by AZ Kelvin
“You know, Pene, these folks work hard for what they’ve got. But, they live a good life here, and with them you could go to the Career Academy and be a certified star pilot. Gina, Boss, Katy, me—we all did.”
“I should stay then, here, with them?” Pene’s eyes rimmed with tears. He could see she truly didn’t know what to do.
“You should know that this kind of life, Pene, takes dedication to a common goal,” CJ carefully explained. “The VerNeers are a rich and powerful family with many obligations. A certain freedom has to be sacrificed to truly make that style of life work, the kind of freedom we have aboard the Altered Moon.”
Pene’s brows knit in confusion.
“I know, it’s a bitch of a choice,” CJ said in empathy, “and, I can’t make it for you. I’m just trying to help you to understand the pros and cons. On one hand, you have a stable and prosperous life, which is great for most people, but you’re planet bound. On the other hand, you have to make your own living, but also have a chance to explore the galaxy and see things most people will never have a chance to see.”
“Would you hate me if I stayed?”
“I will never hate you, Pene, ever—and I will miss you terribly if you decide to stay, but I will back whatever decision you make.”
“Captain, I’ve wanted to be a star pilot as long as I can remember,” Pene said with a sad face.
“I understand, kiddo.” He gave Pene a long and loving hug. “I understand.”
While Pene talked with Diana VerNeer, CJ called the Altered Moon to tell them about the opportunity she had been given and to stand by for further information.
An hour later, Moonshadow set down in the shuttle bay on the Altered Moon after the trip down to Revellia and back. The crew piled into the shuttle bay the second it pressurized to see what decision Pene had made since CJ’s comms unit somehow switched off during the journey back. CJ slowly walked off the shuttle alone with his hands in his jacket pockets and his eyes cast down to the deck.
He looked up briefly and saw the somber faces of his crew when they saw CJ came out by himself. Pene had not only earned a place on the ship, but also had won a place in their hearts.
A flurry of activity behind CJ caught their attention and brought smiles to their faces at the same time. Pene flew out of the shuttle in a leap, as she playfully cleared the shuttle’s entry ramp, landed noisily on the deck, and nearly falling. She skipped a couple of times to catch up with CJ and then bounced along happily beside him.
CJ grinned slyly. “Oh, sorry, was my comms down?”
“You know damn well that your comms wasn’t down, CJ Evermore!” Katy scolded him for his shenanigans.
The entire crew surrounded Pene in a group hug; even GABI got her holographic self in on it, kinda.
“Hey, what am I, space chum over here?” CJ complained loudly and then was included in the group.
“What about the Career Academy?” Gina asked Pene, as everyone left the shuttle bay.
“Eh, I figure the best place to really learn how to be a star pilot is right here,” Pene said with a shrug.
“Well said, well said,” Cal complimented her.
“After we take care of Boss, do you think we can look for my parents?” Pene asked.
The crew looked at each other and shared a smile.
“Hmmm…” There may be tough answers down that road for her, he thought, but her parents’ disappearance has got to be a bugger. “Of course we can.” CJ said aloud. He put his arm over Pene’s shoulders and turned to Boss. “Well, Bernie, time to get you to Outlook Station, my friend.”
“Yes, sir, I got a date with some old friends,” Boss said, as he patted his legs.
*~*~*
Epilogue: Loose Ends
CJ sat in the crew lounge aboard Horizon’s Call on a long and surprisingly comfortable couch. Horizon’s Call, the entire ship and crew, had been brought inside a Keect’na science vessel to provide the Humans with a familiar living environment while they were in such close proximity to Keect. The crystalline replacements for Boss’ vertebrae could be made nowhere else and Human vessels, not to mention the Humans themselves, wouldn’t be able to withstand the extreme conditions.
CJ’s new wife, Katy, had nestled up against him a while ago and closed her eyes. Almost an hour had gone by since Boss went in for his pre-op preparation. CJ exited from the star charts he had been studying and closed his datpad. He closed his eyes and thought about a stop they had made on their way to Outlook Station to help Kendra Varrin. Kendra Varrin of all people! he thought, as his mind went over the recent encounter.
Kendra contacted CJ after they left Revellia when she heard of Che’s involvement in the defense of Cantankerous Base. Kendra’s efforts to find her daughter had met with no success. CJ told her of the combined attack on McCarthy and his unfortunate escape.
