“We got to move now,” he said after a moment, his voice urgent, but in control.
The two quickly got Brian on the stretcher and as they did, Brian opened his eyes.
“Hang in there, dad,” Wilson said. “I’ll catch up with you in twenty years or so along the way.”
Brian smiled.
“Try not to get yourself killed before I get out there,” Wilson said.
“I don’t think Captain Leeds is going to let that happen,” Brian whispered, just loud enough for her and Wilson to hear.
Dot almost broke into tears right there. Just hearing him talk again was wonderful.
Then Brian closed his eyes and the two men rushed him out the door, vanishing almost as soon as they cleared the edge of the room.
The other two men quickly placed the other body on the bed. It looked exactly like Brian, right down to the old nightshirt stained with food. But this body was very, very dead.
They both nodded to Dot and Wilson and then stepped outside, vanishing almost instantly as they cleared the door.
Wilson went over and pulled the sliding glass door closed and made sure the drapes were in place to keep the room dim.
Dot stared at the dead husk on the bed. It looked like the old Brian, but she knew it wasn’t.
Then she turned to Wilson who was also staring at the body under the sheet on the bed. “You and the League had no intention of letting him die, did you?”
Wilson shook his head. “They were going to make an exception to the marriage policy for him. But it seems they didn’t need to.”
“You planned on taking him out tonight?”
Wilson nodded. “I don’t think he would have made it. Thank you again for pushing the general and saving Dad’s life.”
“Let’s hope he survived,” Dot said. “From my understanding, it sometimes takes time to get those transport ships going.”
“They’ll save him,” Wilson said. “They’ll just put him on a warship and jump him a few years if it’s coming down to that, before putting him on a transport.”
She nodded. “Of course.”
“Just wish I could make the wedding,” Wilson said. “But someone would have to change my diapers if I tried it.”
“We’ll send you pictures,” Dot said, laughing for the first time in days and days. And that felt wonderful.
More wonderful than she wanted to admit right now.
Wilson smiled back, then looked at the body on the bed. “Guess I have some phone calls to make and a funeral to attend. Makes it a lot easier knowing he’s going to be out there alive, and with you.”
Dot touched Wilson’s arm and then pushed her chair out of the room as Wilson held the door for her.
Joyce and Sue were standing in the hallway watching them come out.
“They got him away,” Wilson said.
Both Joyce and Sue nodded.
At that moment, Sue’s cell phone rang.
She looked annoyed, but glanced at it and then answered it.
After a long moment of listening, she said simply, “Thank you, General. I’ll pass the word.”
She looked at the other three. “He made it, but barely. They jumped him a few years away to make sure and then put him on a larger transport to Davis Station.”
Dot felt her knees get weak, but Wilson slipped a hand under her arm and steadied her as she held the handles on her wheelchair.
Sue smiled at Dot. “The general had a message for you. He said to tell you that Captain Saber will be waiting for you on Steven’s Base. It seems you have a wedding to plan and some dancing to do.”
At that, Dot simply moved around her wheelchair and sat down.
ONE LAST TRIP OUT
Four Nights Later
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
April 28th, 2022
Actual Earth Time
Location: Chicago
IT SURPRISED DOT that she had so few “affairs” she had to wrap up. After living in assisted care for over twenty years, she didn’t have much, and the insurance money from the settlement from the car accident, that had killed her first husband and crippled her, would go to her son in her will. She had spent very, very little of it over the years. That money would make his life easier, and she had put some of it in trusts for her grandchildren’s college education.
There just hadn’t been much for her to to spend money on considering she was crippled and her living in Shady Valley was paid for in the settlement.
The worst part of getting everything in order had come with the phone call to her son and two grandkids. She really couldn’t say goodbye, but she sort of did anyway. She would miss them, even though she seldom saw them.
She hoped they would miss her, even though the grandkids didn’t really know her at all. They had lived so far away for so long, and there had been so few visits.
Shady Valley Nursing Home had a small memorial service for Brian, but Dot had claimed she wasn’t feeling well and had skipped it. She just didn’t feel much like mourning the man she would be marrying very shortly.
That just seemed wrong in so many ways.
And she really didn’t know anyone else who lived here, since she had spent all her time with Brian over the years, especially the last four.
It would have been another matter if he hadn’t made it out in time.
A totally different matter, actually.
She didn’t want to let herself think about that at all. He had made it and was young and waiting for her. That was all that mattered.
So finally, on the fourth morning after Brian left, when Lieutenant Sherri came to wake her up at a little after three in the morning, Dot was ready to go.
And she surprisingly had no regrets.
All she could see was a bright and happy future ahead.
“I hear congratulations are in order,” Lieutenant Sherri said, smiling as she helped Dot out of her bed and made sure her wheelchair was there and sturdy to hold onto.
“I guess so,” Dot said. “I understand I have a fiancé waiting for me at Steven’s Base. Seems we have a wedding to plan.”
“I hear it’s beautiful there,” the lieutenant said as they started for the doorway to the hallway, Dot holding onto the lieutenant’s arm and walking slowly to let her old legs get going again.
In the hallway Joyce was standing there, smiling. “I’ll miss you, Captain.”
Dot indicated that Joyce should give her a hug.
The nurse did.
“Thank you for your help in saving Brian,” Dot said, smiling at Joyce.
“You are more than welcome,” Joyce said. “And I hope to be out your way in about thirty more years or so.”
Dot laughed. “You’ll be young and I’ll be middle-aged by that point. Sometimes this is just very strange.”
Joyce laughed.
“I’ll be about twenty years behind her,” Lieutenant Sherri said.
And all three of them laughed at how they would all be back in their same ages they were now by that point.
