“What? What is it?”
He seemed stunned. He hesitated like he was trying to sort through the data and decide what to tell her.
“Quickly, before they turn the field back on,” she urged him.
“They want to lobotomize me…us.”
“What?”
“Not being able to get the information they want from me seems to have made them more paranoid. They are tired of waiting for me to crack. The next time they come, they’re going to cut into my brain and try to extract the memory engrams they believe hold the invasion plans.
“That’s insane!”
“Once their procedure yields no information from me, I’m sure they’ll try again with you. We’ve got to get out of here now. No more waiting for a rescue mission. We can’t… We can’t…” Sero struggled to finish his thought. “We… I…” He slumped to the floor oblivious now as the psychoactive field filled their cell.
6
When Carolyn snapped back to reality, she was sitting on the ground facing the corner.
“Carolyn?” She heard Sero behind her. “Are you back?”
She got up and turned to him. “Yeah, I’m back.”
“Good. I think I have an idea.” He had a glint of hope in his eyes.
“An idea? How could you have come up with an idea while that field was active?”
“Well I actually had the idea a while back, but I’d rejected it because it’s risky. I figured it was better to wait for the UHT to come for us. But now it seems like we have no more time.”
“Alright then, what is your plan?”
“I’m going to try to cause dissent among their ranks, cause them to attack each other hopefully. I’ve been getting a good idea of the way their distributed intelligence works and I think I can cause a rift in their hive mind.”
“Are you serious? How?” She had a hard time believing that Sero could actually get the Ex-Sol 217s to turn on each other. They appeared to do everything as one.
“I think I can exploit some of the drawbacks of their thought-sharing. They started communicating this way to create unity, right? It was a survival mechanism. But it wasn’t without its drawbacks. Just look around you. They clearly have trouble innovating. That’s why their technology and ships and everything seems like it is right out of a museum. They suffer from the worst form of groupthink: Any attempt at innovation probably gets stifled. The only thing they seem to have developed on their own in over 800 years is the psychoactive field and that probably evolved pretty naturally from their thought-sharing technology.”
“Okay.” Carolyn could see some potential. “But, how does that help us?”
“They strive for unity in their thinking. This causes them to jump to conclusions. If one of them forms a strong opinion on something the others are forced to adopt it. We can’t convince them that human civilization is alive and well because they’ve already decided as a whole that it is not. So I’m wondering what would happen if I planted the idea that there is a coup stirring in their colony? It would be easy enough to present in a way that they would read it in my mind without reading any sign of deception. I’ll just think about you and me coming here to assess the stability of their society. It’s not untrue that we were interested in that.”
“And you think that will lead to some kind of chaos in their group mind?”
“I think so. If I suggest it framed in this way, I think they’ll adopt it. Then they should launch a crusade to find the rebellious factions of their society. I’m sure they would work it all out eventually, but by the time they do, we can be out of here and back in the UHT.”
“Maybe. Or, we could get caught in the middle of a civil war.”
“I know. Which is why I had to discuss it with you. I think it’s worth the risk. It’s better than waiting around here until they’re ready to start slicing into my brain or yours.”
Carolyn weighed their options. In truth, she could think of no better plan. At least Sero’s idea would give them a chance. And it was better than doing nothing at all.
“Alright. Might as well give it a try.”
“Good.” He exhaled a deep breath as if he had been holding it waiting on her answer. “Okay. In the meantime there is another matter I need to address.”
“Which is?”
Sero moved slowly to her, placed one warm hand deep in her hair and guided her lips to his. “That. I’ve hardly been able to think of anything else since the moment we woke up together. To be truthful, I have been wanting to do it since the first day I saw you.”
You were? Carolyn’s head was spinning. She had been caught completely off guard by the kiss. When they’d woken up together, she’d assumed that the psychoactive field was the only thing that could have led to Sero sleeping with her. Now it seemed he’d been harboring feelings for her all along.
“Sorry if this is sudden. And maybe ill-timed.” He looked sincerely into her wide eyes. “I may not remember everything that happened between us, but I have this feeling that we were good together and I want to experience that wide awake at least once before we risk our lives.”
Carolyn smiled broadly and pulled him into another kiss. When they separated, she took a deep breath. “But I’m…”
“Stunning.” He punctuated it with a nip on her bottom lip. “Unlike any human I’ve met before.”
And with that, all of the walls came down. The fear and pain of these last weeks trapped here melted away. There was only the two of them in the entire universe. Carolyn could feel Sero undoing her shirt as they shared deep, long kisses. He gently pulled up and her arms slipped out of the sleeves. Then he went to work on her bra as she began undoing his shirt, urgency building in her. She opened it to reveal his muscular torso, taking a moment to revel in the sheen of his skin. Her hand reached out to caress his abdominal muscles and worked their way up, over his heart to his beautiful shoulders. He had freed her round, full breasts from her bra, letting it fall forgotten to the floor. She took hold of his uniquely Dextronin shoulders and began to massage deeply and intently. Sero closed his eyes and let out a slow moan.
