[LEGACY VERSION] The Enemy of Time (Book 2 - The Kaireyeh Chronicles)

Chapter 28 - Damon

Damon stood on the bridge with his hands clasped behind his back, aware of the tension in those around him. The bridge crew's stress intensified whenever they focused on him, so he kept his eyes on the center screen up front, tracing the ghostly blue-white lines of Kaireyeh outside the ship. He wasn't really seeing color. This was how his mind translated raw Kaireyeh, but even though he had thousands of years of Alexi's memories of Kaireyeh, seeing it made him want to shiver, too.

To the right of the center screen, large numbers counted down the minutes until the ship exited Kaireyeh.

"All sections, report," Campa barked into her comm. She sat rigid in her command chair, so wrapped in anticipation that Damon could almost taste it.

The comm echoed throughout the bridge as section heads reported in.

"Enviro, reporting."

"Tactical, reporting."

"Sickbay, reporting."

What would they find outside of Kaireyeh? Would the Aezthena be waiting? Would their Resistance ship be where they were supposed to be? How long would it have taken them to get there? The coordinates Damon had pulled from the ship were for a Kaireyeh Highline, with an approximate time difference of fifteen days in Kaireyeh to nine days in Normal spacetime. After fifteen days of heightened emotions, too-vivid dreams, and sometimes hallucinations, everyone on the ship was ready to be out, no matter what they'd face on the outside.

Damon felt Alexi's tension, too, like a knot in his mind. Alexi was in the engine room. He'd wanted to be on the bridge, but Campa had argued as hotly to keep him there as she had to have Damon on the bridge. She'd said she needed someone familiar with Kaireyeh travel in the engine room if something went wrong, and she needed someone familiar with the Aezthena on the bridge. And someone who could scan outside the ship in the few minutes the sensors would be down from Kaireyeh interference.

Campa glanced over at him, and he saw himself through her eyes. He was still pale. But days of working with Alexi had allowed him to tamp down the openness of his mind to something more manageable. He still felt too much, but he didn't feel everything. His hair was more carbon than silver, and his eyes shifted between blue and gold, depending on his focus. Alexi, in turn, had grown paler, his eyes sheening constantly, though they were blue underneath. He'd braided his hair again in the tiny braids, and Damon had his hair short and had no plans to change that. They'd found a balance between themselves--a precarious balance, but it was what they had.

When Damon had dressed that day, he'd looked at the well-made but plainer clothes that he'd borrowed after he'd decrypted, and then the fancier jackets and trousers that Milla and Elise had discarded while planning his trip to the station. He had only hesitated a little before putting on some of those instead. It had felt right. It still felt right. Alexi had told him he might have odd impulses while in Kaireyeh, and as long as no one got hurt, the best thing to do was to run with them. He still wore Campa's diamond studs in his ears as well. Looking through her eyes at the pale, compact man in a military-cut jacket covered in dark embroidery, his posture casually confident, he did not recognize himself.

He met Campa's gaze and his vision doubled before he let go of his view from her thoughts.

"Cargo bay, reporting."

"Hangar deck, reporting."

"Engine room, reporting," Alexi said.

There was a brief silence as the numbers on the screen ticked down. Thirty seconds.

"Engine room, take us out of Kaireyeh on my mark," Campa said.

"Bridge, acknowledged," Alexi said.