From the Sleeping Nebula to the lost dunes of Regus 7, he could take her everywhere. He could delight in her wonder, as if he was seeing all of those wonders for the first time too.
It was such a curious thing to consider whilst he stood over her, watchful in case the entity should take hold. At least it kept him sane though.
It also gave him something else to think about.
Nida wasn’t his type. Or at least he wouldn’t have thought she could be. Back at the Academy when he had first gotten to know her, he’d done so through a sense of duty. Yet over time, that duty had morphed into something else. Now he, quite literally, couldn’t imagine his life without her. Hence her inclusion in his future holiday plans.
Sighing deeply, he kept watch above her, and as he did, he kept imagining the future.
. . . .
The future.
One thing this crazy adventure had taught him was that the nature of time was completely different to what he’d once assumed. He was still trying to wrap his head around the fact time travel was possible.
And yet, no matter how surprised he was by it, he also got the niggling feeling that the surprises weren’t done yet. Before this whole epic journey was over, he’d be shaken to his bones a few more times, he knew that.
Yet nothing stopped him from standing there and keeping a watchful eye on those instruments as she slept softly.
She spoke occasionally.
But he couldn’t quite make the words out. He strained his hearing in case one phrase appeared, however: ‘help me.’
In fact, as he stood there, he kept replaying those first few experiences he’d had with Nida over and over again.
Especially the moment he’d saved her in her apartment. If he hadn’t been quick enough, if he hadn’t pushed her through her bedroom door and closed it in time, then she would be dead.
And he could imagine—in perfect detail—what it would have looked like. Because he’d seen it. The Vex had been cruel enough to show it to him in their simulation.
She would have drawn limp in his grip, blood splattered over his face and hers.
Closing his eyes for only the briefest of moments, he collapsed his hand over them. His fingers were shaking and sweaty.
‘Pull it together,’ he commanded as he finally forced his hand to drop.
Then it happened.
She woke up.
No, she bolted upright as if she’d been catapulted forward by some immense force.
In fact, she jumped right out of her chair, and if Carson hadn’t been standing right there to catch her, she would have fallen into the bank of consoles at the front of the bridge.
‘Whoa,’ he spat, ‘you alright? What’s going on?’ He pushed her back slightly as he tried to get a good look at her face.
Her eyes were wild, yet they were, quite thankfully, not blue. Just white rimmed and obviously filled with surprise.
‘What happened?’ he asked as his heart beat hard in this chest, the vibration of it repeating up though his neck and jaw.
She took a moment to still herself, then she shook her head. ‘I’m fine,’ she whispered. ‘The entity is still controlled,’ she said, clearly knowing exactly what he wanted to hear.
He breathed a heady sigh of relief, letting his eyes close once more.
Then he snapped them open. Relief could come later. ‘What happened? Did you dream?’
She pressed her lips together and nodded. Though the move was somewhat fragile, and he could see that her eyes were shimmering with emotion, there was still a hard, determined edge to her look. ‘Yes,’ she confirmed in a soft voice.
‘What of?’
‘The same visions. Stars falling from the sky . . . ,’ she trailed off.
‘We don’t’ know whether that will really happen,’ he suddenly interrupted, feeling the need to focus Nida before she could get pulled under by the entity’s manipulation.
‘I know,’ she said.
He still had his hands on her shoulder, and she now reached up and rested her own hand against his. Again her touch was warm. In fact, it was always warm—now that she had discovered a way to push back the entity at last.
It was also a blessed kind of warmth, one Carson hadn’t ever really experienced. It seemed to bypass his skin and seep right down to his bones, imbuing them with energy and life.
He smiled. It was a kinked, curious move, but it felt good to display an emotion other than shock and sorrow.
She had a strange way of centring him, of stealing away his guilt and anguish.
He probably didn’t need to keep his hands on her shoulders any more; it was clear she could stand on her own. Yet, once again, he didn’t seem capable of moving away.
‘A field of grain,’ she suddenly said.
‘Wait . . . what?’
She looked immeasurably distracted as she stared past his right shoulder at the wall behind him. Her gaze, though narrowed, had a far-off quality to it that sent a rush of nerves escaping up his back.
‘A field of grain . . . ,’ she shook her head. ‘Never mind. It was just one of the dreams the entity showed me,’ she clarified as she pushed a hand up and neatened her hair.
He took a deep sigh that reverberated up through his hands and into his chest.
She shifted back, and Carson almost wanted to double forward to put his hands on her shoulders once again. Even though she appeared capable and ready to stand without him, he couldn’t say the same about himself.
His fingers tingled with loss as she moved away.
Sighing to herself as she took a short walk around the bridge, she finally faced him once again. Slowly the far-off glint to her gaze lifted.
He swallowed. ‘Are you sure you’re alright?’
‘Yeah,’ she nodded low.
He sighed. Yet it was ragged and shallow. Wiping the back of his hand over his mouth, he nodded. ‘Okay . . . well at least you got some rest, right?’
