Somewhat Alien: The Station (Terran Trilogy Book 2)

by Sheron Wood McCartha

  “What?” She couldn’t believe what she’d heard. “Did you say that you’ve come to say goodbye?”

  He brushed a strand of disarrayed hair from her forehead and gave her a wan smile.

  “You… can’t... leave now,” she choked out.

  “I must.” He stepped closer until his face was inches away from hers. “I’ve come for a goodbye kiss.” He blinked. “No!” His hand waved about in front of her face. “I just wanted to tell you in person that I was leaving. You, at least, deserve that.” That pleased him better, and he stared earnestly into her eyes as if he wanted her to understand.

  She took his face in her hands and kissed his lips. “There’s your kiss.” Her chest lightly brushed his.

  What am I doing? I must stop.

  He inhaled sharply. Closing his eyes, he stroked her face with a tender caress. “You need time to clear your head about us,” he said, “and cleanse this gebbit rubbish from your system. I want you to love me but not because of some witch-brewed love potion.”

  A wave of desire washed over her. Her mind protested, but her body stepped forward involuntarily to nuzzle his neck as his arms closed around her. Melting against him, she could feel him harden. Knowing he desired her, sent wild, uncontrolled lust rampaging through her.

  “Elise,” he moaned in agony.

  “Don’t leave me alone. Don’t go.”

  They fell onto her bed, both gasping. “You won’t be alone. I need…” He stopped to kiss her neck, her shoulder, her forehead. “I need to oversee the trial and gather more sponsors.” Breathing heavily, he slid a hand inside her top, circling to her back, and pulled her to him while continuing to kiss her all over.

  Reasons for her to stop formed a list in her head, but her body ignored all suggestions, and she found herself shrugging off her top as he pulled off his slacks.

  “Perhaps one last farewell before I leave,” he panted.

  “So, you won’t forget me,” she added.

  “I will never forget you,” he murmured.

  Then all became touch, taste, and no talk.

  ***

  Richard ran his hand through his hair in fits and starts. “I didn’t plan to…”

  “No, neither did I.” She gazed off into the distance. “Neither did I.”

  “Look, Elise…”

  “Maybe it’s better if you go… at least for a while. We need to rethink this relationship.”

  “Elise, I love you. I want to marry you.”

  “Marry me? That’s a quaint custom.”

  He shrugged. “As the fleet produces more biologically conceived children, it should re-institute the custom. Family is the all-important tie that binds a relationship together.”

  Now dressed once more, he faced her. She smoothed out his collar and leaned her head against his chest. “I’m counting on you to find a lot of sponsors so we can get off this station and start a new life on Alysia.”

  “More politics than you realize are involved, but Carter’s air cleaners help the Terran’s cause. Alysia is making a comeback. It’s imperative that I make sure the right people are in control, so we’ll be safe. Also, you need to make up your mind about us, and decide how you feel about that doctor friend of yours.”

  She finished fastening her top and glanced up. “The gebbits have taken care of Jay. He’s focused only on Jennie. No worry there.”

  “Hah. I always worry there.” He checked his comm and inhaled abruptly. “Trace is already in the shuttlebay waiting with Braithe and the two other prisoners. Frag, I’m going to be late and miss the shuttle.” He scanned the room and kissed her cheek.

  “How long?”

  “I don’t know. As long as it takes. I’ll let you know what’s happening. Behave until I get back.”

  She watched him dash out, a bit relieved, a bit sad.

  ***

  President John Armstrong stared out the ornate window of his penthouse office as he picked up the emergency caller and tried to understand its message.

  Behind him, the plush rug, expensive heartwood furniture, and precious art hanging on the walls, all testified to the power of his position as President of the Democratic Union. Not for the first time, he glared at the portrait of their long-ago leader, Arwoyn Telluria, whose image smiled benignly at him from across the room.

  The responsibility of being president of the most powerful country on Alysia had brought him white hair and a lined face full of character. His brow furrowed deeper as he continued to listen to the troubling report. Abruptly, he turned to stare out into the busy city of Tygel but noticed little.

