Eleven Unveiled (Imortum)

by Kord Stone

  Eleven Unveiled

  Kord Stone

  Book Two in the Imortum series.

  Justin wakes up to a few surprises after nearly being murdered. First, he’s on a time-traveling space ship. Second, he has been dead for a year, at least according to his eldest brother. And third, an unknown time-traveler on an identical ship is trying to kill his entire family.

  And as a triplet, he has an advantage—two identical brothers who are covering his back Better still, he has bonded with a very sexy female artificial life form who knows her way around time and space. Together, they’ll do everything they can to find and stop the killer—and change the past and the future.

  Reader Advisory: This story has graphic sexual language and scenes—no closed bedroom doors (or other rooms) here!

  An adult science fiction romance from Ellora’s Cave

  Eleven Unveiled

  Kord Stone

  Acknowledgments

  I would like to take this opportunity to thank Ellora’s Cave Publishing for believing in my vision and picking up my series. To my editor: Thank you for all the hard work you have put into this series. I appreciate the critiques and the guidance you have given me; it is making me a better writer with every edit. To my wife and kids: Thank you for putting up with my tunnel vision with regard to my stories, the open brainstorming, and never-ending proofreadings that have driven this and the other book series I have to where they are today. To my dogs: What can I say? At least you have let me write in peace, when you are not hounding me for attention that is. And finally to my fans: I would like to thank all of you for the encouragement and prodding you have given me to push on and complete the series. I am pleased that my storytelling entertains you, and I hope I continue to release books you all can enjoy.

  List of Terminology

  AI: Artificial Intelligence

  AL: Advanced Lifeform

  ALISE: Advanced Lifeform Integrated Synaptic Escort

  DARPA: Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency

  EMP: Electromagnetic Pulse

  EVA: Extra Vehicular Activity

  GEO: Geostationary Orbit

  GMP: Geomagnetic Pulse

  GSO: Geosynchronous Orbit

  HAHO: High Altitude High Opening

  HALO: High Altitude Low Opening

  HUD: Heads Up Display

  KK: Thousand Kilometers

  Lanna: Mars

  MAD: Mutually Assured Destruction

  NNEMP: Non-nuclear Electromagnetic Pulse

  OCS: Officer Candidate School

  OIC: Officer in Charge

  PARSEC: Equal to 3.26 light years or 19 trillion miles.

  PTD: Phased Time Dilation

  SCI: Sensitive Compartmented Information

  SLO: Stationary Lunar Orbit

  TDS: Time Dilation Ship

  TPE: Time-Phased Explosive

  Terra: Earth

  Prologue

  It was difficult for Justin to wrap his head around exactly what was happening to his family. The youngest of triplet brothers, he felt it was strange that he wasn’t shocked to hear that he and his brother Jerren had died almost a year ago, at least according to his eldest brother Jason’s perspective. What surprised him more was hearing that his entire family had been targeted and almost killed off as well.

  The eldest triplet, Jason, with the help of an extremely beautiful artificial intelligence named Alise, had used a time-traveling ship to save Justin, Jerren and the rest of their family from an unknown killer who wanted them all dead for some reason.

  Jason had told Justin and Jerren that they had a distant relative named Elgon, who had commanded the time-traveling vessel they were now on. Realizing he was going to die, Elgon brought Time Dilation Ship One, also known as TDS 1 to Earth to retrieve Jason and install him as the new commander of TDS 1.

  Remembering what he had felt and seen just before waking up on board TDS 1, Justin had no doubt Jason was telling the truth about his death. To Jason it may have been a little more than a year ago, but to Justin and Jerren only a few minutes had passed. They had been staying at Jason’s house while Jason was at the V.A. medical center in Reno, Nevada, participating in an overnight sleep study Jason couldn’t put off any longer. When Jason returned from Reno the following morning, the triplets planned to go camping for a few weeks to celebrate their upcoming mutual birthday.

  Justin and Jerren had been heading to the kitchen to make a snack while watching an old movie. Justin was telling Jerren that he planned to move closer to Jason to help him cope with his PTSD. Something drew his attention and he looked over his shoulder but saw nothing in the living room behind them.

  Looking at his brother, he saw that Jerren too had looked back and apparently seen nothing either. Shrugging, he continued talking on his way in to the kitchen. A moment later, he felt the most intense pain in his back and chest. He remembered looking down at his chest and seeing some kind of bloody blade protruding from it. Shock must have set in because a moment later he heard a melodic sound and felt numbness overtake his body as everything went dark.

  The next thing Justin remembered was waking in a strange room with Jerren on a medical table next to the one he was lying on, with Jason standing over them. And that was when Jason informed them of the plot to kill off their family. Jason and Alise had traveled back and forth in time to rescue all of their family members and bring them to this ship for safekeeping.

  Since then, TDS 1 had been attacked twice, and Jason had decided it would be safer for the entire family to place them all on a planet friendly toward refugees until he and Alise could find and stop the person hunting their family down. The day of their arrival just so happened to fall on the triplets’ birthday, and after a brief birthday party, Jason escorted everyone down to the planet before setting off.

