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Chapter 14 Home Away From Home
"TK" I asked.
"Yes sweet Bransen?"
Damn I wish Khore could fix that fucking computer! I wiped the wet from my eyes. "COM. Shipwide. "
"All personnel will report at 1600 hours in Cargo Bay 15. EVERYONE is to attend."
I had almost forgotten Doc was still standing there. "Doc, I need you to find out what is going on with Khore. I need you to stop whatever is happening to him. I need you to learn the function of every piece of equipment in the med bay. Sleep until 1530 hours if you must, but make it happen. You may go."
Doc's bloodshot tired blue eyes blinked at me as though my head were spinning in place. It had not been the best day for him either.
"I need to transport Khore to the med facility." He was using his concerned voice, and its deep timber did not sooth me.
I nodded to the Doc before looking away from him to where Khore lay. The covers I had piled on him before were a chaos of arctic fabric.
"This is to stay between us Doc. TK, Transport Doc and Khore to Med level 5." Seconds later they were gone.
My eyes burned and it felt like my stomach was eating away at itself. I had gone too long without sleep, but couldn't comprehend lying in that bed without him. The room felt so empty. The deafening silence reminded me of places I had buried the dead.
"TK, extend the couch 2 meters in length. I will also need a pillow and blanket."
The couch reverted to liquid metal and extended its silvery fluid before solidifying with a folded blanket and pillow on its grey cushion.
"TK, wake me at 1400 hours." I said as I made a bed of the couch pulling the blanket over me. I gave the pillow a few punches venting anger more than fixing its shape for sleep. I laid there thinking. I was pissed off and worried. The more indestructible Khore seemed, the more I gave him my heart. It had been so easily and completely given when I thought nothing could touch him.
"Bransen... Time to wake up" TK announced. "Wake up, you're going to be late for your own assembly."
He'd been a bit more gentle than the last time and it surprised me. I lay there and grunted my response.
"Get your ASS UP!" TK's voice boomed..
I swung my legs to the floor preparing to cuss that damn computer and decided against it. I just didn't need any more aggravation right now. I trudged over to the food dispenser.
"2 Coffee's. Black." The blink of red peaked from the edges before I realized I had requested for one for Khore. My heart ached as I looked back at the bed wishing I would see those blue wolf's eyes staring back at me.
I stood leaning against the wall as I sipped my coffee waiting for my mind to clear. Finishing my coffee I showered and dressed. Glancing over at the clock I saw it was nearly time for the assembly to begin. Running a comb through my still damp blond hair I pulled at the knots. I didn't want to be around anyone, but there was work to do.
"TK. Cargo Bay 15"
I had to admit; this was much more convenient that taking the lift in the complex. I arrived in the bay and it had appeared nearly everyone was there. I watched as intermittent flashes brought stragglers to the bay.
"TK, What is the time?"
"1558 hours. Bransen"
"TK, How many are still not here excluding Khore?" I growled out the question.
"23 are still not in attendance." Came the reply.
"COM. Shipwide. Those who are not in Cargo Bay 15 in one minute will be escorted from the ship PERMANENTLY." I barked out the announcement. I was pissed and they were going to bear the brunt of it. Several flashes brought the stragglers as some were still putting on clothes.
"Is everyone here TK?" I asked.
"All required personnel are in attendance." TK announced.
"Listen up! You will ALL attend mandatory meetings prepared and on time. Those of you who do not will be removed from this ship. If you fear you may forget ask TK to give you a reminder. If you do not attend a mandatory meeting without a valid excuse you will be transported to my office and I will personally kick your ass off this ship."
Twist, Rift, Raven and the other team members had worked their way through the crowd and placed themselves on either side of me during the announcement. Doc gave me a glance that told me Khore's condition had not changed.
"Starting now you will all associate yourself with Team One members. You all had your duties at the complex; it will not be any different here. Those of you who wish to work preparing meals may still do so. Those of you who wish to pursue a different interest may do so." I paused.
"TK, place all team one members in pairs in the following pattern. Perpendicular to myself and eighty foot apart thirty feet ahead of me. Dusty and Neek, Engineering. Raven and Sweed, Tactical. Rift and Twist, Weapons. Doc and Chris, Medical. Khore and myself will be Operations. Those of you who choose Service please stay where you are. You have five minutes to choose. TK, announce when 5 minutes have passed." TK transported them as I listed the names and designations.
"Yes master." Announced across the COM.
Several nervous laughs escaped the crowd as people diverted their eyes and moved through the bay. Most hadn't changed their duties but I did notice a few had ventured out for something new. I was glad. I wanted everyone to enjoy their work, but right now I wasn't happy and wanted everyone else to feel as miserable as I did. I was being a hard core solid gold asshole and I needed to stop.
