“Now they can be at peace. The curse has been lifted!” David said.
“What about the Sarceastians? Do you think there are any of them left?” I asked.
“I don’t know. If I know the Sarceastians, it’s likely that they have left someone behind to guard the ship. We must make sure that none is left alive. Then we will need to communicate with their leaders to make sure that no more are sent as back up,” David said. So, we began the long trek down towards the valley where the Sarceastian ship was located.
“Let’s make sure that we are cautious. The last thing we want is for the remaining creatures to be alerted of our presence. We need to be as stealthy as possible,” David said. We split up again- David approached from the west and we approached the ship from the east. When we reached the small clearing, there was no sign of life anywhere near the ship. We got as close as we could while still trying to stay behind the trees in order to give ourselves some cover. It wasn’t long before a door slid open from the side of the ship and a cloaked Sarceastian began to descend the ramp.
“Hello, Hermitis do you read me?” the creature spoke. “Jermitonis, are you there?” He held a laser gun in front of him and proceeded to walk within feet of where David was hidden behind the tree. In a flash, David shot his laser gun and the creature shrieked as it disintegrated into thin air.
“Come on, we have to see if there are more of them on board,” David said quietly. David led the way and we followed close behind him as he walked towards the ship. All of us had our weapons ready just in case there were more of them.
David cautiously boarded the ship. He could hear voices coming from their communication radios from their home base.
“Sargost, do you read me? I said, do you read me?” the voice said over the radio.
We walked all around the round perimeter of the ship and found no remaining Sarceastians on board.
“That seems to be all of them. I will try to talk to their commanders and convince them that the life forms they are looking for have been terminated. I just hope my language skills won’t fail me. It has been a long time since I tried to speak in Sarceastian,” he said as he made his way back into the front room of the ship. He picked up the headset device that lay on the ground as the voice from the commander came over the radio again. I had my language decoder device switched on so that I could understand what was being said.
“Sargost, if you don’t answer soon, we will dispatch a backup expedition. Sir, I’m not hearing from any of the crew. I think something must have gone wrong,” the voice said.
“This is Sargost reporting in,” David said.
“Sargost, you sound different. Is everything ok down there?” the commander asked.
“Yes sir. I have caught some sort of virus down here and it has affected the sound of my voice. A few of our radio transmitters are malfunctioning, which is why you aren’t hearing from the others. We have terminated the life forms and will be returning home shortly,” David said.
“That is good to hear Sargost. Have you extracted the minerals and fuel from the surface of the planet yet?”
“Negative. We are in the process of amassing the resources now. We wanted to make sure that our progress wasn’t hampered by the life forms that we detected.”
“What were the life forms? The Padureans are extinct so we were quite surprised to find a life reading that wasn’t a wild animal,” the commander asked.
“It was two humans and a Karkastian,” David answered.
“The Karkastian and humans were together?” the voice said.
“We believe the humans had captured the Karkastian,” David said.
“Hmm, that makes more sense. Are you picking up on any more life readings? We can send back up if you require it.”
“Negative sir. Our life readings are registering at zero. We believe that we have taken care of the threat,” David said.
“That is good news, Sargost. We will check in later to see how the mineral extraction is going.”
“Thank you sir, over and out,” David said, switching off the communication radio.
“Whew, my Sarceastian language skills are better than I thought they would be. It seems to have worked,” David said.
“So what should we do now?” Jessie asked.
“Well we have bought ourselves some time to be sure, but it will only be a matter of time before more of them come. They will begin to get suspicious if it takes too long to extract the minerals and fuel that they came here to obtain,” David said.
“For the time being, we can go back to the cabin and figure out our next course of action. I fear that we may never be completely rid of the threat of the Sarceastians. They do not give up easily,” he said.
We made the long trek back to David’s place and stopped when we ran across a herd of golden stag passing through the forest. I tried to get a shot of and missed, but Jessie hit one.
“Got it!” she yelled proudly. We picked up the animal and carried it back to the house, knowing that we would have meat for many days to come. That night, we feasted and drank ale that David had brewed himself.
“I should be going back down to the ship. They will be expecting the crew members to give an end of the day report,” David said.
“How do you know so much about the Sarceastians?” Jessie asked.
“When I was a member of the expedition crew, I belonged to a special ops crew focused specifically on the Sarceastians. Even in the old days, the military was aware of the threat that the Sarceastians posed. If only we could have gotten a handle on them before they started to lay waste to the universe. Now it seems that they are destined to rule over everyone and everything,” David said, shaking his head.
“Well they still haven’t conquered the Earth!” Jessie said, proudly.
