Free Omega Force: Savage Homecoming by Joshua Dalzelle

you again.”
    “And I’m sorry for acting like an ass when Crusher found you,” Jason said, most of the fight taken out of him at her words. “I’m just afraid, Taryn. I know how these missions usually go, and I’m terrified about having you on board. I’m also afraid that it will make me hesitate at a crucial moment.”
    “You know, that last time you came back to Earth and gave me all your stuff … I still didn’t believe any of this was real,” she said. “I really thought you had been convinced to rejoin the military and were shipping out again to some God-forsaken place and you couldn’t tell me. I figured this wild tale of spaceships and aliens was just your own bizarre way of telling me goodbye without really saying it.”
    “If only that we re true,” Jason laughed. “It’s all very much real, some of it so wondrous I don’t have the words to describe it. But some of it is equally horrific, too. I had wondered why you seemed to take it all so well when I described everything to you.”
    “So … you’re really going to make me stay in the guest room?” she asked with a little smile.
    “Well, I didn’t want to seem too presumptuous,” he said with a shrug. “You can sleep on the couch in the common area if you want.” She made a face of mock indignation while drawing back to slap him on the arm. Instead , she stood quickly and wrapped her arms around his neck, kissing him softly before he had a chance to pull back or stop her.
    “Why don’t you tell me about it?” she asked, pulling him towards the bed.
    “Which parts?”
    “All of it,” she said with another kiss.
    They talked long into the “night” while the Phoenix continued her relentless pace towards the planet A’arcoon. Laying there with her tore down nearly all of his defenses, and he told her things that he would normally have protected her from. The joys of helping people who had lost all hope, the horrors of the mission that almost cost them their lives and nearly the Phoenix herself, and above it all the trust he had in his crew and his pride in serving with them.

Chapter 6

    The next morning, or at least morning according to ship’s time, Taryn left a still-sleeping Jason and padded out of his stateroom for the galley. She paused momentarily at the entrance to the common area when she caught sight of a solitary Crusher sitting at one of the tables. She saw one of his ears twitch and knew that the fearsome being likely knew she was there.
    Striding towards the galley with a confidence she didn’t feel , she went to the processor and asked for a mug of chroot, the closest thing to coffee the Phoenix could make, and walked over to sit across from the hulking warrior.
    “Excuse me,” his bass voice rumbled as he got up to leave her in peace, painfully aware of how uncomfortable she was around him.
    “Please stay,” she said quickly, actually reaching out her right hand to cover his massive, clawed left one. He sank back into the seat and looked across the table at her. The fierce intelligence that blazed in those yellow eyes sent an involuntary shiver up her spine. “I owe you an apology, Crusher.”
    “You owe me nothing of the sort,” he said.
    “I do,” she insisted. “I behaved badly when I first met you. I was frightened by everything that was happening, but I shouldn’t have kept quaking in fear every time you came near me. I’m sorry. The funny thing is that I recognized who you were immediately, but I couldn’t believe you were real.”
    “You’ve lost me , I’m afraid,” Crusher said, relaxing a bit now in his chair.
    “Jason has sent me written messages describing each of you along with some somewhat vague descriptions of your missions,” she said. “I had thought he was just playing a game with me, trying to alleviate the fear I always felt when he would go away when he was in the military on our world.” She paused to take a sip of the bitter drink and chuckled to herself a moment before