And that is how I got here. The memory of it all overwhelmed her. She wanted to forget that Rex was there, but out of necessity she had programmed the computer to provide updates on his movements. Days passed this way, Mila trying to repair what she could and Rex occupying himself with reading on a small tablet he had brought with him.
Mila was glad her system computer could use internal cameras to “read” the text on the tablet. It told her that Rex was tracking news stories from the Dextronin System, a star system Mila had never heard of. He went back and forth between news and literature from the same system. Curious, Mila told the computer to gather as much information on the Dextronin System as possible.
Vital facilities on the ship rotated between red and blue and Rex and Mila kept to the schedule religiously. She slept in her loft as always. Rex took spare blankets and slept on the floor of his portion of the cabin.
These days had passed with no words between them and that was just fine with Mila. She had left the translator off since explaining the ship rules to Rex, so she wouldn’t know what he was saying even if he tried to speak to her.
One morning, she emerged from her loft and was startled to see him standing there, as if he had been waiting for her to get up. With the computer monitoring him and the separation of their living spaces, Rex had become almost like a pet that only occasionally crossed its master’s path.
This morning, Rex was difficult to ignore. He said something short, seeming to want her attention. Mila wiped the sleep from her eyes, gave a sigh, and tapped a console to activate the translator.
“Have you seen the latest news?” He wore a cautious smile.
“New?” She’d been consumed in repairs for days and her tone expressed frustration. Her primary concern was with keeping them in a stable orbit and keeping their life support running. Like I had time to sit and watch the stupid news.
“While we were sleeping, they made it official. That’s what the last data-burst says. Your planets are officially part of the United Human Territories.”
“We’re…” Mila suddenly snapped to fully awareness. “We’re part of…” She struggled for the right words. “My government agreed to give up sovereignty to UHT?”
“Well yes,” Rex calmly answered. “The war ended with our battle. A treaty was necessary and unification was inevitable.”
“But I thought it would take years for them to work out the negotiations! I didn’t expect our people to just roll over and accept whatever yours handed then in a matter of days.”
Rex’s expression was one of discomfort. Clearly there was more news. “Oh. You haven’t been paying attention to...” He took a breath. “Mila,” she didn’t like how personable he sounded saying her name. Like they were acquaintances. “It has been two years on the outside already. We’re sitting in a gravity well and travelling at a portion of the speed of light. We’re experiencing intense time dilation.”
Two years? Of course it had been two years. How could she have been so stupid? She’d been so engrossed in just staying alive that she’d put aside the outside world. In the meantime, two whole years had passed on the outside and the political landscape of her star system had changed.
“I can’t believe we allowed ourselves to be annexed.” Her anger at having Rex aboard her ship boiled over. His people had invaded her system. Killed millions of her people and seized control of their planets. Now this enemy combatant was standing in front of her trying to small talk while her people became slaves.
Before she knew what she was doing Mila was lunging at him. She crossed the cabin and entered the red space in the blink of an eye, but it was just enough time for Rex to throw up his arms to block her attack. Mila’s anger became fuel for her blows as her hand-to-hand combat training kicked in. She punched at Rex, but he dodged. He grabbed her arm and twisted her away from him to prevent another swing.
Mila quickly regained her footing and turned back toward him. She delivered three jabs in rapid succession. The third finally connected, catching him on the jaw. He stumbled back, dazed. He recovered quickly and took a defensive stance. His expression said, “I won’t let you do that again.”
She ran at him again, this time aiming at his abdomen. He deflected her effortlessly. The fact that her enemy was behaving defensively and not returning her offensive moves annoyed Mila. Where was that conqueror’s spirit that had brought you to my system in the first place? Spurred on by his calm, she kept fighting but was not able to manage another hit.
Suddenly his arms surrounded her. Before Mila knew what was happening, the enemy soldier had wrapped her in a bear-hug, pinning her arms to her sides. She wrestled to break free, but Rex had a solid hold. She had not noticed until that point how thickly muscled Rex was, especially his upper body. She screamed, a guttural primal sound.
Rex leaned back a bit lifting her off the ground. Now who is the unruly child? “Let go of me!” She howled. The computer translated her words, but they lacked her rage. She threw her head backward, aiming for his face, but he anticipated this and pulled back in time to avoid a broken nose. The lights around them shifted to blue as he carried her across the boundary between their symbolic territories. Finally he lowered her, giving her a slight push as her feet touched the ground.
Forced off-balance and about a half meter from him, Mila whirled around to see he was bathed in red light. Only his arms had crossed the boundary. His face was expressionless. If it said anything to her, it was pity. For what? My lost home world? Or my loss of control?
“You people think just because we’re all human that we all want to be part of some galactic empire!” Her words were spat out, full of vitriol. “But we don’t. Some of us just want to be left alone. Why couldn’t you just take your wormholes somewhere else? Go live your lives and we’ll live ours!” Frustrated and exhausted, she felt the tears coming on.
