19. Paladian Ghosts
19
Paladian Ghosts
ISSA
T hree days.
A glorious, indulgent, sinfully perfect escapade before duty called them back to the Perseus Prime.
In their precious time, Issa did something she hadn’t done in years.
She surrendered.
To pleasure. To laughter. To a man she was growing to like more than she ever expected.
Because Ki’Remi Sable, behind closed doors, was nothing like the cold, calculating commander she had first met.
The gruff, one-word-answer man disappeared.
In his place was someone thoughtful, observant, and shockingly funny.
Who cooked for her without asking.
Who memorized how she took her kahawa with a dash of cream and ensured a mug awaited her before she woke up.
Who pulled her into slow, indulgent kisses while making breakfast and lifted her onto the counter so the food had to wait.
Who never complained when she stole his tee and sweatpants, just eyed her in them like he was committing every second to memory.
She loved it.
After years of functioning on all cylinders as a medic, warrior, and worried daughter, always on high alert, a lazy interlude was liberating.
They hibernated on his couch, curled up in blankets, as they binged a holo series neither of them would admit in public they were obsessed with.
She found out Ki’Remi had a secret soft spot for reality trash viewing when she caught him gripping a pillow during the season finale.
They cooked together, which was usually an excuse for him to press against her from behind and distract her with slow kisses along her neck.
They played cards, with Ki’Remi going at it with all the ruthlessness of a card shark. Until it got too competitive and ended with her sprawled beneath him, their clothes in various stages of disarray.
They made love til they couldn’t breathe.
‘It’s too much. You’re too extra,’ she protested one moment when he was thrusting into her, driving her to the precipice of oblivion.
‘ Fokk , we were fighting off celestial warriors and working all week; we deserve it,’ he growled at her as he groaned while bottoming out, stroking his cock into her, taking her to the edge of bliss once more.
Then they napped, tangled up together, limbs draped, skin on flesh, lost in each other.
With Remi, because he was Remi now in private, she felt like true to self.
She had the freedom to be herself.
Even when he raised a brow at her proclivity for pickles and cheese for lunch, he indulged it with a lazy smile.
When she danced in his kitchen whilst waiting for the food to simmer, he joined in and churned his hips to hers in an age-old grind.
He laughed without holding back when she muttered in a celestial tongue when she lost a round of holo-cards.
There was no pretense with him, no pressure.
Just a sense of acceptance, and for the first time in her life, that was enough.
The room was quiet except for the unhurried, steady rhythm of their breathing.
Issa lay against her lover’s chest, her fingers tracing lazy patterns over his inked skin.
The glow of his metanoid tattoos pulsed beneath her touch, the shifting symbols responding to the slow beat of his heart.
He wrapped an arm around her, idly skimming her spine. His other hand rested over her hip, his grip firm as if anchoring her to him.
Neither of them spoke for a long while.
It wasn’t an awkward silence or an empty one. It was the kind that came after a seismic session of lovemaking, still riding the waves of bliss.
Ki’Remi was the first to break it.
‘Issa,’ he rasped, his utterance rough from post-coital pleasure.
She hummed, tilting her chin to glance up at him.
His eyes were darker than usual, a pensive storm brewing behind them.
‘Tell me something true.’
She studied him for a moment, her fingers stilling against his chest.
There were a thousand things she could say.
A myriad of deflections, teases, or half-truths.
However, honesty was all that was left after all she’d laid bare.
‘I don’t know how to stop running,’ she whispered.
Ki’Remi exhaled, his grip tightening over her hip. ‘Perhaps it’s time you let someone catch you.’
Her heart stuttered. ‘Who exactly?’
‘Me.’
She shifted, pressing her forehead to his chest, her voice muffled on his skin. ‘You make it sound so easy, Sable.’
He released a quiet, humorless chuckle.
‘Nothing about you is easy, Elaris.’
She huffed. ‘Neither are you, Commander.’
‘True,’ he admitted. ‘I’m a difficult bastard.’
She lifted her head, studying his face, the chiseled lines, the raw power he carried.
