by Maia Starr
Soon the speeder stopped, and Korin helped me out of it. I looked at the surroundings that were very familiar.
"Are we really here?" I said as I looked at him with a smile.
"Yes, I have wanted to bring you back here ever since we left," he said to me.
I looked around to see that we were in the same ravine where it had all begun. It was still beautiful and lush, and as night began to fall, Korin had more of a surprise for me.
"Come with me,” he said after he camouflaged the speeder.
I followed him along the ravine and soon we came to the same rocks with flowing water. I immediately jumped into a depression and frolicked in the icy cold water. Korin laughed at me.
"I knew you would do that. I love watching you do that," he said as he jumped in next to me and splashed cold water on me. We played like this for a long time until he said, "This is only part of the surprise. Come with me," he said as he led me out of the water.
Soon I found myself walking into the same cave that we had stayed that night so long ago. I watched as he lit a fire in the middle of the cave. As the cave lit up, I saw that it was already stocked with fruits and food. He had come here before this in order to set this up.
I ran into his arms and hugged him.
"I thought maybe we could stay the night here. We can finish what we started that night," he said to me.
I gasped as I suddenly remembered about the dream that I had that night. I pulled away from him and gave him a playful pat on the chest.
"Korin! The dream I had that night. You did that?"
He laughed at me and said, "It was my first time doing that. But yes, it was a projection."
"I wish I would have known that then, because I thought I was losing my mind with the very real dreams I was having with you in them. Either that or I thought it was the Icannet juice."
"Well, now you know, but it does not have to be a dream any longer."
I kissed him on the mouth and then I slowly slide my hands down his body. I dropped down to my knees and I proceeded to do what I had done in that projection so long ago. We made this night in the cave what we wanted it to be when we first slept in it. It was good. It was as though we were washing away any bad memories and replacing them with good ones as we made love, or coupled, as he called it.
We came to that cave often and made many new memories. I was happier than I had ever been. I was happier than I had been on Merton Loy. As the days wore on, I knew that if I had made it to Earth as I had planned, I would not be as happy as I was now, because Korin did not live on Earth: he lived on the cold, blue planet Kaethon, my new home.
THE END (Flip next page to read Kalazaron Jaylin)
BOOK 4: Kalazaron Jaylin
(Blue Planet Warriors)
By Maia Starr
Chapter 1
SERENA SWANDS
Boom! His hard knee met my ribs and I doubled over with the sharp pain I felt. But I recovered quickly and moved fast. I moved upwards and came back with an uppercut to his chin. Bam! I made contact with it. He stumbled backwards clumsily until he fell onto his back. I ran and jumped into the air, wanting to put an end to this once and for all.
"Aaagh!" I screamed as my body came crashing down on top of his and I pinned him to the floor. I pressed all of my body weight on him, keeping him down as I locked eyes with his.
"I give! I give!" The soldier, Mason Ludlow, shouted loudly for everyone to hear. I smiled and gave him a quick wink. Everyone erupted into loud, bawdy cheering and clapping all around. I laughed and rolled off of him. I did a forward flip onto my feet. I stood over Mason and said, "Two out of three. I win. How much is that now?" I said as I extended my hand out to him and helped him to his feet. He put his hand in mine. It was warm and strong. He gave me a flirty smile with his full lips, square jaw, and startling, blue eyes. Mason Ludlow was a full-on, hard-core infantry soldier and great leader. He was very intelligent and was good at making fast decisions in the heat of battle. He was strong and very sexy. He was the best damn soldier I had ever met, and it is what attracted me to him in the first place. It is what turned me on about him.
"I think that makes one hundred," he said as he circled around me as we playfully talked crap to each other. This was the soldier way. It was fun, and I fit right in, being a tomboy and all.
"You better pay up, Soldier," I said playfully back to him as I grabbed a towel and wiped the sweat from my forehead. This is what we did on the ship in order to pass the time and keep in shape. Mason and I often fought each other. I was trained in kung fu and kickboxing, but it was not my main talent. I was a sniper. It was why I was one of few women on this particular military ship, called the Madera.
"Oh, I'll pay up. I'm a man of my word," Mason said loudly. Then he leaned in and whispered in my ear so that only I could hear, "Unless you will accept some other form of payment. Perhaps even some sort of arrangement to pay off my debt. You know what I mean, Serena."
I smiled. I did know what he meant. He wanted to roll with me in the sack as we had been doing for a month now. I was thoroughly enjoying it as well. It was a great way to pass the time on this seven-month voyage from Earth into deep space.
"I'm going to hit the showers," I said to him quietly. "Meet me after and we’ll see what kind of arrangement I can come up with to pay off your debts. That is if you’re up for such a challenge.”
