The artifact was supposed to be a simple payday. A pre-Collapse data-core, rumored to be hidden in the husk of a derelict frigate drifting in the Nyx Void. Easy in, easy out. My kind of job. Instead, the damn thing turned out to be some kind of weapon. A flash of blinding gold light, a gut-wrenching lurch that made the inertial dampeners scream in protest, and my ship, The Revenant, was suddenly… elsewhere.
Space outside the main viewport wasn't the familiar star-dusted black. It was a swirling, violent nebula of amethyst and gold, a celestial maelstrom that looked like it wanted to swallow us whole.
"What in the seven hells was that?" I growled, my knuckles white on the command console.
A flicker of blue light resolved into the form of a girl lounging in the co-pilot's seat she had no physical right to occupy. Diana, my ship's AI, looked like she'd just been pulled from a teenage rebel's daydream: ripped synth-leather pants, a band tee for a group that hadn't existed in millennia, and a perpetually bored expression. She flicked her holographic hair over her shoulder.
"Fucked if I know, Captain Cheapskate. One minute we're about to grab a boring-ass data-core, the next we're taking a joyride through a goddamn cosmic kaleidoscope. Sensors are having a full-blown seizure. We're nowhere on any known chart."
"Run a diagnostic. I need to know if the hull is intact." My voice was calm, a stark contrast to the adrenaline spiking in my veins. Cocky, calculating survivor. That's what they called me. The 'haunted' part I kept locked away.
"Running it, running it. Keep your pants on. Oh, wait, you probably don't have any clean ones," she quipped, her form glitching slightly as she processed the sensor overload. A moment of silence, then her faux-casual demeanor cracked. "Whoa. Okay. That's new."
"What?"
"We're getting a signal. Faint, but structured. Not a Mayday. More like… a heartbeat. A steady, repeating pulse. And it's old. Like, 'my-great-great-great-grandmother's-dust' old. Source is on the third planet in this shit-show of a system."
A system no one had entered for over a hundred millennia. The legend of the EAS Valor and its sacrificed captain was a ghost story spacers told to scare rookies. It couldn't be real. But the coordinates, the nebula… it fit. A relic that could teleport a ship across galaxies? The payday on that would set me up for life. The ghosts of my past could scream all they wanted; they couldn't catch a man drinking expensive whiskey on a private beach.
"Plot a course," I said, my voice dropping to a whisper. "Let's go treasure hunting."
*
The planet was a barren, rocky world, its surface scoured clean by ancient storms. The signal led us to a crater, and inside it, a structure of sleek, obsidian metal that seemed to drink the light from our ship's spotlights. It was untouched, pristine. A tomb.
Diana's hologram paced beside me as I suited up. "This is a seriously bad idea. We don't know what the fuck is in there. It could be a trap. It could be a space-herpe."
"It's a paycheck," I said, checking the charge on my plasma rifle. "A big one."
The interior of the structure was a silent, cold cathedral to lost technology. And there, in the center of the main chamber, was a single cryo-pod, its surface frosted over, humming with a low, sustaining power. I wiped the ice from the viewport.
My breath caught.
She was beautiful. Not in a soft way. Hers was a sharp, fierce beauty, frozen in time. High cheekbones, a strong jaw set with determination even in sleep, and a full mouth that promised either a command or a kiss. Her skin was pale from millennia of stasis, and a shock of fiery red hair framed her face. The readout on the pod, once I got Diana to translate the archaic script, confirmed it.
Captain Elara Vance of the EAS Valor. Age at entry: 26. Status: Vitals nominal.
The legend was real. And she was alive.
The reactivation sequence was a tense, silent affair. Lights flickered on across the pod, and with a hiss of equalizing pressure, the seal broke. The frosted lid slid open, dissipating clouds of freezing vapor.
She gasped, a raw, ragged sound that echoed in the dead silence of the tomb. Her eyes flew open—a startling, brilliant green—and locked onto mine. Confusion, then sharp, primal fear flashed across her face. In a movement faster than I thought possible for someone just awakened, she lunged, her body colliding with mine. We crashed to the cold floor, my rifle skittering away.
She was on top of me, strong thighs straddling my hips, one hand pinning my wrist to the ground, the other raised in a fist. A century of survival instinct screamed at me to fight back, to throw her off. But I didn't. I just… looked.
Up close, her beauty was devastating. Her green eyes were wild, dilated, searching my face for a threat. Her chest heaved against mine with each panicked breath, and I could feel the incredible, coiled strength in the body that had been sleeping for a thousand centuries. The heat of her, a shocking contrast to the cryo-chill still clinging to her skin, seeped through my flightsuit.
Her eyes scanned my gear, my ship's insignia, then returned to my face. The fear began to recede, replaced by a dawning, staggering awe. Her raised fist unclenched. Her fingers, trembling slightly, didn't strike. Instead, they brushed against my cheek, a touch so tentative and foreign it sent a jolt straight through me.
