Scifi Romance: Solaris (Paranormal Alien Space Romance) (Fantasy Interstellar Military Short Stories) (4 page)

Chapter 9.

Cassie fell asleep in Dahl's arms and was awoken the next morning by a beep from her computer. Jolted awake, it took a moment for her to evaluate the situation. She hadn't planned on falling into such a deep sleep. She looked over and saw Dahl was already awake.  She looked at her computer to see what was causing the noise. “That's the test results,” Cassie said as she stared at the screen and wiped the sleep from her eyes. “Your shape-shifting gene has been extracted from your blood and now the computer will tell us if it can be used to terraform a planet.”

She stood up, redressed herself, and walked over to the computer. She scanned the numbers and data with an increasing level of excitement. When she finished reading, she turned back to Dahl with a huge smile on her face. “I did it! Using your DNA, I've created a serum to change any planet we want into a suitable home for us!”

“Well done, Cassie. I knew you could do it,” Dahl said as he changed himself into his original human disguise. 

“We should go and tell the team,” Cassie said rushing out of the lab into the hangar.

She found the hangar empty. She ran across it into the briefing room where she saw the team standing around the large screens. 

“What's going on?” she asked.

“The aliens Dahl was running away from,” Jennifer said without taking her eyes off the screen, “they are on their way to us. It seems they are more determined than we thought to kill him.”

“Is there anything we can do?” Cassie had suddenly forgotten about her good news.

“Captain Jackson should be meeting with his Security Officers now. Defending
Solaris
is their job, not ours,” Jason answered.

“So, we just sit here and wait?” Cassie asked again, becoming increasingly worried.

“Pretty much,” Jason said. “How's the lab work coming with the alien?”

“Oh, actually, I was just coming to tell you. It's done. I did it,” Cassie said suddenly remembering.

“Great!” Jack shouted. “We can send him back to the planet now and these other guys will just piss off.”

“I don't think it will be that easy,” Dahl said as he entered the room.

“What do you mean?” asked Lars.

“The Grimmots see you as allied with my people now and will exterminate your people as they have done mine,” Dahl answered sadly.

“What are these things?” Lars asked.

“The Grimmots are a race of invaders that have swept through this star system like a plague. They never settle anywhere, they just eliminate all life on a planet and move on.” As Dahl finished speaking, Captain Jackson's face appeared on the screen. 

“Landers, I have spoken to my Security Officers and we have decided our best course of action is to surrender the alien you brought on board.”

“Sorry, Captain, but that's not going to work,” Jason said. “Apparently we made ourselves a target when we brought Dahl on board.”

“Wrong. I made contact with the Grimmot leader and we have negotiated our safety in exchange for the alien known as Dahl.”

“You can't do that!” Cassie screamed. She felt hurt that Captain Jackson would surrender so quickly. “You're a coward!” she shouted.

“Silence, Cassandra,” Captain Jackson reprimanded her. “I will not tolerate your insubordination. You may feel a need to protect this alien, but I am protecting the entire ship. Remember that.”

Cassie felt like she wanted to cry. When she first rescued Dahl from Novus, she was doing it out of kindness. Now, she felt like he was her responsibility. After last night and his contribution to giving humanity a new home, Cassie was heartbroken at the thought of losing Dahl. She turned around to seek solace in his arms and found he had already left the room. That was when she heard the roar of shuttle engines.

Cassie sprinted to the door leading into the hangar and attempted to rip it open only to find it locked. She slammed her body against the door in an effort to force it open, but to no effect. She pushed against the metal door becoming more and more desperate to get into the hangar. She knew Dahl was in
The Raven
and planning on sacrificing himself in order to save
Solaris
.

“Cassie, stop it!” Lars said as he arrived at the scene. He grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her away from the door. “The main doors are open. Even if you did get that door open, you would be sucked out into space!”

“Dahl stole the shuttle!” Cassie said fighting back tears of worry and frustration.

“We know. We got an alert when the main doors opened up. Why are you freaking out so much?”

“I don't know. I just can't stand the thought of losing him. I can't explain why, I just don't want to lose him,” Cassie said.

“You two might want to see this,” Jason shouted from the briefing room. “We got video feed from
The Raven
.”

Cassie and Lars ran back to the briefing room and stared at the screen showing Dahl in the cockpit and the screen showing the external camera. Dahl had a look of steely determination on his face as he flew directly at a large, black ship that was at least twice the size of
Solaris
.

“Dahl, get back here. You don't have to do this,” Jason shouted into the communicator microphone. “Especially don't do this in my ship.”

“The Grimmots have taken everything from me,” Dahl said in a voice that Cassie felt was disturbingly calm. “My friends and my family were murdered by these people. I've been running for a long time. Cassie was the first person to show me any compassion since the Grimmots killed my family. I won't let them take her, too. I have suffered long enough. This ends now,” he said.

