Paradisus (Awakened Book 6)

by Harley Austin

“We’re in a Kir vessel. We can go anywhere we want. Look outside. We, you and I, might well become the last spark of humanity alive in the Universe. We’ll need every scrap of knowledge in this bucket for you and I to stay alive.”

  77

  C aptain, you’re feeling like a caged animal. Relax. They’ll be here. As all of you are so fond of saying, the Imperium is nothing if not resourceful.”

  Zaer paced the small but comfortable high-rise condo somewhere in the middle of L.A. He watched the sun rise over the city with a large ocean in the distance.

  “Chill-out, Zaer.” Scott relaxed on the posh sofa. A Playstation controller floated in front of him, its buttons clicking like mad as he expertly dodged blasts of fire while riddling the huge red dragon on the game’s TV screen shooting enough bullets to drop a building into rubble. Scott watched the huge 3D beast on the screen explode into fire signaling he’d just beaten the new game yet again.

  “Perhaps you should be practicing your lessons,” Amethyst glared at the teen.

  “Whatever.” The PS controller tossed itself onto the table. Scott fell silent while psionic fire danced in his open eyes.

  “This, hiding in plain sight, as you call it, makes me uncomfortable.” Zaer paced in front of her.

  “We won’t be here long.”

  “I’m still disturbed that we could not bring out the rest of our people.”

  “They were expendables.”

  “No one in the Ra command is expendable, my dear Amethyst. That’s a political perspective, not a military one.”

  “It was a one-way mission, Captain. I’m sure you’re familiar with those.”

  “To be sure. And I highly respect those men for their sacrifice. Who will rescue them now?”

  “They will be well cared for, Captain. They were captured by the Dominion, not the Taliban.”

  “Prince Dane was never so cavalier about his command.”

  “He’s young, Captain. Besides, you’re working for another member of the royal family now. Dane has a price on his head. He’ll be lucky to live through the end of the month.”

  “He’s also now protected by one of the gods, my dear Amethyst; a god that is now at his beck and call.”

  “Tanner?” she laughed. “He’s no god. You place far too much value on the ability of the newbloods, Captain Zaer. We’ve been killing them for centuries now. They are not nearly so magical or as invulnerable as your lore has made them, especially untrained. As reckless and undisciplined as Scott here is, he could defeat Tanner in a matter of moments.”

  “I heard that,” Scott glared at her.

  “It is still a dangerous gambit you are weaving here, Amethyst. The Emperor desires this world destroyed and the Yin with it.”

  “Your Emperor is a simpleton and a fool, Zaer. The Yin are one of the most potent races ever to grace the face of the Universe. Dane is not the only prince to recognize that. The Emperor is afraid of the Yin. It is his fear that controls him. Instead of cultivating us, he wants all of us dead.”

  “The strategy has allowed him to reign uninhibited for nearly a thousand millennia.”

  “Still, a reign that is a mere blip within the history of the Ra, my dear Zaer. Our dinosaurs lived longer. And like the dinosaurs, your Emperor’s time is limited. He will become no less extinct in due time.”

  “Says the woman,” Zaer mocked her. “The woman who runs and hides in the shadows and murders her own kind.”

  “Touché, Captain. Nobody’s perfect. Not even you. I could have left you to rot in that Dominion detention cell.”

  “You have my gratitude,” he bowed slightly. “Still, it is an ambitious plan you weave, my dear.”

  Amethyst walked toward the double doors of the apartment’s foyer. “Indeed. But we are not without our own resources, Captain.” She opened the door. Zaer’s eyes drew wide as saucers as he looked at the woman standing on the other side.

  “Princess Arra,” fell out of his mouth as a whisper.

  * * * * *

  Julia unwrapped her lips from Kari’s as she watched Kari’s body recover from an unusually deep morning rapture.

  “OH! Hmmm!” Kari flexed her body deeply with Julia’s fingers still teasing sweetly, wetly between her thighs. “God! Julia,” she breathed.

  “Well. That was big.” Julia smiled. “You haven’t come that hard in a while.”

