Into the Dark (Dark Universe Book 1)

by Jason Halstead

  Janna stared at the display and whispered, “The hiagin in front or the sulkras behind?”

  Aden nodded. She was talking about predators native to Vagnos, her home world, but it was the same as him wondering whether he should go from the fire to the frying pan. “The ships chasing us are smaller. Fewer weapons, probably.”

  “But more of them,” Meshelle countered. “We play dumb, like we don’t know what’s ahead of us, and as we near their weapons range, we use the Lermians’ toy.”

  “It’s hardly a toy,” Kessoc snarled.

  Janna nodded and looked at Seph. “Stage one evasion, randomized. I don’t want a lucky mass driver hitting us in the rear.”

  Aden couldn’t stop himself from mumbling, “Nobody wants a surprise mass in the ass.”

  Twyf snorted and glanced up at him. She opened her mouth and then glanced at her sister and closed it. She waited a moment and then winked and let the tip of her tongue dance across her lips before turning back to her station.

  Silence fell across the bridge, other than status reports detailing their closure with the cloaked Kesari ship. When they were down to less than five minutes remaining, Janna leaned on her communications again. “Chuck—report.”

  “A few more minutes, Captain,” he said. “It’s nearly there, I think.”

  “We’re nearly there too,” Meshelle said. “We’ll be in range in sixty seconds.”

  “They haven’t fired at us yet?” Tosc asked.

  “Nothing,” Twyf confirmed. “Probably don’t want to risk destroying us and the crystal.”

  Seph snorted. “They’d rather capture us and torture us to death for taking it from them.”

  “I’m not a big fan of torture,” Aden offered.

  “Forty-five seconds.”

  “Deploy the Lermian whiteout when we’re six seconds out,” Janna said. “Seph, at two seconds, go to evasion level five.”

  “Five? There is no five programmed in!” Seph protested.

  “Then figure it out manually!”

  “Thirty seconds,” Meshelle announced.

  “Grab on to something or strap yourself in,” Kessoc warned. Tosc had already moved to grab a hold of a handrail near the door.

  Janna slapped open the ship’s comms again. “Strap in or hold on—ten seconds to zero-G!”

  Aden looked around and frowned. “Shit.”

  “My chair,” Twyf hissed.

  He grunted and dropped to his knees behind her so he could grab her chair while she clamped her restraints in place. “Always wanted to bring a strong man to his knees,” she teased.

  “Ten seconds,” Meshelle warned. “Nine, eight, seven, deploying whiteout—”

  The lights dimmed and went out first, followed by the holographic display and then each of the stations. Emergency lights flickered on, powered by internal batteries. Aden’s stomach lifted as the artificial gravity died off. He swallowed it down and watched as the crystal floated off Twyf’s console. Her arm lashed out and caught it. She shoved it behind her and into his chest.

  “We’re blind,” Twyf announced. “Hold the crystal.”

  Aden grabbed it with one hand and managed to shift himself around so he could wrap his legs around the base of Twyf’s chair.

  Seph cursed and reached for the manual controls locked in place beside her console. She flipped the release and contorted her body to put a hand on each of the joysticks. She used them to turn the ship and then drop it down, and then brought it back up and around to the right. She reversed the turn, slamming the unrestrained people into walls, floors, and whatever they were holding on to.

  Meshelle continued her count through the jarring maneuvers, timing it in her head. “Three, two, one.”

  Other than the grunts of bodies sliding and crashing, the only sound was Seph’s breathing as she worked the two control sticks and their many buttons to make the Uma an impossible target to hit. Whatever the Lermian whiteout consisted of, none of them saw any sign of it.

  Displays flickered and booted up, starting up from the power loss and running self-diagnostics that took precious seconds. Seph continued to twist and jerk the ship through space and Aden continued to hold on for dear life.

  The gravity returned and yanked him to the ground, driving his head against the padding in his helmet hard enough to leave him stunned. He shook it and tried to roll up to his feet, but the sudden gravity and strike to his head left him disoriented.