  “What do you mean their shuttle dropped out of contact?” His tightening grip on the caller turned his knuckles white.

  “Something interfered with the shuttle’s electronics and caused it to go off course. We can’t locate it, sir.”

  “My son is on that shuttle along with Richard Steele. You better damn well find them. Trace has an embedded tracking device and so does Richard. It can’t be that hard.”

  “Yes, sir. We’re doing all we can. Whatever caused the interference isn’t Alysian. Our scientists are baffled. We suspect they have activated a cloaking device.”

  “A cloaking device! You find them and let me know as soon as you do.” President Armstrong slammed down the caller and gripped the back of his gold ornate chair. He couldn’t go through this again. When he had been a young senator, and Trace was only a kid, the boy had been abducted and buried alive. The experience had marred them both. Consequently, he’d implanted a tracker in his son so he could always find him. Later, Trace had put one in Richard. So, it was only a matter of time when they would be found. The question was: would they be found dead or alive?

  “President Armstrong, I have an urgent call from the Commander for you.”

  He looked up, puzzled. “Commander Talbot?”

  The aide shook his head. “Commander Fujeint of the Terran Fleet. She’s extremely insistent on speaking only to you.”

  He thought of the twenty-eight alien ships circling his world determined to claim a chunk of the planet and involuntarily shivered. So here it came at last. Rubbing his face, he wondered if the missing shuttle was an attempt to hold his son hostage in order to advance a Terran takeover?

  “Sir.” His aide pointed to the blinking light.

  “Put her on line two.” He would need to sit down for this conversation. “President Armstrong speaking.” He tried to sound authoritarian and in control.

  The voice on the caller came through loudly, carrying a strange accent that he strained to understand. “This is Elise Fujeint, Commander of the Terran Fleet. I just received word that the shuttle carrying Richard Steele and Trace Walker is missing. Sources at Tygel Spaceport claim they haven’t landed. They say they don’t know where they are. What’s happened?”

  Blast Tygel Spaceport and eager reporters for releasing that information. A news firestorm will result from their efforts to grab headlines.

  He forced calm into his voice in spite of feeling panicked. “Greetings, Commander. We’re working on it. Something interfered with the shuttle’s electronics and led them off course. Alysians don’t have that kind of tech, so I suspect it’s yours. We’re attempting to recover them. Anything you know involving the incident would be helpful.”

  A pause, and then she said, “That shuttle carries Alysian terrorists. Trace and Richard could be in danger.”

  Clenching his jaw, Armstrong acknowledged, “That I know. We’re doing all we can right now.”

  “I’m calling to offer help. Richard has done a lot for us… made friends here who have vital skills and have offered to help rescue him.”

  He stopped to consider a possible sabotage motive and if he should trust this alien woman’s offer. Yet, Trace had worked with the commander and said positive things. So had Richard. Additionally, something in the urgency of her voice persuaded him that this offer was sincere. At this point, he admitted to himself that he shouldn’t turn down any possible help.<
br />
  “All right, I welcome any assistance you might offer. What do you have in mind?” he asked.

  A long pause ensued. “I don’t know. I can put together a team to search for them. I can find out who in the fleet might know about electronic intercept technology. Where were they last located?”

  “We’re not sure. They entered the atmosphere, on course to land at Tygel Spaceport and disappeared.”

  “Okay. I’ll see what I can discover on my end. I would appreciate any updates as you get them, and I’ll do the same.”

  “Thank you, Commander. I appreciate it.” He hung up and stared back out the window. “Son, where the frag are you?”

  Chapter 28

  Hidden Base

  As the shuttle rocketed through the stratosphere for Alysia, Richard cast a furtive glance at Trace sleeping peaceably nearby. He leaned back, closing his own eyes as depression swept over him. He hadn’t wanted to leave, but it was clear that he and Elise needed time apart. Their white-hot relationship was an increasing distraction from critical tasks that he kept neglecting. Nonetheless, his thoughts continuously returned to the feel of her lips on his and the sweet fragrance of her skin. He wanted her desperately, but did she want him? He believed that fate promised the relationship, but any future wasn’t one-hundred percent certain—that much he also knew through his experience in the Timelab.

