Hybrid: A Space Opera Adventure Series (The New Dawn Book 4)

by Valerie J Mikles

  40

  Energy flowed from Hawk’s body into the ship. It felt like wires were attached to his spine and threaded through his fingers, each tingling with electric charge, making his spirit body throb in agony and his physical body burn. The bleeding wounds on his arms and legs from bullet grazing pulsed with every heartbeat.

  “I thought Liza mutilated you,” Sky whispered. Maybe she shouted. She hadn’t looked the same to him since his eyes had been pierced. She looked gray and shriveled, old and worn. He barely recognized her face.

  “She destroyed my eyes. But I don’t need to see to remember how this place works. I know it very well, and now I understand it,” Hawk said. As the bruises on his cheeks darkened, he could feel the painful hole left by his stolen spirit eyes. Now that he knew what power they offered, he wasn’t afraid of himself. He was glad Liza took the eyes from him, so that he could know what it was like to see the world as the human he’d always believed himself to be. Kerris must have been terrified with the insight his new eyes brought. The sight of energy flowing in and around this room had seemed natural to Hawk, and without his eyes, the room looked dull. The panels were blank, and they didn’t draw him in or speak their purpose. He had to remember.

  Sky brushed his hair from his face and Hawk’s concentration faltered. “Please don’t touch me.”

  It was too late. The wires threading through his body severed and the tension holding him upright vanished. Hawk collapsed, slumping gracelessly on the metal deck plates, over-sensitized and hyper-aware of the chilly crosshatched deck plate pressed to his cheek.

  “Sky, what’s going on?” Amanda hailed.

  “Hawk ran out of juice,” Sky said, stepping over Hawk and jogging to the adjacent grav-room.

  “It’s just us, then. Let’s finish this,” Amanda said.

  Hawk quivered from the inside out, imagining he was spreading the spirit wings he was told he possessed. It felt like his body was melting and his life fading. Rolling onto his side, he reached into his breast pocket and found his flask, empty as it should have been. Empty. Just like their fuel tanks. Just as he began to feel.

  Day 45

  My dear, sweet Myung,

  There are dangers outside of Rocan. There are creatures that seem as magical to me as the live birds flying overhead, and I am one of them. I shot my friend today. I watched as my hand fired the pistol that nearly ended Tray’s life. The pistol wasn’t even real. It shouldn’t have been there. I shouldn’t have been there. I hope Tray can forgive me when he wakes. I hope he wakes.

  A tear rolled down Hawk’s cheek, seeming to sizzle on the deck plate. He wanted to write one last letter to his daughter before he died. He felt his energy waning. His sense of the Spirit Realm faded, until his physical pain dominated. He stayed on the floor, concentrating on feeling the engines, promising himself he wouldn’t rest until Tray was home.

  Epilogue

  The room quaked and Kerris tensed, throwing up mental shields to protect himself from the onslaught. He lay on a wooden bed with a limp pillow. A rough, linen sheet was pulled over his naked body. He could feel the scratch of the fabric against bandages on his skin. The room shook again, and Kerris curled his fingers, searching for something to steady himself. There was a stinging sensation that started at his heart and went down into a sea of pain beyond which he couldn’t make out his lower limbs.

  It was quieter here than on the ghost plane, and he couldn’t quite find what was making the room shake. Then he heard the familiar song of nomads. He lay in a covered wagon, more primitive than the Nelka wagons.

  “Liza!” he cried. The effort of speaking made his shoulder sting, and the world went dark and sparkly.

  “Easy there, fellah,” a soft voice soothed. “Your arm was hanging on by a thread when we found you. Took us half a day to sew it back on. If you move too much, it’ll fall off again.”

  A ten-year-old child leaned over the bed, placing a firm hand on Kerris’ shoulder. The freckles and short red hair reminded Kerris of Liza, though the child’s features were androgynous, and Kerris didn’t know if he was looking at a boy or girl. “Was she family?”

  “Was?” Kerris repeated, his skin growing cold. His ears were ringing, but clogged to the point where it felt like the ringing came from far away.

  The child nodded to a bench on the opposite side of the narrow wagon. A sheet was pulled over a body. Kerris’ heart twisted in knots and he couldn’t breathe.