"Five minutes have passed Bransen."
I looked at the three individuals that had moved to my side for the operations group. Jake had been the first to approach. He was taller than most people standing at 6'3" and was awkward looking. His nose was large and hooked and his hazel eyes seemed set too far apart. His jaw line rounded down his pasty white face to an almost undetectable chin. His head was topped with muddy brown hair that seemed to never have been introduced to a comb. It looked like the permanent home to some large rodent I hoped never to meet. His body was thin and lanky making him appear even taller than he was. He had a warm heart and a sharp mind and I was glad he stood there.
Next to him stood Morland but more commonly known as 'Mouse'. He was even shorter than Khore standing at 5'2". His small willowy frame reminded me of someone who had eaten only the smallest bit of food for the last century. He looked almost fragile. That he was able to walk up to me after my tirade impressed me. Mouse had earned his name from his shyness and from hardly ever speaking above a whisper. It had happened many times that Mouse would be in a room and later seem to have completely disappeared. He had large dark eyes, a small pointed nose, and pert thin lips. His pale skin seemed to make his dark brown shoulder length hair look almost black. He seemed so nondescript that I had a hard time remembering when he had joined us, but I was certain it wasn't more than a year ago.
Next to Mouse stood Kent. He was young, barely 180 years old, and eager to impress. He had joined us about six months ago after being rescued during one of our better planned raids. He had been one of the Thorens' toys and, to hear him tell it, extremely popular. I later heard that this had not been because of his average endowment, but due to his over achieving tongue. Kent had flawless olive skin and an almost too perfect body. His 5'11 frame was packed with muscle similar to my own. It was hard and defined, but not bulky. His dishwater blond hair feathered forward to his face down to his neck. His deep green eyes were framed by long eyelashes that led to a strong straight nose. His plump lips were quick to smile and fit perfectly in his square jaw that ended at the dimple in his chin. He was handsome and he knew it. I was forever curbing the urge to push my fist into his face. He was a kind and jovial young man, but something about him aggravated me. He brought out that dark piece of me that wanted to destroy an oddity of perfection that had no place in my world.
"You all have some balls coming over here." I growled.
"Yes captain!" Kent and Mouse said in unison.
I squeezed my eyelids into slits. "Call me that again and you won't." I growled again.
Mouse looked like he could have crawled through the floor to escape while Kent looked like he may have just shit his pants. I could see the smirk on Jake's face out of the corner of my eye. It had been a running joke for the long timers. Tell the new meat that I insisted on being called captain and then watch me shred them when they did. It was an informal initiation into the family.
"Relax you two." I softened my voice, "and please call me Bransen." I smiled to let them know there were no hard feelings. Normally I would have laughed, but right now I just didn't have it in me.
The groups were almost evenly distributed. I was relieved that at least this part of my day had not been complicated.
"Team Leaders, I want you to assign separate systems to individuals or small groups. Those individuals will need to learn their assigned system and every facet of its operation and then transfer that knowledge to your team leader. Team Leaders will then transfer that information to the rest of the members of your group."
I took a breath letting what I was telling them sink in. I decided not to tell them about the Kotan just yet. I didn't know exactly what they were or if they were a threat. I let some of the harshness of my voice leak away and continued. "Look people, we need to know these systems backwards and forwards in case we are discovered by the Thorens. TK can't do all of the work, though I'm sure he'd tell you otherwise."
"You cut me Bransen. You cut me deep!" TK interrupted following with a quick raspberry.
I hate that computer. If I could find its electronic tongue and lips I'd nail them to the floor! I took another deep breath and continued.
"We will begin now and continue until 20:00 hours. Starting tomorrow we will study these systems from 08:00 hours until 20:00 hours every day. You have seven days to complete this task.
"Team Leaders will report to my office at 21:00 hours tomorrow and each day after that with a status report."
"TK, transport all but my group to their designated areas." The entire room emptied with a flash.
"Jake, you're in charge tonight. Assign them and yourself a separate system and we'll discuss your findings in the morning."
Jake nodded to me. "TK, transport Mouse, Kent and me to the operations room.
There was finally silence in the bay and I found myself hating it.
"TK, Transport me to Khore."
I arrived in the room with Khore frozen exactly as he had been in our bed but now on the medical platform. Several silver thermal blankets had been placed over him but had failed in their purpose. The top most layers had already become dusted with frost. I noticed an extra bed had been placed in the room that wouldn't normally have been here. Doc must have instructed TK to add it. I'd have to make a point of thanking him later.