  “Ready for superluminal,” Chuck’s voice announced over the speakers.

  “Go!” Janna shouted.

  “Captain, the Kesari ship has decloaked.”

  “We did that,” Kessoc said. “Prolonged radiation burst that overloads virtually every wavelength we’ve found.”

  “They’re turning to target us,” Twyf added.

  Tosc and Kessoc chose to stay quiet that time.

  Seph locked the manual sticks in place and let her long fingers dance across her station. The ship groaned around them and they felt a bump as the artificial gravity suffered a momentary setback without enough stored battery power to accommodate their demands. The Uma steadied and flew through space, each passing second causing the crew to tense in expectation of a fusillade of enemy weapons fire.

  Seph’s voice cut the tension like a knife snapping a rubber band. “Entering the dark in three, two, one...we’re black.”

  Everyone stared out the windows as the starfield shifted and blurred before blinking out and going black. Twyf was the first to cry out. She unclamped her harness and turned to Aden, who was rising to his knees. She threw her arms around him, heavy suit and all, and hugged him. She pressed her lips to his faceplate and then let him go.

  Tosc and Kessoc were struggling to rise to their feet from where the brutal maneuvers had left them battered and dazed. They shook off their bruises and let the victory lift them up. In no time, Twyf’s mood turned infectious and everyone began congratulating each other.

  Aden turned, grinning like an idiot, and saw Seph glaring at him. He wiped the smile off his face and noticed the residue of moisture on his faceplate from Twyf’s lips. That was a close one. Almost as close as...

  “Hey, I get it!” he blurted out, drawing everyone’s focus. He grinned and explained, “Tassarians don’t have any hair, so if you shave them, that’s like, really, really close.”

  His statement brought stunned silence to the bridge. Meshelle was the first to snort in laughter and then everyone else joined in.

  Aden blushed and grinned with them. He turned, happy enough to not care if they were laughing at him or with him. At least until he turned and saw Twyf watching him with eyes full of emotion.

  “You are too cute,” she whispered as she walked past him to join the others.

  Chapter 27

  Aden hit the mat chest and chin first. His breath burst out of his mouth from the impact. One thought filled his mind: get up and get up fast. Or die.

  He contorted his body, sending a spasm that jerked his shoulders, arms, hips, and then knees into the ground. He bounced up off the thin mat and flipped over on his side. He touched the ground again with his hip and arm and threw himself into rolling and turning faster. He used the momentum so that the next time he rotated, he sprang up off the mat and came up to a three-point stance, four including one knee on the ground.

  Tosc had recovered from throwing him and was lumbering towards him. He started to reach for him when he saw Aden roll up and face him. He straightened a little, exposing himself just enough for the Terran to lunge forward and slip beneath his hands.

  Aden slammed his shoulder into Tosc’s hard midsection and wrapped his arms around the Lermian’s legs. He drove his feet into the ground and strained, lifting the larger and heavier alien up and forcing him to fall over Aden’s shoulder like a sack of flour. Aden kept pushing and threw himself back, using their joined momentum to land on top of Tosc and dive his back, shoulder, and elbow into his chest.

  It was Tosc’s turn to cough out his brea
th from the force of the double impact.

  Aden rolled off the Lermian and leapt to his feet. He stared down while Tosc panted to capture his breath. He shook his head and looked up at Aden. He snarled, but it was a snarl that accompanied a nod of respect. Aden relaxed and offered his hand. Tosc took it and climbed to his feet.

  “Good move,” Tosc offered. “You shouldn’t be strong enough to do that.”

  “I wouldn’t have to be if you went on a diet,” Aden offered.

  Tosc hissed and shook his head. He stretched his neck and arms, popping a few joints before he shook all over like a dog fresh out of a bath. He snarled again and turned away. “Don’t think I’ll underestimate you next time.”

  “I’ll remember,” Aden promised as the Lermian walked out of the small workout room in the belly of the Uma.

  “You’re getting better,” Seph said from where she ran on her nearby treadmill.