  Kari exhaled deeply; her skin lightly glistening. “I was dreaming of Mitch all night.”

  Julia raised an eyebrow.

  Kari nodded. “I guess he’s still with Serena.”

  “His ring is still in her apartment,” Julia assured.

  Kari took another deep breath.

  “Are you okay?”

  Kari nodded.

  “He needs to be like us, Kar.”

  “I know.”

  “You’re jealous of Serena. I can feel it. Knock it off.”

  “Sorry. I’m not jealous of her, just their attraction.”

  “Don’t lie to me.”

  Kari sighed, still feeling the tremors of ecstasy rippling through her body. She lifted Julia’s hand from between her legs and held it warmly against her chest.

  “Double standard much?” Julia chided.

  “I’m a hypocrite,” she admitted. “I get to have you and Jerrod and he only gets to have me.”

  “Only gets to have you? We’re lucky to be sharing you. I know what you feel for him. Don’t worry about it, Kar. He isn’t leaving you. I know my brother.”

  “I know. I’m just—” Kari didn’t finish.

  Julia watched as she slipped from their bed.

  * * * * *

  Serena awoke sweetly to something she’d not felt in a while; a strong hard body, with an incredible scent, spooned warmly behind her, breathing her hair, fingers sweetly moving over her breast tightening her nipple. She hadn’t felt this rested in months.

  “Hmmm,” she breathed.

  “You even sleep beautifully,” she heard him say. The words made her sleepy pulse move.

  She turned onto her back to look at him. To touch his face with her fingers. “You didn’t exactly awaken last night.”

  He took a deep breath and nodded. “I guess I was a little too much of a gentleman then.”

  “A gentleman?” she scoffed. “Gentlemen do not make ladies scream their names.” The memory of last night with Dark was making Serena tingle between her long slender legs all over again.

  One side of Dark’s face smiled. “This gentleman does.” Dark pulled her close, wrapping his muscular thigh between both of hers.

  “How did you sleep?” she asked, moving her hand over his military-built pecs, teasing his nipple like he was doing to hers.

  “Really well. I never sleep till noon.”

  “Maybe you should more often.” She brought their lips together. The goddess tasted sweet to him. With her fingers teasing his nipples, he found himself once again arousing until he was throbbing hard against her soft skin. Unlike the soft sweet kiss of the night before, his lips were now tightly lip-locked with Serena’s pout, Dark moved himself between her legs and sweetened their makeout with the tip of his hard shaft teasing her folds until they were wet again.

  In a long kiss, Serena felt Dark finally stop teasing her. His hardened male slipped smoothly between her wet folds filling her tightly as each kissed now more passionately. Dark had managed to bring Serena from a deep sleep to now deep arousal within what felt like nothing more than a passionate morning kiss. Perhaps only Dark could make love to a woman’s lips so well that having his manhood buried deeply within her seemed like only a secondary part of what his lips were doing to hers.

  Serena’s lips danced breathfully over his while his body brought her again to a forceful and deep eruption of ecstasy. Serena gasped for breath, taking it from his own lungs as his mouth deliberately covered hers.

  “Oh—Dark.” She breathed quietly, still feeling the tiny ecstatic ripples going off within her body, both from her lips and from between
her legs, curling her toes once again. She watched him watching her. She lifted her arms above her head feeling the sensations of what he’d just delivered into her.

  “Have I mentioned that you’re really beautiful when you’re coming?” He smiled, still moving himself sweetly within her. His own desire was still building.

  “Once or twice. I like watching you too.” Serena mingled her feelings deeply within his and then rolled the man over to his back. She lifted her body while moving her hips sensuously over his, slipping his long hard wet shaft into herself between her spread thighs.

  Dark watched her pleasing herself over him while bringing his own desire closer to the edge. But Serena’s own emotion was also cresting again. Ecstasy began filling her soul. She gripped Dark’s body, lifted herself and then dropped her hips over his, forcing his cock to plunge quickly and deeply into her.

  “UHH!” Dark gasped, arching his back with the new intimately powerful sensation. Again Serena dropped her hips over his thick cock.