  Richard’s throat constricted and beads of sweat lined his forehead as his pulse raced. He bent to peer out the small window and realized that, once again, he was plunging through orbital space, where outside, death surrounded him with a dark embrace. Halting that destructive train of thought, he reminded himself, that up ahead in the cockpit, a professional pilot would soon bring him safely home.

  Home. He occupied his mind with those comforting thoughts. His large, graceful estate rose in memory. He imagined the soft feel of sheets on his ample bed. There would be no more cramped spaces where his head needed to duck before entering. He could look forward to a real shower with falling, endless water, not small drips recycled from who knows where. Also, the foods that he wanted upon returning danced across his thoughts: rare steaks, mashed tapers, ice cream, that bubbly concoction his father had enjoyed so much. A smile emerged. His anxiety eased. His shoulders loosened.

  Voices drifted back from the cockpit that he only half-listened to. “Tractor beam intercept. Shield activated.”

  The weight of gravity would be an annoyance…

  A sharp dip jerked him out of his daydream. His eyes flew wide open. Bright daylight flooded the shuttle. They were finally in Alysian’s atmosphere with daylight outside instead of stars.

  Tractor beam intercept? The words bounced around inside his head. He yanked up his seat to look out the window.

  Next to him, Trace also sat up and stared out.

  The shuttle appeared to be diving toward a range of formidable mountains.

  “What the frag!” Trace exclaimed. “We’re coming down way too fast, and that’s not Tygel Spaceport.”

  As Richard peered out, the shuttle dove directly toward an exceptionally large mountain at an alarming rate of speed.

  “We’re going to crash!” he gasped. He shut his eyes and shielded his face with his arms, expecting the world to explode around him.

  But it didn’t.

  The mountain swallowed them up, bringing darkness, as the shuttle slammed to a stop. He bounced forward, the straps cutting viciously into his chest, then he slammed back into the seat, his head whiplashing. After catching their breath, he and Trace stared at each other.

  Where were they?

  Someone breathed behind him, but before he could unstrap to turn around, he felt the bite of a hypodermic on his neck, and he slumped into unconsciousness.

  ***

  “No! Absolutely not. No way.” James Bradley’s voice shouted at Elise through her comm so loud she had to pull the device away from her ear. She was back in her office gathering together her things after informing him that she planned to go rescue Richard.

  “He’s missing, James, and I have to find him.”

  Her second-in-command objected, “The Commander of the Fleet does not go haring off to a hostile alien world because some quasi–important native has gone missing. No. Absolutely not.”

  “I’m the one who makes that decision.” She clenched her jaw in frustration.

  “Yes. And, as Commander, you should decide for the good of the fleet, not for some political, personal relationship. Look, Elise, already there are outrageous rumors claiming you’re in bed with the enemy. Going off station will damage your effectiveness as a leader. The fleet needs you. Your prolonged absences are causing dissension within the ships.”

  She cringed at the comment, knowing how close to reality it sailed and not wanting James to suspect the truth. “They’re not our enemy,” she protested.

  “Attacking the station and killing our people are not the actions of allies. Executing Kusov has aggravated the situation and brought more attention to the fact that almost a year later we still have far too few people on the planet. Protest groups are springing up all over the fleet. A few threaten to invade, regardless of the cost.”

  Elise slapped her desk with a hand. “I can’t just stand idly by, not knowing if he’s dead or alive.”

  There was a pause on the line, and then James said, “Your idea to send a rescue mission is a good one. I can think of several people who might get the job done. John enhanced several individuals, making them effective enough to carry out such a task.”

  “We don’t know where they are, yet.”

  James cleared his throat. “I’ll consider the idea of a cloaking device and see if anyone in the fleet has designed one.”

