Dark Universe & Forbidden Love (41 page)

Liutein soon learned that the
Estian vessels failed to bring Cruiser General Klizan back. At the same time,
the 17 families coaxed some Glycans to protect against the royal families.
Liutein quickly ran short on soldiers. He requested Estian to send troops to
him. Since he still didn’t have the control over the fleets, he brought those
Estian soldiers on Sylareon in cargo vessels and disguised them as Glycans
using biological suits.

However,
things went wrong when a team of Estians went outside the palace to monitor a
protest which consisted of thousands of Glycans. One Estian’s biological suit
malfunctioned and exposed his face. Driven by anger, Glycans clashed with
Estians, which resulted in hundreds of casualties. The domestic security forces
such as police and government guards quickly reacted to the clash and captured
all Estians involved in the shooting. Even though Liutein had replaced the
commanders of domestic security forces with his own confidants, but they didn’t
stick with Liutein under the pressure from the public. It in turn triggered
larger scale protests. On the other hand, as soon as deputy chiefs from the
Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth fleets learned about the crash against
Estian, they all sent part of their fleets back to Sylareon. The officers sent
by deputy chiefs immediately requested to meet their fleets’ commanders.
Liutein and his subordinates made up some excuses, but none of the officers
bought them. They clashed in the palace and Liutein had all of them killed.
When the deputy chiefs lost the contact with those officers, they realized the
gravity of the situation. They contacted other fleets right away. Now the
deputy chiefs of Glycan fleets believed what General Kalan said before. Now all
the fleets were heading to the assembly point at the outer layer defense line.
They planned to drive the fleets from Estian, Oireitan and Uainanese away
first. After that, they would decide the next step.

In the
flag vessel of the Seventh fleet, Kalan just talked with other deputy chiefs on
the communicator. He heaved a sigh of relief. Even though he lost the Hylocan
eyeball for now, he achieved the same goal he wanted from using the eyeball.

“Finally,
they knew I was right!” Kalan said happily.

“You
were indeed. Liutein may want to save himself by trying to threaten your
father’s life” Doensen said.

“I will
save him no matter what.” Kalan said decisively.

“That is
certainly the right decision, but every coin has two sides.” Doensen said with
a mysterious smile.

“What do
you mean?”

“I
certainly hope General Klizan survive all these.” Doensen said politely.

“Come
on. Don’t play jargon with me. Tell me what you think.” Kalan said in a relaxed
tone.

“If
something happened to him, someone has to step up to take his post.” Doensen
said quietly.

Kalan
was angry at first, but when he thought about it, he started to calm down.

“We
always like heroes, but if every position was taken, heroes could only get some
dust-covered medals and a five-minute fame.” Doensen said in distaste.

Kalan
flashed a brittle smile and said, “That is true.” He stood up and strolled back
and forth for a long while. What Doensen just said echoed in his head.

“How
long will it take us to arrive at the assembly point?” Kalan asked coldly.

“About
four hours.”

“Maybe
we should make sure General Klizan is alive first.” Kalan said sadly.

“We
should send in a team before any major movement. Just to be sure the well-being
of all those generals.” Doensen said with an evil grin.

“I see.
But the team should be given a more specific order such as…you know.” Kalan
said slowly as if he was searching for the perfect word.

“The one
giving the order is critical in this case. I will say he should be rewarded
accordingly afterwards.”

“I
agree.” Kalan said.

They
smiled at each other quietly.

After Relinee left, Jason didn’t
take any rest but asked around in the neighborhood and he quickly found out
where Michael R. Stonan lived. Right now he was walking on a trail into the
forest. The wind was cool and gentle, carrying the breath of the forest. The
afternoon light passed through trunks and branches, leaving a gentle touch on
the ground. Birds and small animals wandered leisurely among the trees. Jason
couldn’t wait to see General Michael R. Stonan. He was the only second class
species appointed as the commander of Guardian Fleet combat division, even
though he passed away before his term could start. If he was still alive, he
would be around 130 years old.

After
about an hour, the trail ended at a garden the size of five football fields. It
was a garden of trees. Some stabbed into the sky and some was only several
meter high. Different types of flowers surrounded each tree. Jason could tell
that someone planted those flowers deliberately.

Jason
walked further into the garden and saw a superace watering flowers under a
tree. He looked as old as Jason. He acknowledged Jason and introduced himself
as Gennzan. Then he took Jason to General Stonan’s place. It was the tallest
tree in the garden. Hundreds of red roses blossomed around the tree. There was
no tombstone or anything to indicate General Stonan was buried here.

“When
Relinee mentioned him, I thought he was alive.” Jason sighed.