  “She died about an hour ago, just after we made way,” the child rambled. “Father said there’s no use stopping the wagons, because we don’t know what’s wrong with her. She wasn’t shot like you were. But we kept her. We figured you’d want to perform the burial rights or we’d bury the two of you together.”

  The pain in Kerris’ torso grew more intense. The wagon rattled. He fought to control his emotions, worried he’d break the wagon apart. Mentally, he focused his energy on pulling the blanket from Liza’s face. The blanket didn’t move. Closing his eyes, he reached out again, but Liza’s body remained covered by the shroud. Gingerly, Kerris flexed his wrist and flicked his fingers. The only effect was a ripping sensation down his arm. The fussy, young caretaker took Kerris’ hand, tucked it by his side, and pulled the rough linen back into place to keep Kerris warm.

  “She was shot?” Kerris choked, staring at the unmoving sheet over his sister’s body.

  “You were,” the child corrected, dabbing the sweat from Kerris’ face with a dry, prickly towel. “She didn’t have a scratch on her; she was holding onto you. Took three nurses to pry her off.”

  The angle of the wagon shifted and a man climbed in through the rear. Kerris could see the family resemblance.

  “Fable, I heard talking. I told you to call me when he woke,” the elder man said, kneeling next to the child and examining Kerris.

  “Sorry, father,” Fable said. “He hasn’t said much. Except his daughter’s name—Liza.”

  “My sister,” Kerris corrected, his eyes welling with tears. Liza would have been in a tizzy over the mistake.

  “I am sorry for your loss,” the man said. “If it is any comfort, she died with your name on her lips. I believe she was praying for your healing. Her ritual was unfamiliar to us.”

  “She healed me?” Kerris asked, tears spilling over. It drained her when she healed and she was already so weak; she’d healed him and it killed her.

  “I’m sure she held you together until help arrived,” the old man said patronizingly. “The gunshot was your worst injury, but not your only. I did my best to repair the physical damage. Can you feel my hand on your arm?”

  Kerris could barely feel his arm through the pain in his shoulder, but he felt the pressure and he wanted to smack the old man. Mentally, he pushed the man, but nothing happened.

  “I recognize your unity mark. You’re Gavameti, right?” the man asked. “We haven’t seen them in awhile, but we’ve sent scouts to look for them. You’ll be back with your people soon.”

  Covering his face with his hands, Kerris tried to find the spirit plane so that he could do something, anything to vent the anger and pain he felt at the loss of his sister, his wife, and the myriad of families who had been kind enough to take him in. But the wagon didn’t rattle in response to his emotions. His abilities were gone. They were not shielded; they were gone. He could feel nothing beyond the physical plane.

  Fable’s hand wove under Kerris’, and Kerris resigned himself to the care of his rescuers, though inside he was screaming. He did his best to answer the old man’s questions, and when he could no longer speak through the tears, the man left him alone to rest. In her death, Liza had given him one last gift. She’d made him human.

  Start reading The Gray Market: The New Dawn Book 5…

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  The Gray Market: The New Dawn Book 5

  Preview

  The Double Wedge pub was the lowest-class, hole-in-the-wall, alcohol-serving establishment within Quin’s spaceport of Kemah. Alex preferred it because it was mostly populated by the morally ambivalent who did not hold his history with the Terranan Patriots against him. In fact, many of the friends he’d met here were a part of the Citizens’ Channel, helping expatriated Patriots from Terrana establish new identities on Aquia. With the embargo and death of the space trade, business at the Double Wedge was rapidly tanking.

  Nattie Bay, the gray-haired communications officer on the Cadence, sat in a corner booth by the street window, her misty eyes gazing out at the inactive port.

  “Thinking of Terrana?” Alex asked, sliding into the booth, offering her a dark beer, keeping a blond one for himself.

  “Thinking of flying,” she said. “Pre-dome society loved their satellites, and four-hundred years of collisions has made an awfully dense cloud of debris. It would take us the better part of a decade to clear the Kessler cloud. I just wish the Cadence could be a part of it.”

  “Maybe it will,” Alex said, his throat getting tight. “The engine will. The rest—”

  “It’ll make a fine museum,” Nattie interrupted. “The ship is over four hundred fifty years old. It brought the moonslate back to make the Domes. It’s a part of history.”

  “There’s not a part on that ship that hasn’t been replaced,” Alex muttered, bitterness seeping in. He’d owned the ship, but he’d never made it his home. Now, he wished he had.

