Finding Darkness

Chapter 30 Trust

"Captain Prey, the enemy ship just achieved jump." The main viewer showed the scene. The Rougarian fleet carrier limped into its jump profile. Leaking jets of gas and flame from hundreds of holes in its hull, it wobbled in mid-flight, took a list to starboard, then shot into FTL, faster than light travel.

"Good luck getting that thing through a jump and back to real space in one piece." Joshua chuckled from his station, just off to the Captain's left hand and slightly aft of his command chair.

"Okay people, that went well, but now we need to attend to damage control. I won't take this ship anywhere until we're in prefect shape."

"Repairs are proceeding well, Captain. These repair drones are awesome. It's nice to have workers who don't have to breathe." The damage control officer reported.

"That's good to hear. How long before they finish?"

"At the current rate of repair, about thirty-five hours. They can only do so much so fast, and the area damaged is huge."

"Understood." Captain Prey sighed. "While we wait, I want an evaluation of every offensive system this ship has, and no, I don't care if the computer says it's functional. I want eyes on every system. When we get back to earth, I don't want anything to go wrong, not when our home planet is on the line."

She woke up somewhere else. She knew she'd gone to sleep in their room, hers and Malachi's. Now she was somewhere else, somewhere she didn't want to be. The walls were the same: dirty, smudged, filthy, with two dim lights shining from the corners.

This was her home or had been her home for the first five years of her life. Now she only wondered why she was here again. This was a dream, it had to be, she knew that, but her mind had rendered it in such exquisite detail, even down to the mice she had longed to snack on as they scurried along the walls.

Pushing herself off the floor, she came to a sitting position and concentrated. If Malachi could bring her into his memories, maybe she could bring him into hers. Within seconds, an image of Malachi materialized next to her. Their eyes met as he turned to her and in that second, she knew he wasn't surprised.

"So, this is where you grew up?" He told her, turning his head to survey the room.

"Yeah, this was my cage. They did all kinds of things to me in here." She shook and shivered at the memories.

"I know." He answered.

"How could you know that? You weren't even here." Her head whipped up again to look him in the eye.

"Because I've been inside your head for a lot longer than you've been inside mine." The air inside the room seemed to have been sucked out.

"HOW long?" She howled. Tamar had to know, if he'd been inside her head, what had he seen?"

"Since about a week after I saved your life." He told her. "I think that tiny fragment of my suit is conveying our thoughts to each other. Because it came from this suit, and it's been connected to me for a lot longer than that tiny piece has been in you, I've been able to see your thoughts for a lot longer."

Tamar backed away. What had he seen? Why hadn't he ran screaming away from her? Everything she'd done, all the things that had been done to her. The dark and murderous thoughts she'd always had, these were things she'd never wanted anyone to see, and here they'd been his to sift through.

"But Mal, you've got to understand!" She pleaded. "I was so young, I couldn't even defend myself! They forced me to do it, all those things. I didn't have a choice!" She yelled, her voice rising in panic.