“He is
alive.” Gennzan said firmly.

“I guess
that was why when I asked around, nobody told me he was dead.” Jason said
slowly. He knew what Gennzan meant and he was happy for General Stonan.

Jason
saluted and asked, “Why there was no tombstone?”

“If you
remember somebody, you don’t need one. If you don’t remember, there is no need
to have one.” Gennzan said easily.

Jason
nodded.

“He
loved red roses.” Gennzan said as he picked up some petals from the ground.

“If I
remember correctly, he was buried on the moon.” Jason said in a questioning
voice.

“My
father said they believed General Stonan should have a better place to rest in
peace. He saved my father and many others.”

“You are
a superace, right?” Jason asked carefully.

“Yes.”

“How
many survived?”

“56.”
Gennzan said calmly.

Jason sighed.
They stood there in silence for a long while. Then they headed back. Jason
wanted to say goodbye to Relinee, so Gennzan took him to Relinee’s place. It
was a wooden house just like others in the forest.

“This is
it. It was a pleasure.” Gennzan said happily and then left.

Jason
took a deep breath and knocked on the door.

Relinee
answered the door and said, “You don’t look like somebody who cares those
formalities.” She gave Jason a kind smile.

“You are
right. I usually don’t say goodbye.” Jason said in embarrassment.

“So,
tell me. What do you want to know?” Relinee said frankly.

“I am
wondering whether you find anything about the eyeball.”

“It’s
hard to say. It seems the eyeball could think like a brain.” Relinee frowned.

“What
are you going to do with it?”

“We are
thinking about destroying it.”

“That is
what I want to suggest as well.” Jason said happily.

They
fell into an awkward silence.

“Alright,
I will hit the road. I don’t know whether I should say see you or not.” Jason
said reluctantly.

“I don’t
know either. Jason, you might be a commander one day. You are still young and
you couldn’t understand that a commander should put his emotion aside.
Sometimes a war started from a person’s anger and ended with the death of
millions.”

“Ah,
that is deep!” Jason said carelessly.

They
said goodbye to each other. While Jason was leaving the small neighborhood, all
different species treated him as if they were seeing off an old friend. Jason
liked this beautiful place, but he knew he could never enjoy a life like this.
For him, it was boring and meaningless. Besides, he couldn’t enjoy this place
without the girl he loved.

When Jason went back to the
training center, the guards immediately arrested him on site. They threw Jason
in a prison cell right away. Jason realized the gravity of the situation. He
knew this cell was not the black box in the training center. It was the prison
cell of Guardian Fleet. These prison cells were only the temporary stops for
prisoners to be transferred to the most heavily guarded prison Listan.

After a
long while, Jason heard some familiar voices. As it got closer along with the
footsteps, Jason could tell it was Titainein and Erikon.

Erikon
slid open a slot on the door and said, “Jason, It’s me, Erikon. Titainein is
here too.”

“Erikon.
Man, how are you doing?” Jason said happily. He couldn’t see Erikon but could
hear him through the slot.

“You
see, that was his first question.” Titainein said sadly.

“Hi,
Titainein. What’s up?” Jason said excitedly.

“Jason,
you are alright? I mean physically.” Erikon asked caringly.

“Yes. I
am fine. You guys know why they lock me here? I thought I will go to the black
box in the training center.”

“Not
yet, but we will find it out really quick.” Titainein said

“Two
minutes.” A cold voice struck them. Jason realised that they were not alone.
There must be guards accompanying Erikon and Titainein.

Erikon
stuffed something into the pockets of the two guards. The guards smiled and
walked to the end of the corridor, but still kept an eye on Erikon and
Titainein.

“Jason,
it is serious this time.” Erikon said in a worried voice.

“I know.
If not, they won’t lock me here.” Jason said calmly.

“They
might transfer you to the prison. We will pull some string to stop that.”
Titainein said decisively.

“It
won’t work. It won’t work.” Jason murmured.

“Jason!
Don’t you give up.” Titainein shouted.

“I am
not giving up. I know this is going down the drain and I don’t want your guys
companies.” Jason said slowly, knowing this might be the last time he talked to
his friends.

“We
won’t let you down. I promise you!” Titainein said confidently.

“We
can…”

“No.”
Jason interrupted Erikon and said, “Listen, Don’t tell Gloria what happened to
me. If she found it out, she will die to save me.”

“OK, we
won’t tell her, but you know she will find out sooner or later.” Titainein
said.

“Then
tell her I am dead.” Jason said sadly. He knew this would broke Gloria’s heart,
but it was better this way.

“Jason,
Gloria will find…”

“Time’s
up!” It was that cold voice again. The two guards walked to Erikon and
Titainein and pushed them away from the door.

