Nash: Trekkers (A SciFi Alien Human Military Romance)

A
long time ago
, in a galaxy far far away… wait, this isn’t that story. Nope. This is a story about a guy and a girl who are not related. (Because that was kinda gross right?)

Floating along in space is the Titan, a monster size ship with, well, monster size men on it. You’re welcome.

They’ve got a hundred varieties of space men, but they all have one thing in common. They’re delicious. And looking for love. Sometimes in all the wrong places.

No one on the Titan realizes quite what they’re getting into with human women. Mates are forever but they haven’t been part of the Trekker way for nearly a century. But now some of the military operatives have found that they’re willing to risk their mission, possibly even their lives to keep these women close to them and safe.

Good luck Trekkers. You’re going to need it.

“
L
ook alive boys
. You never know what's coming around the corner.” They were in another dump. Nash hated these missions. The commander was always putting them in these dangerous situations for stupid pieces of space junk. All these little things that he just didn't want the rebels to get their hands on, but they didn't even matter. It was busy work. And Nash didn't like to see the rest of his squad get shot over busywork.

“Hold your fire until we’re sure that it's not a friendly, right boss?” Aevar said over the handheld communicator.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Nash responded so the whole team could hear.

“Well last time you blew that spaceship out of the sky, the commander wasn't too pleased.”

“It wasn't like anybody was on it, it was just a piece of space trash. Not even worth a human dime.”

“Doesn't matter to the commander what it's worth, if he says that we can’t shoot it, we can't shoot it.”

Aevar had a point, even if Nash didn’t like it. He rolled his eyes underneath his oxygen mask. They were on Aflana, a plains nation. All that was out here was thick sandy dust and not enough oxygen to breathe. Ever since they had mated with the humans Nash’s kind needed oxygen to survive. He took a deep breath as he surveyed the landscape around him.

It was an uncomfortably dark warehouse, lots of corners for the bad guys to hide in. “Keep your eyes open gentlemen. I don't want any surprises and cut the chatter.” Nash heard silence from the com but footsteps off to his left. None of his guys should've been over there. So either someone had seen something and broken out of rank, or they had found an enemy.

Aevar crossed in front of Nash focused on the target, he must've seen it as soon as Nash heard him. That poor swuya would dead in seconds. Aevar never missed.

But instead of Aevar's blaster going off, Nash saw him fall back. Nash cocked his head at him. He had been wrong, maybe there wasn’t an enemy over there after all. Aevar shuffled over to him, his footsteps louder than the other person’s had been. He turned his com up so that he wouldn't have to speak above a whisper.

“You see something?” Nash asked him.

“I thought I did. But when I looked in my scope nothing was there. I thought the commander said this place was abandoned.”

“That's what he always says.”

“No, that’s not what I mean. I was in the war room when they were going over the intel. He specifically said that we were just here on a mission to obtain those navigational maps. No friendlies, no baddies. It doesn’t make sense that someone would be here. This plains development has been abandoned for at least twenty human years.”

The other Trekkers noticed them convening and came over themselves, they also turned the volume up on their coms.

“Everything okay boss?” Raelor asked. He was the newest on their team, and the biggest. He had a com on but didn't need an oxygen mask, his kind had never mated with humans before. They strictly breed with their own kind; they didn’t want to dilute the bloodline. Raelor's eyes were constantly shifting back and forth, always on alert. Sometimes Nash wondered if his senses were better than the rest of theirs, that made Raelor trustworthy even if people weren’t fond of the way he looked. Nobody wanted to be the smaller guy in the room.

“Intel said that this place is empty, but I don't believe it. Everybody needs to stay on guard. I don’t like the way this place feels.”

Aevar nodded, “Guns up gentlemen. Shoot on sight.”

Aevar was Nash’s second-in-command, Nash trusted him with his life. He was the only other person on the squad who could give instructions like that. The only other man they were supposed to listen to. Nash crept back over to the corner where the footsteps had emerged from only to see Aevar was right, it was empty. The scope of his blaster didn't even pick up any thermal indication that someone had been there recently. Just before Raelor went back on his line of patrol he approached Nash.

“I've heard things about some of these plains people. About what's left of them.”

“What does that mean?”

Raelor was from the outer planets, rumors swirled around those parts like an uncaged animal. The further you got out there, the more things that you heard. It didn't mean any of them were true, but on the other hand, sometimes Raelor’s intel was better than anything that their guys could get. He knew people. They would trust him with their secrets.

“They got some of the people out of here after the plague hit. That's why this place is deserted. But it's been deserted a long time, get what I mean?”

He meant that they may not be the only ones looking for those navigational maps. God damn Pirates.

“Swuya. You really think there might be some out here?”

He nodded briefly. “Either that or what's left of them. I've heard that the plague leaves imprints, some of these souls have been laid to rest, some might still wander here.”

Nash nodded to Raelor even though he didn't believe that part of the story. Raelor’s species was extremely spiritual, and while Nash respected it, he didn't believe half the mumbo-jumbo he spouted around about souls and ghosts. At least that's what the humans called them.

His father was a human and he didn't believe in ghosts, so neither did Nash. He only believed in memories, you remembered the dead and you respected them, but you didn’t think that they would come back.

Nash heard Aevar through the communicator. “Found the war room, let's get these maps and get the hell out of here, this place gives me the creeps.” Nash followed his patrol line using his scope, and for a precaution, they kept it on the whole time they moved. Raelor had his six, while Nash thought he was a little crazy with all the soul talk, Nash was glad to have him back there. Aevar was right, something was off about this place.