“Dahl, please no!” Cassie shouted with tears streaming down her face. “I don't want to lose you. Please come back to me.”

Dahl stared directly into the camera and Cassie saw those bright blue eyes he used last night. She thought it was his attempt to comfort her, but triggering that memory ripped her heart apart even further. Without saying another word, Dahl flipped a switch and the screens went dark.

“Get that video back,” Jason ordered. 

Jennifer typed furiously on the keyboard in an effort to restore the feed. The best she could do was to find the external camera on the front of
Solaris
. The entire crew of Landers watched in horror as
The Raven
flew into the engines of the Grimmot ship, exploding it into millions of pieces. Cassie collapsed on the floor at the sight of it and began to weep openly.

Lars knelt next to Cassie and attempted to console her. “I know it sucks, but he saved all of us and countless others. You heard him. Once they killed him, they were just going to go to another planet and commit another genocide there. He is a hero for this entire galaxy.”

“Him?” Jason interrupted. “What about
The Raven
? I loved that ship.”

“Shut up, you dumb ass,” Jennifer said slapping Jason on the shoulder.

The whole scene was suddenly interrupted by a knock on the door leading to the hangar. Jennifer looked back at the screen and saw the main doors were closed again. Cassie looked up when she heard the knock and searched the faces of the crew hoping they had an answer. However, everyone looked just as confused.

Cassie rose and slowly walked toward the door, suspicious and scared. There was no way anyone could be on the other side of the door. For a moment she thought it was just her ears playing tricks on her until she heard another knock. Slowly and carefully she crept toward the door. Jack, along with the rest of the crew, followed behind her with a rifle aimed and ready to fire on whatever was on the other side. Cassie took a deep breath and pressed the button to open the door. She nearly fainted when she saw Dahl standing smiling on the other side.

“How? How did you get here?” Cassie asked dumbstruck.

“I came back just as you asked me to,” Dahl said in that same calm voice.

“How the hell did you survive that explosion?” Lars asked.

“I was never in that explosion. I evacuated the ship shortly before impact. It was a simple matter of changing my body to survive the vacuum of space and floating back here,” Dahl explained.

“You are one tough bastard,” Jack said stunned, lowering his rifle.

Cassie struggled to believe it. Finally she reached out and placed a hand on Dahl's face. Feeling his warm skin against hers, she knew it was really him. Her terror and sadness was immediately replaced with overwhelming joy and she leapt into his arms and covered him in kisses.

“Don't you ever scare me like that,” she said between kisses.

“Great, but what about my ship?” Jason asked.

Before anyone had a chance to respond to Jason's question, they heard the front doors to Landers HQ slide open. They all walked back to the briefing room to see who was visiting them. When they entered the room, they were surprised to see Captain Jackson standing there.

“Well, I was coming to offer my condolences to Cassandra, but it seems like she doesn't need them,” the Captain said, seeing Dahl.

“Dahl saved us all,” Lars said.

“I saw that. It was very noble,” Captain Jackson replied. 

“Also, Cassie was able to synthesize a terraforming serum from Dahl's DNA,” Jennifer added.

Captain Jackson paused and took a look around the room as he processed all of the information. After a brief moment of silence, he said, “Well, in light of all this, I can't rightfully send him back to his planet now.” Captain Jackson walked up to Dahl and extended his hand. “Dahl, I would like to offer you citizenship on
Solaris
in honor of your heroism and sacrifice.”

Dahl graciously accepted the Captain's handshake. “Thank you, Captain Jackson. I gladly accept your offer of citizenship.”

“I suppose with this new serum, we could begin to colonize this planet. What do you call this planet anyway?” Captain Jackson asked.

“Novus, sir,” Lars answered.

“Like the hooker?” the Captain asked.

“Yes, like the hooker,” Jason said with a laugh.

“What do YOU call your planet, Dahl?” Captain Jackson asked.

“I simply call it 'Home',” Dahl replied.

Captain Jackson sighed and shook his head in resignation. “Fine, ‘Novus’ sticks as the name. Dahl, would you object to us living on your planet?”

“Captain, my friends and family are all dead. I would be honored if my new friends would share my home with me,” Dahl replied.

Cassie smiled and hugged Dahl. She didn't care what people thought about her hugging and kissing an alien. She was just happy he was back with her and they could now be together without worries.

The rest of the day was a rush of excitement and celebrations as the ship was informed they would be settling down on Novus. Cassie and Dahl were paraded around in front of everyone and hailed as heroes for their efforts. Eventually, the parties and ceremonies came to a close and it was time to go to bed. Cassie was glad she could crawl back into her own bed. Her parents even allowed Dahl to come stay with them. As Cassie was ready to close her eyes and fall asleep after an exhausting day, she heard her door open and saw Dahl walk in.