Jason
heard them walking away. He suddenly remembered the promise he made to his
father that he would be an officer in Guardian Fleet. Now it seemed so far
away.

Two
hours later, Jason ate his first meal since he was locked away. It was two
pieces of bread and a small bowl of soup. He gulped them down in a blink and
was still hungry. There was still some crumbs on the plate. While Jason was
licking those crumbs, the door suddenly slid open. Six guards walked in with
stone cold faces and rifles in their hands. Jason stood up leisurely. He knew
it was the time.

Escorted
by six guards, Jason headed to the hangar in chains. He never thought he would
leave the Guardian Fleet in this way. The tight and cold handcuffs kept
reminding him how real this was. Jason looked around, trying to capture every
detail of whatever he saw. He wanted to remember all of these. At least, he
could keep them deep in the memory.

Before
boarding the space vessel, he looked back one time. Nobody was here to see him
off. It was him and him alone.

Prison Listan was actually a
mobile mining facility previously owned by Gieoaio. During UWII, the nine
species eliminated the entire species of Gieoaio and practically robbed
everything Gieoaio had. They decided to keep Listan as a mining facility, but
did some modifications which converted 20 stockrooms into prison cells. So now
it was also a prison and all prisoners were mine workers. Whatever they
harvested were split evenly among all nine species.

The
vessel carrying Jason was about to enter the asteroid belt. Jason looked out of
the window and caught Listan sitting right in the middle of the asteroid belt.
He remembered reading something about prison Listan. It was a Gieoaio-made
small planet capable of catching asteroids and extracting materials from them.
In order to survive the hostile environment, the outer layer of the planet was
made by sponge like material and 500 meter thick steel net structure was right
below it. It was so sturdy and solid that Gieoaio simply used it as a weapon to
ram other fleets and broke their formation during UWII.

The
vessels had a difficult time approaching Listan because of those moving rocks
and wreckages. When the vessel got closer, Jason could see Listan swing its
kilometers long tentacles, grab asteroids and swallow them. After a long and
bumpy ride, they finally touched down on Listan. Jason slowly stepped out of
the vessel. The chain on his ankles were cutting into his flesh. It hurt like
hell at every step. Several guards took Jason to a processing room the size of
a tennis field. In the room, there were some 10 guards hanging around
leisurely. Three of them were Glycans and the rest were Estians.

An
Estian walked to Jason and shouted, “Look, we got a new mother fucker here. Let
me introduce myself first. I am Hwoei, the captain of guards. Do you have anything
for me?”

“I only
have this uniform on me. If you want, take it.” Jason said calmly. He knew
exactly what Hwoei was looking for, but he didn’t have anything valuable.

“That is
funny, isn’t it?” Hwoei said ironically as he looked around at other guards. He
suddenly hauled out his baton and hit Jason’s belly. As Jason bent over in
pain, Hwoei grabbed his neck and rammed the baton into his mouth, deep into the
throat. Then he bunched Jason’s face again and again for about a minute.

Jason
was trembling, his face swollen, his head bleeding. He curled up on the cold
floor, gagging, his mouth still holding the baton.

“Honey,
you owe me this time, so you will provide some service in the near future. You
understand?” Hwoei said angrily as he kicked the baton.

Jason
couldn’t make a sound.

“I will
take it as a yes.” Hwoei said and pulled the baton out.

Jason
threw up everything in his stomach, coughing and gasping for several minutes.

“Process
him!” Hwoei shouted.

Two
guards couldn’t wait Jason stood on his feet and dragged him into the
decontamination room. After that, the guards removed the chains and cuffs on
Jason’s body and kicked him into another small cubic. Jason stripped naked like
he was ordered and soon some kind of liquid flooded into the cubic. It only
took a second to fill the cubic full and Jason was struggling for air. Before
Jason drowned to death, the liquid was sucked away. He kneeled on the floor,
too tired to stand up. A guard came in, kicked his belly and pulled his hair,
dragging him to the next room. There he got his new clothes, a blue prison
uniform.

“Put it
on in one minute or go back to the water room!” The guard said coldly.

Jason
felt his head spinning, but he didn’t have time to think about it. He quickly
put on the uniform and stumbled into a prison block. It had the size of five
football fields with a 10 floor high ceiling. Hundreds of cells were packed on
every side. In the center, there was a watch tower with airborne drones cycling
it.

Watched
by the flying drones, Jason headed to his cell. The moment he walked in those
bars slammed home. Except a bed, a sink and a toilet, there was only a square
meter left in the cell. Jason slowly sat on the hard bed. He knew this was just
the start.