"TK, what can you tell me about Khore's condition?" I asked while sitting on the bed across from him.
"He has stopped." TK replied. "Khore is in a form of stasis I have not encountered before. He has paused on a molecular level. Any further attempts to warm him will likely result in cell damage. Brain activity is at an elevated but steady rate."
"Come back to me Khore." I whispered as the arch formed to the room.
"I thought I might find you here." Doc said in a quiet voice as he made his way past me to more closely inspect Khore. One of Doc's many new interns had walked past stopping with a look of horror on his face before the portal closed.
"Any status changes TK?" Doc asked.
"No." was the simple reply.
"Continue running scans and notify me upon completion." Doc sighed before settling in beside me as he sat on the bed.
"I thought I asked you to keep this quiet!" I felt my anger flaring.
"Since when was there ever a secret in the complex? Did you think it would be any different here?" Doc shifted his weight peering those all knowing slate blue eyes at me.
"You could have transported in here." I said now beginning to wonder if it hadn't been deliberate.
"Yes. That would have been one option. What do you think would have drawn more attention? Me teleporting to a room not eight foot away, or walking through the door?" He continued to stare at me with his tired eyes. His logic was pissing me off.
"You can't do this to yourself again Bransen. It wasn't your fault then and it it's not your fault now." He said in a hushed even tone. "Let it go."
I felt my skin flush at the memory and bristled against it. This was a low blow even for the Doc. He had no right!
"This isn't the same Doc and you fucking know it. He is so much stronger!" I was quickly losing control. I could feel my face flush and the temptation to rip his head off. I know he meant the best. He knew me better than anyone, but at the moment I wanted him to get the hell away from me.
"Oh?" he said standing. "I would have thought someone as old as you would have known better by now."
I stared at him as he walked through the newly formed arch and left me alone with my thoughts.
Damn him! Doc had been there as I watched the coma eat away at my son's body before time finally took him from me. He had been there the day I buried him. Doc let me cry on his shoulder after the news of Kelay's passing. He had become one of the few permanent fixtures in my unstable world and now I almost hated him for it.
A yawn broke my thoughts as I looked across the room again at Khore as he lay frozen. I breathed a deep sigh and lay out onto the bed. Pulling the covers around me I situated myself so that if I woke I could see his face. It wasn't long before sleep pulled me to its familiar horrors.
The scene played across my mind like it did on so many nights. Torel had died giving birth to our son Vaden. Images of our son growing older stuttered like slides in my mind until the day of his first mission.
It had been a normal day like any other. It was mid summer, the season where the moon and sun shared the sky. The moon had been witness to the sun set hours ago and now shown alone in the night. The humidity seemed to capture the smell of the soil and plant life in the air as we made our way through the thick vegetation of the jungle that surrounded us. Our scouts had discovered a small group of Thorens and their human slaves performing some type of scientific study as they took samples of various plants and wildlife.
Our plan had been a simple one. Move in, liberate the humans, and kill the Thorens. My son Vaden had become impatient and had been discovered before we were ready to spring our trap. A Thoren had hit him with a wave of mental energy that had caught his side sending him to the ground. It had turned from a simple extraction to a cluster fuck of mass chaos.
When the smoke cleared I found Vaden barely alive lying on the ground in too much of his own blood. The energy blast hadn't done so much damage as the sharp rock that his head had struck in the fall. I never heard his voice after that day. He had lingered for too long in the complex's medical facility before he finally passed.
I woke up with hot tears streaming down my face. The memory was fresh but fleeting in my mind. I glanced over to Khore seeing him unchanged. How many times had I repeated this scene with Vaden? The memories were opening an old wound.
I sat up in my bed and looked at Khore. He lay like a statue of cold. It isn't natural that a parent out live their child. It seemed like some sick blasphemy that it could happened. I would not outlive Khore or our unborn children. They were going to live even if I couldn't. I would not be witness this horror again.
"TK, time." I whispered as though I might wake Khore.
"It is 0400 hours Bransen."
I pulled the covers from me and sat up in the bed swinging my feet to the floor. I sat waiting for sleep to leave me before standing.
"Come back to me Khore." I whispered to his cold unmoving form. I hoped for movement but there was none.
I took a moment to memorize his face before exiting the room as an arch formed. The light was harsh and blinded me as I made my way into the main medical bay. The arch closed behind me as my eyes adjusted to the bright white light. There were several sets of eyes staring at me quickly looking away trying to seem busy with their work. Doc had apparently set his crew of new interns into shifts. Smart man that Doc. There were nearly twenty to twenty five people studying away at different consoles in groups of four and five.