“What is it, Dahl?” Cassie asked sleepily.

“I don't like sleeping alone,” Dahl admitted.

“Well, come sleep with me,” Cassie said scooting over to make room for him. She was surprised by his confession, but was very happy he came to lay with her.

“I'm very glad you came back to me today,” Cassie said to Dahl once he was in bed with her.

“I'm very glad I came back as well,” he said.

“I don't know how to describe it, but I have very strong feelings for you,” Cassie admitted.

“I know,” Dahl said. “I feel the same way.  I would like to explore these feelings further and I know you would like to as well. If you would like to, I would like to have a relationship with you.”

“I would like that very much,” Cassie said excitedly.

“I know you would,” Dahl said with a smile.

With that, Cassie gave Dahl a passionate kiss on the lips, curled into his arms and listened to the sound of his heart beating as they both drifted off to sleep…

THE END

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The war had lasted far longer than anyone could have ever imagined and Ester had grown long tired of it.

As one of the best fighter pilots in the fleet, however, there was no escaping it for her. She would remain in the fight until the unlikely event the war ended or until the much more likely event of her death.

In fact, death had danced close to Ester Rodriguez so many times that she could picture it clearly: maneuvering her Stinger between enemy ships, red laser bolts shooting around her as she spins and dodges. Then her luck runs out. A bolt pierces the engine of her fighter and it spins powerless and out of control.

Struggling, cursing, trying desperately to get herself back into combat as the enemy ship opens fire and her ship explodes, tearing her to shreds as metal and glass rip apart, as the vacuum of deep space ruptures her lungs and pops her eyeballs and boils her blood…

“Code Red, Code Red. Battle stations immediately. Repeat, Code Red.”

The emergency alarm interrupted Ester’s grim train of thought. She would have been grateful for the distraction if she had time.

Code Red. No time for anything but go, go, go…

Jumping out of her bunk, she looked around.
Nobody.
Ester pulled on her black leather pilot jacket, a large patch sewn onto the breast: five gold arrowheads signifying her status as Gold Squadron, the letters EMD patriotically announcing her affiliation with the Earth Military Defense.

Where the hell is Rocky?
Her co-pilot, Rocky, was nowhere to be found.
He better be ready. He better be in the hanger waiting for me and not in the laundry unit trying to fuck that little cleaning girl.

Rocky had been Ester’s co-pilot for two years and she knew he was trustworthy, fast-thinking and reliable. Rocky had only one downside in Ester’s eyes: his never-ending stream of Falgan hormones.
She knew it wasn’t his fault though, it is just the way Falgans were hardwired.

The Falgan species was humanoid and had all the basic body shapes, organs and parts: bipedal with two arms and pairs of eyes, ears, lips, etcetera. On average, they were taller and more muscular than humans but with dark skin the thickness and color of well-worn leather.

The most compelling difference between humans and their Falgan comrades was sexual in nature. Falgans had naturally huge penises and they emitted a strong pheromone that smelled of a sweet, spicy cinnamon. This phenomenon not only made Falgans unnaturally sensual compared to humans but it made sexual relations a centerpiece of Falganian custom and tradition.

Fortunately, or unfortunately according to some, Flagans found humans irresistible. Male, female, both, three at a time, five, six. There was nothing Falgans would not involve themselves with when it came to pleasure.

Add in the fact that it was biologically impossible for a Falgan to impregnate an Earthling and it was no surprise that the Falgans were quite popular with Earth women. So popular that the general joke was that the fleet was kept alive and fighting with three things: food, fuel and hot Falgan sex.

Ester knew it was both cultural and biological but most of the time she just found it annoying having to constantly brush off their advances. Now, however, rushing onto the flight deck, Ester wasn’t concerned with the general state of Falganian sex habits or expertise.
Where the fuck is Rocky? It’s a red alert.

She scanned the hanger and saw no sign of her partner.
Dammit
. She tucked her short black hair under her flight cap as she made her way towards her Stinger. There were nine Stingers in her squadron and as Ester neared her ship she saw all of her squad mates already climbing into their own sleek jet-like ships, adjusting controls, starting engines, preparing to roll out to the runway tube.

In the Stinger beside hers, Ginny glanced up from her controls, “Hey, you ready for this?”

Ester climbed into her Stinger and settled into the cockpit before she replied, “I’m ready for everything, I’m just not sure what’s up this time.”

Behind Ginny, her Falgan co-pilot, Dawndo, said, “You didn’t hear?”

Ester’s gaze moved from Ginny to Dawndo and back again. “Hear what?” she asked, “I was on sleep rotation, I’ve been out since morning call.”

Ester became aware of the rushed, nervous edge of the scene.

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