EvO (Darverius, House of DaR #16)

Chapter 21

Chapter Twenty-One

EVO

“ What happened, LeX ? Is she ok?”

“ She is fine, simply exhausted. You should be grateful that is all that’s wrong. Frack EvO , we practically found you two frozen together. Her eyelashes had ice droplets on them. Hypothermia is fatal for their kind and if we had not got here when we did. We would have lost her for sure. You have lost an immense amount of blood yourself. That’s why the cold affected you the way it did.”

“ What hit me?”

“ It’s more like what did you hit. If you had not wrecked the lab looking for heaters, then the drawers would not have been open for you to catch the edge of with that thick skull of yours.”

“ What happened for the ship to stop like that?”

“ When it was bursting through the last layer of the Nebula , the thrusters overheated just as we broke through. In an attempt to protect the main energy core, the ship suddenly powered down, causing us to go from top speed to a complete halt instantly. Most of us were confused with no way of figuring out why we were suddenly sitting dead, with no power at all. I remember plainly standing there watching the primary control boards start to freeze over.

“ Rafe reacted without thought of his own safety. Everyone on board owes him for being here right now. He grabbed one of the main circuit breakers and flipped it off, then back on. Things instantly started flashing back on, but he had to manually prime the larger ones that were in the adjoining maintenance room. By the time he got done and staggered back in the control room, his fingers had started turning black from the exposure. Unknown to me, those outer rooms do not have the insulation the Control room does. His hands were exposed to negative triple digits for an extended amount of time. Luckily , I was able to get back in the Med bay and got his hands wrapped before the damage became permanent.

“ It took the ship half a rotation to heat back up. The second the sensors outside said we were clear of the Nebula’s gasses. ViN immediately initiated the purging of this room. However , because most of the ship was still offline, we had no idea if you guys had survived or not.

“ I tried contacting you from the other room at first, but when neither of you responded, ViN forced the doors open. It took all my strength to push him back when we uncovered you two, finding you literally frozen to the mattress on the floor, and neither of you responsive.

“ We originally tried to move Qwin , but her distressed scream stopped us instantly. Instead , I layered the area you were in with heated blankets. Then set one of the Med bots to monitor your vitals. It took a substantial amount of time to revive both of you. I expected you to come to sooner, but your injury hindered that.”

“ LeX , is the ship still at a standstill? I don’t feel the usual vibration under my feet.”

“ ViN maneuvered us as close as possible to a sun in the outer belt of this solar system. The Destroyer is recharging her batteries slowly. That’s why we are still operating on emergency power. ViN wanted to give her a chance to fully charge before bringing everything back online. It’s been quite the ride, brother, but I am glad we are on the other side of it.”

“ Is the ship responding?”

“ I am available, Captain .”

“ Good to hear your voice Destroyer , can you open a comm to ViN for me.”

Moments later, ViN’s worried face appears on the holo screen. “ Frack , it’s good to see your ugly face, EvO . I am ready for you to take back over this bucket of bolts. My frackin nerves are shot.”

“ Yeah , I love you too, big brother. LeX told me you and Rafe have been having all the fun without me.”

“ Yeah , neither of us were lounging on the floor with our arms wrapped around our mates. All of us were up here, freezing our balls off. You scared the frack out of me when I found you like that. I would prefer not to feel those emotions ever again.” I see him turn away for a moment, talking to someone behind him. “ My Ember is worried about the female, is she recovering on her own?”

I look over at LeX . “ She will be fine. A few rotations from now she will be up and running all over the ship.”

“ How long do you think she will be out?”

“ Half a rotation or longer, according to the monitors she is in a deep slumber. As you can tell, even our voices are not waking her.”

“ That should give me time to get cleaned up, check on the ship, and the pods. Will you contact me the moment you see her vitals changing?”

“ I will, I am assuming you are going to start pulling the pods in?”

“ Do any of them seem to be in the same distress Qwin’s was?”

LeX shrugs his shoulders as something on his personal comm seems to have captured his full attention. Since this is common, I just shake my head and limp off towards my quarters. The material of this uniform is irritating the new tender skin on my legs. “ Destroyer , I need all the updated information available on the attached pods sent to my comm as soon as you obtain the information. We need to get those people inside as soon as possible.”

“ Confirmed Captain .”

