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  Winter in Paradise

  T. C. Archer

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  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are fictitious or have been used fictitiously, and are not to be construed as real in any way. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales, or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  Published By:

  Etopia Press

  P.O. Box 66

  Medford, OR 97501

  http://www.etopia-press.net

  Winter in Paradise

  Copyright © 2011 by T. C. Archer

  ISBN: 978-1-936751-71-6

  Edited by Charlotte Cowie

  Cover by Mina Carter

  All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  First Etopia Press electronic publication: October 2011

  Chapter One

  Major Kelly Andres woke from the nightmare, unable and unwilling to move. The feeling of depression and aloneness lingered like a Uldaran Howler bug waiting in the shadows of the cave to feed upon her carcass. In the dream, she was cold, freezing cold. Her fingers and toes where dead and black. Frost sparkled on her skin. Purple bruising and dead flesh spread from the frostbitten digits up her hands and feet to her wrist and ankles. She had felt no pain, only dead lifeless stumps that made her certain her hands and feet would be amputated—the kind of certainty with which a person knows their name, rank, and serial number. She was always cold and alone in the dream. So very alone.

  She shivered despite the thick furs that cocooned her in warmth. The nightmare always left her hollow with the conviction she would spend her life with no hands or feet, deformed and unloved. She remained unmoving, sorting through her emotions. It was only a dream. She was in her bed, under her covers, facing away from her man. He was always warm, as if he had a fusion reactor at his core. So much heat radiated from him, she couldn’t hold him long when they settled beneath the covers for the night. Her body clenched with the need for his warmth—and his readiness to fill her. If she cupped his balls, he’d wake with a hard cock and make her feel loved. The memory of dead hands and feet would vaporize.

  Kelly snaked a hand behind her, but only cool sheets met her fingers. She rolled to face him and stretched out again. He wasn’t within reach. She opened her eyes. The yellow cave-light seemed to emanate from all directions, an effect created by walls carved of clear crystal. The top fur on his side of the bed lay flat on the mattress. He must have risen as he often did to check the instruments and surveillance systems. She shifted toward the main part of the cave, pulse already accelerating in anticipation of seeing the muscled buttocks she’d felt beneath her fingers countless times these last five months. But he wasn’t standing among the consoles, storage drives, or quantum communicator.

  She pushed back the furs and sat up. She hugged herself against the chill. The atomic power unit, the source of the yellow glow, provided too little heat to be wearing only panties. They were surrounded by sold mountain crystal, but couldn’t chance much heat. If the enemy detected them, their planet—and their people—would have no chance for survival.

  “Byron?” she called.

  Only the whisper of fans and the faint beep of the power sequencer answered.

  “Grayson!”

  Still no answer. The one room cave, her and Major Byron Grayson’s duty station, was only forty feet wide. She swung her feet to the cold stone floor, yanked a fur off the bed, and dragged it around her bare shoulders.

  “Grayson, damn you, answer. This isn’t funny.”

  She forced back panic and approached the surveillance station. The weather monitors displayed the same uniform whiteout and gale winds that had swirled ice crystals outside the station ever since they broke free of the Kirsovals’ tyranny.

  “Byron, you’re scaring me.”

  His furs still hung by the exit, but… Her blood chilled. His enviro-suit was gone. Heart pounding, Kelly leaned forward and looked to the far left. Half hidden from view, a smaller storage cabinet sat beside a large locker. The small locker was open and the quantum disruptor that had been stored there was gone. She couldn’t mistake the message behind the disruptor’s open case. That was like him. No note, no good-byes, just an open door that stated I’ve taken matters into my own hands.

  Anger replaced fear. The fool had disobeyed orders. Her orders. They were officers in the Provisional Army and she was the senior officer on this mission—senior by four months, but senior nonetheless—and she had ordered him to stay put. Worse yet, he’d promised. He’d promised!

  She dropped the fur and rushed to Biometrics, located in the right hand corner of the cave. The readout indicated his suit had been gone for four hours and had dropped off telemetry link two hours ago. The computer had extrapolated how much power his suit would have used during the last two hours based on the weather conditions outside and subtracted that from how much remained when he lost contact. A red 0% flashed on the monitor.

  Kelly blinked away hot tears and glanced at the furs just inside the tunnel leading to the exit. Two sets hung on the wall. An enviro-suit would maintain his core temperature for ten hours when wearing the furs, but he’d worn only the suit. She turned and batted the weather monitor around to face her. Green numbers glared bright against the black monitor that showed the outside temp the same today as it had been yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that: sixty below zero.

  Her heart constricted. By now, his suit would be drained of all power. She couldn’t imagine the powerful body that had ridden her into a delirious frenzy night after night lying frozen and alone in the ice somewhere. How would she live without ever feeling his touch again, the flutter that always began in her stomach when he looked at her, the feeling in that moment when his cock invaded her? What would she do without him?

  Damn him and the ridiculous honor that compelled him to forego his furs in hopes the enemy would detect his body heat and not search for smaller heat signatures like that of the shielded station…and her. Was this proof why lovers shouldn’t be stationed together? No, the most glorious part of love was undeniable devotion.

