Anytime that I felt a need to mention the unique entity that had repeatedly intruded on our ship, I referred to him as Freddy. That was Portia's name for him. It was strange the way her personality was developing, but mostly enjoyable.
"Seventeen minutes until jump," Lin announced. "Is everyone ready?"
Nancy and I confirmed were ready, and Portia declared that all preparations regarding our spacecraft had been made. She had double checked Lin's navigation numbers and found them flawless. The jump from Pegillas to Teegarden was an unusually long one. In the early days, ships would come back to real space once or twice along the way. Those nav-holes were still there and recorded in our data, though they may have shifted a bit as the galaxy rotated and expanded. But most ships did it in one jump these days. That was what we planned to do. However, interstellar navigation always included contingency plans.
"Alora?" Lin turned to look at our guest seated in the back of the room. "How are you feeling?"
"Nervous," she replied as she pulled her knees tightly to her chest. I didn't like the way it exposed her furry thighs or white panties, but that wasn't the time to deal with that particular matter. Besides, I wasn’t actually her father.
The short countdown was the most suspenseful since my first time through. I wanted to get it over with, but there was nothing that could be done to accelerate the process. Our speed was set perfectly with the timing of our rip-jump engines as we entered the nav-hole. And the duration of time spent in the other realm of existence was completely out of my control as a pilot.
The icy chill suddenly began at the bottom of my spine. Right on my tailbone. Then it crept up my back at a rate so slow I occasionally wondered if it had stopped. By the time we began our plunge into jump space, nearly my whole body is freezing. I should have been shivering, but the sensation didn’t work that way. My body never reacted to the frigid onslaught in a defensive manner. I deduced that it must all be in my head. If that was the case, could I push it away?
My screen went blank. I was locked out of piloting control. That was standard procedure for the jump. Our course was then in the hands of the ship’s computer. I closed my eyes and tried to think of a bonfire in an open field. In my mind I walked up to it as some sexy girl in extremely short jean shorts handed me a bottle of whiskey. Real whiskey from Tennessee. I gulped it down to send the burning fire water into my belly where it could work its way through every inch of me. Concentrating on the familiar warmth, I waited patiently. Unfortunately, I was still as cold as a nudist in the arctic ocean.
Then I heard screaming. In another language. It was Alora rattling off some sort of religious chant like a Spanish mom trying to exorcise a demon from her child. Only there was a lot of screeching in her native language. She sounded just as much like a monkey that had spotted a lion hunting in their midst.
I opened my eyes to see the command room's light's flashing in a multi-color strobe. Did I just transport myself into a disco? No. It was Portia's program to fight the shadow monster. Low drumming and high-pitched dog whistle sounds began to accompany the assault. The experience made it hard to concentrate, much worse than a CAT scan back on Earth.
I slowly turned to view the room behind me, afraid of what I might find. Sure enough, mister black smoke was levitating in the middle of the room, just above the captain's chair. Like he thought that he now runs this show. I could almost feel the confidence exuding from him.
Then Lin and Nancy were yelling, too. I stood up tentatively and approached the beast as all the voices in the room got louder. The strobe light pattern changed, followed shortly thereafter by a new sound like wind blowing through satin curtains. Suddenly, my knees got weak, making me wonder if I might fall.
Shadow monster, or Freddy as Portia had taken to call him due to some strange personality programming that was beginning to emerge, lowered himself right down on the chair in the center of the room. Everyone was staring directly at him except for Portia. As a non-organic creature, she still lacked the ability to see him with her own eyes. But her sensors could pinpoint his location.
"Freddy seems to be getting weaker," Portia announced in a voice way too calm for the situation. Alora continued to chant as she held one hand forward, her fingers crossed in an unusual pattern. She reminded me of someone trying to ward off a vampire by making the symbol of a cross.
I nearly stumbled, my legs felt like cold Jell-O. I reached out and grabbed the arm of the captain's chair, my hand going right through the dark smoke as it slowly churned in place. Nancy was demanding to know what the fuck I thought I was doing. Lin leaned forward as if she was about to keep me from falling, but hesitated due to our mysterious adversary.
My hand got warm all of the sudden. It was the only part of me in physical contact with the shadow creature. I then stared intently into the smoke for a face that simply isn't there. Yet,