I decided I would take a more scenic route back to my quarters. I hadn't truly seen much of the ship other than the bay, hydroponics and this med level. I exited through another archway into a long but curved hallway.
Looking in both directions I could see the brightly lit curved hallway that appeared to cut off nearly one hundred meters in either direction. Looking over my shoulder behind me where the arch had been was a large M5A in black print high on the blue and white split wall. The floor was white and seemed to almost swallow my steps like sand, but leaving no footprint.
I turned to my right and started down the hall. Except for the almost unperceivable hum of the ship, the brush of fabric was the only sound as I walked. The walls were a soft shade of light blue from the floor to shoulder height before being split by an eight inch black line. Above that, the white wall extended for another five foot. The same black print indicated the level and function of each area and the presence of an entry arch.
I didn't remember the long drawn out explanation TK had given about the layout of the ship. I remembered that sections of each level had been split like a pie cut into thirds but not much beyond on that. It had been too much information, though I had to admit it wasn't set up much differently than our old complex.
The print indicators helped paint my mental picture as the walls shifted from blue to red. I didn't remember TK explaining the medical level of the ship though everything from that day had seemed so much a blur.
"TK, what does the Red color of this area indicate?" I asked noting the R5A indicator of an access arch.
"This is research level five Bransen. The alcove to your left is a data access terminal and food dispensary station. The A indicates the upper levels above the ship's equator." TK informed me.
Paying closer attention to the inset arch and data panels on my left I noticed that there were several food dispenser panels much like the one in our room. The inset arch was maybe only a foot deep, but eight foot high and rounded and at least twenty feet wide. It was wide enough to stand eight men side by side.
I was still having problems grasping the layout of the ship, and it was nice for a change to have something to occupy my mind.
"TK what is on the level above us?" I asked.
"The levels are split above and below the equator of the ship. Levels above the equator, are labeled A, those below are labeled B. The level directly above this one contains living quarters and storage and ship bays." TK explained.
"TK? Weren't crew quarters on a separate level from ship bays before?" I was feeling a bit confused. I had studied the ship bays personally through the data access panel in our room personally. The idea of piloting one of them had made my flesh crawl with excitement.
"Yes Bransen." He replied.
"But they're not now?" I asked
"No." TK answered.
I continued to walk down the quiet hallway. I was now in the research area of the med level. The silence was eerie. There was no sound other than the movement of fabric of my clothing moving against itself as I made my way through the ship. It sent a chill up my spine. No silence of this sort had ever been a good thing. I felt my bad mood returning quickly. What the hell was happening. This wasn't what I remembered at all from our overwhelming orientation. How could the ship not be as it was before?
"Khore restructured the ship two hours ago for better functionality." Came the booming response. I hadn't spoken the question, but the answer had come just the same. TK's words sliced the silence around me so abruptly it made me jump.
"TK, can you read my thoughts?"
"Yes Bransen" came the familiar voice. This time it the answer entered my mind but not my ears.
"Why didn't you say something before?" I asked aloud.
"Two reasons. One, you didn't ask. Two, Khore told me not to." Came TK's reply.
I felt a tinge of jealousy and anger. Why didn't he tell me?
"Because a direct downlink of all ship information would kill you." TK's voice invaded my mind. "You are not Thoren. You are not quite human any longer either. He instructed me to allow you to learn the systems of this ship naturally. You humans waste much space." TK answered..
"WHAT!? What do you mean we waste space?" I projected.
"Your minds... you use so little of your brain, and they leak. Khore says you are not ready."
"BULLSHIT! TK... I want all ship information! I want it now!" I insisted.
"No." answered Khore's soft voice.
I fell to my knees. Hot wet tears streamed down my cheeks. I was elated to hear his voice if only in my head.
"Khore?" I asked.
"Yes Bransen. I'm here." Came Khore's reply.
"Are you OK?"
"No, and you cannot help me. The Kotanare little more than bugs. One purpose... Feed and multiply, and my mind is trapped in their web. Have the team absorb what they can and pass it to those in their group. Do NOT try to contact me again. They already shave pieces of my soul from me. It hurts Bransen. I love you... do as I ask." The sounds of Khore's voice broke into pieces across my mind and he was gone.
This chapter is a bit longer. It's not what I'm used to so I hope it moves comfortably. I've not written in someone elses voice before so I hope it's not too odd. Any feedback is always appreciated. Please send feedback, criticism and suggestions to gaywriter72@yahoo.com. I'll get to work on the next chapter asap. I hope to hear from you all soon. Let me know what you like and hate.
As always... take care of you and thanks!