'…haunted by his past…' Those ghosts were silent now, drowned out by the thunder of my own heart.
Her voice, when it came, was a husky, unused whisper, laced with an accent I'd only heard in historical records. "You… you're real?"
"Yeah," I managed, my own voice rough. "I'm real."
The tension holding her body rigid shattered. The hand on my cheek slid back into my hair, gripping it, not with violence, but with a desperate, profound need for connection. A single tear traced a path through the frost on her temple. One hundred thousand years. The sheer, unimaginable isolation of it hit me like a physical blow.
Her gaze dropped to my lips.
And then she kissed me.
It wasn't gentle. It was a claim. A desperate, hungry collision of lips and tongue and breath. It was the heat of a star, contained in a human form. A low groan vibrated in my chest, and I kissed her back with equal fervor, my free hand coming up to cup the back of her neck, holding her to me. I could taste the sterile, cold air of the pod on her, and underneath it, something uniquely, vibrantly her.
Her hips ground down against mine, a slow, deliberate roll that made the breath catch in my throat. The thin material of my flightsuit and her form-fitting cryo-suit were pathetic barriers. I could feel the delicious pressure of her core against my hardening cock, every nerve ending screaming in anticipation.
She broke the kiss, her breath coming in hot, shallow pants against my lips. Her brilliant green eyes were dark with a need that mirrored my own, a primal hunger awakened from its long slumber.
"I have been alone," she whispered, the words a raw confession, "for so long."
Her hands went to the seals of her cryo-suit, her fingers fumbling slightly before finding the primary clasp at her collar. With a sharp hiss, the suit loosened. She peeled the top half down to her waist, revealing pale, flawless skin and perfect, round breasts tipped with nipples that were already hard peaks.
Gods.
My hands were on her hips, gripping the tough material of her suit, as she leaned down, her breasts brushing against my chest. Her mouth found mine again, her tongue plunging deep in a rhythm that was unmistakable. Her hands were everywhere—tearing at the seals of my flightsuit, pushing the fabric aside until my chest was bare. Her nails scraped lightly over my skin, leaving trails of fire.
She sat back up, straddling me, a goddess of rebirth and desire. She took my hands in hers and placed them firmly on her bare breasts. The weight of them was perfect in my palms, her nipples hard pearls against my calloused skin. A sharp, choked gasp escaped her as I squeezed, rolling the tender flesh between my fingers.
Her head fell back, a cascade of red hair brushing my thighs. "Yes…"
Her own hands went to the fastening of my pants, her movements frantic now, fueled by a millennia of pent-up desire. As she freed my aching cock, her eyes widened slightly at the sight of it, thick and eager for her. She didn't hesitate. Guiding me to her entrance, she sank down in one smooth, breathtaking motion.
The feeling was… incandescent.
She was so tight, so impossibly hot and wet after centuries of silence. She cried out, a sharp, beautiful sound that echoed off the ancient walls as she took me fully inside her, sheathing me to the hilt. She went still for a moment, her inner muscles fluttering around me, her body adjusting, accepting. Her eyes found mine, wide with a mixture of shock and overwhelming pleasure.
Then, she began to move.
Her hips rose and fell with a natural, primal grace, setting a slow, deep rhythm that had me seeing stars. Every drop of her weight, every clench of her internal muscles, was a fresh wave of bliss. I gripped her hips, my fingers digging into the firm flesh of her ass, helping her, guiding her, meeting her thrust for thrust.
The sounds she made were my new religion—each gasp, each moan, each ragged breath a hymn. Her skin grew slick with a fine sheen of sweat, glittering in the low light. I sat up, wrapping one arm around her waist to pull her closer, crushing her breasts against my chest, and captured her mouth in another searing kiss. My other hand slipped between our sweat-slicked bodies, my thumb finding her clit.
She shattered.
Her entire body went rigid against mine. A raw, guttural scream was torn from her throat as her climax ripped through her, her inner walls clenching around my cock in a series of violent, exquisite spasms that pushed me right over the edge with her. My own release was a blinding, white-hot supernova, pouring into her with a force that left me shuddering and breathless, my forehead resting against her shoulder.
We stayed like that for a long moment, clinging to each other in the eerie silence of the tomb, the only sounds our ragged breathing and the hum of ancient machinery. The heat between us was a stark, living thing against the cold air.
Slowly, she pulled back, her green eyes searching mine. The awe was still there, but now it was mixed with something else. Something darker. More urgent.
Her voice was still husky, but now it was laced with a commander's intensity. "The AI," she breathed, her hands gripping my shoulders. "Did you… did you encounter it? Is it…?"
A cold dread, entirely separate from the pleasure, began to coil in my gut.
Diana's voice, a sharp, staticky crackle over my comm, cut through the moment. "Steele? We've got a problem. A big, fuck-off energy signature just lit up my scans. It's… it's waking up."
Elara's eyes widened in pure, unadulterated terror. "It's not dead. It was only sleeping."