from the arm of her coat and slowly, gently began to wrap the strip of cloth around Kinraid’s blood soaked upper arm with typical practiced skill. The sergeant looked up at her as she continued to tend to him, she had a sweet vulnerability about her, such a kind person, often going without herself in her effort to care for others. Rachthausen knew he had feelings towards her, and also knew that those feelings had grown the more time they had spent together. She was far more than just a fellow officer to be protected now, that both scared him and enamoured him in equal measure.
Finally, he could stand it no longer, for too long he had put what he wanted to say off, and he might not get another chance. “If we are to die here, will you grant me one last request, So that I may die without regret?”
“What’s that?” She asked while she finished tying the makeshift bandage tightly around his arm, making him wince and gasp in pain once again.
“Kiss me.”
Kathryn was shocked, taken aback, yet not overtly so, she was more surprised that Rachthausen had developed the same feelings for her, that she had been suppressing all this time.
“If you do not wish to, I understand,” he said a little sheepishly.
Kathryn could suppress her urges no longer, she was attracted to him, wanted him from the first time they had landed on the planet and found themselves stuck in this predicament together. Desire burned within her as though he had just poured petrol on the spark she was carrying for him. She quietly, slowly leaned down beside him; the lights from a dozen consoles gave the room a kind of hypnotic kaleidoscope effect. She searched his features; saw his longing in his eyes. She leaned in closer, fixated on those gorgeous blue irises of his, their lips touched and she kissed him deeply, longingly and passionately. A gentle warm wave of pleasure filled her body, and at the same time a weight had been lifted, the weight of her own suppressed emotions, she could hide it no longer, she was in love with him.
She was now torn, a battle was raging inside her. Her head was telling her that she was a Lieutenant commander and should not be fraternising with junior ranks, even one as comely as this. Her heart however, was telling her that she wanted him so badly that it hurt.
Gently he released her from their tender embrace, “Now, I can have no regrets.”
Outside the base, the rumbling reached a critical peak once again as the base shot forth its fury, in the form of another gigantic stream of intensely bright energy through the planets atmosphere and out into the darkness of deep space, illuminating the three black Dracos ships orbiting nearby, as though three dark spiders come to prey on the planet.
The two other craft sent down a pair of assault landers each, four small black craft arced down through the planets upper atmosphere trailing fire from the heat of entry. They had cleared the majority of interlopers from their ancient facility, now it was time to claim the planet the structure was built upon, in the name of the Dracos.
The sleek, advanced looking assault landers cut through the thick layer of methane cloud, the diffused sunlight from the Aurigan sun glinted off their bullet shaped fuselages, sickle wings, and upper engine pods, as they gently touched down on the surface, throwing up an immense cloud of dust as they did so.
The Dracos Kallan warriors quickly emerged, charging down the access ramps of the craft and surrounding the immediate area. Within seconds forty more elite Dracos warriors dominated the area around the landing craft. The time for the ultimate victory was at hand, their squad leaders barked out orders for those under their command to fan out along the ground near to the base. While another squad entered inside to find out what Drax had been doing.
“Landers from the Blade of Rhovanion, and the Vengeance of Kelmarroth have successfully touched down on the surface,” a junior officer announced.
Kaelleth held his head in his hands, not believing how badly this was all going, twenty of his finest men had been sent down there, to clear out a few pitiful interlopers, now just one Dracos remained. One so utterly devoted to finishing the hunt, that he had turned dangerously insane, and may very well end up dead too. Yes, the facility was all but secure, but it had cost the Dracos dearly in blood to do so.
He looked up from the centre seat of the Flame of Celthris, “understood,” he managed after a short pause, “keep me informed.” He really just wanted to put this whole sorry mess behind him now, and return back to his home within the warm subterranean depths of Corvandris once again.
The Liberty was closing in on the small Stockholm class lander that carried Colonel Nikolai Vargev and his elite team of E.D. F commandoes. Michael could now see the olive green, square looking craft in the Liberties viewer. He had seen this type of craft a hundred times before, they were used extensively in the Krenaran war, but he never got over just how ugly the thing looked.
They resembled little more than a flying brick, in fact that was their nickname amongst the soldiers of the troop division and the navy alike. It was wide, yet short and stubby; from its central crew compartment, which took up the majority of the tiny vessel. Two winglets jutted out, on the edge of each was a powerful gravitic engine, rotatable through ninety degrees. Jutting out from the back of the main crew compartment were two large stabilisation fins, which served as the crafts tail when inside a planetary atmosphere. There was a very small reinforced command bubble located at the front of the thing, about three quarters the way from the bottom, looking like the top of a small cut diamond jutting out from the front of the craft, yet devoid of any kind of sparkle or lustre. It did however, provide the pilot an unparalleled view of the terrain when flying.
“Open a channel to the lander,” Michael said.
“Channel open,” Kinraid replied.
“E.D. F lander, this is the E.D.F. S Liberty, we are alongside you, request permission to soft dock to allow crew transfer.”
The Liberty, being one hundred and forty metres long, utterly dwarfed the tiny twenty metre long lander. One of the few things the Liberty did dwarf, Michael thought with a smile.
Colonel Vargev’s voice came over the speakers, a voice Michael recognised, but one in which he hadn’t heard from in five long years. “This is lander alpha-two-niner, glad to hear your voice Liberty, we are ready for soft docking procedure.”
Michael was surprised to find that the lander could only communicate via speakers, although he quickly remembered that the Stockholm class, only had one long range radio transceiver. He guessed the troop division didn’t really go for complex electronics that could go wrong, they preferred their equipment rugged, simple and survivable.
“Err, cap’n.” Kinraid spoke, “ya’ do realise, ‘tat the Liberty has never performed a soft dockin’ manoeuvre before don’t ‘ya, we really don’t know how this is gonna’ go.”
“We’ll be fine,” Michael replied confidently as he turned toward his pilot, “Eldathar, we need to stay alongside that lander, and our docking hatches need to come within five metres exactly of one another, think you can do it?”
The Solarian nodded, then began concentrating on making the tiniest of movements in the pilot’s chair. Banking the Liberty very gently, so that the two ships hull’s came closer and closer together, the proximity alert went off once again, as they slowly continued to drift closer until it seemed as though their hulls would touch. Eldathar frowned in concentration, his blue Solarian features flushing a deep purple as he concentrated ever harder on the smallest of movements he was making with the arms of his chair. Eventually he stopped all movement and proclaimed proudly, “five metres, captain.”
“Excellent work,” Michael replied.
Docking with a Stockholm class lander was proving to be an exceptionally tricky affair, part of the landers wing was now holding steady, just a few feet above the Liberties sloped hull. If either ship deviated from their manoeuvre, even by the tiniest of amounts, it could mean disaster for both ships.
“Okay, now extend the port docking extension, and connect to the hatch on the lander.”
“Aye, sir.” Eldathar replied as he keyed in a few controls on the monitor in front of him.
The tiny temporary berthing corridor snaked out from the port side of the Liberty, it was not solid like the rest of the ship, but flexible, instead made from a lightweight, but extremely strong carbon cloth. The temporary corridor un-coiled toward the lander, growing a little longer each time it did so, very similar to the old folding fabric roofs of twentieth century convertible automobiles. The corridor continued to extend telescopically until it reached its maximum length of five metres, now within touching distance of the landers own hatch.