  Tears flowed freely. “Byron, Byron, Byron.”

  The need to hear her voice vied with disgust at hearing the rising panic. She was an officer. She refused to break down and cry.

  Think.

  Why had he chosen now to activate the quantum disruptor? Last communication with their superiors had reported the invasion was imminent, but the exact timetable was still unknown.

  Two years ago, their scientists harnessed the wormhole that connected them to the third spiral arm, the quadrant where the Kirsovals, Onyx’s conquering masters, lived. She and Grayson had met during that operation. He was a techie and she was a command officer with the forces that fought off the Kirsovals at the other end of the wormhole. The cursed Kirsovals, the result of a human genetic experiment gone wrong a century ago, had spread like a cancer, conquering every race in their sector of the galaxy. The wormhole provided their avenue of expansion, but Onyx was positioned to
block their exit into new territory. They never forgave and never forgot. Onyx’s victory came with a price.

  Eighteen months ago, intel reported Kirsoval ships were headed their way. The Kirsovals couldn’t allow Onyx to throw off the yoke of slavery. To do so meant rebellion throughout the galaxy. The Kirsovals intended to make an example of them.

  Onyx’s salvation lay in the power of the wormhole. If their scientists could draw the wormhole’s energy to power their photon beams, they could destroy the Kirsoval armada before it struck a heavy blow to Onyx. She and Grayson manned the remote outpost in preparation for Operation Slam, an attack on the fleet as it exited the wormhole. Her mission was to deploy the decoy that would draw the Kirsovals’ attention away from Onyx’s photon beam—and their attacking fleet.

  These last five months had been the best and worst of Kelly’s fourteen years in the corps. Grueling workdays had given way to passion filled nights that were overshadowed by the knowledge that this was all they had. She hadn’t pictured dying without Grayson…or him dying without her in the white wasteland that Onyx had become, and she certainly hadn’t considered living without him.

  Kelly took three steps to the comm terminal and spun the scroll through the messages. There had to be a reason he chose now to activate the quantum disruptor. He knew something she didn’t. Grayson was communications officer. Had he received and hidden the message that reported the time for the invasion? She scanned through the messages, searching for missing sequence numbers or gaps, back in time then forward to the present. She stopped. There. The code word had reached them—her pulse jumped—the code had reached them seconds before he left.

  He had known the invasion was about to begin. Kelly could see it. He had awoken to that weirdness he always laughed about and denied. Only this time he didn’t laugh and he hadn’t denied what he knew. Grayson had eased out of bed without waking her, disabled the audio alarm, took out the disruptor, donned his enviro-suit, then waited for confirmation. He had done all that in silence, knowing the message would come.

  The elders damn him—and every Diviner in the universe. How was she supposed to be equal to a man with precognitive abilities? She couldn’t best him—which made her inferior by nature. A decade ago, Diviners were a scant one per cent of the population. Now, they had tripled in numbers. Still a minority, but the sudden explosion had caused speculation that they were the next step in evolution. His kind frightened many…frightened her. She should have recognized the clues when they first met. He finished her sentences, showed up at her quarters when she needed him most, and knew when to stay away. At first, she taken that to mean they were compatible. Too late, she realized the truth. She was in love with him. Which meant she had to go after him.

  Kelly pulled on her enviro-suit, then wrapped the flaps around her wrists, ankles, neck and face. The suit automatically merged at the seams and hugged her like a second skin. The readouts on the suit’s cuff under her wrist came alive and showed a full charge and active navigation/location. The bio-station was already clicking down from 100% to 0%, based on telemetry. She glanced at Grayson’s display. Once a suit moved out of range, the computer extrapolated its location.

  She programmed his vector into her suit. Two seconds later, estimated coordinates scrolled across the screen. Just as she suspected, he had taken the disruptor to The Rock Pile, an acre of exposed rock spires three miles west by northwest.

  He meant to activate the disruptor far away from base so that she wouldn’t be destroyed when the Kirsovals fired on the signal. Grayson, however, would be killed instantly. Which meant he’d never planned on returning. The flashing red may have read 0%, but that didn’t mean with absolute certainty he was frozen solid out there. She intended to drag him back, then bring him up on charges of insubordination—after she’d fucked him beyond reason. She would ride him hard, punish him for disobeying and, most important, for scaring the life out of her.

  Kelly threw on her white fur coat, boots, goggles, and mittens, then stuffed his furs into her backpack. She left the cavern behind and jogged along the passageway to the exit. Once she left the cave, the going would be slow in the ice storm that raged outside. The floor gave a sudden quake. She halted and counted down the seconds. A low boom was followed by an explosion that she estimated to be about three miles away. The Rock Pile. She started forward again.

  I’m coming for you, Grayson, and I’m going to kick your ass.