  “Not a cell in my body hasn’t been replaced. Doesn’t mean I’m not seventy-five,” Nattie chuckled, patting his hand, then raising his chin. “They won’t take the engine right away. There’s no way this embargo can last forever. We’re going to decommission the ship. This museum thing… it’s just a way to make money.”

  Alex pursed his lips. “Is anyone else from the crew coming?”

  “Sanders fled after the Guard paralyzed you and he hasn’t been back to Kemah since,” Nattie shrugged, folding her arms and putting her head down. “He and Holly have a kid on the way.”

  They’d left Terrana twelve hours behind Oriana, and he’d talked to Danny just hours before the crash. Amanda was safe and alive; she and Danny were going to come live with him. Things seemed to be going right. Even through the pain in his body, he’d stolen a few hours of peaceful sleep, only to wake up to disastrous news. Nattie said there was a streak of light as Oriana veered off course, and then nothing. They’d stayed in orbit for three days searching, waiting for a distress signal. Alex understood why Sanders quit. He still wished his friends were here for the decommissioning.

  “Have any of the ships that go up gotten news from Terrana,” Alex asked, dropping his voice. “Any word on how they’re doing?”

  “I took a gig the other night moving trash,” Nattie smirked, rubbing her eyebrow. “They’re not calling for help. I got through to one of your contacts on the Citizen’s Channel. No one has heard from Johann since he blew up his house.”

  Alex shuddered at the answer to his unspoken question. “Well, he blew up his house. He obviously had an escape plan,” Alex reasoned, though he still felt like he’d lost another son.

  A siren sounded in port and within the bar, workers leapt from their chairs. Some gulped down the rest of their drinks, others abandoned them altogether, their hands instead reaching for their side arms. After Jennifer’s warning of dole attacks, Alex had brought a pulse rifle with him, too. Nattie shoved her beer toward Alex and gave him a look.

  “I’ll be fine. Go!” he said. When the siren sounded, all ships were on alert, and Nattie had to report in to her new captain.

  Leaning his face against the window, Alex scanned the port for smoke or emergency crews, but the emergency didn’t seem to be within port itself. That meant the trouble was outside—one of the ships flying in the Kessler Cloud.

  Abandoning the drinks, Alex walked purposefully out of the bar and headed for the Dome gate. He couldn’t be here for the death of another crew. There was a crowd forming at the gate, and emergency crews lining up. Alex balled his hand into a fist, ready to fight his way through if need be.

  Then he heard the whispers—the nature of the emergency. The one word he kept hearing over and over was Oriana.

  Start reading “The Gray Market: The New Dawn Book 5”

  The Qinali Virus

  An ancient warning. A new threat.

  Amber’s astral projection ability is rare…

  … and it’s everything the Council of Highmere has been waiting for.

  Trained in astronomy, Amber is bored by her tedious, Council-appointed job. When her mind wanders, so does her astral body, and always to the same place – a meteor-flattened crater in a forest with an ancient metal sign poking up through the dirt.

  The sign warns of Sudden Death.

  Decades ago, a silent, but deadly virus had decimated the population of the planet, and left in its wake the seeming utopia Amber’s people enjoyed. But with the warning, Amber starts to question her world like never before. Her quest to unbury the past makes her a threat to the Council.

  And they will use her family against her.

  Can Amber uncover the truth behind the ancient warning sign before the Council enacts their plan?

  You’ll love this sci-fi thriller, because you can’t protect your family if you don’t know what’s out there.

  Get it now!

  Also by Valerie J. Mikles

  The New Dawn Series Novels

  #1 The Disappeared

  #2 Sequestered

  #3 Trade Circle

  #4 Hybrid

  #5 The Gray Market

  #6 The Confluence

  #7 Premonition (coming soon)

  Standalone Novel

  The Qinali Virus

  Short Stories

  (free to newsletter subscribers)

  Second Chances: A Reason to Walk

  Second Chances: The Lost Ingredient

  Invasive Species

  About the Author

  Valerie J. Mikles is a PhD astronomer who defected from academia to pursue her dream of being an out of work actor in L.A. She is active in community theater as an actor, choreographer, costumer, and stage manager. She frequents sci-fi conventions as a science/author guest and a fan/cosplayer. She currently lives in Maryland with her three cats and works on weather satellites for NOAA.