“Not yet, but trust me, it’s only a matter of time before they attempt it. Let’s just hope the military is better prepared than they were when I was a soldier,” David said as he strapped on his laser cannon and prepared to walk back to the Sarceastian ship.
“I will be back soon. Please make sure that you leave some of that ale for me,” David said.
“Not to worry,” I said. My head was beginning to get fuzzy. We Karkastians weren’t accustomed to alcohol, but I liked the way it made me feel.
Chapter 14
Jessie
David managed to convince the Sarceastian commanders that the expedition was going as planned, but they began to get impatient with him. One day when Yahn and I had just finished our lunch, we began to get frisky with one another. We figured we had a couple of hours alone together before David returned. I took off all of my clothes and entered the bedroom where Yahn was reading a book that he had brought from his home planet.
“Well, isn’t this a lovely surprise,” he said as he began to get up.
“No, you stay there,” I said, cocking an eyebrow at him seductively. I climbed on top of him and slowly slid his clothes off of him. We were just starting to make love when we heard the door open and slam shut.
“Damn!” I said as I climbed off of Yahn and began to put my clothes back on.
“Guys, are you here?” David asked.
“Yes,” Yahn answered back, unable to hide the disappointment in his voice.
“I think we have a big problem on our hands,” he said.
As soon as we were dressed, we came into the living room to hear what David had to report.
“What’s wrong?” Yahn asked.
“It’s the Sarceastian commanders- they began to ask questions that I couldn’t answer. They know that they’ve been fooled,” David said.
“What happened exactly?” I asked.
“Well, they asked why it was taking so long to extract the minerals. I made up some excuse about the drill being broken and they did a scan of all of the systems and said that they didn’t detect a problem. Then, they became suspicious and asked me for my rank and serial number. I looked around for an identification tag for Sargost, but I coul
dn’t find it. Then, the commander asked who I was. I continued to insist that I was Sargost, but he didn’t believe me. The next thing he said was that there was an army on the way. I am sorry, I did the best I could to hold them off.”
“So what now?” I asked.
“Well I don’t think it would be wise to try and go up against an entire army of Sarceastians. When they are ready for battle, they can be formidable indeed,” David said.
“So I guess we have just one choice then. Leave this planet before they arrive,” Yahn said.
“Yes, that is precisely what we should do. I would recommend that we take the Sarceastian ship. There will likely be Sarceastian ships patrolling the atmosphere. They will shoot us down for sure if we take your space cruiser.”
“Just when we thought we had found a place we could call home,” I said, sadly. Yahn came over and put his arm around me.
“Don’t worry, my love. One day we will find a place where we can permanently settle down,” he said.
“For the time being, we need to focus on remaining alive,” David said.
We gathered up as much food and water as we could carry and prepared to make the trip to the Sarceastian ship. At the moment, we weren’t sure what our destination might be. All we knew was that we had to beat a hasty retreat before the army arrived. As soon as we got on board, I strapped myself in and David began to push buttons on the control panel. He kept the radio switched on so that he could hear the conversations of the commanders.
“Ok, I’m starting the launch sequence. Everyone prepare for lift off. Yahn, I need you to man that laser cannon in case we have some visitors,” David said.
“I’m on it!” Yahn said.
“What about me? I can fire a laser cannon like the best of them,” I said, feeling that there was a bit too much testosterone on the ship.
“I need you to help me navigate,” David said. “Find us a pale where we can go and hide out until the threat has passed.”
I sighed and went over to the seat beside David and began to scan the surrounding area as the ship began to lift off from the surface of Padure. I looked down at the tree-covered surface of the planet, feeling disappointed to be saying goodbye to a place that was starting to feel like a second home to me.
“Goodbye Padure,” I said as I scanned the area.
“There is a habitable planet about fifty-nine parsecs from here. We should be able to reach it in about two hours,” I said.
“Are there life forms?” Yahn asked.
“Yes, but I’m having trouble getting a reading on what the life forms are, exactly,” I said.
As soon as I finished speaking, I looked out through the main windows of the ship and saw a huge Sarceastian war vessel approaching the planet. It was grey and round with large, pod-like rooms attached to it. It looked somewhat like a sea monster to me hovering above the green surface of Padure.
“Oh no, looks like we’ve waited too long,” David said.
“Identify yourself, vessel 4598,” a harsh voice said through the radio.
“Yes, we read you,” David said.
“Who is in command of the ship? What have you done with the crew?” the voice asked.
“We do not understand. We are Sarceastians as you are,” David said.
“Surrender your vehicle and land it on dock twelve or you will be attacked!” the voice said.
