Beyond the Empyreal Stars

38.

38.

The Acer went to warp just as soon as they passed Mars. Odette switched the ship to autoflight and held on, closing her eyes as space stretched in front of them, reaching their maximum speed within seconds.

A signal sounded and Odette's eyes flew open, finding the warning of an approaching ship.

"At warp speeds?" Nova questioned, dumbfounded. "How is this...?"

"Give me the specs!" Odette demanded. "Can you zero in on it? What...?"

"It is a Whispian ship, I know." Nova's hands flew over the screen in front of her, eyes searching for a way in to the other ship's signal. Odette knew when she'd found something. Her wide-eyed pause was her answer. She didn't have to give the ship's specs at all, only a name. "Comae."

How? How had Comae gotten away from Earth? Hadn't she killed him when she blew up the Aviatrix?

"He was dead," she growled through her teeth.

Another signal.

"We are being hailed," Nova stated. "What do we do?"

"The only thing we can do," she answered, and switched the ship to manual just as soon as they dropped out of warp.

The vast openness of space was before them, only the pinpoints of light from distant stars in the darkness. The silence was deafening as Odette looked over at Nova, back to Bas and her father, and finally to Duke, still cryo-frozen and unchanging.

The stars weren't the only thing in front of them then. The Whispian ship appeared out of nowhere, its exterior lights zeroing in on the Acer. The steel gray body made it hard to see with the black backdrop behind it, but the glow through the glass shield was clearly visible.

This time, Odette was the one to open the comm. Their specs on the glass shield in front of them went dark before the request came up directly in the center.

"Accept vid comm?" the message read, waiting for her spoken reply.

Deep breath. An answer. "Accept."

Comae appeared on the screen with a wide, toothy grin. He looked unscathed. The only marks on his skin were his distinction of his Whispian race.

"Hello to the new Terrian Primes...and their two humans aboard."

"How are you still alive?" Odette hissed, her hands tightening into fists over the controls.

Comae laughed. "You really think I was on that ship, knowing exactly what you would do? I'm much smarter than you give me credit for."

"I did not give you any credit for being smart at all."

He laughed again, throwing his head back. The motion gave them a view into the ship behind him, which was completely empty. "Oh, you are a funny one. Your time on Earth before and after the wars did you good."

Nova's hand slowly slipped over her screen, eyes cutting over to Odette. "He has a weapons lock on us."

"Positive?" she whispered back.

She turned the screen toward her, a blueprint of the outside of the Acer. It was completely red, pinpointed with the various missile impact points. "Positive."

Odette turned her attention back to Comae, who was still smiling, though it had turned menacing. "As Terrian Prime One and a leader in the Worlds Alliance, I command you to draw back your weapons."

His grin turned into a smirk. "Have you forgotten, Prime, that the Whispians are no longer a part of the Alliance? And as for you being a Terrian Prime now...well, that makes me want to kill you all the more."