“I have an idea of where they may be then,” Kendra said.
“If you think she’s in trouble, we’ll help,” CJ told her. “Che is a remarkable person.”
“Of course, she is,” Kendra responded.
CJ looked down and smirked.
“I, ah”—Kendra stopped for a moment—“I went to Blood Star Command for help, but they didn’t want to get involved in the petty squabbles between two of its junior officers. More like they wanted to see who came out on top.” She sighed and then continued. “I don’t know who to trust.”
“You can trust the fact that I will assist in any effort to help Che, as she did for us. So like it or not, that puts us on the same side of the board.”
“The only thing stronger in me than being a Blood Star is being a mother. CJ Evermore, I owe you a debt. One I can never repay. And yet, I need to ask even more. I can’t trust any Blood Star forces to help, but I can’t take McCarthy down alone.”
“I’m sorry, is there a question in there, somewhere?” CJ put her on the spot, but not too harshly.
Kendra’s eyes pinched at the ends in irritation. Eating crow would be a small price to pay for his help. “Captain Evermore, will you and your crew help me rescue my daughter?” she asked pointedly.
“Yes, Commander Varrin. We most certainly will.”
A few million kilometers and a relatively short time later, a Blood Star stealth recon ship dropped from Kendra’s ship, the Scythe and descended to a set of ruins on an out-of-the-way planet far from any Marlacuer patrols. CJ, Gina, and Cal accompanied Kendra and two of her personal guards.
CJ and the crew had body armor on under their new ballistic Altered Moon Command Crew jackets, and each one was armed head to toe in CQB gear, complete with headsets and omnivision optics.
“What?” CJ asked after he caught Kendra looking at them a couple of times.
“You guys look good. You look—capable,” she said as a compliment, with a slight nod.
“Oh,” CJ said with a smirk and unconsciously settled his jacket.
Cal nodded enthusiastically, knocked fists with Gina, and grinned.
The pilot set the craft down far enough from the ruins, so not to attract attention. A sensor sweep showed no security measures whatsoever.
“Why no security?” CJ wondered.
“Probably a supply cache before he runs for good,” Cal answered.
“Yes, you’re probably right,” Kendra agreed, as she scanned the area with a monocular. “Look, there’s the Triton.”
The three ships sat in a clearing near a group of small ruins of an early settler colony, which were clustered in front of a larger ruin with an open roof.
“Let’s move in on that position and look for entry from there.” CJ pointed down to a growth of brush by the side of the large ruin.
“Agreed,” Kendra answered, and the group started out.
Che Talos and her crew had tracked McCarthy to this backwater planet, but underestimated the size of his forces. The plan to eliminate McCarthy in a flash attack and then talk the others down didn’t pan out at all. Che was pinned down behind some rubble with no other
cover around her. Verlon and Benton managed to get to a spot where they couldn’t be attacked without being able to shoot first, but they couldn’t get out either.
Blasts of red plasma blew off chunks of Che’s rubble pile until there wasn’t much left to hide behind. One blast was so close the rubble particles peppered Che’s face and eyes; she was stunned. McCarthy ran in, kicked the gun from her hand, and raised his own toward her.
“Sshtupid bitsshh!” He sneered at her in disgust. “You think you can jussht walk up and sshoot me?”
A flash of sizzling red plasma streaked in as Kendra Varrin walked around the corner and shot him in the face. McCarthy’s locked-up jaw flew off, along with the bottom half of his face, in a bloody eruption of flesh and bone. An odd look passed across his eyes as he gurgled horrendously and dropped sideways to the floor.
CJ, Gina, and Cal ripped into the rest of his forces with the help of Kendra’s guards. The skirmish lasted less than a minute when McCarthy’s forces were either dead or subdued. Kendra Varrin walked over to McCarthy’s corpse.
“Nobody shoots my baby.” She pumped two more rounds into his head, while she held her jaws together in her best McCarthy imitation, and added, “Ash-hole.”
“Mom!” Che said as Kendra helped her to her feet. “What are you doing here?”
“Oh, thank you, Mom, for rescuing me. I love you. Oh, you’re welcome Michelle. I love you, too.” Kendra Varrin carried on a conversation by herself, with a considerable degree of sarcasm.
“Ugh, Mom, you know I hate being called Michelle!”
Kendra just looked at her with her eyebrows raised.