  “Oh—you’re gonna—Uh, kill me if you—Hmm, keep doing that!” he complained drawing deep breaths.

  Serena smiled wryly as both felt their mutually building emotional pain. Serena drove Dark into herself again—and again.

  “AHHH!” Dark complained. She felt his thick rod pulse with a sudden release. Over and over she drew herself over him as if to draw every ounce of his seed from him, only, he wasn’t stopping.

  “UHHHH!” he arched his back as if in a deep ecstatic pain beneath her. Her feelings mingled with his, she felt what he felt. It was as if his cock and jewels were on fire with ecstasy as the warmth began spreading quickly through him. His skin was suddenly damp with moisture as another epic ecstatic tremor ripped through his hard fit body.

  “OH GOD!” he groaned loudly, writhing in painful pleasure, flexing his back beneath her.

  Serena could feel his climax, so intense it hurt. Her hand went to his face. “It’s okay.” His cock was still pulsing within her. Then Serena began to notice a soft glow rising from his skin. It seemed to move like flowing water within him. But then the glow began to fill into her. An ecstatic sensation quickly built within her doubling her over on to him.

  “AAAHH!” she called out.

  “Serena!” Dark wrapped his arms around her. “What’s—what’s wrong? What’s happening?”

  Her mind was unfocused. It was like—like she couldn’t think. All she knew is that she wanted to hold onto him. Whoever he was. Both wrapped their arms and legs around each other as liquid light pulsed into her from his cock that was now so rock throbbing hard it felt like it was going to explode.

  Both kissed hard as their skin took on a new golden glow. Suddenly their glow burst into bright brilliant light; a light that then exploded from them shattering the windows and cracking the thick brick walls of the third floor industrial building in a circular ring-wave of light that radiated outward through the riverside city.

  78

  C arson appeared on the bridge of the Tiburion. The Nemesis-class vessel was already moving quickly out of Earth orbit toward a more lunar distance from the planet. Other gods began appearing on the bridge. Carson sighed nervously while standing in the middle of the holographic imagery of the very distant but advancing fleet. He still hadn’t been able to contact Dark.

  Jerrod descended the stairs from the command bridge.

  “How in the hell—?” Jerrod walked around the seemingly infinite number of vessels moving into positions and formations he didn’t understand.

  “Where did they come from?” Beau asked. “We would have seen them coming through the cloud.”

  “They didn’t come through the cloud,” Rion materialized out of nowhere. “They were diverted.”

  “Diverted?” Carson moved around the image of the fleet trying to make sense of their three-dimensional formations.

  “The endpoint of the portal doesn’t have to be static. They can power the opening from either end. If they can open it, there’s a good chance they know how to divert the destination point.”

  “Then they can already go anywhere?” Carson asked.

  “Almost,” Rion glared.

  “Then the Ra are already learning Reflex.”

  “They are, Carson. They’ve learned to open the portal. To control it—at least somewhat.”

  “How long, Rion?” Carson asked.

  “Before they learn to do more than just how to hop around the Universe?”

  “Exactly.”

  “A few millennia, maybe. Some of those equations are not simple.”

  Elle descended the stairs from the command bridge into the image of the fleet within the holographic war room. “How do we defeat them?”

  Jerrod, Rion and Carson exchanged quick glances.

  “We don’t, Elle.” Carson spoke ominously.

  “What do you mean we don’t?”

  “We don’t have the weaponry to attack a fleet anywhere near that size.” Rion responded. “We’re just one world. And a small one at that.”

  “Rion, there’s enough firepower in this one vessel to blow our whole world into oblivion.” Jerrod moved around the image looking at their ominously designed black flagship, its twelve-thousand mile length half again larger than even the diameter of Earth.

  Rion agreed, moving up beside him. “This vessel alone could destabilize the whole star—and wipe out the entire system.”

  “What do we do?” Beau asked, moving up behind Elle, his hands moving to her hips. She leaned back against him. “We can’t exactly retreat to anywhere.”