Which wrapped around her in an aftermath that devastated her.
‘Yet, here we are,’ she murmured.
Ki’Remi’s fingers drifted up her spine, resting at the nape of her neck.
‘Here we are,’ he echoed.
‘Catch me if you can,’ she breathed.
‘I intend to give it a fokkin ’ good try,’ he growled.
It was the last thing he said for a long time as their breaths hitched and desire ramped up again.
Ki’REMI
A neural node tap jolted the Rider from his deep sleep.
He blinked, the ambient lights of the suite auto-adjusting as he stirred.
The room was quiet, save for Issa’s rhythmic breathing beside him.
Her golden curls spilled over the pillows, and her chest’s steady rise and fall was a soothing contrast to the urgency vibrating in his skull.
Kainan: Mirage and I need an urgent meeting. Now.
Ki’Remi exhaled.
Whatever this was, it would not wait until morning.
He peeled back the sheets, and Issa murmured something unintelligible, shifting between them.
He bent over her and ran his palm down the curve of her waist, stroking her skin in reassurance, and she stilled.
Allowing him to slip fluid, silent and controlled, from the bed before he padded toward the wardrobe.
He threw on a pair of loose sweats and a dark tee and slipped his feet into slides.
He stepped onto the marble and rug-strewn floors without a sound, exiting his front doorway.
Minutes later, he entered the Sable HQ boardroom, where Kainan already waited. His arms were folded, and he rubbed his eyes with one hand. His countenance was grim, and his hip leaned on the extensive oak desk.
He was also incongruously cloaked in an over-the-top scarlet, gold velvet robe and was barefoot.
‘Ki’Remi raised a brow.
‘Don’t,’ his khosi warned with a growl. ‘Twas a gift from Selene and the first thing I found.’
Mirage sat at the head of the table, a stunning figure wrapped in a liquid gold sheathe dress, her eyes flicking over both Riders with a rare expression.
Concern .
Ki’Remi slid into a chair, rubbing a hand over his jaw. ‘This better be good.’
‘When isn’t it?’ she intoned in a dulcet alto.
The Sable Group AI exhaled, lifted a long, elegant finger, and pointed at the holo projection above them.
The image sharpened into a series of tactical readouts, energy displacement charts, and cross-referenced data sets flashing across the vast display.
Also, imagery of one distinct vessel.
The unusual gunship that attacked them over Alloria Prime.
‘It’s about the assailant craft that fired on you and your crew. I took footage from your neural node and ran it through millions of databases and thousands of images,’ she began, tapping at the screen with a manicured digit. ‘I even compared it to all vessels in Pegasi. Against every classified system.’
‘What did you find?’ Ki’Remi rasped.
She snapped her fingers. ‘ Nada .’
Kainan’s gaze was wry. ‘She’s never seen anything like it.’
Ki’Remi frowned. ‘From another galaxy, then?’
‘Oh, it gets worse, darling,’ Mirage purred. She flicked her wrist, and another readout materialized a side-by-side comparison.
‘What am I looking at?’ the Sable medic asked.
‘The first image is of the munitions fire patterns from the celestial assailant. The other, an ancient, fractured data set, is from the Paladian ruins that are centuries old.’
Ki’Remi’s entire body tensed.
He leaned forward, studying the overlay. It wasn’t just similar. It was identical.
His intonation fell into a timbred burr, edged in steel. ‘You’re saying this mystery ship, which fired on my team and me, is linked to the weapons identifiers found in archaeological Paladian sites?’
Kainan and Mirage exchanged glances.
‘I am,’ the Sable Group AI confirmed.
Mirage tapped the screen again, enlarging sections of scorched Paladian relics.
Ki’Remi’s brow arched at the sigils burned into old ruins, fragmented historical records showing entire deities vanished overnight, civilizations erased, integral star maps rewritten.
‘If the energy signatures match,’ Ki’Remi muttered, ‘whoever these people are, they were fighting with or against the Paladians.’
