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  A red blast rocketed out of the muzzle. The laser cut a burn across the side of the monster’s face below the eye and above the jaw.

  It lifted its head and roared again, only this time it sounded higher pitched, as if screaming.

  It brought its head down; the front of its long snout whacked the bottom of the door. The ship twisted in air. Aria stumbled back a step, before falling forward. She dropped out of Liberation. The weapon strap was lodged on the corner of the door, the snaps on the weapon bending from her weight.

  Aria refused to look down or behind her. She reached up with her free hand. Her fingers were inches away from the bottom of the door. Falling was not an option. If she didn’t do something fast, it wouldn’t matter. The spiked spine lizard would eat her. Simple as that.

  Candice must have been fighting with the controls. She regained balance and the ship continued to climb into the air.

  Unable to stop, Aria looked down.

  The lizard jumped, jaws snapping. Its snout was close to taking off her legs.

  The blaster strap was going to snap. The fall would kill her, she hoped. Death from dropping out of the ship would be better than getting torn apart by the lizard.

  The ship tilted to the right. Aria’s body slammed against the door. She moved quickly, planting her feet against the hull and climbing upward. Her hand latched onto the opened door, and she pulled herself up. It wasn’t easy. She was physically drained. A little at a time. Her arms felt like rubber, as if there were no muscle tone at all. There was no quitting. Candice had given her a second chance. She had to make it back inside the ship.

  It was a last effort attempt. She grunted and groaned and pulled. She was up and halfway in. She repositioned her hands and pushed and dragged herself inside.

  The blaster fell away.

  She threw herself into the ship. “I’m in,” she said. “I’m in!”

  “Braddox is still down there,” Candice said.

  Aria stood up, retrieved another blaster, and went back to the open door. “Get me just a little closer.”

  Candice lowered the ship.

  Aria could see the top of the lizard’s head. “That’s good. Hold it steady.”

  “Doing my best,” she said.

  Aria ventured out onto the open door, again. She held the blaster with both hands and took aim. Her shots struck the lizard’s skull. It looked up at Liberation, roaring continuously. Its small arms with tiny hands waved around as if trying to reach the ship.

  She thought about Martin while she fired shots at the animal.

  The mission wasn’t to interfere. It was to observe and gather samples.

  It sounded good on paper and when it was explained during briefings.

  She didn’t take her finger off the trigger.

  The lizard stumbled back and finally went down. The sound of its body crashing on the ground was thunderous. “Get me closer,” Aria said.

  “It’s dead.”

  “It is not. It’s still moving. Closer!” Aria watched her shots slam into the softer side of the thing’s belly. The burning holes smoked.

  Its eyes remained open. They stared at Aria.

  She fired more shots into the lizard’s gut. She had no intention of stopping until the blaster ran out of ammunition, or the lizard combusted bursting into flames.

  “We’re landing,” Candice said. “Back inside.”

  Aria let off three more rounds and then reluctantly stepped back into the ship. Braddox Founding ran toward the door. He was close.

  She imagined a lizard taking him down just before he reached the ship.

  The image flashed across her mind over and over with every step he took.

  She couldn’t risk that happening. She jumped out of Liberation and aimed the blaster left and right and left, there was nothing.

  Braddox grabbed her arm as he ran past her, pulling her with him back onto the ship. “Doppler, get us out of here!”

  “Aye, captain.”

  Thrusters flared.

  Braddox hit the button to close the door.

  “Hold onto something,” Candice said.

  The ship shot into the sky.

  Chapter 18

  Aria buckled in behind Candice in the jump seat. Braddox sat in the co-pilot chair.

  “Fuel gage,” he said, tapping a glass plated instrument on the panel. “We’ve got three quarters remaining. Should be plenty to reach—”

  Aria looked up when the captain stopped talking.

  Liberation was on its way up toward space.

  Balls on fire sped toward them, flaming tails trailing behind.

  “Captain?” Candice said.

  “You can do this,” Braddox said. “Two rules. Simple rules. One, don’t hit one of the meteors.”

  “And the second rule?” Aria said.

  Candice and Braddox said the second rule together: “Don’t get hit by one of the meteors.”

  They laughed.

  Aria had no idea what was so funny. She latched onto the armrests in white knuckle grips. She didn’t even blink watching the shower rain down around them.

  Candice handled Liberation well, though.

  They zigged. They zagged. Meteors flew by the ship far too close. The worse part were the sounds of explosions on the planet below them.

  “We need to get out of this atmosphere fast,” Braddox said.

  “Working on it,” Candice said.

  “Aftershock has got to be rippling across everything below us,” he said.

  # # #

  They were in space, away from the clutches of the shower. As they made their way back to Clandestine, they watched in awe and horror as the planet was pummeled by meteors. The mass grouping of chunky rocks tumbled directly toward the planet.

  “That one,” Braddox said. He didn’t need to point. They all saw it.

  In the center of the shower, and speeding faster than the other rocks at the already damaged planet, was a massive sized meteor. It pierced the atmosphere and looked as if it immediately caught on fire. The tail of flames zipped along behind it.