  The family had only been on the planet Gloran for nine minutes before Jason had returned and transported them back aboard TDS 1. He informed them that he had discovered the family was being hunted by a time-traveling murderer who had a ship exactly like TDS 1, and the commander of the other ship was using DNA tracking to track down and kill the family. For that reason, there would be no world the family would be safe on until the other commander was dealt with.

  Jason had mysteriously disappeared for several days after that, and tempers had been flaring among family members. He had recently returned and told the family he had a plan to find and stop the person who was trying to kill them. He wouldn’t go into details about the plan, but he insisted that if it was successful they would not see each other again for a long time. In anticipation of success, he was going to hold a feast tonight. That was when he gave Justin, and Jerren his “I will explain it to you later” look and left the room.

  Chapter One

  The dining table had been set up in the common area on the second level. A few hours into the feast, Justin raised his voice just enough to be heard by the others and said, “I love this music. Where is it from?” Jerren said the exact same thing at the same time, and that got them smirking at one another. Justin and Jerren shouted playfully in unison, “Jinx, you owe me a Coke,” followed by, “Where do we get a Coke?” followed by another, “jinx,” then Jason, Alise, Jerren and Justin erupted into laughter. This drew admonishing glances their way.

  Jerren said, “Seriously though, this music is mesmerizing. I really like it.”

  Justin thought he would have to agree. It sounded vaguely familiar, and he really enjoyed listening to it.

  Alise said, “It is a Lantin rendition of an ancient Imortum song. The music is the same but the language is different.”

  Justin sat back and enjoyed the music while Jason and Alise explained some of the functions of the ship to Jerren and
him. He was fascinated when Jason told them about the weapons system and what he was able to do with his mental connection to the ship. In between the conversations, Justin happened to look at the other end of the table where his half brother Tim sat. He noticed Tim had a freshly blackened eye and a swollen cheek. Justin had an idea who had given it to him, and looking at his uncle, he was not a bit surprised to see that he too looked battered.

  Justin knew they had never gotten along, though he never knew why the two of them hated each other so much. He was surprised his father didn’t step in to call a halt to it, but for some reason, he just seemed indifferent to it.

  Justin was happy that the family would all be leaving the ship if Jason’s plan, whatever it was, worked. He had worried that one of them might kill the other, and at this point getting them separated would be in everyone’s best interest. He wondered what Jason had in store for them, and Jason must have known he was going to ask, because Jason shook his head slightly and whispered, “After they go to bed.”

  Justin had been sitting at the end of the table with Jerren, Jason and Alise. Jason and Alise had continued explaining to him and Jerren in more detail about what was involved in being the commander of the ship and what was expected of a commander, and he silently wondered why he and Jerren would need to know those details. Justin saw how happy Jason seemed to be, despite the injuries he had sustained in his brief time as the commander aboard the ship they were on, and he was happy to see that his brother had found a place that put him at ease.

  A few hours later, Jason stood and called out to the group at large.

  “I’m going to bed now; I need to get some rest for tomorrow.”

  Jason and Alise said their good nights and Jason gave their father a hug and said, “See you in the morning.” Then Jason took Alise by the hand and they vanished without a trace.

  Their father shook his head and said, “How cool is that?”

  Justin smiled at his father’s astounded expression and thought, I would have to agree that is seriously cool,as he made his way into the bedroom he shared with his brother Jerren and cousin Jeff.

  Justin was lying on the uppermost bunk in the room that brought to mind a submarine or a prison. The room was eight feet deep and five feet wide with a three-level bunk bed against the wall. His cousin Jeff entered the room, and Justin could tell Jeff was irritated. “What’s bothering you?” he asked his cousin.

  Jeff moved to the corner of the room and leaned back before saying, “My father! What else?” He shook his head in apparent disgust.

  “Is this about his and Tim’s dislike for each other?”

  Jeff only snorted in response.

  Justin asked, “What is that all about anyway? It’s been going on for what seems like ten years now.”

  Jeff replied, “Eleven years, three months and a few days to be exact.” Jeff seemed to realize he had said that out loud and added, “I’m not supposed to speak of it. I only wish your father was mine, and you, Jason and Jerren were my brothers.” Shaking his head, he said, “I need to rest,” as he climbed into his bunk.

  Justin lay there thinking over what Jeff had said. It was sad, but with the way Tim had been acting out lately, Justin kind of wished he didn’t have to call him brother.

  He heard deep rhythmic breathing and realized Jeff had fallen asleep. Jerren entered and looked like he was about to speak, but seeing Jeff was in the room he just gestured for Justin to join him.

  Justin quietly got down from the uppermost bunk and followed Jerren into the outer room. The room was deserted now, even the dining table was gone, and they took a seat on the couch that had been placed back in the room, then they waited for what felt like another thirty minutes before Jason appeared.

  Jerren quietly asked, “Okay, what’s up?” when Jason made it to the floor.

  Jason seemed to be thinking it over, then he asked, “Do either one of you remember where we learned to speak our private language?”