Kainan’s voice was grave. ‘They either helped erase them in a galaxy-level extinction war, fought alongside them, or sent them running.’
Ki’Remi stared at the projection, mind racing.
Kainan sucked his teeth. ‘This is a foreign enemy. An ancient threat operating in the shadows of Pegasi for millennia or from some unknown dimension. Now, for whatever reason, they have resurfaced.’
‘ Fokk ,’ Ki’Remi rasped.
Mirage folded her arms. ‘You, my dear, are our closest link to figuring out who they are.’
His jaw flexed. ‘What do you need me to do?’
Mirage’s expression didn’t shift. ‘Your lover, Issa. You said she knew who they were.’
His stomach tightened. He didn’t like where this was going.
‘She shared.’
‘What has she told you?’
Ki’Remi sighed, then repeated Issa’s saga to the pair.
He let loose on the Sacran planet, the Sedevan Ascended deities, and the Savatti demi-gods.
Also, the Ssisigan warriors, the Saatifa guardians, Issa’s family, and what they endured at the hands of a Divine Immortal deity with no mercy.
Finally, what she had been forced to do since.
‘So she stole from the most precious treasure to the divinities of Sacra and ran with it?’ Kainan rasped.
‘Ki’Remi huffed. ‘For good reason.’
‘A freakin’ justification for the Ssigis venators to come hunting her again.’
He nodded at Mirage’s assertion. ‘True.’
‘Then you must find out more. Like whether they have plans to stay the fokk where they are for eternity or if they intend to bother us if she doesn’t hand over their shit,’ Kainan growled.
‘Likewise, if they come knocking again and demand her return, you somehow need to ensure she takes you with her so you can have a look-see and report,’ the AI added.
His body went still. ‘You asking me to spy on her?’
Mirage arched a brow. ‘Indeed. Good old-fashioned espionage and intelligence gathering.’
Kainan exhaled. ‘We’re urging you to do your job, aki .’
Ki’Remi’s nostrils flared. ‘I’m a surgeon.’
‘You’re also a Rider,’ Kainan countered. ‘A damn fine warrior first who’s made an oath to protect the Sable family, Eden II, and Pegasi at all costs. Furthermore, you’ve got a relationship with the one person who can get us into Sacran soil. We must exploit the opportunity, for we may never get another again.’
Ki’Remi leaned back in his chair, a streak of obstinacy hardening his face. ‘How? My ammo didn’t even penetrate those beings when they attacked. I only survived because she wiped them out. I’m nada against them.’
That’s what you think, but you are mistaken.
This time, the whisper came from a wellspring so deep within him that he almost growled out loud.
Tamping down the energy surge that went through him, he inhaled.
We have been waiting for such a time as this, Ki’Remi, son of the Ameru. Unleash us at the right moment, and we will win over these so-called gods for you.
His mind spun.
‘What’s up?’ his khosi asked, concern flitting as he stared at Ki’Remi’s stricken expression.
Which the Sable medic rearranged into a calm mask. ‘ De nada .’
Kainan was not so easily appeased.
His piercing flame-tinged eyes assessed his friend, cutting through to the heart of the matter like he always did. ‘You know something or have something you can use on this mission to our favor. Am I correct?’
Ki’Remi’s jaw clenched, the words hitting a raw edge inside him.
He did have three freakin’ somethings, but what to do with them, he’d no clue.
We’ll show you when the time is right and upon us.
He suppressed a shiver at the whisper, gritting his teeth.
The lines he drew between his calling, commitment to the Riders, his ancestral legacy, and his personal life were fast becoming blurred.
Messy too, with a potential for a significant fokk up.
He loathed uncertainty, muck, and fokk -ups in general.
‘So, tis an order,’ he growled, deflecting.
Kainan nodded, his voice steady. ‘ Naam . These attackers, whoever they are, are tied to an extinction-level war on Pegasi. Should they return with bigger guns, we must have intel on their weapons, army, artillery, and threat scale so we can defend and, if necessary, respond in kind.’
Silence pulsed between them.