“Look us up,” Dot said, marveling at the fact that when Lieutenant Sherri got out there, Dot and Brian would be old again and the lieutenant would look just as she did now. But fifty years will have passed.
With one last wave to Joyce, Dot and Lieutenant Sherri moved slowly into Brian’s empty room. It had been cleaned and was waiting for the next resident.
Dot wondered if that resident would be a recruit for the EPL. More than likely, they would put one in her room and one in Brian’s again since Joyce was already working here. It just made extraction easier.
Outside, in the center courtyard, the spring night air had a bite to it, but Dot didn’t care. It was her last night on Earth.
She had loved Chicago. She had loved watching the seasons here through the windows over the last twenty-plus years.
But she wouldn’t really miss it.
A moment later the yellow light from above took her and the lieutenant up into the transport ship.
Lieutenant Sh
erri helped her into the coffin-like sleep chamber one last time and stepped back and saluted.
“It has been an honor to serve you, Captain,” she said.
“The honor has been mine to serve with you,” Dot said. “See you in about fifty years.”
“That’s a promise I’ll hold you to, Captain,” Lieutenant Sherri said, then closed the lid to the sleep chamber.
She did her standard two taps to tell Dot it was secure.
And a moment later Dot was asleep.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
April 28th, 1962
Equivalent Earth Time
Location: Deep Space
ONCE AGAIN DOT awoke from the deep sleep and pushed the lid to her coffin open, reveling in the feeling of being young again.
After being in that old body, this just never got old.
Her skin was smooth, her hair full and brown and not brittle.
And her legs worked.
She levered herself out of the coffin and landed on her feet, enjoying the feeling of standing on them without worrying about falling. And without the aches that came with trying to walk.
She stripped off her old-lady nightgown and tossed it back into the coffin. She wouldn’t need it again. But she would let someone else throw it away.
Back on Earth, her son would be getting a phone call that she had passed away easily in her sleep. He would be upset, but her leaving would make life easier on him and his children. There was a lot more money in her estate than he knew about, and that would surprise him.
She just wished she could see his face when he discovered that.
She would miss him and her grandchildren, she had no doubt. But she would survive.
And so would they. That was the nature of death.
But she wasn’t dead. She was getting a chance to be reborn in a brand new home, and that had her excited.
She got her uniform out of the closet and got dressed, enjoying the feel of the silk blouse and the photon stunner on her hip.
She looked to be in her mid-twenties this time and she assumed she was at Steven’s Base. But she wasn’t sure. This was clearly her cabin on The Blooming Rose. So no telling exactly where she was.
But now she got to stay in this young body, not go back to the old, crippled body.
This was the body she remembered.
Finally ready, she opened her door and stepped into the hallway.
There were people on both sides of her door.
Everyone snapped to attention and saluted.
She laughed at first, smiling and looking for Brian. This had to be his doing, but she didn’t see him.
She saluted back and then everyone broke into cheers, welcoming her.
Marian Knudson from Brian’s ship stood next to Steve and both Dot’s crew and Brian’s crew were mingled and cheering and shouting welcome and congratulations on the coming marriage to her.
Then from down the hall she heard a loud “Attention!”
Everyone stopped and again snapped to attention, holding their salutes.
Through them came the most handsome man she had ever seen, making an entrance from an old Hollywood movie.
Once again the sight of him just took her breath away.
Captain Brian Saber stopped in front of her and keeping a strictly military face, also saluted.
All she wanted to do was shout and jump on him, but somehow she managed to hold herself together, staring at the man she loved more than she could ever imagine loving anyone.
Finally, letting him hold his salute just an extra second or so, she saluted back.
Brian snapped off his salute and said with a smile on his face to everyone in the hallway, “As you were.”
Everyone went back to cheering as he said simply to her through the noise, “I love you.”
Then she kissed him and felt him kiss her back and felt his wonderful, strong arms around her.
And she knew she was home.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
USA Today bestselling author Dean Wesley Smith published more than a hundred novels in thirty years and hundreds and hundreds of short stories across many genres.
He wrote a couple dozen Star Trek novels, the only two original Men in Black novels, Spider-Man and X-Men novels, plus novels set in gaming and television worlds. Writing with his wife Kristine Kathryn Rusch under the name Kathryn Wesley, they wrote the novel for the NBC miniseries The Tenth Kingdom and other books for Hallmark Hall of Fame movies.
He wrote novels under dozens of pen names in the worlds of comic books and movies, including novelizations of a dozen films, from The Final Fantasy to Steel to Rundown.
He now writes his own original fiction under just the one name, Dean Wesley Smith. In addition to his upcoming novel releases, his monthly magazine called Smith’s Monthly premiered October 1, 2013, filled entirely with his original novels and stories.
Dean also worked as an editor and publisher, first at Pulphouse Publishing, then for VB Tech Journal, then for Pocket Books. He now plays a role as an executive editor for the original anthology series Fiction River.
For more information go to www.deanwesleysmith.com, www.smithsmonthly.com or www.fictionriver.com.
Look for These Other Titles from Dean Wesley Smith
The Seeders Universe:
Dust and Kisses
Against Time
Sector Justice
The Thunder Mountain Universe:
Thunder Mountain
Monumental Summit
The Earth Protection League:
Life of a Dream
Poker Boy:
The Slots of Saturn
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
Author’s Note
The First Mission
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
The Second Major Mission
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
The Third Major Mission
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
The Last Mission
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-one
Chapter Twenty-two
Chapter Twenty-three
Chapter Twenty-four
Chapter Twenty-five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-seven
Chapter Twenty-eight
Chapter Twenty-nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-one
One Last Trip Out
Chapter Thirty-two
Chapter Thirty-three
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Look for These Other Titles from Dean Wesley Smith
Copyright Information
Life of a Dream Page 12