"I wish I could see that shower you are about to take, but I think you know I’ll be up for anything you can throw at me," he growled at me as he slapped me playfully on the ass. I laughed and watched as he walked out of the gym.
We parted and I went to the female shower section of the long-distance ship. The entire soldier infantry and pilots on this ship had been sent on a mission from the Earth government to take back a mining planet. In other words, we were going to war.
A corporation from Earth had decided that they rightfully owned the planet Dartu in the Andromeda Galaxy. The corporation had only been allowed to lease it from the government in order to mine it for copper for one year. But after that year was over, they refused to leave and they established a military force of their own to inhabit the planet and protect their corporate interests. Once this news had reached our government, we were dispatched to go to all-out war with the corporate army.
This is the mission we were on, and it was going to take us seven months to get there. So far, it had been five months, and living aboard the ship was a lot like boot camp, except you could not go outside. But the ship was made in order to keep soldiers in shape and give us a place to continue to practice and keep our skills sharp. There was a shooting range, a gym, a track for running that went all the way around the ship, and various fighting and war combat simulation obstacle courses. We trained all day, every day.
We even had study hours, where we would go over every detail of the mining planet on maps, and plans. We went over the geography, the plant life, and how to survive in the wild alone using local resources in case we were separated from our troop. We were set for a long-term invasion. I was not infantry, like Mason. He was a ground soldier. He was the one that would run straight into battle trying to take back ground we had lost. I, however, was a sniper. I was a gun specialist, and I could shoot a target from one mile away.
There were very few women in this troop—only about four others. The other women were pilots, doctors, and engineers. I was the only one that was a combat soldier. I was pretty much a tomboy and always had been. Though it always shocked people when they first saw me, because of my looks. I had blonde hair, blue eyes, and long legs at six feet tall. I was a slender woman with an ample chest and an ample bottom, but underneath, I was hiding long, lean muscles and incredible fighting skills. No one ever expected that I could kick some serious ass, but I could. It was what I loved. My father, a military combat general, raised me so it was in my blood. I was glad to join this mission to fight for Earth. But I did not know exactly what I was giving up when I left. I had no idea that I would never return
, or that I would never make to the mining planet of Dartu. But of course, I could not know any of that then.
After my shower, I was growing very impatient waiting for Mason. I wanted him; I was feeling very turned on. So instead of waiting for him to come to me, I went to him. I knocked at his bunk door. The door slid open and he stood there with a towel wrapped around his waist. His short, black hair was still wet and there were beads of water on his body. I wanted to lick them off of him.
"You are taking too long. You know how I hate to wait," I said to him as I pushed him back with the palm of my hand on his strong chest inside the small room. The door closed behind me.
"You just take what you want whenever you want, don't you?" he said with a grin as he put his hands around my waist and gave me a quick kiss.
"I think you already know the answer to that, Mason Ludlow," I said as I grabbed the towel and whipped it off of him. He laughed as I looked down at his hot body and got my fill of him with my eyes.
The room we stood in was very narrow. It only fit the bed and nothing else. There were over a thousand bunks just like this on the massive ship. They were squeezed in side by side and stacked on top of each other. With the doors closed, they looked like bricks. It was an efficient way to create private sleeping spaces to keep the mostly hot-headed soldiers from killing each other on this long journey. This offered a place to escape, but Mason and I were using it for far better purposes. I pushed him and he fell backwards on the bed. He was already hard. I pulled my tank top off and slipped off my boots. I unzipped my olive-green cargo pants and panties, pulling them to the floor. Now I was completely naked, just like Mason.
"Straddle me, Special Forces Serena Swands," he ordered me.
"Sir, yes Sir," I said as I climbed on top of him with one leg on either side of him. I slowly lowered myself down onto him, teasing him. I kissed his lips and ran my hands over his shoulders. I had been waiting for this all day.
This had begun as something very casual, as these things often did. However, over the last few weeks I started to develop something else for Mason. I started to look forward to seeing him; perhaps I was even falling for him. But I could not admit that to myself.
"It's lights out. You know what that means," he whispered in between kisses.
"No. What does that mean?" I said to him.
"It means that almost everyone is in their bunks as well. It means that you can't be shouting at the top of your lungs, no matter how good I make you feel," he whispered between kisses. I sort of laughed and put his lower lip in my mouth playfully.
He was right. It was lights out and everyone would be in bed, or were heading to bed by now. Since there were bunks on all sides of us, it would be very easy for them to hear through the thin metal that separated the closet-like rooms.
"I think you were the one shouting last time," I said to him as I bit lightly on his neck. He let out a groan. He sucked in a deep breath of air as I massaged his shoulders with my hands. He let out a slight cough with that breath of air.
