by D. A. Hicks
Prime Vector
The Immortal Oath
D. A. Hicks
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental.
PRIME VECTOR
COPYRIGHT © 2020 by Diana A. Hicks
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or HMG, Inc. except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
Cover Art by J Caleb Design
Publishing History
First Edition, 978-1-949760-25-5
Published in the United States of America
Dear Readers,
Thank you for downloading Prime Vector, The Immortal Oath! I hope you enjoy Catita and Tek’s immortal ride in this first episode.
So why serials?
Prime Vector is my book version of the television series I love to binge watch. Each one-hundred-page novella is set up like an episode, where you get a complete story arc that also moves the story forward for the entire series or season.
Each episode will pick up where the previous one left off.
If you like immortals in space, romance, and fast-paced thrilling action, you’ll love Prime Vector!
One-click to download episode 2 now and find out what happens when Catita and Tek meet up again.
Happy Reading!
Diana
About the Author
D.A. Hicks is the alter ego of Diana A. Hicks, an award-winning author of steamy romantic suspense and science-fiction romance.
When Diana is not writing, she enjoys kickboxing, hot yoga, traveling, and indulging in the simple joys of life like wine and chocolate. She lives in Atlanta and loves spending time with her two children and husband.
Connect with Diana on social media to stay up to date on her latest releases.
www.DianaHicksBooks.com
Contents
1. Watch It, Pet
2. This Riot Isn't Nothing
3. Hide Me?
4. We’re Out in the Open Here
5. More Time Would Be Nice
6. Don't Say Good-Bye Yet
7. Out of Uniform. And Out of Place
8. Until the Blood Runs Red
9. You Really Are a Full-Time Job
10. But Your Killer Hasn't Paid
The Immortal Oath
By the grace of the Forever Queen,
we are granted eternal life.
Our bond with the Ukruum virus shall heal us.
It shall give us strength, and abilities beyond what is human.
We are the keepers of the peace.
We are the protectors.
We pledge our bodies to serve as hosts.
Forever young, we belong to her and her alone.
Until the blood runs red.
1
Watch It, Pet
Mars Year 103, Month 7, Sols 414
(Universal Solar Time)
Earth Year 2148, April 15th
Catita
My watch buzzed on my wrist with a reminder to report for tactics training at oh-six hundred hours. If I hurried, I could still get a full-night sleep. The halogen glow that replicated daylight on board the Epoch1955 turned a darker shade of gray. Yeah, time to go.
I shot one last glance at the wide window and the Old Planet, Earth, in the distance. The second I spun around to head back to my bunk in the blue quadrant, I found myself face to face with a worker dressed in greasy orange overalls.
“Sorry.” I mumbled.
We did an awkward dance, where she went left when I went left and then right when I went right.
“Sir.” She ducked her gaze and stepped back to the side to let me pass.
I opened my mouth to tell her that kind of ceremonial display was wasted on me, but when I rounded on her, she recoiled and scurried down the hallway.
Right. The uniform.
The Forever Queen’s coat of arms embroidered on my sleeve commanded respect, fear. The worker had no clue I wasn’t a commando in the Forever Queen’s immortal army—the Queen’s Elite Cadre, or QEC as the rest of us called them. But I was military. She had to play it safe. If she only knew I wasn’t supposed to be here either. The red quadrant was for QEC only.
The elevator slid open, and a unit of QEC lieutenants pounded out of it, laughing and shoving each other. Within seconds, they covered the length of the corridor. They huddled around me, their cruel gazes searching mine. If I’d had time to react, I would have done what the worker did. As it was, the immortals were too damn fast for me.
“Watch it, pet.” Mak, the commando with the mean, round face, squinted at me and pushed me out of the way.
I stalked back and let him through. His little display would be over soon.
“Just when I thought this day couldn’t get any worse.” Mak adjusted his jacket, eyeing me with disdain.
I got a different look from my sister Ry, the dark-haired, clad-in-full-QEC-gear lieutenant. I conceded to her and focused on my boots instead.
“Night.” Ry planted herself inches from him to block me from view.
Anyone else faced with a bored QEC unit would be praying for the floor to open up and swallow them whole, but Ry was here—my immortal twin sister and protector.
“What?” Mak’s tone turned to an annoyed one. I was the mouse he intended to toy with, and Ry was in the way.
“It’s nighttime.” She pointed at her wristband. “And keep it down. If the captain says we’re needed on the planet, we go. Period. Keep your mouth shut before you lose your tongue.” She crossed her arms—slowly. For an immortal with superspeed this was deliberate, meant to remind him she was stronger and in charge. “Go.”
One moment her unit of eleven commandos was there, and the next they were gone. Their laughter and chatter trailed behind them like an echo.