  Aden turned to look at the Tassarian. She didn’t have any bodywear sprayed on today, but instead wore a figure-hugging royal blue halter and matching shorts. Her only other clothing was the athletic sandals she wore to protect her feet. “Thanks. They don’t make it easy.”

  She nodded. “There aren’t many who could surprise a Lermian like that. Garf is stronger and enjoys a brawl, but Lermians are experts at striking and finishing off their prey.”

  “Criknids are pretty dangerous too,” Aden pointed out. “I trained against one a few times. Hard to keep track of all those arms. Speed and leverage has always worked best, I’ve found.”

  Seph turned off her treadmill and stepped off it. She was covered in sweat and seemed to take comfort in the moisture. She stepped onto the mat and faced him. “Want to try me?”

  “Whoa,” Aden muttered. “Are you sure? I mean, I don’t want to hurt you.”

  Seph smirked. “You have to put your hands on me to hurt me.”

  “I don’t want to, though.”

  “Afraid I’ll beat you? I’ve heard some Terran men have some foolish notion of women as weaker beings. After what I just saw, I’d think you were tough enough.”

  Aden stared at her. She was Tassarian, a race that looked delicate and fragile. He knew from firsthand experience that wasn’t the case. Twyf had impressed him with just how physical she could be. Seph was slimmer, but he had no doubt that she was just as tough, if not tougher, than her voluptuous sister.

  “Tell you what,” Seph continued. “You knock me on my back or land off the mat and I’ll take my top off.”

  “What?” Aden blurted, torn from his thoughts. “No! I don’t want that.”

  Seph regarded him for a long moment before asking, “You don’t to see me?”

  “Didn’t we cover this the other day?” he asked.

  She shrugged. “Friends can have special kinds of friendship. Isn’t it called friends with benefits?”

  “You want to strip down, go right ahead,” Aden said. “You’re beautiful, but I’m not interested in you because of that.”

  Seph humphed. “Fine. Then when I knock you down, I get to ask a question.”

  “Why wait?” Aden asked.

  “Good point,” she said and launched herself at him. Her hand clipped his cheek as he tried to jerk it back, making him hiss.

  Aden swung for her, trying to grab her if he could or at least drive her back to give him a chance to recover. She ducked her head while bumping his elbow up. Aden tried to counter by bringing his arm down…and right into her grasp.

  Seph pulled and twisted his arm while she danced around behind him. He cried out and bent forward, as the Tassarian predicted. She sprang off the ground and used his arm to guide her flight and pivot around him. She landed on his upper back and wrapped her legs around his neck.

  Aden struggled against the sudden weight driving him down. He pushed up but couldn’t counter her momentum and leverage as she leaned forward. He gambled and threw himself forward, hoping to spook her into leaping free.

  Seph tucked and rolled with him instead. She twisted to the side and guided his crash, flipping them across the mat and ending up lying on her back with Aden’s face pressed into her thigh and crotch. She tensed her legs, flexing them and letting him know with a few more pounds of pressure she could twist and snap his neck.

  “Mmph!” Aden grunted into the damp material of her shorts.

  Seph grinned at him and asked, “Give up yet?”

  Aden moaned again, unable to make his words clear with his neck squashed and his jaw clamped shut.

  “Tell me who she is and I’ll let you go.”

  “Who mmmf is?” he managed.

  “Who you’re fucking. Who is so amazing you wouldn’t take my offer.”

  Aden reached up and tried to work his fingers between the soft iron of her legs and his neck. It was slow going but the strain she showed by clenching her teeth proved he was making progress. “Let. Me. Go,” he grunted.

  “I could kill you,” she growled.

  “I know,” he said. “You win.”

  Seph squeezed him harder for a second and then relaxed her legs. She planted her heels in his back and sprang off him so that she flipped on her hands and landed after the back flip on the mat.

  Aden grunted again as his chin hit the mat. He struggled to one knee and stopped, staring at her. She was standing, ready to attack him again. “Tell me,” she hissed.

  Aden coughed and cleared his throat. He massaged it a moment to buy some time and then asked, “Why? What’s it matter? You’re not the jealous type.”