Ki’Remi exhaled. He could fight the directive, argue, say he wouldn’t betray her.
However, this was no betrayal.
This was survival and the right move for his family, home, and future.
He sat back in his chair, muscles taut, every fiber of his being resisting the ask. ‘ Sawa .’
Mirage beamed. ‘You beauty.’
Kainan was still pensive and nailed his friend with an extended look. ‘Whatever you have in your back pocket when it comes to it, use it.’
Ki’Remi arched a brow. ‘As long as I’m absolved of my actions and not disavowed.’
‘Never,’ his khosi grinned. ‘I’m off to bed and my woman. I’ll leave you two to wrap up.’
He stalked out, his ludicrous velvet robe billowing as the chamber door shut behind him.
‘Still can’t work out who was the stick and the carrot in this here wind-up,’ Ki’Remi groused, turning to the Sable Group’s mind master.
‘Kainan’s the softie. I’m always the stick, the whip, and the rod, my friend,’ Mirage said with a sweet smile.
‘What great big whips you have,’ Ki’Remi growled.
‘All the better to smack you into line with,’ Mirage replied with a sanguine simper.
He spent the next twenty minutes in a detailed briefing.
The AI walked him through everything they had, what little it was. The unknown ship’s weapon profiles, the tactical analysis, and power readings.
By the time he left, his mind churned with more unanswered questions.
He returned to his suite, silent as a shadow, slipping into bed without waking Issa.
She stirred.
Still half-asleep, she murmured with a sultriness he was unable to resist.
In an instant, she curled into him, her bare leg sliding over his, her body melting into his warmth, her breathing slow, peaceful, unaware of the turmoil burning through him.
He exhaled, kissing the crown of her curls as he soothed her back to sleep.
However, his mind roiled in chaos, and it took many long minutes of burying his face in Issa’s nape before he quieted and let himself fall into slumber.
The following morning, Ki’Remi did not want to leave.
Not his suite, not the peace they built in those stolen days, and not Issa, warm and languid in his arms, tangled in his sheets.
Still, duty called, as did a curly new order burning his craw.
With reluctance, he rose from bed and packed up while she stretched, still in his tee.
Her eyes followed him as he moved around the room.
‘You look pissed, Sable,’ she teased, taking a sip of kahawa from the cup he made earlier for her.
‘I’m always pissed when I have to deploy,’ he muttered.
His jaw clenched as the reality of last night’s briefing settled over his mind like a lead weight.
He hated that he’d been handed a mission that meant prying into the woman who was fast becoming his reason for breathing.
Despite all his years of loyalty to the Riders, this was the first assignment he didn’t want to take because spying on Issa wasn’t just distasteful.
It felt like a breach of a sacred, unspoken promise, given she opened her heart and shared her most agonizing secrets with him.
However, he had no choice.
The ghosts of an ancient war were resurfacing, and somehow, she was tied to it.
He ran a hand over his face, his fingers grazing his scruff as he shifted to glance at her.
Her face was still sexy, soft, and sensual in the morning, unaware of the conflict raging inside him.
Fokk. He hoped this was not going to be a disaster.
She laughed, rolling out of bed, bare feet padding across the ebony floors as she came up behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist.
He turned, cupping her face, his thumb tracing the edge of her jaw. ‘I’ll be fine. I’m just fokkin ’ chaotic that we must return to duty.’
‘So am I,’ she murmured, pressing a slow, open-mouthed kiss to his lips.
Ki’Remi closed his eyes and savored her.
‘We need to get going,’ she whispered.
Yet neither of them moved.
Not until the soft chime from Ki’Remi’s chrono reminded them of reality.
Packed and dressed, they exited his home and jumped in a fly cab to the spaceport.
Inside, they held hands and watched Eden II rush by outside the windows.
Halfway there, in the darkened cabin of their transport, Ki’Remi couldn’t take it anymore.
He reached for her.
Issa met him midway.
Their lips crashed together, a slow, deep kiss that promised more, that whispered of a thousand more nights just like the ones they had just shared.
