“Enough explanations,” Gonzales said, jumping into the pilot’s seat. “Everyone strap in, I’m about to punch us through the hangar hatch.”
“Um, aren’t you supposed to open it?”
“Yeah, normally. But normally we aren’t on lockdown.”
“Right. Well go ahead then.”
“Thanks for the permission. I don’t know what I would have done without it. Hold on everyone. Either we’re gonna break through, or blow up in a fiery ball of death.”
Ciangi let out a light laugh. “Sounds like college all over again.”
I clenched the seat as the engines of the escape vessel kicked into gear, but I felt small, cool fingers brush at my wrist. Looking down, I realized that Mimi was trying to hold my hand.
I let go of the armrest of my chair and wrapped my fingers through hers. Our gazes locked, and I watched her face as we hurtled forward.
Time seemed to suspend itself for a moment, her hair floating around her head lazily, her eyes regarding me with an admiration that no one else had ever had for me before. In that moment, I knew I cared for her in a way that I had never quite felt for anyone else in my short life.
“Brace yourself for impact!”
Alarms were going off everywhere and the ship’s systems were delivering repeat warnings that a crash was imminent. The cacophony was intense, but nothing could disrupt the connection between us.
And then we hit the hangar wall.
My whole body jolted and it felt like my skeleton left my body. My teeth rattled, my head ached and my stomach did about a million jerks that made me want to lose my lunch. Sparks flew. The other engineers screamed. The ship’s computer was going crazy.
Then, just as suddenly as the wild ride had happened, we broke through. The dark, endless void of space stretched out beyond our forward-facing cockpit window.
No one said anything for a moment, then a loud whoop issued from Gonzales. “That’s right! We made it baby!”
Buckles came undone, and the next thing I knew, Mimi was in my lap, arms wrapped around me as she hugged me with all her might. Which was nothing to sneeze at I might add.
“Don’t worry, Mimi. We’re going to get you home,” I whispered to her.
She pulled away from me. “It will be a long journey. And dangerous. Your people will come after you, you know.”
“Then let them.” I said, feeling more confidence than I had in my entire life. “With all of us here, there’s no way they can stop us.”
And I meant it.
This was just the beginning of the journey, but I was in it for the long haul.
Like they used to say on earth, for better or for worse, I was sticking by her side.
THANK YOU
Thank you so much for reading Mimic and the Space Engineer, the first book in the ESS Space Marines series. I am so excited you took the chance to read it and I really hope you liked it. If you could leave a review for me, that would be awesome because it helps me tell others about my books.
If you want to be the first to hear about new releases and special offers, be sure to sign up our Science Fiction Newsletter. We have several fun things planned that will only be available to newsletter subscribers and can’t wait to share those with you too. To start with, you will get a free short story from the Niakrim War series. It tells the story of Cyrus Jones, one of the main characters in the series, and how he came to be part cyborg. All the information is on the next page.
I have also included a preview of Discovery which is the first book in the Niakrim War series. After you read the preview, you can download the book on Amazon.
Get Discovery here: amazon.com/dp/B071NJBNH4
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Preview: Discovery
Space is so boring!
This was certainly not what Violet had expected space travel to be like. She had dreamed of this since the first time she looked up at the stars in the sky, but none of those dreams had included endless days of nothingness. The only excitement she had experienced during the first days of the journey was when an occasional piece of space debris penetrated the warp field forcing the pilot to take evasive action. Even those potentially deadly encounters were brushed aside, as if they were no more bothersome than a fly buzzing around the room, by the Krim Sprinter's legendary pilot, Cyrus Jones, who was as much machine as man.
The captain had assured her that the Krim Sprinter was the fastest ship in the fleet, which made it the fastest ship in the known universe, when he reluctantly brought her on board the week before. The problem with space travel was the incomprehensible distances between planets. Even at three hundred times the speed of light, the travel time to Proxima was listed as seven days. The captain had assured her that they would be there in five. When she asked what they would do on the Proxima outpost for two days while they waited for the rest of the crew to arrive, Captain Mitch Cooper had just smiled and walked away.
After four days of watching countless specks of light stream past in a blur, Violet wished her childhood dream had involved something less monotonous...like being an accountant. She was wondering if it was possible to actually die of boredom when the ship violently lurched, throwing her from her chair. She froze in the air momentarily as the warp drive was forcibly shut down, dropping the ship back into real time, before being slammed into the navigation console. Everything went black.
When she came to, the ship’s bridge was in total chaos. Warning sirens were going off. Red lights were flashing. Captain Cooper was rushing from station to station, assessing damage and muttering to himself. She had a pretty good idea of what he was saying.
"What the hell just happened, Cyrus?"
"We were hit by a photon torpedo, Captain," he answered calmly as he stared at the seemingly empty space in front of the ship.
"That's impossible!"
"Yet here we are."
Captain Cooper looked ready to explode. Instead, he took a calming breath as he ran both hands through his grey hair. "Did you drop us out of warp before we tore the ship apart?"
"Of course," Cyrus replied without taking his eyes off the still empty space in front of the ship. "Belzaire's not gonna be happy, though. There's no telling how much of the warp system we tore up shutting it down that quickly."
Violet had pulled herself to her feet and was using the navigation console to steady herself. "So what just happened?"
"Somehow, we were hit by a photon torpedo while traveling at warp three," the captain muttered.
"How is that possible?"
"It's not."
The captain raised his hand to head off further questions. "We'll talk later. Can you find your way to engineering?"
"I think so."
"Get down there and help Belzaire. There's bound to be damage of some sort."
She was leaving the bridge when Cyrus quietly said, "There's something out there, Captain."
"Where?"
"Right in front of us."
"What is it?"
"I don't know," Cyrus answered. "I can't see it."
"If you can't see anything, how the hell do know something's there?"
Cyrus just shrugged.