remove you from my side.”

  CLICK HERE TO READ THE REMAINING CHAPTERS…

  Forbidden

  An Alien Sci-Fi Romance Story

  T.J. Brandow

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

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  Chapter 1

  Private John Norman sat in his bunk and stared up at the ceiling above him. He had only been in the Earth Exploration Army for four months, but to him it felt more like an eternity. Everything that he knew in his former life was back in Smithsville- hundreds of miles away from the training compound, which was deep within the Sonoma desert in Arizona.

  John ran his fingers through his short, light-brown hair and closed his blue eyes, trying to drift off to sleep. As he slipped into a dream, he saw his mother standing in the yard feeding the chickens the way she always did every afternoon. Then, he saw his father walk in the front door of the small farmhouse where they had lived in North Carolina, covered in head to toe in grease and dirt. James Norman would travel back and forth in their used hover car each day to work as a robot mechanic at a weapons plant. By the year 2180, most skilled labor jobs had been replaced by robots. For anyone who was skilled with their hands, but lacking in higher education, robot maintenance jobs were just about the only employment left.

  “Another hard day, dad?” John asked his father.

  James took a deep breath and fell backwards into the nearest chair.

  “Hard as any other one. You heard back from the academy yet?” he asked in his usual gruff and guttural manner.

  “Yes, I couldn’t wait to tell you- I’ve been accepted. Now, in a few years I can pay for school.”

  “And be the first Norman to go to college. That’s my boy. I know you want to be a writer and all, and despite what others may say around here I think it’s a worthy job. The last thing I want to see is my only son coming home looking like I do. Someone in our family has to make something of themselves,” he said.

  “I’ll do my best,” John said as his mother, Helen walked in.

  “Hi dear. How was your day?” she asked as she kissed her husband’s greasy forehead.

  “Like any other- hard and gritty. No worries- in a few years John is going to write a cyber book that will be a bestseller no doubt.”

  “Yes, he will,” she said, looking at her son approvingly. John was tall and handsome, but not the rough and rugged type. His straight hair hung like a mop on his head and his blue eyes were wide but deep in thought.

  “What’s on your mind, son?” Helen asked.

  “I just hope I have what it takes to pass basic training,” he said.

  “Don’t worry, what you can’t solve with your muscles, you can solve with your brain. You’ve got a good head on your shoulders, and that’s all you need, son,” James said with a rare grin.

  “Thanks, dad.” Just then, John’s liquid crystal phone began to light up and ring incessantly.

  “Oh, it’s Hanna. I better take this,” John said, as he left the room to talk to his girlfriend.

  The sound of the ringer woke John up from his dream. Much to his amazement, the call coming in was actually from Hanna. He hadn’t talked to her but once since he left, being too busy with training to do so. She had left him with the reassurance that she would be waiting for him once he returned to Smithville.

  “Hanna, it’s you! I’m surprised to hear from you at ten o’ clock at night,” he said, switching on the screen imaging function on his crystal phone so that he could see a projection of Hanna’s face on the wall.

  “I had to speak to you. It couldn’t wait,” she said, with a concerned look on her fair face. Hanna had long, red hair that was tied in the back and huge, hazel eyes that had captured the attention of many young men in her day.

  “What’s wrong? Is everything ok back home? Is there something wrong with my parents or yours?” he asked, sitting up in his bunk. Luckily, his bunkmate was on night guard duty so he wasn’t disturbing anyone.

  “No, no, nothing like that. They’re fine,” she said, swallowing hard.

  “Well then, what is it?” he asked, furrowing up his brow. John always clammed up when the conversation got serious, preparing himself for the worst.

  “It’s about us,” she said. John took a deep breath, feeling a large lump forming in his stomach. He could tell from her tone what was coming.

  “Oh no,” he said.

  “John, I’m been lonely the past several weeks and Ken has been a real friend to me,” she said. Ken Howard had been a good friend of John’s since they first began to attend Smithville High together.

  “Please, don’t tell me you’ve hooked up with Ken,” he said as the tone in his voice reflected his disappointment.

  “I never intended for it
to happen, John. It just did. One day when we were walking alone by the Harris’s farm….”

  “Spare me the details. I don’t want to hear about it,” he said as he got to his feet and held up the phone to switch off the screen.

  “John wait- don’t turn me off just yet,” she said.

  “What else is there to say? You’re dumping me for Ken. I get it. He’s everything that I’m not- he’s strapping and I’m skinny and lanky. He’s got money and I don’t…”

  “Now wait just a minute. That’s not what I see in him at all. How shallow do you think I am?” she said, glaring at him defiantly.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that.”

  “It’s ok, John. I don’t blame you for being upset. I just want you to know that I’ll always be here for you. When you come back, I want to know that you’ll still be my friend.”

  “Don’t even. We both know that once people break up they can’t be friends. It never happens,” he said, turning his back on the screen.

  “I promise you that it will,” she said.

  “Look, I have to go. Training starts early in the morning and if I’m caught on the phone…”

  “Alright John. Please take care of yourself, and if you ever need someone to talk to….”

  “Goodnight Hanna. Take care,” he said, switching off the screen and the call.

  He took another deep breath, buried his head in his hands and began to sob softly as the moon rose over the fields outside and shone its hopeful light through the tiny window. John looked out at it and sighed.

  Maybe it’s a good sign. Well, now I guess I’ll have to find another girlfriend and best friend he thought as he lay back down. He tried his best to sleep, but he lay awake until the moonlight was replaced by the first rays of the sun.

  “Up and Adam, sleeping beauty!” the familiar voice of Sergeant Miller called out.