“Oh, fine,” she rolled her eyes. “Thank you—Mom, for rescuing me—I love you,” Che said, with an equal amount of sarcasm. “Now, what the hell are you doing here?”
“Cleaning house,” she told her daughter. Kendra looked at Che and applied wound adhesive from her med-pack on the deeper cuts from the flying rubble. “Mich—” she stopped and started again. “Che, I’d like to hear more about your idea.”
“Mom, really?” Che asked with hope.
Blaster and Darkcloud joined Kendra and Che, along with CJ’s group.
“Yes,” Kendra said to her and everybody else there, “really.”
Kendra dropped CJ and his crew back off at the Altered Moon with her thanks and a promise to consider Che’s proposal that the Blood Stars ‘turn over a new leaf.’ Che and her crew continued on to Outlook Station with them so Che could begin talks with Nelson while Boss went under the scalpel.
CJ snapped back to the here and now when alarms went off and medical personnel scrambled to action.
A team of nurses and doctors burst through a set of doors around Boss’ med-bed. The big man thrashed around violently, as massive seizures racked his body. Nurses tried to secure his arms and legs while they rushed him down the corridor and through another set of doors that led to the operating theater.
CJ and the entire crew, who had waited for what was a normal part of the procedure to be completed, all jumped to their feet.
“What’s happening?” Pene cried out.
CJ ran after the group, “Cat?”
“The prep meds are attacking his central nervous system!” Cat yelled back through the doors as they hissed closed.
Gina stood among her crewmates as they all stared helplessly at the ‘AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY’ sign on the sealed doors to the surgery bay.
“Bernie—?” she whispered.
*~*~*
Yawn
Apogee of the Altered Moon
-CUL8R-
Acknowledgments
Thank You!
Thank you reader, for your support as well, through your purchase of the book. I appreciate your support and I hope you enjoyed the story. If you did enjoy it, please consider telling your friends or posting a short review. Word of mouth is an author's best friend and is much appreciated!
The journey here…
The writing of a story, for the most part, is a solitary work for the author alone. The development of a novel, on the other hand, might require a small crowd to achieve. I am both lucky and grateful to have such a wonderful crowd of supporters not only for the Curse of the Altered Moon project, but the works of AZ Kelvin in general.
My deepest gratitude to you all for your support!
The AZ Kelvin All-Stars
Sunny & CJ Lee
Evelyn & Bill Lee
Matt Metzler
Amy Stahl
Brandy Lowrey
Lee Companies, LLC.
Lee Companies, LLC did a terrific job with publishing Curse of the Altered Moon. The Lee team checked the storyline for consistency and designed both the interior content and the cover illustrations.
CJ Lee – Interior and exterior design, cover illustrator.
Sunny Lee – Story wrangler and creative consultant.
Nikki Busch Editing
Nikki Busch Editing took on the job of editing Curse of the Altered Moon. I have worked with Nikki before and hope to continue to work with her in the future. I am very satisfied with her editing and expediency. She is an absolute pleasure to work with. Thank you, Nikki Busch!
Find her at www.nikkibuschediting.com
Beta Readers
Curse of the Altered Moon had a stellar group of beta readers give the book its pre-release reading. Beta reading is a very important part of the publishing process and I am very glad to have had such a great group to work with. My thanks to every one of you for a job well done!
Sunny Lee
Gabriel Strump
Deb Scott
Rod Kroes
Steve Gannon
Rise of the Altered Moon Release Party
On Halloween 2015, I held an online release party for Rise of the Altered Moon. People who picked up a copy of the book on October 31st, 2015, earned a surprise bonus Thank You in the credits of this book, Curse of the Altered Moon.
So, Thank You to the following people who picked up a copy of Rise of the Altered Moon on Halloween 2015.
A. Lohrmann, Pamela Morrison, Carol Babcock, Gabriel Strump, Grace Hudson, William J. Jackson, Amy Stahl, Keith Baker, George Tomlinson, Nikki Busch, Melissa Zaleski, Rick Lee, Sue Schroeder, Jane Brady-Ertz, William Goldstein, Crystal and Stephen Dallavalle, and Brad Isley.
Thanks again everyone for helping kick off a great online book release event! You rock!
See you out there!
Connect online and look for more on the Altered Moon Series, along with other stories like The Druids of Arden and Here We Ghost, at: www.azkelvin.com
Cheers! – AZ Kelvin
