Read Online Naero's War: The Citation Series 3: Naero's Trial by Mason Elliott - Free Book Online
Authors: Mason Elliott
Tags: Science-Fiction, adventure, Military, Science Fiction & Fantasy, alien invasion, first contact, Galactic Empire, Space Marine, Colonization
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anything she could reach.
Khai rushed in. She beat at and thrashed against his solid mass for a time, even though he deflected or endured her blows.
Finally he just held her, and she leaned against him and sobbed and whispered, “They have her, Khai. They’ve got her. And after what they did to Danner, I can only imagine what they’ll do to her, and she isn’t even born yet.”
Khai unleashed a heavy sigh of his own. “We will find her. We shall find a way. You will find a way. I know you. For you, there is no challenge that is too great. Think. What do we know? What can we try? What do we need to go after them?”
“Baeven. We need Baeven. If anyone can track them down, he can.”
“That is ill-advised,” Klyne said.
Naero pulled away from Khai and snapped, “Shut up, Klyne! Baeven has been saving our sorry asses all along; yours included. You and Intel need to deal with that, and live with it. Without him working and killing our enemies behind the scenes, all of us would be dead or enslaved–a thousand times over! He helped foil the trial plot against me. Who do you think it was that rescued Master Tree and freed the Elders from those enemy stasis pods before they could be stuffed into Darkforce generators, after I was supposed to be dead? It was Baeven and his people.”
Klyne snarled, “He is an outlaw, a murderer, and an outcast. You cannot trust him!”
“I trust him with my life and the life of my child. And you should trust him with the lives of our people, because every day he fights for them, in places that even Intel will not go, and he emerges–victorious! A killer? An assassin? Call him by whatever name or insult you wish, yet he fights for us all. And we need him. We need a thousand more like him against what we face!”
“Naero, I am still bound by our laws, and so are you, even if you think you are not.”
“I have seen the limit of our imperfect laws. They would have allowed you and our enemies to take my life unjustly, and that of my child, and curse Khai forever for doing so. Tell me, Klyne. Can you bring my child back? Do you know where the enemy is and where they have taken her? What they are doing to her?”
Klyne said nothing.
“And when the enemy cracks the KDM and learns its secrets, and uses them to wipe out all resistance–including our people–what will you and Intel do then?”
Still Admiral Klyne said nothing.
Naero glared at him and brought her voice down to a whisper. “We are friends and will always be friends, but for right now, you will get the hell out of my way and stay out of my way while I use every means at my disposal to stop the enemy and get my daughter back.”
Klyne grimaced. “I never said I was going to stop you. Do what you must. Just keep me in the loop. We can help. And don’t forget Kalathar in all of this. We have to figure out what to with a planet full of the possessed. We’ve evacuated everyone we can who hasn’t been infected. Without anyone or anything to fight, and no ships left, many of the creatures are going dormant to conserve their energies.”
“After I contact Baeven and get him on the scent trail, I’m going to take some time and attempt to get something out of the KDM. It’s still a part of me and always will be. If I can find any kind or part of a solution from the KDM, I will. The Kexx fought all of this stuff long ago. Has Intel isolated the possession wyrm parasite or learned anymore about it?”
Klyne nodded. “We’ve accomplished that much, at least. We have several specimens, taken out of hosts frozen in stasis. But the parasites are insidious. Even after we remove the possession-triggering parasites, when we try to unfreeze the former hosts, the hosts still perish. Our medteks and biomancers can’t figure it out.”
“Send a couple of the specimens and the hosts to my medical bay for study. If I can biomance anything that will help us, I will let you know. And, Klyne, I’ve never cut you out of the loop,
Khai rushed in. She beat at and thrashed against his solid mass for a time, even though he deflected or endured her blows.
Finally he just held her, and she leaned against him and sobbed and whispered, “They have her, Khai. They’ve got her. And after what they did to Danner, I can only imagine what they’ll do to her, and she isn’t even born yet.”
Khai unleashed a heavy sigh of his own. “We will find her. We shall find a way. You will find a way. I know you. For you, there is no challenge that is too great. Think. What do we know? What can we try? What do we need to go after them?”
“Baeven. We need Baeven. If anyone can track them down, he can.”
“That is ill-advised,” Klyne said.
Naero pulled away from Khai and snapped, “Shut up, Klyne! Baeven has been saving our sorry asses all along; yours included. You and Intel need to deal with that, and live with it. Without him working and killing our enemies behind the scenes, all of us would be dead or enslaved–a thousand times over! He helped foil the trial plot against me. Who do you think it was that rescued Master Tree and freed the Elders from those enemy stasis pods before they could be stuffed into Darkforce generators, after I was supposed to be dead? It was Baeven and his people.”
Klyne snarled, “He is an outlaw, a murderer, and an outcast. You cannot trust him!”
“I trust him with my life and the life of my child. And you should trust him with the lives of our people, because every day he fights for them, in places that even Intel will not go, and he emerges–victorious! A killer? An assassin? Call him by whatever name or insult you wish, yet he fights for us all. And we need him. We need a thousand more like him against what we face!”
“Naero, I am still bound by our laws, and so are you, even if you think you are not.”
“I have seen the limit of our imperfect laws. They would have allowed you and our enemies to take my life unjustly, and that of my child, and curse Khai forever for doing so. Tell me, Klyne. Can you bring my child back? Do you know where the enemy is and where they have taken her? What they are doing to her?”
Klyne said nothing.
“And when the enemy cracks the KDM and learns its secrets, and uses them to wipe out all resistance–including our people–what will you and Intel do then?”
Still Admiral Klyne said nothing.
Naero glared at him and brought her voice down to a whisper. “We are friends and will always be friends, but for right now, you will get the hell out of my way and stay out of my way while I use every means at my disposal to stop the enemy and get my daughter back.”
Klyne grimaced. “I never said I was going to stop you. Do what you must. Just keep me in the loop. We can help. And don’t forget Kalathar in all of this. We have to figure out what to with a planet full of the possessed. We’ve evacuated everyone we can who hasn’t been infected. Without anyone or anything to fight, and no ships left, many of the creatures are going dormant to conserve their energies.”
“After I contact Baeven and get him on the scent trail, I’m going to take some time and attempt to get something out of the KDM. It’s still a part of me and always will be. If I can find any kind or part of a solution from the KDM, I will. The Kexx fought all of this stuff long ago. Has Intel isolated the possession wyrm parasite or learned anymore about it?”
Klyne nodded. “We’ve accomplished that much, at least. We have several specimens, taken out of hosts frozen in stasis. But the parasites are insidious. Even after we remove the possession-triggering parasites, when we try to unfreeze the former hosts, the hosts still perish. Our medteks and biomancers can’t figure it out.”
“Send a couple of the specimens and the hosts to my medical bay for study. If I can biomance anything that will help us, I will let you know. And, Klyne, I’ve never cut you out of the loop,
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