“A little reverence wouldn’t hurt you, you know?” Ry faced me, hands on her hips.
“Yeah, I’m sorry. I’m just tired.”
She flashed me her bigger-than-life smile. “You okay?”
I nodded. “You didn’t have to do that.”
“You know I did.” She placed one arm around me. “I wasn’t expecting to see you here. Bad dreams again?” She tightened her grip on my shoulder, as if wishing she could protect me from nightmares too.
“No, why?” I wiggled away from her and braced a hand on the windowsill, blinking twice when the magnetic shield hissed under my touch.
The bad dreams had started four months ago when I boarded the mothership on my first tour to the Old Planet. Since then, I’d had the same dream with the same dreadful end—the man with the kind, green eyes writhing in pain, his blood everywhere, and screams that made me want to claw my eyes out.
“The best lie is the one everyone wants to believe.” His words always stayed with me long after I woke.
And every time, I ended up in the red quadrant, staring at the Old Planet in the distance. No matter how horrid the scene playing in my mind was, this need to see him was always there.
“You’re here. That’s why.”
“I had a free day. That’s all.”
“You can’t fool me. I know you come here when you see him. Your dreamy guy died again?”
Maybe the ghost pain in my chest had turned me reckless, or maybe it was the pull I felt every time I caught a glimpse of the Old Planet, but I w
anted this.
“Take me with you.”
“What?” Her eyes burned with a purple tint around her irises, making her look even more beautiful.
“You have orders, don’t you? To download to the surface?” I glanced down at my hands.
The immortals with their flawless skin and indefinable beauty had a way to make the rest of us invisible. She looked like me, but she was stronger, faster, more graceful—better.
“Yes.” She cocked an eyebrow. “We are going down to the planet, but you know you can’t come. They need us for crowd control. That can get complicated sometimes. This is your first tour. You’re not ready for a mission like that.”
My heart drummed in my throat. This was a rare opportunity. A pod lander leaving the Epoch in the middle of the night, while my cohort leader slept, never happened. This was an insane idea, though. No matter how much I wanted to step foot on the Old Planet. Ry and I, we didn’t abide by the same rules.
As the oldest, when Mom was exiled from the City of Phoenicis, Ry inherited her immortality along with all her financials. Five minutes had made all the difference when we were born. I was the spare Mom never should’ve had. We were sisters, but the difference in our social status left us worlds apart.
While Ry could come and go as she pleased, I only had restricted access to the ship and the orbiter. If they caught us, I’d be the one spending the rest of the tour in solitary confinement. Solitary was no joke. Most people didn’t come out quite the same after a few weeks of it.
“Come on. Just tell me which transport pod you were assigned to.”
She sighed. “You think you’re going to find him down there, don’t you? This is not only dangerous but impossible. You can’t land on a hostile planet and instantly find a guy you’ve never met. Just because you see him dying on the Old Planet doesn’t mean he’s there for real. It doesn’t mean he’s real.”
“I know that. I know it’s only a dream. I just want to get out of here. Put my training to good use.” Did I constantly fantasize about saving him? Yeah, sure, but Ry didn’t need to know how deep my obsession for him had become.
“Catita.”
A stream of calm washed over me when she said my name. Influence came with the immortal package deal. Her serenity was literally contagious.
She took my hand. “How about some tea? In my quarters?”
It wasn’t a request. By the time I met her gaze, we were already on our way to her QEC-level room. She kept her arm around me while other commandos eyed me up and down. They could sense I wasn’t an immortal like them.
Ry pressed a hand to her door, and it retreated into the wall automatically. She was right. I should be happy with my post. I should stop asking to be more. I should be thankful I had her to protect me.
I plopped myself on the oversized comforter, tossing a few plush pillows out of the way. The white sleek walls and bedding were a stark contrast to the dark, sparkled sky outside the large circular opening. The entire QEC quadrant was filled with windows, comfortable furnishings, and oxygen that tasted sweet like ripe strawberries.
“Here.” She shoved a hot mug in my hand and sat next to me, facing the stars.
“At this hour, you can see Mars.” She pointed at a red spot on the right. “Do you miss home?”
“Not really. I’ve been waiting for this tour all my life. I hate that they held me back for so long.”
“Wela did it for your own good.” She petted my hair and pressed her hand to my tea to make me drink.
“Grans is just like you, thinking I can’t handle myself.” I took a big gulp of the brew.
Ry chuckled. “I dare you to call her that to her face.”
Wela didn’t like to be called Grans. She thought it made her sound old. As a one-hundred-fifty-year-old immortal, she was old. But I chose not to point out that fact, not to her anyway.