“I’m Dextronin,” Rex said flatly, but Mila didn’t hear. She was already turning away. Mila ran to the loft and climbed in. She made sure she slammed the door for effect.
A few hours later, Mila came out of the loft and immediately went to work. Rex was sitting on the cabin floor reading his tablet. Mila said nothing to him and he respected the peaceful truce. Although pretty sure the translator had been left on, he decided to leave her alone. Several hours passed in the silence to which they had both become accustomed.
“What is a Dextronin?” No preamble. Rex jumped at the unexpected sound of her voice.
“Excuse me?”
“A Dextronin. You said you were one earlier, right?”
“Um. Yes. I’m not human, at least not your version of human. I’m extraterrestrial.”
Mila looked at him with a confused expression. “You look like us though. You look like all the other enemy soldiers.”
“Yeah. The biologists and the historians are still trying to explain that one. Genetically, we are related, but we have no idea how our ancestors found themselves in a distant star system.”
“So, you’re not just colonists from the Human expansion like we are?” Mila couldn’t help it—her curiosity got the better of her.
“Nope. My people have lived in the Dextronin System for at least ten thousand years. Much longer than the few centuries separating you from your Earth ancestors.”
“So, the UHT must have annexed your system too.”
“No,” Rex said uneasily. “We maintain our sovereignty, like all the alien species that humanity has encountered. My people have trade agreements with the UHT. I was assigned to work on a UHT ship by my government as part of an exchange program. I’m not really a soldier, just a pilot. We don’t really have soldiers in our system in fact. I came to this system to complete a job of piloting a ship. I was told that there had been political unrest in your system, but I had no idea that it was an all-out war.”
The UHT manipulated him. A strange pang of sympathy was quickly suppressed. How many people had he killed while doing his job?
“I was glad when I first heard
that I would just be piloting a patrol ship around this black hole on the fringe of the system. It didn’t occur to me until I was already here that the black hole was the only thing that made it possible for the UHT to project wormholes into your system without mechanisms to hold the wormhole in place and open.”
That was true. It was the only reason any fighting was happening around the black hole. Usually the UHT’s wormhole technology required a mechanism they called a “doorstop” to maintain a wormhole opening on both ends, but they had found that they could open stable wormholes in orbit around the black hole out here on the system’s fringe without the need for a doorstop. This made the black hole’s neighborhood the primary battleground for the war. At least it had, until the reinforcement drones had arrived.
Rex was looking down at the two-tone ground between them. “This sucks.” Mila held back a giggle at hearing the computer translate the slang. “I mean look at us. You were ready to drag us both into a black hole just to get one tally mark for your team.” He took a hesitant step forward. “It doesn’t need to be like this, you know. I mean, I know you’re not happy about the way UHT and your government are handling things out there, but that doesn’t mean that we need to be at each other’s throats in here.”
He took another step, more sure this time. “I know a thing or two about ship systems under gravitational stress. I pilot ships through wormholes for a living.” The next step took him halfway across the color boundary. “If we pool our resources, we might be able to get enough juice from our ships to free ourselves from this orbit.” He was in the red area now. Mila had not moved an inch during the entire exchange. One more step would bring him within arm’s length of her. “So what do you say? Can we do this together?” He took that step.
Mila grabbed him by the collar and swung him around hard. His back hit the wall knocking the wind out of him for the moment. She was coming at him again. He threw his hands up and managed to grab both her wrists. She tugged, trying to free her arms, but he had the advantage again with his strong upper body. She was breathing heavily. Now, she could smell him. She had not been this close to a male of any species in a long time. Her training class had been all female and Mila worked exclusively with women since joining the military. He was still holding her tight, but something in his posture changed. He was not holding her back anymore. He was…
He body shifted forward and their lips met. His scent doubled in strength. But she did not find it offensive. As Mila let herself be kissed, a thousand thoughts rushed through her mind, all blurring together and cancelling each other out. They faded into the background of her mind and it was just her and Rex, for that moment.
His hands opened and her arms were free. A chorus of background thoughts shouted “attack him”, but she did not. Instead, almost of their own volition, her hands slipped behind his head and ushered him into another kiss. They slid downward to the back of his neck, not to choke him, but to feel the large muscles that bridged his neck and shoulders. She found herself musing that it must be a trait of the Dextronins. Her fingers sank into his shoulder muscles.
Rex’s hands reached around to the small of her back wrapping her in his warmth. Suddenly, Mila’s voices began to shout more clearly. What are you doing? He is the enemy. He associated with the UHT. She violently pushed away from him.
“Get back to your own side,” she growled at him through gritted teeth.
It was another two days in their isolated world before they interacted directly again. Rex had returned to his red area and stayed there. He would have tried to stay out of sight as well if it had been possible, but the layout of the cabin prevented this. He kept to himself, spending time reading or exercising. Mila mostly ignored him. He caught her stealing a look at him while he was doing his pushup/sit-up routine, but had the wisdom not to comment on it.