“Hang on everyone. I haven’t tried to outmaneuver a Sarceastian army vessel in a long time. It’s just like the old days,” David said. Suddenly, I felt my heart drop into my stomach as David steered the ship away from the war vessel in an attempt to escape. The war vessel immediately began to follow behind us.
“Jessie, get those shields up!” David yelled as he began to dart back and forth in an attempt to outmaneuver the army vessel. I tried the best I could to get the shields up, but the army vessel was jamming the frequencies and making it impossible.
“I can’t get the shields up! The Sarceastians are jamming the frequency!” I said, in panic.
“Crap! Hold on!” David said again as the ship dropped downwards, pitched and rolled through space. The Sarceastians began to fire the laser cannons at us. David managed to maneuver the ship in such a way that we avoided being shot. Yahn fired our laser cannon back at them, but they had their shields up and the lasers simply bounced off the large hull of their ship. David turned the ship sharply, dipped and turned again, but he couldn’t lose the ship.
“I’m trying to activate light speed but they’ve jammed that frequency too,” I said.
“Damn, this is not looking good. We may have to surrender,” David said. Yahn and I exchanged a disappointed glance when suddenly the ship was hit with a massive laser blast.
“We’ve taken a direct hit to the second engine. We will have to crash land!” David said. I looked at the navigating screen and saw that an inhabitable moon was just below us.
“Try to land on that moon down there. According to my readings it has a slight atmosphere. We should be able to survive there,” I said.
“Alright, everyone hang on!” David said as the ship went hurtling towards the surface of the moon. It was a typical crater-covered moon with an orange tint as if to imply that there were high levels of iron in the soil. My life detector began to flash, showing me that the planet was indeed inhabited by some life form or another. We could only hope that they were friendly. Soon the dusty surface of the moon came into full view. The ship was coming in too hot as David began to lower the landing gear. With a snap, the gear was broken off as the ship scraped a gigantic boulder. It tumbled over and then ground to a halt. The ship sensors were lighting up and beeping, indicating that massive fires had broken out in the engine room.
“Quickly- we must get out of the ship before it blows!” David yelled in panic. We managed to grab our bags of supplies and forced open the main hatch. We ran for the nearest pile of boulders for cover and looked back at the ship. About two seconds later, the ship burst into flames. I took a deep breath as Yahn hugged me.
“That was far too close for comfort,” David said, catching his breath.
We looked above us at the large Sarceastian warship as it moved off towards Padure. They probably thought that we had perished in the blast, so they continued on their mission.
“Well let’s try and find some shelter on this rock,” David said.
As soon as we came out from behind the rocks, my motion detector picked up on something moving towards us from the rocky mountain just to our east. My eyes caught a glimpse of small hooded figures moving in formation down the side of the mountain towards us.
“What are they?” I asked.
“No idea, but they look like little fellows. I believe that they are creatures known as the Domyabee, ” Yahn said.
“Quickly, let’s make for those rocks over there!” I said, pointing to a rock pile just to our left. We ducked down behind the rocks just as the dwarf-like creatures reached the base of the hill. A huge scorpion-like creature came out from behind the rock and stung David just as the dwarf creatures drew near.
“Ouch!” David yelled out in pain as he fell backwards. The creatures ran up to him and surrounded him. We attempted to fire at them, but they had jammed the frequency of the laser cannons. They didn’t see Yahn and me.
“Stay down. We will follow them and rescue David if we can,” Yahn whispered.
We watched as they ascended the hill that they had come from, carrying David. We followed at a safe distance until we came to a valley surrounded by sheer, jagged orange and brown cliffs. There was one tiny opening that the creatures walked through. They tied David up on what looked to be a stone altar of sorts. Yahn and I stayed behind the rocks and discussed what to do next.
“Can you use your mind control on them?” I asked.
“I will try. You stay here and I will make an attempt to communicate and control them,” he said. I watched as he walked out from behind the rocks and approached the large crowd of creatures that were gathered a
round the stone altar.
They turned in surprise towards Yahn who held up his hands in the air.
“I come in peace!” Yahn said. Suddenly, the creatures dropped to their knees and began to bow to Yahn. I looked on in amazement. One of them got up and approached Yahn.
“Oh great one, we have been waiting for your arrival as it is written in the prophecy,” a slightly taller creature spoke. He took his hood off to reveal, small slit-like eyes and a pig-like nose. His complexion was quite ruddy.
“Yes I have come to you and I have two companions. One of them you have tied up,” Yahn said. The creature turned and looked at David who was struggling to free himself from the ropes that kept him tied to the altar.
Alien Romance Box Set: Alien Former: Sci-Fi Alien Romance (Books 1-5) Page 132