"What is that?!" he said in an alarming fashion. I followed his gaze toward the door. There was fog coming in underneath the door—a very unusual sight. We immediately jumped to our feet.
"Fire?" I said.
Mason inhaled another breath and said, "Gas!" He grabbed two masks from a shelf, throwing one at me and I put the other one on. Then there was a sudden shift in the ship and it rocked hard. Boom!
We were knocked off of our feet and against the wall. We were still naked, with just our gas masks on. The ship groaned as it made a massive shift. It was obvious that the ship had either hit something, like an asteroid, or it had been hit by another ship. Since there was poisonous gas entering the rooms, we both knew that it was an invasion. How had we been caught off guard so quickly?
As soon as the ship stopped rocking and we were able to stand without assistance, Mason and I both put on our clothes as quickly as we could. We opened the door and moved into the hall. It was so filled with gas that we almost couldn't see. Mason ran to the alarm and pulled on it while I pounded my fist on the surrounding bunk doors.
But I knew that it was too late. If these soldiers had been sleeping, the gas would have knocked them unconscious. Sirens blared as soon as Mason pulled the alarm. There were red lights flashing. A couple of soldiers opened the doors to their bunks and jumped out wearing gas masks. But it was less than half of our population.
We were all trying to yell at each other through the mask.
"What happened?"
"What type of gas is this?"
"Guns, we need guns! Everyone to the artillery!"
Soldiers shouted in the chaos. We all began to run toward the artillery at the end of the hall. Mason kicked the door open. Within minutes, we were all armed, and ready to hunt.
"Call the deck! Get the captain on radio!" I shouted. A soldier went to the wall and pressed the intercom communication.
"Captain! Captain, report! What have we hit?" The soldier yelled over and over into the radio. But there was no response.
"We have to get there. We have to get to the command deck. They may need us. They may need support," Mason said.
"Or they're all dead," another soldier said. We were all quiet, but only for a moment.
Then Mason took charge again as he said, "We're stuck on the ship. Retreat is not an option out here in space. Whatever it is, we either fight to keep our ship, or we die trying."
We all looked at each other and realized that he was right. We did not have any options here and we were trained for this. We were just caught off guard and it shook us up a little. But this was our ship and we could still come out victorious to this situation. I knew how hardcore Mason was and he was willing to give his life. He stood proud and strong in front of the battalion and shouted, “Are you with me, Soldiers?!”
Every single soldier let out a grunting "Who-ha!" in agreement. We were armed and ready, but we had no idea what we were walking into. Had I known exactly what was going to happen, I would've forced Mason to retreat with me into an escape pod. True, they were not capable of long-distance travel to get us back to Earth. But I would've taken my chances alone with him on some foreign planet. It was better than the fate that lay ahead of me. I looked at Mason as he led us quietly down the long and massive corridors to the deck.
He turned me and gave me a knowing look, and then he signaled quietly with his hand as everyone fell in behind him. We quietly ran to the command deck. As soon as we came into view of the door—
Pew! Dew! Pew! The sounds of blaster guns flew by our ears. We shot back, not knowing exactly what we were firing at in the gas-filled fog of the ship. A full on battle raged, and we seemed to hold our own for a few minutes. It was a dangerous situation. These ships were made to handle a certain amount of gun blasts, as could be expected. But this was an all-out battle, and at any minute, it could blow a hole in the ship and we would all be sucked into space.
I crouched down, trying to get a better view. The gas began to clear and we were able to finally see the enemy. I knew who they were as soon as I saw them, even though I had never seen one before. But their reputation and appearance had preceded them.
It was the warrior race known as the Kalazaron. The blue tint of the skin that was exposed under their battle garments, their extremely tall size, and their close resemblance to man made it unquestionable that it was the Kalazaron. They had been known to act like pirates in space. They would send out scouting parties thousands of light-years away from their planet and commandeer other space ships. They would the passengers as prisoners and slaves. They were known to be ruthless, and we only had fleeting reports that were made before capture, as no one ever returned from their planet back to Earth. I sneered at them.
"The captain is down! The whole command deck crew is down!" Mason shouted.
"Are they dead?!" another soldier asked.
"I think they are just gassed! We have to go in there and pull them out!" Mason shouted.
&nbs
p; "No! Don't" I shouted at him but it was too late. He was already charging forward. Every soldier looked at each other for a second, and then we blindly and faithfully followed our rebellious leader on to the command deck.
Gun fire grew heavier. One soldier after another went down beside me. I went as low as I could. I did a somersault across the floor, dodging laser bullets. I couldn't see Mason anymore. My heart raced. Now there were physical altercations breaking out as some soldiers began to fight in hand-to-hand combat with the Kalazarons. We all still had our gas masks on and it made it very hard to see.