  “I almost can’t watch,” Aria said. She didn’t close her eyes. She couldn’t look away.

  It took seconds before the meteor slammed into water. The high velocity impact was visible in space. The halo blast rippled around where it crashed and spread out over the sea and onto land. It looked as if most of the planet was going to cave in on itself, as if the meteor had bore a hole through the crust and everything would be sucked down to the core. Aria fully expected the entire world to explode from the inside out.

  “Azure?” Braddox said. He shook his head.

  “What?” Aria said.

  “Did I hear you tell Caldera if you could name the planet, you would call it Azure?” he said.

  “Yeah. That was before we landed.”

  “That means blue, right? It’s a shade?”

  Aria nodded. “It is.”

  “I don’t think a single one of those lizards is going to survive this space shower. It’ll be questionable if the world doesn’t collapse soon. Look at how many meteors are still headed right for them. I’ve got a better name for that forsaken place, though,” he said.

  “And what is that?”

  “Obsidian,” he said. “It means—”

  “I know what it means,” Aria said. “I think Obsidian is a much more appropriate name.”

  Chapter 19

  Captain Braddox Founding let Candice Doppler land Liberation inside Clandestine’s bay.

  The decontamination showers lasted nearly an hour long. The spray was meant to enter their pores and to be breathed in. It worked as it raced through their systems. Hot water was mixed with special suds. Rough bristles scrub their skin raw.

  Aria didn’t complain; she worried mostly about Candice. Machine Techs didn’t know to be careful with her stump. Aria heard her scream a few times. She could only imagine how bad it hurt when the bristles scraped over the wound.

  Dressed in fresh clothing,
they met back at Liberation where they transferred the sleep pods back onto Clandestine.

  “We’ll get these refreshed, resupplied, make our vlog reports, send them home ahead of us, and then it will be beddy-bye time,” Braddox said.

  “But I’m not tired,” Candice said.

  It wasn’t funny. Aria didn’t want to sleep. She had already been asleep for ten years. They’d only just woken up a day ago. One day. And now he wanted them all just to go back to sleep for ten more years?

  “We do have one option,” Braddox said. “It goes against protocol.”

  “And we can stay up a while?” Aria said, knowing she sounded far too eager. She didn’t care. She was more stimulated now than she had been leaving home to reach. . .Obsidian.

  “Doppler’s in a bad way,” Braddox said.

  “Such a way with words,” Candice said.

  “Well, I’m just being serious. We can rig the pod to feed her meds and antibiotics, but that dressing is going to need changing two or three times a day for the next few weeks. That wound is going to need some air, too. We need to keep an eye on it for infection. Can’t do any of those things if we’re asleep,” Braddox said. “Aside from Candice, we don’t all have to stay awake. . .”

  “I’m in,” Aria said. “She’s going to need help. She can’t do everything on her own.”

  Braddox smiled. “I propose we hit the pods in a month, maybe six weeks, after we see how she’s healing. How’s that sound?”

  “Like a plan,” Aria said.

  The sleep pods were connected to slow-feed and hydration intake tubes as well as waste outtake hoses. The setup process was simple enough. Gages were calibrated and power supply sources verified, as well as the back-up power supply, and the back-up to the back-up power supply.

  Aria brushed her hands on her pants and made her way up toward Clandestine’s bridge. Clandestine was six times as large as Liberation. Batteries and power sources, combined with tracking and computer mapping systems, made up most of the electrical aspects of the ship. There were two levels, and a third was dedicated to engines and light speed.

  Engineers at home used keypads and joysticks that remote controlled the entire ship. Animatronics and robot-like technicians ambled about the halls handling repairs, as well as taking care of circuit boards, and other electrical issues behind the scene. Software upgrades and patches were done from home as well. So when Captain Braddox went to sleep with the rest of the crew and turned over leadership, it was as if an invisible crew took over at the helm.

  “Obsidian,” Aria said.

  “What was that?” Candice said. She hobbled up next to her using a crutch to support her weight.

  “Nothing,” Aria said. “Should you be up and about like this?”

  “I’m getting in a little bit of exercise in before sleep,” she said. “I just finished recording my vlog. I’m headed to my chamber. I may not be ready for a ten year sleep, but right now, I could stand an eight hour nap.”

  Aria placed a hand on her shoulder. They looked at each other for a moment. The silence between them was filled with mutual understanding.

  “I’ll be up shortly,” Aria said. “I’m beat, too.”

  Candice Doppler nodded and carefully walked away.

  # # #

  “Light, could you report to the bridge?” Braddox’s voice resounded over the P.A. system.

  Aria made her way through the halls and onto the bridge. “Captain?”

  “Caldera had items in his bag,” he said. “Did you see what he’d collected?”

  “Some rock samples. Dirt. Some other things as well. I’m not positive. His bag was down in Liberation.”

  “I retrieved his bag and yours. I was going to catalogue items,” Braddox said.

  “I could do that, Captain. Now that we have some extra time to get things done.”

  “Well, the thing is, I dropped his bag on the way up.”

  “And?”

  “And have a look at this.” On the table, the bag unzipped, were three large rocks.