“Maybe when I’m ready to spin out of this world.” I laughed, and Ry glanced down at her hands. Hopefully, not soon but in time, I was supposed to die while Ry and Wela lived forever. “So a special invite to your fancy quarters, crazy good tea, and a night chat. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you have bad news for me.”
She clicked her teeth and started the process of removing her QEC armor. I liked this side of her better, the more human, more like me side. I stood and pulled off her boots and the rest of her gear until she was in her training tank top and shorts.
“Let me guess they turned down my request to be transferred to pilot detail?”
She pursed her lips. “Catita.”
“Stop saying my name. I can’t think when you do that QEC thing.” I met her gaze and recognized the guilt there. “Correction. You didn’t even ask.”
“I did ask. Well, sort of.” She ran a hand through her long hair to undo her braid. “I checked with Eli, and he said it would be best if you waited another tour.”
“Eli?”
“Captain Weston.” She pulled my arm, and I sat next to her on the mattress. “It’s just a few more cycles.”
“I don’t have a few more cycles. I’m twenty-two. I’m aging as we speak. I...”
Her eyes brimmed with tears. Ry and I could talk about everything except this. She felt guilty for being Mom’s firstborn. And I was an asshole for reminding her every chance I got.
“I can do so much more than patrolling the streets, giving people infractions for loitering or being out after curfew.”
“At least you’d be allowed after dark.” She elbowed me, offering a cute smile.
“I’m serious.”
“Me too. Flying Pods is dangerous. Wela would never allow you to go on an off-planet mission.”
“I’m already on an off-planet mission.” I extended my arms toward the sunrays peeking over the side of her window.
“But I’m here to make sure nothing happens to you. That was the deal. As your sister, it’s my duty to protect you. You’re safe this close to the sun.”
“What does that even mean?”
“The Old Planet isn’t exactly dangerous.”
“Which one is it? Earlier you said it was a hostile planet.”
“It is, but I can protect you from the people there. If you pilot a mission somewhere else—”
“I’d be living a normal life. I’d be living. Period.”
She paced the length of the room. On the third round, the space became highly charged with a force that pressed against my chest. Fear? Ry was afraid for me? I gasped as the compression increased. “Stop it, Ry.”
“Shit. I’m sorry. I’m thinking.” She squeezed both my hands in hers. “I want you to be happy and be like everyone else. How about a deal?”
“Let’s hear it.” My lungs expanded and filled with air.
“If I let you download to the Old Planet tonight, would you put this pilot detail request to rest? Forget about it?”
I asked for the moon and got something in between. “I’ll take it.”
“We have to be careful, though. No one outside my unit can see you. Especially not Captain Weston.”
With an exaggerated sigh, she tapped her wristband to mine. “This is the transport pod we’ve been assigned. Wipe that smug smile off your face. I have rules. Rule number one, you never leave my side. Rule number two—”
“I never leave your side.” I rested my hand over my heart.
“Catita, this is serious.”
“I know. That’s how it goes. The two rules are the same to emphasize—”
She exhaled. “Rule number two, you do everything I ask without question. Understood?”
“Yeah. Stick to your side and do everything you say. Basically, life like any other day.” I beamed at her, and her eyes watered.
“If I could take your place, I would.”
A warm current washed over me, like a liquid version of all her emotions right now. Of course, she was telling the truth. I felt it on my skin and deep inside my bones. My sister would do anything for me.
“I know.”
I could try and say no, but then she’d use her immortal compulsion to make me stay. Plus, I really did want to stay. This room was way better than the bunk I shared with three other cadets.
“Thank you.” I climbed into bed next to her. “Tell me about the Old Planet.”
“It’s dirty.” She shrugged. “And hot.”
I laughed. “If it’s so dirty and hot, why do we keep making the trek out here from Mars?”
“Supplies. They have what we need.” She blew out air. “Not just food, but materials, precious metals, and such. This planet belongs to us. It’s how we stay alive, Catita.”
“Sounds exciting.” I flipped on my back and stared at the ceiling.
“If we have time, maybe we’ll have a beer. There’s a bar by the docks. You’ll like it.”
“So what’s the plan?”
“Wait until my team boards. I’ll leave the door unlocked. Just make sure you engage the latch behind you. Hide in cargo bay. I’ll come get you when it’s safe.”
“Your unit hates me.” I crossed my arms over my chest. It hurt that I couldn’t be part of Ry’s world. That I couldn’t even be friendly with her friends.
“Don’t worry about them.” She planted a kiss on my temple, then turned to her side. “Go to sleep.”
“Okay, but only because I’m tired.”
The usual dream started different this time. I had my hands over the pod console. The screen showed us orbiting near Mars, not the Old Planet like before. That part had changed, but the feeling in my gut was exactly the same. It hurt to die. I spun my chair around and saw him. The man I’d seen so many times before in my nightmares.