His hands explored her body in return. He deftly ran them from the round curve of her hips up her ribs to the side of her breasts. Just when she thought she couldn’t bare it, he cupped both breasts expertly flicking his thumbs across the pink peaks. A shudder coursed through her body.
She tore her hands from his shoulders long enough to reach down, undo her pants, and step out of them. She found herself giggling at the thought of the rumors she’d heard about how easy it was for Dextronin men to take off their pants. She was pleased to find it was true as Sero appeared to simply pull them away from his lower body. They were discarded in a rapidly growing pile of clothes at their feet. She could see that he was as aroused as she was, his manhood erect.
He closed the space between them with a swift, forceful grasp of her generous bottom. They collided with a mutual groan of pleasure. He seemed to catch himself and gently urged her back until she met the cell wall. It was cold against her naked back, but it warmed as he pressed against her, his lips travelling from her mouth to the small of her neck and back to her waiting, parted lips. Then with one deft movement he was inside her. She was glad for the wall as her body melted with his thrusts. She felt his muscled shoulders tense and release rhythmically as he moved with her. As one, they were gripped with ecstasy and they held tight as the waves washed over them. In that moment there was nothing else in the system but them.
7
They were dressed and ready when the colonists returned a few hours later. The 217s were in their usual formation of three. This time, they were clearly ready for a fight. They had their batons held high when the door opened and their suits seemed to be armored. They took up positions around Sero but thankfully lowered their weapons.
He glanced at Carolyn briefly, then turned his focus to the colonist standing directly in front of him. The two stood staring each other down for several minutes. It appeared to Carolyn that
they were in deep conversation. Sero barely blinked. Finally, they seemed to break the connection and Sero looked back to her. His subtle nod told her he had done it.
All of a sudden Carolyn saw the colonists’ batons move. All three were raised above their heads again, poised to strike Sero.
“No!” She had cried out instinctively but to her relief and surprise, they did not assault Sero. Instead, they turned to the door and marched out at a brisk pace. Sero took off after them at a sprint. He stumbled as he hit the edge of the psychoactive field, but inertia carried him through. He had just enough time to regain his thoughts and stick his hand through the open door before it closed behind the third colonist. He winced at the contact, but his hand did not appear to be injured by the door. He looked back to Carolyn and grinned.
Carefully he opened the door wider and looked out to see if the coast was clear. Apparently the colonists had been too preoccupied to check behind them and make sure their prisoners were still locked up. Sero gestured for her to join him. Carolyn was so nervous, she took a breath as if she were about to jump into a body of water then she bolted to the door. She experienced a brief moment of fogginess as she crossed the field, then she was on the other side grabbing the doorframe to stop herself.
They’d made it out of their cell, at least. Sero kissed her in triumph. Next they turned their attention to the hallway ahead. It was empty, but they could hear the sound of footsteps in the distance.
“How will we find our way out?” Carolyn was trying her best to keep her voice down.
“Follow me. I know the way—I think.” She gave him a confused look.
“I saw flashes of the colony’s layout in the diplomat’s mind that first day. And then a little bit each time they interrogated me. I think I can piece it together.”
Carolyn followed as Sero took measured, silent steps down the hall. They reached an intersecting hallway and Carolyn waited as Sero tried to work out the right direction.
Their pause was interrupted by a scream echoing through the halls. They looked both ways but the screamer was not in sight. The sound of batons striking muscle and bone could now be heard.
“Quick, this way.” They took off, moving faster this time. Another scream echoed from a different direction. The 217s appeared to revert to verbalizing when in pain. Carolyn cringed as she heard more baton blows and even more shrill screams. Sero them down yet another new hallway. Each time he picked a new direction he seemed to become more confident in his ability to find the exit.
They rounded another corner and Sero stopped dead, motioning to her to do the same with a sweep of his right hand. Ahead of them, leaning against the wall, was a colonist. A female civilian, no armored suit, no helmet. She wore a plain grey shirt and pants and both were stained with blood. For the first time, Carolyn saw an Ex-Sol 217 colonist’s face. The woman was very small and thin with a pale complexion and she had a black oval attached to her temple. She was conscious, but appeared to be on the verge of collapse. The woman looked up and met Sero’s eyes as if trying to communicate with him. It worked.
“Their police force is attacking them.” Sero translated to Carolyn. “They’ve just started indiscriminately attacking their own citizens.”
“I guess your plan worked a bit too well.”
Sero looked at the woman for another moment, then turned away. “We need to go.”
“She’s bleeding. We can’t just leave her here.”
Sero did not seem to hear this. “The dock is just up ahead, we’ll be there in a minute.”
Carolyn looked back to the bloody woman. I won’t leave her here. Sero looked at her with disbelief as Carolyn moved past him and scooped the woman up over her shoulder.
“We did this. We have to make it right. Now lead the way.”
They resumed their race through the sterile hallways. Shouting and screaming continued to echo around them. A suited trio turned a corner ahead of them coming directly into their path. When they set eyes on the foreigners and the bloodied now unconscious woman they froze. Carolyn almost dropped the woman as she too skidded to a halt, but luckily regained her balance. The armed trio hesitated then drew their batons and charged. Sero stepped in front of Carolyn ready to shield her from a blow, but the colonists ran past them and continued down the hall to some other objective. Carolyn couldn’t believe their luck. Coming back to the task at hand, they wasted no more time. Soon, they had successfully reached the landing dock.
