Star Force: Death Knell (SF26) Read online

  No, they’d leave that jumpship for last. Hopefully the fate of the other two would convince the Nestafar onboard to surrender, whereupon they’d be escorted off the ship to Calavari prison camps on the surface…then Star Force could board the vessel and look for survivors, as well as recover remains and decide whether or not the ship was salvageable.

  A vessel of that size was hard not to be salvageable, but there was no way of knowing how much internal sabotage the Nestafar might do on their way out…if they chose to surrender. If they didn’t, then the definition of ‘salvageable’ truly came into play.

  That would be undertaken by the Calavari or Kvash, because Star Force didn’t have the personnel in system to handle a ship of that size for more than basic operations, let alone repair and refit duty. Morgan’s concern was to deny the enemy the use of the ships and the material and troops onboard…if they were to become of use to the Alliance after that fact then that was just a bonus.

  Morgan dried off quickly and walked down from the top of the shower compartment and over to her closet where she began pulling out fresh clothes. As she did a tingle manifested in her arm and discharged against a uniform top as she brushed up against it like static electricity…save for the fact that the sleeve of the uniform jumped back an inch from her arm like a gust of wind had blown it.

  She blinked twice, then dismissed the thought as something random, either her eyes playing tricks on her or she’d nudged it without feeling…which was entirely possible given the sensory disruption in her body. Everything felt as if she was controlling her body like a puppet without actually being inside, a sort of disconnect that she hoped would wear off soon, though her brief breakdown period had helped.

  Morgan pulled on a T-shirt then covered it with a white Archon’s uniform top, zipping it up along the left side and around behind the shoulder and up to the neckline, hiding the thin division in the material from frontal view. She pulled on a pair of white socks that matched the white shoes then found a dark hair tie for her ponytail. As she was pulling it back her other arm got the tingles again, like a case of goose bumps that moved from her elbow down towards her wrist.

  She flexed her arm and felt it discharge in a flurry…as well as seeing the cuff of her uniform puff up for a moment.

  “What the hell?” she said, digging her fingers underneath the material and rubbing her wrist and forearm. That was twice now, and she doubted that she was completely seeing things, though she still didn’t fully trust her senses.

  It had been tingles both times, so she tried to summon them up again. At first they wouldn’t come, then she remembered having been able to make them come back as a kid. She thought hard, trying to pull up the memories that had always elicited them. It wasn’t a scary movie, or being surprised, it was…

  Then she remembered. In her mind she heard a familiar voice yell out, not in anger or rage, but in sheer effort and determination. She imagined her hair changing to blonde in a flash and energy racing from her body…then the tingle came back, this time down her back and moving up her spine. She mentally held it there for a moment then pushed it outward, trying to get the tingle to move down her right arm. Instead it dissipated again, going out her neck and popping her pony tail up into the air, again like a gust of wind.

  “Ok, I am not seeing things,” she said to herself as she found a chair and sat down. Her head had been pounding ever since she’d walked out of the med bay and she rubbed it for a moment as she thought about her eye color change, wondering if the regenerator had also changed some other things in her body, including whatever this was.

  Part of her wanted to push it aside and get up to the bridge as soon as possible, but she forced herself to take a moment and self-analyze…what exactly had she just done?

  The ranger thought about it for several minutes and, coming to no conclusions, did what any sensible Archon would.

  She tried to do it again.

  It took a couple tries to find the right mental switch, piggybacking on memories of Dragonball Z, but eventually she got the tingly sensation to form in her right forearm and willed it to move up into her hand…then she pulled her left arm overtop so that her sleeve hung down an inch or so above her opposite palm. With an easy effort, as if the tingle wanted to be released, the sensation bled out of her hand.

  In response the cuff of her sleeve moved, not once, but like a quick flutter…or more precisely, as if a tiny conduit of air had blown on it for about .75 seconds.

  Morgan stared at her palm, wide eyed…then her sparkling orbs narrowed as another thought occurred to her.

  “The dragon,” she whispered. “It said we should have other abilities. Maybe the regenerator kicked them on.”

  Following that line of thought she got up and went back over to the mirror and stared into her intimidating eyes.

  “Ok, this needs investigating. A little hand puff isn’t dangerous, so it can wait a few hours,” she said, staring into her reflection and wondering if it was really her body she was in, given how odd the rest of it felt, not to mention this new…skill.

  “Alright,” she said, nodding at her new look. “Airbending skills can wait till downtime. Avenging my brothers and sisters comes first.”

  With that thought focused firmly in her mind Morgan took her still shaky body and left her quarters headed for the bridge.

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