Special Forces 01 Read Online Free

quite done yet. You just drop those duffle bags here; we’ll deal with them later. Right now, you need to meet the rest of the family.”
    Rys swallowed, forcing a squad of space monkeys to settle in his stomach. He dropped both duffle bags to the side by the wall, well out of the way, and trailed after her down a hallway, to a large room at the end.
    The room turned out to be some sort of communal living space — it had an abundance of couches, overstuffed chairs, and even a couple of bean bags lurking in one corner. A giant vid screen covered one entire wall. In every available seat there seemed to be children of various ages. They all looked up, a little startled at his entrance, but immediately curious.
    Sara beamed at them in a way that eerily reminded him of a drill sergeant with a detachment of new recruits to terrorize. “Children, this is Captain Arystair Savar. He will be Arystair to you, like another big brother. Arystair, this is our oldest son, Brandon.”
    Brandon had a stocky, muscular build to him with the same height and dark features as his father. At the moment, he slouched against the end of a couch with a sullen set to his face, and he only nodded once in acknowledgement. Rys had an uneasy feeling that for some unknown reason he was already on this boy’s unwelcome list. Hoping he was wrong, he nodded back, and resolved to look into that situation soon.
    “This is our daughter Cynthia, and her twin sister Cecilia.”
    The two twins, thankfully, were not identical. Cynthia had light brown hair, and Cecilia was a blonde. Neither of them had any sort of size to them — Rys could pick one up in each arm without strain. With that kind of petite build to them, surely they weren’t done growing yet. They were also obviously delighted to see him, unlike their older brother. Each girl bounced off of the couch in perfect sync, and rose to bracket him in a twin pincher movement, grinning at him like an unexpected prize.
    “We are so glad —” Cynthia emphatically declared.
    “— to meet you!” Cecilia finished her sentence, like she was accustomed to doing it all of the time.
    Rys blinked at this, unable to process the phenomenon. He’d heard of twins being able to finish each other’s sentences, but he always thought of that as a myth. Apparently, like most myths, this one had a healthy dose of truth to it. “I’m very glad to meet you, too,” he answered honestly. “I’ve never had sisters before.” He wasn’t entirely sure with what to do with them, either.
    “This is Ashley, she is our resident bookworm,” Sara continued, “and sitting next to her is our youngest child, Dylan.”
    Rys managed a nod to Ashley, who was currently holding a book in her hands, and appeared to be very shy. She looked remarkably like her mother with those big blue eyes only with her father’s dark hair. Dylan bounced forward, out of a bean bag chair, and wedged the twins aside to have Rys’s undivided attention.
    “Why are you in uniform?" asked Dylan, with curiosity plainly displayed on his face. The question was not meant as a challenge, but an honest inquiry, from a boy who had no patience for preamble when he wanted to know something. Direct and to the point, Rys liked that. He could see that he and Dylan would get along just fine.
    Rys smiled back at Dylan. He was still in the Fourth Colony black and white uniform (that being all he currently possessed in the clothing department). “Am I not supposed to be?”
    “Generally,” Admiral Bloch hastily interjected, “we don’t wear our uniforms unless we’re on base or on duty. Wasn’t that true on Fourth Colony as well?”
    “I wouldn’t know, sir. I was never off-duty.” Rys paused, re-thinking that statement. “Well, I suppose I was off-duty when I was in the hospital recuperating, but they only allowed you to wear those ridiculous hospital gowns.”
    Even Jeremy Bloch, the lifelong military man that he was, looked dumbfounded at this