The door opened without difficulty and Sero climbed aboard the colonist ship they had arrived in. He reached down and took the injured woman from Carolyn’s arms, then gave her a hand up. Once inside, Carolyn moved to secure the woman in one of the passenger seats.
“No, bring her up here with us to the cockpit. I’ll need her,” Sero directed Carolyn.
“What?”
“It’s actually a good thing you grabbed her. With her close to me, I think I can access their interface through her communicator. She’s my key to flying this ship.”
The woman had finally roused and seemed thankful to be out of the clutches of the police. Sero was able to interface with her and assure her of her safety. The three of them entered the cockpit and Carolyn motioned to the woman to take the empty seat next to Sero. Carolyn began tearing strips of cloth from her own shirt and to bandage the woman’s wounds while Sero initiated their launch.
The lift-off was rocky and jerky, but Sero managed to get them airborne. A few seconds later, they were in orbit and Sero was plotting a rendezvous with their own ship.
“How’s our passenger doing?” He kept his attention focused on the instrument panel in front of him.
“She’d lost a good deal of blood, but I think she’s stable. I’m no medic but she should make it until we’ve docked with the UHT platform on the other side of the wormhole. I’d bet she’s faring better than the rest of her people right now…”
Carolyn couldn’t believe what they’d managed to do. That colony survived 800 years on its own only to tear itself apart when we were thrown into the mix. She looked at the poor woman she’d brought aboard. What if she had no home to go back to when this was over? This woman had lived her whole life with her fellow colonists in her head. How would she manage on a UHT world? She’d be even more out of place than Carolyn or Sero.
“Okay, we’re far enough from the colony.”
“For what?”
“For me to save the day.” He smirked and tapped at the controls. “There. The whole colony is bathed in a psychoactive field. Our new friend here gave me access to their mainframe and with them all attacking each other no one seemed to catch a few settings changing. Right now, the whole colony is starting to feel that same cognitive blunting we had become so familiar with. I doubt they’ll continue attacking each other when they can’t remember which way is up. Once we’re back home, we’ll have UHT send over a team to restore order.”
Carolyn leaned Sero’s chair back and planted a kiss on his beaming face.
“My hero.” She kissed his nose next and laughed. “Now get us back in one piece.”
THE END
V
Worlds Away
Scifi Romance
1
“They say it’s like falling in love”
June rolled her eyes. “Is there a more cliché sentence to be found anywhere in the entire Solar English Language?”
“Perhaps not” Q-bit admitted. The AI’s holographic avatar was perching on top of the control panel next to her. “Still, I have heard it spoken of in this manner. After all, isn’t interconnectedness what building wormholes is all about?”
“That’s what they tell me,” June replied. “But I’m just a physicist. I’ll leave the diplomacy to the diplomats.”
“I still say you sell yourself short when it comes to your diplomacy skills,” Q-bit continued. “After all, your work is the primary component of the Rosetta Stone message. I’d say you are personally responsible for more treaties and wormhole trade routes than any
political representative from the Solar System.”
She sighed. “I don’t sell myself short. I am quite happy with all I’ve accomplished.” And with good reason, she thought to herself. After All, Dr. Juniper Kato had overseen the opening of the majority of the wormholes that humanity had been using for colonial expansion and trade over the last century. She did so because she was the one whose brilliant innovation had made them possible in the first place. Only six years out of college, while working the overnight shift at the Charon-Pluto Particle Accelerator, she had found just the right sequence of particle interactions to tear a hole in the fabric of space-time.
After that, Juniper Kato had become a household name across the Solar System. She was the woman who made interstellar travel practical. Before her discovery, the Centauri System had been colonized with sleeper ships. Her insight made travel between Earth and its colonies possible within a standard lifetime.
Of course, her notoriety and wealth meant June was able to afford the nanite treatments that kept her body physically young and fit. She was now over a century and a quarter old and still had the body she did when she was a lowly accelerator tech. She had spent that extended lifetime overseeing the formation of wormholes to connect humanity’s fledgling colonies.
She often liked to claim the honor of being the first person to take a vessel into newly stabilized wormholes. She had been the first Homo sapiens to enter more than two dozen star systems.
This was why she was aboard her ship orbiting around the newly formed Wormhole Z114. In just under 24 hours, she and the team currently assembling aboard the nearby observation platform would take June’s ship into Z114 and emerge in a new system.
The catch when it came to building a wormhole network was that the apparatus used to stabilize the wormhole, which she affectionately called the “doorstop”, had to exist on both sides. They couldn’t just project an exit out into the depths of space—they had to travel there first. Or at least the doorstop’s design schematics had to travel there. After her discovery, it had taken four years for the designs to arrive at the Centauri System. Then it took two more years to construct the apparatus and successfully open the first interstellar wormhole.
Taken by the Alien Warrior: Scifi Romance Page 15