  “Carter may have.”

  James contemplated the idea. “He’s certainly smart enough,” he agreed.

  “Yes, but he wouldn’t help the Alysians.”

  Her second-in-command snorted. “Carter isn’t political. Show him a shiny blueprint or pose an engineering problem, and he’s off and running.”

  “You have a point.”

  “Where is he now?”

  She remembered the newly redesigned transit car and Carter’s grinning face when he had picked them up. “He’s here on station. I’ll ask him if he knows of anyone capable of building a cloaking device and who might be able to repurpose a tractor beam into an intercept beam.”

  “I’ll ask around the fleet, too. You might want to contact Elija over at the Homestead and see if he has any idea where they might have gone.”

  “Okay, James. Let me know if you discover anything.”

  “Will do. Captain Bradley out.”

  She stood in her headquarters staring blindly at the wall. “Richard, where are you?”

  ***

  With a start, Richard regained consciousness and was asking the same question. Groggily, he rubbed his throbbing head and groaned. An answering moan sounded nearby. Blinking, he managed to make out the huddled forms of Trace Walker and Todd Jacoby.

  A hard, cold floor beneath him bruised his aching body, and rough rock walls all around formed a dungeon-like enclosure.

  “Where are we?” he croaked.

  Trace eased up into a sitting position and leaned back, using the wall as support. “I’d guess the Diechwrathe Mountains.” He shivered. “Or possibly somewhere in Islia.”

  “It’s cold enough,” Richard grumbled.

  Heavy boots tramped down the corridor and stopped outside their cell. “Well, well, look at what we got here,” a voice said.

  Next to him, Jacoby grunted to awareness. He managed to painstakingly raise himself to a sitting position. He blinked, also attempting to ascertain their situation.

  “Okay, on your feet,” barked a heavyset guard with a long brown beard as he rattled a set of keys at the three.

  Richard managed to get his feet under him and, using the rough crevices of the wall, he forced himself to a painful stand. Beside him, Trace and Jacoby also levered th
emselves to upright positions.

  The door opened as three muscular Alysians entered. “Move together and hold out your hands,” ordered the bearded lead guard. Handcuffs clicked onto their wrists before they were marched down a dim hall and into an open, brightly lit room. Here, blinking electronic equipment lined the walls. A large table held banks of computer monitors.

  Three men were gathered in a corner conversing. A quick glance revealed a familiar form. The other one was tall and scrawny while the third carried a lot of bulk and bushy hair. All were Alysian.

  “Sit.” A guard roughly pushed Richard onto a straight-back, metal folding chair. He half fell, half landed, into it.

  The familiar form in the corner spun around, walked up to Trace, and smashed a fist into his face. Trace collapsed into one of the chairs with a stunned expression. He lifted his bound hands in front of his face to protect himself.

  The familiar form was a very angry Braithe Wilder.

  A tall, brown-haired man with cruel lips and sharp cheeks roughly grabbed the attacker’s arm, saying, “Stop it, Braithe. If you can’t behave, I’ll ask you to leave.”

  “He humiliated me,” spat out the Alysian. “He was taking me to stand trial. He made me a dead man walking.”

  While the two glared at each other, a towering redheaded man strode into the room. He paused long enough to survey the scene and comment, “You’ll get your satisfaction, Braithe, don’t worry, but first we need to make them useful.”

  Twisting around on his chair, Richard exclaimed, “Theo Cadwell! We wondered where you were hiding.”

  Trace head snapped up. “Cadwell?”

  A broad smile emerged from beneath a rust-colored beard. “In person. Did it ever occur to you that I might be alive?”

  Trace grimaced. “We figured you were alive, merely hard to locate. The Diechwrathe has a lot of places to hide.”

  “This base is pretty remote, but my people have operated out of here for a while now. We’ve managed to make it quite comfortable.”

  “A perfect position to run ambushes from, I imagine.” Richard glared. “You attacked anyone who tried to occupy my land.”