Bringing Stella Home Read Online Free

are scattered all over this
local sector. I’m guessing they came in from at least a light-year
out, and at that distance, jump precision isn’t very good. It’s
going to take them a while to regroup, and that might give the KDF
time to scramble something together.”
    “ So we might be able to
beat them?”
    No.
    “ Yeah,” he said, avoiding
her eyes. “Maybe.”
    Maybe if the entire Gaian
Imperial Navy shows up in the next ten minutes. He drew in a long breath, trying to relax—he didn’t want
Stella to see through his lie.
    The Hameji had always fascinated him.
Descended from the explorers and frontiersmen in the early days of
space exploration, they had developed a culture entirely
independent from the rest of humanity. As spacefaring nomads, they
spent their entire lives on their battleships, never setting foot
on any inhabited world. Without any government to keep them in
line, warfare was the only law they knew—total, unrestrained
warfare.
    For generations, they had kept to
themselves, clan fighting against clan in the far reaches beyond
the old Imperial frontiers. In the last few years, however,
something or someone had united them as a single force, turning
them away from their myriad vendettas and blood feuds to rise up
against the armies and navies of civilized space. The frontier
worlds on the far side of the Good Hope Nebula had been the first
to fall, but the Hameji soon sought worthier prey. With the fall of
the Tajjur system only a few months ago, a bare handful of systems
now stood between them and the very heart of the New Gaian
Empire—Gaia Nova itself.
    Karduna was one of those
systems.
    A bright, soundless flash through the
windows on the opposite side of the aisle cast irregular shadows
against the seats and bulkheads. Screams filled the cabin, and Ben
quickly closed his eyes and shielded them with his arm. His hands,
he noted with some dismay, had started to shake
uncontrollably.
    “ What was that?” cried
Stella. The flash slowly faded, but the passengers continued to
scream in panic.
    “ A nuclear blast,” said
Ben. “Much closer this time.”
    “ Did it hit anyone? Did it
kill anyone?”
    “ I don’t know,” he said,
his voice cracking for the first time since puberty. “Probably not.
The Hameji are jumping nukes at our battleships, but our beacons
are probably interdicting—”
    Another intense flash of silent light
filled the shuttle, this time much brighter. Without thinking, Ben
grabbed his sister and pulled her close, shielding his eyes with
his arm. Adrenaline surged through his body as the nuclear blast
bathed them in impossibly brilliant light.
    “ My eyes!” the man in front
of them wailed, his voice joining a dozen others. “Oh God! My
eyes!”
    One one thousand, two one
thousand, three one thousand … Stella
trembled in Ben’s arms but still held onto him. When he reached
five, he opened his eyes for a peek. Outside, the pink afterglow of
the blast was subsiding. He let go of his sister and took a deep,
uneven breath.
    The situation in the cabin was quickly
deteriorating. Screams filled the air, and several of the
passengers were starting to panic. The man in front of them rose to
his feet and staggered down the aisle, covering his eyes with his
hand. Three stewardesses quickly tried to placate him, but when he
refused to return to his seat, one of them pulled out a short metal
stick and prodded him in the stomach. His scream jumped up an
octave, and his body went limp; two stewardesses caught him and
returned him to his seat.
    “ Wow,” Ben muttered.
Overhead, the Fasten Seat
Restraints sign flashed on.
    “ Ladies and gentlemen,
please remain calm,” came the captain’s voice over the
loudspeakers. “You may have noticed the emergency situation
outside, but I assure you, we are doing our best to get you all to
safety. I’ve been in contact with several evacuating freighters,
and one of them, the Sierra
Vista , will be picking us up soon. Again,
please