  Joshuah stepped into the middle of hologram from nothing, dressed in formal Kir attire, his cape moving around him as if blown by some invisible wind.

  A smile suddenly crept across Rion’s lips. The young mage was exactly who Rion needed to see.

  “Don’t worry about the star.” Joshuah began, his New York accent arrogantly thick. “They wont be able to get anywhere near it.”

  “Oh?” Carson raised his eyebrow.

  “Our biggest problem right now isn’t this fleet,” Joshuah continued.

  “The portal,” Rion offered.

  Joshuah nodded. “As large as this fleet is, it’s still finite. Finite we can handle.”

  “But if they somehow focus even more of their resources on our world?” Carson added.

  “The resources of an entire galactic disc?” Joshuah continued. “Yea, that’s not gonna be good for Aden.”

  “You mean they’ll blow it out of the sky.” Kari stepped into the conversation.

  “I don’t think so,” Joshuah corrected. “This doesn’t appear to be typical of Ra battle tactics.”

  “Battle tactics—?” Kari began. Unlike Carson, she knew the seventeen-looking youth wasn’t much older than twenty-five, if that. “What would you know of Ra battle tactics?”

  “Kari,” Rion stepped into the conversation. The last thing he needed was the goddess of war getting on the nerves of a Kir mage prepping for war, especially a Kir New Yorker. “Not all of us share the same history. Let the Kir do his job.”

  She nodded.

  “They’re still in maneuvers after the jump. My guess is they’re testing their vessels. Making repairs. I don’t think they quite have full control over the conduit. Manipulating dark matter with ionic energy, that’s rudimentary—at best. But altering the endpoint, that’s just asking for a really rough ride. There’s no telling how many of their vessels didn’t make it.”

  “They’re vulnerable right now?” Carson asked Joshuah.

  “Probably. But they know that. They chose a jump point too far away for us to do anything about it.”

  “Then we have at least some time to prepare,” Carson offered.

  “We do.”

  “How long?”

  “A few days, a week maybe.” Joshuah affirmed.

  “For as much good as that will do us.” Jerrod frowned. “Finite or not, this fleet is still bigger than anything we can handle. They could snuff us out in a mome
nt.”

  “Don’t bet on that,” Joshuah cautioned. “Apparently we still have something they want. It’s the only explanation why they haven’t destroyed us already.”

  “We know what they’re after, Joshuah. Newbloods.”

  “That’s exactly what they want, Rion.” Gage stepped out of nothing with Kirin right beside him. He bumped fists with Joshuah on his way past into the center of the holo image of the fleet. “This is Dane.” A new holo video of the young Ra interacting with Gage and Kirin glowed to life while the fleet image dimmed into the three-dimensional background. “One of the many hundreds of high princes of the Ra Imperium. He’s been tasked with securing Reflex technology from us. They refer to us as the Separatists.”

  “Good work, Gage.” Carson complimented.

  “But Rion is right. It didn’t take the Imperium long to discover that the Earth is also home to the Yin, an ancient psionic race that settled here long before the Ra showed up. Ra and Yin don’t exactly get along at the moment.”

  “It would seem then, Gage, that they would want to destroy our world,” Carson continued. “So why haven’t they?”

  “Dane wants an alliance. He wants to use the Yin and the power of Reflex to defeat his father, Darius, the Supreme Emperor.”

  “Bold,” Francesca acknowledged.

  “Can he be trusted?” Carson asked.

  “I doubt it.” Gage folded his arms.

  “Trading one imperial despot for another?” Kari guessed. “That sounds fun.”

  “No. Wait.” Carson began, his finger moving to his lips as he paced the transparent holo floor. “This could be exactly what we need. Whatever Dane’s intentions, his fleets are beyond anything we’re capable of building or defending ourselves against.

  “Francesca. Take a message to this Prince Dane. Personally. Arrange a meeting. Invite him here, to Aden. Tell him we want to talk.”

  “What makes you so sure he’ll come here?” Rion asked.

  “I’m not sure of anything at this point.”

  “He’ll be vulnerable. We could just kill him.” Kari moved up next to Carson.