  Byron was a fool and a patriot. The quantum disruptor was the best deceptive device the Provisional Army had developed. When energized, it simulated the subspace signature of a Battle Killer, the most fearsome and expensive weapon in the known galaxy. A real Battle Killer would fill the space of their cave and then some. How likely was it that the Kirsoval armada would believe that a Battle Killer was located on the surface, in the open? Grayson had decided to take the chance they would believe that. Gooseflesh raced down her arms. Maybe it wasn’t the chance she thought it was. Maybe he knew exactly how they would react. He was, after all, a Diviner.

  Up ahead, the electronic shield closing the mouth of the cave shimmered as wind driven ice sizzled on the interface. The wind beyond roiled in the opening. Kelly checked her readouts. Only ten minutes had passed since she’d woken and needed him. Now he was out there and needed her.

  “Shields down,” she ordered.

  The wind’s roar split the air around her. Kelly raised her hood and plunged into the howl.

  Chapter Two

  Plush furs, big mittens, and fuzzy boots weren’t what Kelly signed up for when she’d joined the Provisional Army. Wind cut dry and cold though her furs and hood. Staggering against the force of the blast, she saw no tracks—as expected. Thankfully, footprints weren’t needed. She would follow Grayson’s nav-track as far as it lasted. She bent into the wind and trudged forward.

  It had taken only thirty minutes to realize he had moved faster than her, likely because she fought the additional wind resistance of her furs. She hoped that was the reason he had worn only his skin-tight enviro-suit. That would mean he hadn’t intended to die out here as she’d first thought, but would activate the disruptor, then return to base before his suit depleted and she awoke.

  But he’d miscalculated. At his rate of travel to where his signal dropped off the grid, it was clear he wouldn’t make the round trip. He had obviously come to the same conclusion. Rather that sticking to the valleys, his path had become straighter, over rises and between ice-cliffs. She had turned on her goggles’ heat vision earlier, hoping to meet him on his way back home, but everything—ground, air, and sky—was a uniform cold. If he suffered from hypothermia, he could already have lost his way and be miles off course.

  Between gusts, she called his name. She scanned for heat and walked and scanned and shouted. On a planet of five million, only she and Grayson occupied this two-hundred mile square of frozen wasteland in Onyx’s western hemisphere.

  Hopelessness settled deeper with every unanswered shout. Several times, she had seen a warm object materialize only to rush forward and find it had been an illusion. Another figure took form up ahead. Kelly trudged forward, expecting to find her imagination had conjured another illusion. The apparition grew. She put the targeting graticule on the form and the temperature readout jumped. The heat was real. She pulled her weapon.

  The form resolved into a man, huddled under an ice overhang. She sprinted the last few feet, throwing off her backpack the instant before her arms closed around him. He tumbled over, unmoving, still hugging his knees. Kelly choked back tears. He couldn’t be dead. She’d found him. She yanked a power gel-pack from her suit and powered his, then pulled his furs out of her backpack and wrestled them onto him. His suit began to warm. She cupped his face in both hands. He twitched, raised his gaze. She kissed him, imparting precious warmth to his trembling lips.

  Kelly brushed away ice that clung to his goggles. “You disobeyed a direct order, soldier.”

  She didn’t wait for an answer, but ripped o
pen the med-kit in the backpack, tore the seal on a hypo, and jammed the needle into his neck. He didn’t flinch. The hypo glowed as it analyzed his blood, synthesized a drug cocktail and pumped it into him, then went dead, drained of energy. She tossed it aside and grabbed another.

  His mouth moved, but no sound followed. She forced calm, inspected his suit, rubbing his hands and feet as she put on his fur boots and mittens. Kelly jammed the second hypo into him. It filled him with the chemicals, then went inert. His lips were moving and Kelly realized he was saying something.

  She held her mittened finger to his lips. “It’s too late to apologize. I’m going to court martial you.”

  A corner of his mouth twitched in a barely perceptible imitation of the smile that always melted her heart, and Kelly almost laughed in relief.

  She discarded the second hypo. “Did you activate the disruptor?”

  He nodded more vigorously this time.

  “Good. Let’s go.”

  Kelly pulled him to his feet. He stood, using her for support. She was down to one gel-pack, as was he. She jettisoned the spent two and left the backpack and med-kit. She was down to only her suit, sidearm, wrist-nav, and furs. Better to travel light. If they didn’t make it to base, the supplies wouldn’t do them any good.

  Head tilted against the wind, Kelly hugged her polar furs with her free hand as she slid Grayson’s arm around her shoulder and pulled him closer. He wrapped his other arm around her; even half frozen, his powerful body enveloped her in warmth.

  An hour later, Kelly was amazed Grayson could still walk. Hypothermia had to be winding its way through his body. His gel-pack had failed a half-mile ago. Fear twisted her stomach. If she hadn’t found him when she did, he would be dead. They might still end up dead.

  She tightened her grip on his sleeve and pulled him through the blinding wall of snow that whipped past in a horizontal whiteout. Cold stung the small line of exposed skin on her forehead. The power in her goggles had died minutes after they’d started for base, but without them, her lids would be frozen shut.