She sighed into his mouth, fingers gliding into his locs, and he groaned, pulling her onto his lap, his hand sliding up her thigh.
The flyer’s AI interrupted them with a soft alert.
They were approaching the dock.
With reluctance, he eased back, forehead pressing against hers as they caught their breath.
Her mouth was red and swollen, pupils dilated.
Fokk.
He wanted to drag her back to his suite and never leave.
Instead, they straightened their uniforms, pulled professionalism over themselves like armor, and stepped out into the busy port.
They didn’t touch, linger, or let a single ounce of what had just passed between them show as they walked toward the loading docks of Perseus Prime.
The moment they boarded the dreadnought, they were back to business.
Ki’Remi greeted his crew with a curt nod, slipping back into work mode.
So did she in an unspoken agreement that the past three days were theirs alone.
The massive vessel launched.
Their next destination was the planet of Falasia, to one of its smaller, poorer coastal cities with no major hospital facilities.
The residents of New Madi had no access to available and reliable health specialists. Diseases and congenital disabilities often went untreated.
Missions like these, which provided life-changing surgeries and healthcare solutions to souls who would otherwise be condemned, energized Ki’Remi.
Within hours of appearing in orbit over the New Madi, Perseus Prime became a hub of controlled chaos.
Teams of surgeons, doctors, nurses, and autobots descended in landers to set up a field clinic in a robust synth-tent setup.
Patients arrived on transports, their symptoms and defects ranging from severe to crucial.
Soon, the atmosphere was rank with antiseptic, sweat, and exhaustion, the frenzy of a battle being fought, not with weapons, but with scalpels, syringes, and desperate hands.
Each hour was utter carnage as the extent of the need unfolded.
Ki’Remi was expected to be in four places at once: an awning ward overflowing with those in need, a surgical list stacked with critical cases.
Plus, an onslaught of emergencies in the roughshod A&E and an isolation unit packed with souls deteriorating faster than they could be saved.
He raced, his meta-strength lending him speed as lives hung in the balance.
Close to him at most times, Issa was a blur of efficiency in theater. Focused on a series of severe cases, she was entirely in her element.
She moved like a force of nature, tending to the worst situations with hands that burned with her Ssignakht power.
He let her, unwilling to stop her, given the level of need.
Yet, it wasn’t enough.
The sick kept streaming in, and at one point, he glanced outside to see a football field-sized tent packed with bodies leaning on crutches.
More in wheelchairs and hover beds, all waiting to be triaged.
He walked individuals through the consent forms, his gut twisting for time itself had already betrayed most of them.
He scrubbed in, the routine ingrained in his bones. Hands washed. Gloves pulled on. Drapes laid, and surgical autobots on the go.
Gazing down at the theater table, the switch flipped.
The patients in his care ceased to be an individual. Each was a battlefield, a puzzle, a body housing a problem that needed fixing.
He put them back together before sending them out and letting in the next patient.
The on-call shift stretched like an eternity, a relentless tide of cases and bodies needing saving.
Hours blurred, meals became routine, and even when Ki’Remi got a moment to spoon some food into his mouth, his trauma pager screamed.
When the surgeries slowed, the ward rounds still had to be done.
Then, it was back to the grind.
Rinse, sleep, repeat.
The most challenging moments came when he had to tell Falasian families that their loved ones’ lives were in danger.
The most satisfying, however, came from being thanked by those he helped save, sometimes in tears.
It took the edge off the guilt, the exhaustion, the lingering shadows of doubt that they’d get through the tides of Falasians needing their care.
What also did the trick was that Issa and Ki’Remi took solace in each other in their stolen interludes. Brushing hands in the hallways. Longing kisses in the back of tent wards, whispered conversations over kahawa in the mess hall.
She waited for him as much as possible after the shifts, the chaos, and the back-breaking surgeries.
She wrapped her arms around him when he returned to Perseus on a lander and slumped into bed in his quarters beside her.
He sunk into her, worshiped her, and adored her.
Every fokkin ’ time.