She pressed her brows together and nodded. She looked confused, yet more than that, thoughtful. Deeply thoughtful.
What exactly had she seen?
Whatever it was, she only mumbled something about a field of grain whenever he asked her.
Soon enough they both settled back into their duties. Yet, in all honesty, there wasn’t much to do. Everything was automated, and though Carson was ready at any moment to run into the Vex . . . it never happened.
Space seemed empty. Though they came across scraps of destroyed vessels here and there, and other signs of battle, that was it.
It was a truly eerie experience. It felt far worse than if they’d encountered ship graveyard after graveyard. Because this ignited more questions than it answered. Just where was everyone? Were the Vex so powerful that they could blast ships out of the air and leave no trace at all?
The Coltex System wasn’t all that far away. Just five days of travel at maximum speed, or one day if Carson took the top priority transport hubs.
Ordinarily the top priority hubs were exclusively kept open for traffic of the most important kind. From United Galactic Coalition cruisers rushing out to save planets or fight off Barbarian incursions, you needed full clearance from the Academy or United Galactic Coalition Council to use one.
Well now there was, quite literally, no one and nothing to stop Carson.
Because there was no one and nothing around.
A few times he logged back into the communication system to ensure that the generalised United Galactic Coalition distress call was still in effect.
It was. And it still told all remaining Coalition ships to redirect to the Coltex System.
As the questions built within Carson, so did the frustration.
He hated being in the dark, because being in the dark had caused this whole thing.
From trusting the entity and its version of events to trusting people like Cara, Carson knew he had done more damage than if he had relied on his own intuition.
Nida was dutifully silent as he went about his task
s. She did what she was told, and mostly kept to herself. He could tell she was thinking about what was happening to her. How couldn’t she be?
Just as he was lost in his own thoughts, she would be drowning in hers.
Too much was happening too quickly for either of them to gain any much-needed clarity.
Yet, of all the indecision and uncertainty, there was one fact of which he was sure.
He wasn’t going to leave her again. He wasn’t going to abandon her like he had on the Vex of the past, and neither was he going to forget her like he had during his simulation manufactured by the Vex of the future.
Because, god dammit, she was all he had.
Every single time Carson considered those thoughts, his feelings for her grew. Yet he wasn’t about to do anything about them. Not here, not now. They had to focus. Plus, he had absolutely no idea how she felt about him.
. . . .
The closer they got to the Coltex System, the more anticipation built within him until it felt like a thundering wall of water surging towards him and blocking out the light.
His heart beat so fast that he actually had to get the computer to manufacture a mild sedative just to calm him down.
He stood on the bridge—in fact, he didn’t move from it.
By his estimate, they were barely an hour away from Coltex.
So he stood there in the centre of the bridge, his back so straight it was as if someone had replaced his spine with a metal rod.
Nida sat straight in her chair too, her hands white with tension as she clutched hold of the console before her.
They both knew the stakes here, they also both knew what was likely to face them.
The Vex . . . or so they thought.
‘Anything yet? Anything at all?’ he mumbled to the computer as he paced back and forth.
‘Scanners still have not detected the presence of any ships,’ the computer answered immediately.
Carson let a pressured breath through his teeth. It sent a sharp tingle through his lips and into his chin, but he just ignored it as he swung around and started pacing in the other direction.
‘We should have faced something by now,’ Carson said for about the 50th time.
To Nida’s credit, she hadn’t told him to shut up yet. Instead, she just sat there and stared at her console with fixed attention. He’d given her the task of monitoring the sensor system for the first sign of activity. And she was doing a remarkably diligently job of it.
When they got back to the Academy, he would have to tell Sharpe to cut her some slack. She certainly wasn’t the worst recruit in 1000 years—she’d just been untested. And now this incredible adventure was testing her to the max, she was proving herself to be more than capable.
‘Carson, it will be okay,’ she said distractedly as she continued her task.
He simply took a breath rather than answering.
. . . .
He wanted it to be okay, god knows that, but all signs pointed to the fact it wouldn’t be.
Though he’d never faced a situation as harrowing as the near-complete destruction of the United Galactic Coalition, he had faced dire battle. He’d been in space, he’d been in combat.
And this . . . didn’t make any sense.
If the Vex had waged an all-out war with the Coalition, then there would be more signs. More broken ships, more dead bodies tumbling in the vacuum of space.
Yet, so far, the only real destruction they’d witnessed had been on Remus 12. All those partially destroyed and disabled Coalition cruisers.
. . . .
He shook his head bitterly.
‘Just trust it will be okay,’ she said tenderly.
It really was a tender move. From the voice to her choice of words, she was trying to calm him.
And he let her.
He closed his eyes, sighed, and shifted his head back until his face was directed at the ceiling.
Just trust it would be okay?
Their experiences to date had proved to the both of them that trust was a truly precious commodity they could not waste.
Then it happened.
Just as Carson took another breath and finally opened his eyes, Nida jumped to her feet, gasping as she did.