The outside world only managed to contact them every few days. They were provided with updates on the political landscape of the system. Several times, Rex wanted to fill Mila in on the latest reported events, but he choose to leave her alone. No need to spark another confrontation. But, if the confrontation went the same way… No. He decided it was best not to have it happen again. One of them might end up pulling a pistol rather than pulling the other into a kiss.
He was pretty sure Mila was ignoring the updates they were receiving. He could understand that. For her, it would only be bad news. Her system was no longer at war, but they were now occupied. The treaty had now been in effect for a few years and for the most part her system’s governments and the UHT were getting along amicably.
Rex found himself wondering what his people’s response would have been if the UHT had viewed the Dextronin as human colonists rather than an alien species. Presumably, they would have felt compelled to integrate the Dextronin into their union too, rather than allow them to continue as an independent alien state like they did with other extraterrestrials. If they had chosen to integrate, there would have certainly been resistance.
His people had not experienced war among themselves, so they did not have a standing military. An armed force had been haphazardly thrown together in the last few years when the possibility of attack from the outside had become a reality after first contact with the UHT. So far, however, all other intelligent races had approached the Dextronin with peaceful intentions. If they had needed to defend themselves against the UHT, the human forces would have easily overrun them. Then, he would have found himself in the same position that Mila was now in.
The latest data-burst informed him that a team of engineers was still working on a plan to free them from the black hole’s grip. Rex did the math and realized that although it had only been about a week for them, the outside world had experienced over four years. Of course, any pilot who dealt in space travel was familiar with the concept of time dilation, but usually they only experienced it on long interplanetary journeys.
Mila and Rex were trapped in a situation in which they would continue to experience it indefinitely. The universe outside would continue to age faster than they would as long as they were still in a high-velocity orbit around the black hole. The team working on their rescue had run into a series of engineering problems, mostly caused by the bands of high intensity radiation circling the black hole.
Apparently, navigating a ship into a long-term orbit on the event horizon’s edge while not getting blasted with enough radiation to tear their cells to shreds had been a near miracle for the ship’s computer. Bringing a second ship into rendezvous with theirs and towing them free of the black hole seemed to be a near impossibility. Rex had always been told that crossing the event horizon of a black hole was a one-way trip. It would seem that stopping just short of the horizon was not much better.
When Mila did begin acknowledging Rex again, it was strictly business. She made a change to their hygiene/mealtime schedule that she made clear was nonnegotiable. The small interaction was a gateway. After a few more hours she asked him a question about the systems on his ship, looking for parts that might be integrated into their life support.
A few hours after that, the conversation turned from engineering questions to questions about the Dextronin System. The longer they talked about Rex being from an alien world that was not part of the United Human Territories, the more cordial the conversation became. The whole time, neither of them strayed from their designated area.
That was until Mila hit a roadblock in her repair work. They had not spoken in about an hour. Without warning, she turned off the different colored lights and the room became one tone again. Rex was in the middle of reading an update when the light changed. His eyes took a moment to adjust to the new color scheme.
“Come here,” Mila said to him, then quietly added, “Please.” He crossed the cabin without hesitation. Mila kneeled down to reach into a panel in the wall. He joined her and saw that she was working on a component of their artificial gravity system. “I got the central processor working for this unit, but it looks like the dive burned out
a few of my graviton generator cells. Would the ones on your ship be adaptable to this configuration?”
He took a close look at the generators. His ship was of human design with some Dextronin components and had been built as part of a cooperative project. The Colonials had developed their graviton generator technology independently. He examined the housing for the cells. “Hmm… We’d have to make a few adjustments to them to fit this housing, but yes, I think they could be used on your system.”
“Good. I want to go retrieve them as soon as possible. I…” A chime from the computer interrupted her. It was the same chime that they had received with each new data-burst, unique only in that is was completely unexpected. They had already received one data-burst earlier that day. At this point, only a few weeks would have passed since then for the outside world. They had never received bursts that close together. Rex immediately got an uneasy feeling. An urgent data-burst could not be good news.
He walked over to the pile of his belongings on the far side of the cabin. There, he retrieved his tablet. The message was labeled “URGENT”. He opened it and began to read.
“What is it? What did they have to say?” Mila nearly pounced on him when he looked up from the tablet. It was the first time she had shown interest in news from the outside.
“There has been a terrorist attack. A coordinated attack on a large Lagrange station. The entire station was torn apart by a series of explosions.”
“Which station?” Mila was afraid she likely knew the answer.
“Central Station, the one positioned at the null gravity point between your star and the black hole. It says a group of Colonial rebels coordinated to carry explosives aboard the station. They had inside help supposedly from UHT loyal workers. The bombs were planted and set to go off at just the right time.” He paused to let it sink in.
Romance: Alien Romance: Simply Aliens: A Ten Book Alien Romance Collection (Paranormal Scifi Interracial Romance) (Fantasy New Adult Alpha Short Stories) Page 2