  That question threw Justin. He was trying to recall where he had learned the language when Jerren spoke first. “No, I only recall speaking it.”

  Justin thought a moment longer, then he said, “Same with me, why?”

  Jason said, “Alise heard us speaking it at our birthday party and was surprised because it’s actually the ancient and apparently dead language of the Imortum.” Jason then explained about how the Imortum had turned over the running of the time ships to the Lantins, who were known on Earth as Atlanteans and that Alise’s first host Andel had been able to speak the Imortum language.

  Justin wanted to laugh. It had been a long time since Jason joked around with them, and he was hopeful that this meant Jason was on the road to recovery. “Good one, you almost had me there,” he said with a smile.

  Jerren said, “No Justin, I can see he believes it. What makes you sure she’s right?”

  That statement got Justin to reevaluate what Jason had just said, and he listened carefully to what he had to say next.

  “She had me look into her first commander Andel’s memories and she was right. I found the memory where he was speaking with an Imortum. He was not speaking it well but it was definitely the same language, and here is the strange part—”

  “Stranger than us speaking a dead language? Oh this must be good,” Justin quipped.

  Jason said, “Yes, well it does get stranger.”

  That drew Justin’s full attention and he listened intently as Jason continued.

  “Well Andel was speaking with a woman and I was about to pull out of the memory when I looked at her. She looked familiar but I couldn’t quite place her, so I sifted through more of his memories until I came to the next one. She was Inola.”

  Justin was brought up short hearing that it had been the imaginary friend they had as children and waited to hear the rest.

  Jerren asked, “Are you sure? It has been twenty-five years since we saw her last.”

  Jason took in a deep breath. Then he asked Jerren, “Do you remember when I was captured in Iraq?”

  Jerren’s face flushed as a hint of fury passed over him and he nodded.

  “Well as you know I was tortured extensively. What you don’t know is a few months into the captivity they decided to get creative with their new techniques.”

  Jason described what had been done to him, and Justin felt the blood leaving his face. He feared he was about to get sick or pass out at the very least.

  Jason told them how he started hearing voices. Then he heard a different, more soothing voice during the torture, and the others faded into the background and his pain subsided as well. Jason then explained that he was brought back day after day and subjected to more of his captors’ methods, but as soon as he heard the voice, none of their torture caused any more pain.

  “I remember having conversations with the voice, but to this day, I cannot remember a single word of it. I know now that the voice I heard was the same voice that came from Inola after she changed,” Jason said.

  Justin was at a loss for words as Jason explained what had happened to him, and upon hearing the details, he realized there was very little he could have done to help Jason with his PTSD. He always suspected the coded message he had heard pertained to either Jason or Jerren, but he never asked, knowing he was under surveillance in the past. He knew that if he divulged any information about what he knew, he could be shot for treason, but he was not on Earth anymore so he asked Jason, “That was you in Iraq?”

  Jason looked at him with a shocked expression. “What do you know about it?”

  Justin figured if anyone would keep his secrets, it would be his brothers, and he told them what he knew. “There was a coded message transmitted over all of our military bands. I later found out that none of the crypto guys or linguists could figure it out, so they sent it into the Cray supercomputer. It worked for days but couldn’t decipher any of it. My commander was in a V-Tell meeting with the joint chiefs when I went in to deliver a critical mission brief to him.

&n
bsp; “They were playing the message and I recognized it as our language. The message was a simple one. The voice said, ‘Sandman is in the nest. Bright boy is sleeping.’ It gave a latitude and longitude just outside Mosul and a time and date the sandman would go to sleep and bright boy was coming out to play.” The message just kept repeating. I relayed what it said and all hell broke loose. I was told that information was SCI-4 top secret and not to speak a word of it to anyone, then the military police proceeded to escort me to the barracks where I was placed under house arrest for the next eighteen hours.”

  Jason seemed to know there was more to his accounting and gestured for him to continue.

  “The next day I was taken to SOCOM headquarters where I spent the next few weeks being interrogated. I was repeatedly ordered to explain how I knew this code and who sent it. I couldn’t explain it. I never said it was the language we three spoke to each other. Somehow I felt like if I did, something very bad would happen to us, so I kept my mouth shut.

  “They knew I had a knack for languages and in the end, they must have just figured I was a savant or something. I was tested over and over with codes and languages, and a week later I was transferred to Goodfellow Air Force Base, where I was fast-tracked through crypto training, then shipped to the Aleutian chain, and I was under constant watch. I was stuck in a box there, deciphering signals and codes for the rest of my tour.”

  Justin couldn’t help but shiver at the thought of that desolate base and continued. “Needless to say, I was more than happy when my hitch was up. They tried their damnedest to keep me in the service though. At one point they tried to say I had to wait until a sensitive piece of information I knew was no longer a threat to national security. I reminded them that I knew if I were to reveal any information deemed top secret or SCI, I would be subject to prosecution for treason, and since it was war time I could be executed. They made me sign nondisclosure for several things I had witnessed, and in the end, they relented and I got the hell out of Dodge. I’ve never said a word about it until just now for fear they would have had me whacked.