  Seph laughed without humor. She stared at him and then relaxed and offered her hand to him. Aden studied it for a moment and then took it, letting her help him to his feet. “My sister is naïve. She likes you, but I’m not going to let that happen without knowing you better. And even then, I doubt it’s going to happen.”

  Aden sniffed. “Isn’t that her choice?”

  She shrugged. “She trusts me to know what’s best.”

  “I see,” he said. He rubbed his neck again. “Can’t say that’s the way I like having a woman’s legs wrapped around my face.”

  She scowled. She stepped closer and reached out to poke a finger into his chest. “There’s something about you that doesn’t add up, Terran. Something extra. Maybe even special. Until I figure it out and you prove yourself to me, you stay away from Twyf.”

  He bit back the desire to let her know that he’d already done things with her sister that were illegal in a couple of solar systems. “Why don’t you let her make her own choices? She looks like a grown woman to me.”

  Seph’s head jerked twice as she struggled to choose her words. “Tell me who it is and why they’re so special.”

  With Twyf’s name on the tip of his tongue, he smiled and shook his head. “I can’t. She is special, and she promised me to keep it to myself.”

  “Friends don’t keep secrets from each other,” Seph argued.

  “Friends don’t try to snap each other’s necks either.”

  She sighed through her nose. “I hope she’s worth it, Terran.”

  “Oh, she is.”

  Seph glared at him and put words to match her gaze. “Stay away from my sister or I’ll kill you myself.”

  Chapter 28

  A chime sounded through the cabin, warning of the pending announcement. Less than two seconds passed before Janna’s voice filled the expectant silence. “All hands, report to the bow lounge in ten.”

  “Shit,” Aden muttered.

  Twyf slid her hand over his and squeezed it, adding pressure to the firm swell of her breast in his palm. She pressed herself back against him, molding herself against his body and encouraging him to hold her. “I don’t want to,” she mumbled.

  “Yeah, me either,” he admitted.

  Twyf sighed. “Captain’s orders. You go first. I’ll follow after you give me the all-clear.”

  He grunted and squeezed her tighter. “We should go together,” he said. “Let them all know. We almost never get any time togethe
r because everything has to line up just right.”

  “My sister—”

  “Will kill me, I know,” he finished for her. “We already had that talk. I say let her try.”

  Twyf twisted in the bed and kissed him. “You don’t know what she can do. What she’s capable of.”

  “You make her sound evil.”

  “If she has to be, she can be.”

  “Even if that means making you unhappy?”

  Twyf hesitated. “She thinks she knows what’s best.”

  He sighed. “I know. I’ve been trying to prove myself, but I don’t think I’ll win her approval until we’re too old to remember each other’s names anymore.”

  Twyf giggled and shook her head. “She’ll come around. I’m working on her too.”

  “After the last working over she gave me, I’ll let you try your method.”

  Twyf laughed again. “You’re the first person on the ship she’s ever sparred with, you know?”

  “No kidding?”

  Twyf nodded. “She doesn’t like people knowing what she can do. With you, she wanted to leave an impression.”

  “It worked!”

  “It’s because you’re different. You scare her.”

  “Scare her?” Aden scoffed. “Why?”

  “She’s afraid of change. Not little things, but big things. She doesn’t want to lose me.”

  “That’s stupid! She wouldn’t lose you—you two are sisters.”

  “On our world, when we mate we go away and form a new pod—family, in your words. Except we lose our associations with our old families.”

  “Well, I’d never want you to lose her,” Aden said.

  Twyf nodded. “Our culture’s slowly changing, but we’ve got a long ways to go.”

  “You’re not even on your home world anymore. This doesn’t make sense.”

  “Since when has fear been logical?”

  Aden opened and then closed his mouth. She had a point.

  Seeing she’d won her point, Twyf kissed him again and then slipped out of bed before he could stop her. “Get up and get dressed or I may ignore the captain and take advantage of you all over again.”

  Aden laughed. “You can’t take advantage of the willing.”