I pull the clothes off I’ve had on for what feels like rotations, and throw them into the laundry shoot as I walk into the Ionizer . Once it kicks off, I am grateful to be clean, but wishing it was a true shower. My tired and aching bones could use a good soak in some soothing hot waters right now. Stepping out, the viewer pops on and instantly I see the cut across my forehead. Probing it gently with my finger, I winch. I can tell my body has been damaged, simply by the time it’s taking for my injuries to heal. My comm unit goes off as I am redressing into something a little looser.

Rafe’s face pops on the screen. “ EvO , we got problems. Six of the pods have started blinking.”

“ Can we get them inside?”

“ It’s possible, but some are on the darkened end of the ship, and they still have that growth on them.”

“ Destroyer , can you maneuver around so that the heat from that sun is on the flashing contaminated pods?”

“ I can, but it won’t be a fast process, Captain . My thrusters are still warming up, and so I am having to use the exhaust vents to maneuver, it takes much longer than you are accustomed to.”

“ Do what you can, then open the outer bays and send the Maintenance bots out to get the flashing ones that are not contaminated first.”

“ Captain , the entirety of all the pods will not fit successfully in the docking bays. We will need to extract the organic and then flush the pod back out.”

“ Frack , I was hoping to give everyone a slight break, but it seems like all hands are going to be required. Tell ViN and Rafe I will be up shortly. I am going to make a quick stop at the Med bay, then I will report to the Control center. Also , contact Ember and see if she is available to sit with Qwin . I don’t want her to wake up alone.”

A half a tick later, I stand above Qwin looking down at her. My responsibilities are already tearing me away from her. She deserves more than I can give her, but I can’t walk away just because it’s the right thing to do. I need her more than my next breath and she doesn’t even know it.

Ember bounces in the room, a huge smile on her face. “ Hi EvO , I am so glad this stupid wall is down. You go on. ViN and the others are waiting for you.”

“ Thank you for coming so quickly, she may sleep for quite some time still.”

“ It’s no biggie, I have my comm unit with me to keep me busy. Before we left communications, I agreed to help SAGE come up with some new clothing designs for the girls. I have been working on them the entire time we were in that ball of colors.”

“ That’s quite impressive Ember , I had no idea.”

“ Hey , I am more than just another pretty face.”

“ Apparently , if you don’t mind, would you comm me the moment she starts to stir? I promised I would be here when she got up, and Qwin will probably need some assistance getting out of all those layers as well.”

“ Don’t worry, I’ve got it covered. You should get back to all your Captain responsibilities, allowing my ViN to have more quality time with me. I don’t like him being gone all the time.”

“ I am sure neither of you do. Don’t worry, I am determined to do everything in my power to get us back on a normal schedule.” Without thinking, I lean down and kiss Qwin on the forehead and then nod to Ember as I make myself walk out the door. Each step is harder and harder to take, as I feel like I am making a big mistake leaving when she asked me not to.

Even though I am torn, it feels good to be able to stretch my legs some. The familiar door of the Control center slides open and all heads turn towards me. ViN pushes his large frame out of my Captain’s chair with a huge smile on his face.

“ About frackin’ time, you got here, brother. I thought you were going to keep doing whatever it took in order to stay with that little female longer. You could have simply told us to let you perish in there. Instead of clobbering yourself over the head just to get her to lay on top of you, lazy ass.”

“ I should have thought about that before you two frackers decided to turn all the heat off. Neither of you understand the intelligence it takes for me to be able to plan my demise so eventfully.”

ViN grabs me in a warrior’s handshake, his large hand practically wrapping around my not so shabby arm. I can hear Rafe’s laughter halfway across the room. “ You two going to catch me up on all the fun you were having without me?”

Rafe points a wrapped hand towards the viewer. “ Behold the beautiful darkness of space.”

“ How far are we from the Nebula ? Is it trying to pull us back? How is the recharging process going?”

Both ViN and Rafe laugh. “ Haa , I win, ViN . You owe me. I told you he wouldn’t make it more than a few moments without issuing out orders.”

I growl playfully at Rafe , missing ViN slipping out behind me. When I turn back to ask him something, I snarl out. “ Where the frack did he go?”

“ Oh , he has been plotting ways to get out of here all rising. His little mate has been teasing him something terrible. So , I believe he is headed right into her arms.”

“ The frack he is! Ember is sitting with my Qwin .”

ViN’s comm unit location pops up on the screen and sure enough he is headed straight towards the Med bay. “ Rafe , the command is yours.” Heading out the door, I hear him yell.

“ Hey , what about the pods and all your questions?”

“ Deal with the issues. Get those pods inside. I have something more important that needs me at the moment.”

“ Man , if this is the way females make bad asses like you two act. I don’t know if I want one or not.”