  Aria remembered seeing Martin stuff the rocks into his bag. “What about them?”

  He pointed to the rock in the center. “Rocks don’t crack,” he said.

  They both gathered around the rocks and bent forward, getting close.

  “It’s not a rock,” Aria said, stating the obvious.

  “It’s an egg.”

  Her breath caught in her lungs. “We should flush it out, captain, get it off the ship!”

  The crack was narrow, starting at the rounded top of the egg and extending out in a few different directions.

  “That was my first thought, Light,” he said. He finger tapped the base of the egg.

  It rocked back and forth a little. It didn’t move from the tap. It wiggled because of it.

  “Captain, we can’t fly back home with those lizards on board,” she said.

  “I’ve got a thought,” he said.

  She shook her head.

  “You haven’t even heard it yet,” he said.

  “You can tell me, but it’s not going to change my mind.”

  “Just listen, what if we stick the unhatched eggs in a cryogenics chamber. If the specimen don’t make it, our lab boys home can bisect and dissect the creatures until they have answers to whatever questions they think of,” he said.

  “And if they don’t die?”

  “Same thing,” he said.

  “And what about this one?” She pointed to the cracked egg.

  Small finger-link limbs poked out of the shell. The green lizard hand pulled and pushed at a section until it fell free from the rest of the egg.

  “This one we stick in Caldera’s sleep pod and it will barely age. We alter the food and water, and in ten years. . .”

  “That’s not right. We shouldn’t do that,” Aria said.

  “You think we should kill it?” Braddox said.

  “We should flush all of them out. Launch them into space,” Aria said.

  “You could do that?”

  The lizard’s head poked out next.

  She couldn’t be certain. She thought it was a baby spiked spine lizard. A spinosaurus, if she were given the chance to name it. It cawed like a bird, snout open.

  “If you want to do it, it’s your call. I won’t stop you,” he said.

  Aria stood up straight. She set fisted hands on her hips. All at once she grabbed up the bag with the eggs. She marched off the bridge. Braddox wasn’t following behind her. She went to the nearest bathroom and opened the door. Setting the bag down in the sink she lifted the toilet lid.

  “You have no right coming home with us. Our planet doesn’t need more problems,” she said.

  The lizard was mostly out of the egg. Its body was covered in a thin, grey yolk. Its tongue lapped at yolk, cleaning itself off. Its eyelids closed and opened. The thing was looking right at her.

  She didn’t believe in imprinting.

  Okay. She believed in it, knew it happened with many types of animals. She didn’t care though. That was the difference.

  She scooped the lizard into cupped hands and held him over the bowl.

  Lifting a leg, she used her toe to flush the toilet.

  There was no water like at home. Just suction.

  The suction was so intense they were taught not to be sitting when they engaged the flush feature. The suction was so powerful she wondered if it helped power the ship.

  The flush ended.

  She looked down.

  The lizard was still in her hands.

  She shook her head at the creature. “No,” she said. “Uh-uh.”

  It had crawled around on her palm, tiny hands wrapped around her thumb. Its mouth closed over her knuckle. It gnawed at her skin. Tiny teeth bit into her, but weren’t large enough to cut through flesh.

  She kicked out with her leg, and she flushed the toilet a second time.

  # # #

  The cryogenics chamber spilled out steam until the sliding door sealed shut. The
unhatched eggs were frozen in a matter of seconds. Those eggs wouldn’t hatch—shouldn’t hatch—until thawed.

  “He seems to like you,” Braddox said.

  They walked to Martin’s sleep pod. Braddox had moved it to a secure part of the ship. The area was made of reinforced steel, meant for hiding or storing valuable cargo.

  “Spinosaurus? I like it. You’re good with naming things,” Braddox said.

  “Except that planet,” Aria said.

  “If everything down there didn’t try to eat us, and the meteor shower didn’t destroy almost the entire planet, Azure would have been perfect,” he said.

  The sleep pod slid open.

  Aria placed the lizard inside. “He won’t grow while he’s in there?”

  “Shouldn’t. Maybe a little,” Braddox said.

  “And you think this is the right thing, bringing a living, breathing creature like this home?”

  “We’ve got video and audio of just about everything that happened back there. I think after they see the footage, they’re going to be very curious about getting their hands on this little guy,” he said.

  She hated that he made it sound like a cute, harmless pet.

  It wasn’t.

  It wouldn’t be, anyway.

  “You’re the captain,” she said.

  The lizard leapt in the air, trying to get back in her hands.

  Braddox closed the sleep pod lid. He activated the sleeping gas.

  It took less than twenty seconds before the baby lizard was out cold.

  Epilogue

  “My name is Aria Light. I was one of two scientists on board Clandestine. Martin Caldera died courageously saving my life. If it weren’t for him, I would not be here right now.

  “Our mission was simple: Find a suitable planet for colonization. At this time, Obsidian is dangerous. That’s what we’ve decided to call it. The Black Planet. Obsidian.

  “Carnivorous lifeforms was half of the problem. The meteor shower we witnessed was the other half. If any species survived the storm, I’d be surprised.