‘I’ve got it. The scanners are picking up activity . . . coming right at us,’ she squeaked in terror.
Carson lunged towards the nearest console. ‘Prepare defensive measures,’ he spat at the computer.
‘Defensive measures are already in place,’ the computer clarified tonelessly.
Of course they were. Ever since they had left Remus 12, Carson had left the vessel in a constant state of red alert. But that wasn’t the point.
The fear coursing through his veins was.
This was it.
This was it.
They were about to face the Vex.
Yet as Carson reached his console and typed frantically across it, the computer suddenly chimed, ‘United Galactic Coalition vessels detected on an intercept heading.’
. . . .United Galactic Coalition?
Coalition?
Carson didn’t say anything. For a moment he was rendered to the spot by his shock.
Then the computer chimed again. ‘Receiving multiple messages.’
‘Display on screen,’ he could barely speak.
Was this a trap? Had the Vex managed to fool his ship’s scanners?
He couldn’t underestimate them, that much was clear.
Yet, in another instant, an image flickered onto the large screen at the front of the bridge.
. . . .Travis.
Christ, it was Travis.
And as Travis’ eyes drew wide, it was clear Carson’s surprise was reflected in the face of his friend.
‘ . . . Carson?’ Travis hissed.
Carson nodded, his head feeling so loose it could have fallen off and rolled onto the ground.
For a single second, they simply considered each other in total silence. Then they both started speaking at once.
‘Where the hell have you been?’ Travis spat.
‘What the hell happened to the Coalition?’ Carson spat.
‘Carson, you disappeared.’
‘What happened to the Coalition,’ Carson raised his voice, the sorrow he’d kept at bay suddenly snaking through his words and making them high-pitched with terror.
‘ . . . It was destroyed. We . . . we were attacked,’ Travis now answered, his face awash with so much emotion, it was hard to describe.
Carson took a frantic swallow that made him sound as if he were drowning. ‘By what force?’
‘We . . . still don’t know. They came out of Remus 12. But Carson, where the hell have you been?’
Carson pushed his hand over his eyes and considered the darkness for a sweet moment.
There was too much to ask, too much to learn. He had no idea where to start, and that immobilised him, locking his muscles in place.
In fact, he felt stuck there until finally Nida got up and walked over to him.
And that would be when Travis gasped so hard, it sounded as though he had swallowed the sun.
Carson looked up sharply to see Travis staring open-mouthed at Nida.
‘What?’ Carson asked as he instinctively took a step closer to her.
‘What . . . what is she doing here?’ Travis pointed forward, his hand trembling.
Carson actually reached out and latched a hand on her shoulder protectively. Even though Travis wasn’t on the same damn ship as him, and even though the guy was indisputably Carson’s best friend, it didn’t matter.
It was the total shock rippling through Travis’ gaze.
‘She’s still alive? They’re looking for her,’ Travis stammered.
Carson felt cold. Totally frozen. It was as if his blood had been drained out and replaced with powdered ice and old snow.
Travis kept shaking his head. ‘What . . . how?’
‘Lieutenant,’ Nida suddenly stepped forward, centring herself with a deep bre
ath as she did, ‘a lot has happened, but you need to tell us what happened here. Is the Galactic Coalition . . . how . . . how many ships were destroyed? Who’s left?’ she choked.
Travis just looked at her as though she were a ghost. No, more than that—a Goddess of some description—something mythological and downright impossible.
Carson swallowed again, suddenly incapable of sucking in enough air.
‘Carson, what’s going on?’ Travis asked quietly, pulling his hand up and closing it hard over his eyes. Carson could see the fingers press tightly into his friend’s face, until he knew Travis would be looking at nothing but stars.
‘We need to come aboard,’ Carson suddenly announced, ‘we need to figure this out.’
‘There’s nothing to figure out; the United Galactic Coalition was destroyed,’ Travis noted bitterly.
‘Lieutenant,’ Carson snapped, drawing on his years of being the leader of the Force, and Travis’ boss.
Travis looked up sharply.
‘All is not lost, and we can help. But you must tell us what happened,’ Carson continued.
Not for the first time, and not for the last, Travis swung his gaze over to Nida, and again it slackened with something akin to awe.
It made Carson’s back itch.
‘What?’ he hissed at his friend as Carson took a dutiful step in front of her.
‘They were . . . after her,’ Travis noted as he swallowed hard. The noise was a loud one, and it echoed around the bridge.
Carson shook his head instinctively, just as Nida took a shuddering step back.
‘They were after her,’ Travis repeated in a louder voice.
Nida turned and stared, wide eyed up at Carson. ‘What’s going on?’ she hissed.
More determined than ever to find out, Carson took a steadying breath. ‘We need to know what you do. Travis, I know this is hard to believe, but you are just going to have to trust me. We went back in time . . . we, Christ, we went back in time.’
Travis didn’t answer immediately, then he hissed two words that stole right into Carson’s soul: ‘I know.’
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