Nash pushed the heavy metal door open and saw Aevar standing over some tables shuffling through papers. Raelor followed him in and then one of the new recruits stood at the door keeping an eye out for Pirates, or worse.

“Find anything yet?”

Aevar shook his head. “Absolutely nothing useful. This place is a disaster, not to mention the dust around here is literally inches thick. Freaking plains people. So damn dirty.”

Nash gave him a look, but through the mask he couldn't see it. Aevar liked to talk about other species like they were less than them, especially in front of Raelor. Sure Nash may have believed it, and some of them didn't live the civilized lifestyles that they did, but it was their life and their right. Aevar and Nash had no room to judge.

“Let's not worry about the plains people and just worry about the maps. Do you even think that they would be on paper?” Nash assumed that they be on their mainframe. Many navigational systems were part of the overall screens.

Aevar shrugged. “You think that piece of junk is gonna start up? There hasn't been power to the station in years. Besides the noise from our attempt would be enough to draw in any Pirates that are on this planet. I don't know that I want to take that risk.”

He had a point. Nash wasn't sure he was willing to take the risk either, but the commander had given orders. And Nash always did as he was told.

“We have to try. Looking through these papers will take us too much time and we don't even know that they were printed.” Nash walked over to the far wall stepping over overturned chairs and a couple tables. The floor was also littered with papers, almost six inches thick, with another four or five inches of dust on top. He was glad at his oxygen mask on, even if he could breathe here, he didn't think he would want to.

Plains people had special lungs, kind of like gills almost. They were located underneath their ribs and they pushed out all the dirt from the air. Their body was its own perfect filtration system, but when the plague came their lungs couldn’t handle it. Green sludge would spill out of the openings between their ribs and most of them drowned to death. What a horrible way to die. That was before the cure. Now nobody died from the plague. That was part of what the Galactic Alliance did, create vaccines and inject any planets they could. They were still finding out about the planets on the exterior rim, some of them had never been touched by the plague but they wanted to be safe. They were looking for the navigational maps in order to find a couple of them, give them the vaccine and move on. It was busywork really. But Nash was happy to have busywork instead of some crazy war. He had seen live-action before, blasters shooting past his head, his men getting blown of out the sky, he’d be okay not seeing that again in his lifetime. That mess could be for somebody else to clean up.

The hum of the machines filled the room. One of the screens off to Nash’s left sparked and he pulled the plug on it before a fire began. Just what they needed, a smoke signal to every Pirate or rebel on this side of the galaxy. Another screen flickered to life and Nash began pounding on the keys trying to find the navigational maps. Aevar was right, the servers were too loud. If anyone was on this side of the planet, they’d find them, and quick.

He entered some code as quickly as his fingers would go, but it was hard to see through the oxygen mask and he kept wiping the dust off of the screen in order to make sure he was pressing the right keys. But no navigational maps came up, whatever was out here on the plains, they didn’t know anything about the outer rim.

“Aevar did you find anything?”

He slammed his fist down on the table as dust floated up around him. “No, it’s useless!”

Raelor looked back at both of them, “I hate to be the bearer of bad news boss, but someone’s got a beacon on us. They’ll be here within minutes.”

Swuya. Pirates. “Can you hear them yet? Any idea of how many?”

Raelor tilted his head towards the sky. His expert hearing gave them an advantage other teams from the ship would never have. “I hear a ship, a small searcher, probably no more than ten men on it.”

“Ten? That’s six more than what we have. I mean I’ve got two other scouts out on the ground, but they’ll be fried before that ship makes landfall. Raelor call into the pod pilot, tell them to get the engine started. We’re abandoning this mission.”

Nash was just about to blast the screens when he saw a restricted file located on the bottom left corner. He hadn’t noticed it before. He used the back of his gloved hand to wipe it off further so he could get a better visual. “Raelor you said that this was just a regular colony right? Then why the hell would they have classified information?”

Raelor shook his head. “That doesn’t make any sense Sir. Their military operation had probably less than fifteen men. Unless someone retired here that we’re not aware of.”

That must’ve been it. Occasionally an Alliance officer would retire on one of the smaller planets. He became somewhat of a hometown hero even if he had done nothing in the military. People praised them, gave them land and lodging. Pretty much they could live for free. They must’ve had one of those officers on this planet, it was the only reason that they would have any sort of classified information in their war room.

Nash directed the code to open the file and immediately used his camera through his goggles to start snapping images of what he was seeing before him. Whatever they had here was a lot more than navigational maps. Nash moved through the screens as fast as possible taking over a dozen images without really realizing what he was seeing. Only a minute later Raelor put his hand on Nash’s shoulder, “Boss, we have to go. They’re landing in about fifteen seconds.”

He nodded to Raelor and then pointed his blaster at the screen. Whatever he had found, it wasn’t meant to fall into the wrong hands. The Alliance would know what to do with it. It only took a single shot for his blaster to completely melt the screen, his watched as the old polymer melted onto the desk. Aevar did the same with the table, the papers lighting up like kindling.

“Is the pilot ready?” Nash asked one of the new recruits through the communicator.

“Yes, Sir. And he says we have company.”

Nash nodded to Raelor, Aevar and the other newbie who was standing at the door. “Blasters up, things are about to get interesting.”