"What do you mean I, of all people, have to go down there? I'd rather just sit here at this nice little bar and keep getting smashed."

  The Army Lieutenant Colonel takes a long drag on his cigar before slowly exhaling a noxious cloud towards, but not directly into the face of Shariah, before he continues,

  "I have literally over a thousand men and women under the rank of E-4 who can play bodyguard, and in fact, it might be a good idea that they do so since idle hands will always cause trouble..."

  Shariah sighs, sitting down at another barstool, the tender starting to mix up her regular. The Space Station that had been built as a collective outpost, known as Fort Gunny, ended up being more civilian than military in the months following its creation. The officers' club, where the two sit becoming a favorite spot of the fleet's officers as it's the only room in the entire station that has an air filter designed for tobacco smoke.

  Shariah takes a swig of her vod-cran and, with a groan, tells the indignant military officer who is forty years her elder,

  "Alright, what will it take for me to get you to do this? As two people, not as military officers of somewhat similar rank... despite me being mission commander, mind you, and you should in theory listen to me... but I digress. What favor will it take? Uriel and Josef are up my ass and they specifically want you as their escort."

  The mustached man raises an eyebrow, letting out a massive puff of smoke, and he looks distant for a moment before responding more to himself rather than the woman next to him.

  "So the old fucker swings out and misses at fourteen because she has a thing for fat boys and now I get to make it my problem while he gets to actually go and do his job...wow, lucky me..."

  Shariah instantly makes a mental note about this new lore between the scientists and the Admiral before she motions for the man to make his request and get it over with. With a deep drag of his drink, which somewhat smells like caramel, he answers,

  "If it wasn't specifically them and literally in any other way, I'd be an ass and probably be the perverted old man and ask for a smooch, but for today, I want you to request me and my men transferred back home so we can join the war. I requested it, but as a nominal subordinate to you, I don't get to just ask for these things by skipping the chain of command."

  Shariah hides her slight recoil at his initial joking request but nods along before granting,

  "Alright, done. I'll put it in, but you'll be responsible for the logistics of getting your army boys out of here, the delegation of their previous duties, and finding the replacements."

  He nods, responding,

  "Yeah, fair enough. I know what I'll request, see if Congress will lend a hand..."

  His eyes flash mischievously for a moment before, with a shit-eating grin, he teases,

  "Buuuttt... if you are actually fishing for lil ol me, then I'm right here and fresh for the smoochin sweetheart."

  Shariah, with a blank expression, finishes her drink and then pours the ice onto his lap before leaving, her stoic front cracking as her melodic laugh fills the officers' club. For a moment, she realizes that the combat branches of the military might be rubbing off on her, a horrible thought... but it sure is fun...

  Lieutenant Colonel Malakai finds himself in a rather bad situation. First, he was forced to switch from his far more comfortable officer's power armor into a bubble-helmeted EVA suit, absolutely ruining his self-image as some sort of dashing Roman legate. Second, he wasn't allowed to bring an actually good APC for the mission; a big fat armored recovery vehicle was chosen instead, as they needed to carry all kinds of scientific supplies. Thirdly, he cannot smoke inside the vehicle, and definitely can't smoke outside, thanks to a little thing called immediate death by radiation. His leg bounces nervously as the sound of modern pop music plays through his helmet's speaker, as the connected coms of this little expedition are always on for scientific recording purposes, and Uriel, the gluttonous monster, picked the music, which is quite upbeat despite her constant stoic expression.

  Across from him is the alien woman that his brother had adopted, who is practically glowing now that her body is able to reabsorb the radiation or magic or whatever it is. Malakai doesn't know or really care which it is. All he cares about is that the entire planet and the woman are the equivalent of standing in front of a plutonium core going hypercritical continuously. Not the best way to spend a day.

  Luckily, Malakai isn't the only soldier forced to come along, for on,e he has the driver of the recovery vehicle to keep him company... except that poor boy is sitting there scared shitless of his absolute superior being in the same vehicle as him on top of being a little hesitant to leaving the nice safe spaceship or the newly constructed terrestrial habitats. No doubt it's a little scary for an E2 like him. Despite it being practically a post-scarcity time for humanity, the grunts on the ground are usually just the rejects from their various homeworld who seek adventure and belonging in the stars. The boy is probably about a year or two out of high school, if he finished it at all. He's at least not the complete incompetent type, because those are too stupid to actually understand the danger of this situation, and unfortunately, the danger isn't just a bullet through the head. It's instead invisible death.

  Suddenly, the grating pop music stops, and Uriel orders,

  "Stop here, we can begin setting up now."

  Her fat husband gets to his feet, his face giddy with excitement for whatever experiment the scientists are trying to run. Malakai has the back ramp open, and they all climb out into the rather scenic open plains somewhere in a valley between mountains. He questions himself why they couldn't have just brought a shuttle, but he swallows the thought, understanding that would make things too easy.

  The driver begins following his previous orders, manning the crane on top of the recovery vehicle and maneuvering the large device they had come to set up out in the wilderness. Malakai watches as the large pillar is erected, and he helps attach it to the ground, manually pounding stakes into the ground with a large hammer. He swears the entire time under his breath, but gets the job done. Once he finishes his piece, he simply waits while a couple of eggheads begin activating the device. Malakai watches with little interest as he sits on the back step of the vehicle.

  He watches as the alien woman practically frolics through the field, minding her own business and really having no reason to be here, but if people who don't need to be here didn't come, then he shouldn't be here either.

  Malakai can't help but watch her with a warm smile on his face, the feeling and expression the same as when a person watches a young child playing and overall enjoying life. The sight of her just enjoying the warm sun or whatever else in the environment the aliens enjoy, Malakai starts to wonder how her current predicament is affecting her right now. First, she was a relative of the main leader of some manner of rebellion movement. Her father and all her comrades are obliterated in a pitched battle. Then she is captured and enslaved. Then the same guy who is responsible for her initial capture and the killing of her comrades is the one she is gifted to, and soon after, she is basically press-ganged into the US Navy by that same man. It's a moral question Malakai can't really find an answer to, because this is one of those situations where he can't see either of the two main parties as doing anything necessarily wrong, other than the kingdom, because they take slaves. He watches the alien woman sit in the flowers and cussing under his breath, he approaches her to get her two cents, because he knows full well his dumbass older brother has been ignoring these types of questions due to how busy he has been.

  Malakai sits down next to her and looks out at the distant mountains, with that strange golden hue covering the world around them. He opens with,

  "Phillia... I know we aren't too well acquainted and I might be overstepping here... but how are you feeling?"

  The woman shrugs with a smile, responding,

  "Right now I feel great. On your ships, I cannot replenish my mana for both reasons of safety and for the utter lack of it in your environments, so I've felt rather drained and tired over the last few weeks. I'll admit the feeling of it once again flowing through my veins feels really great."

  Malakai nods, argues with himself internally, and then continues,

  "That's great, but not what I meant... I meant your whole situation... I want to make sure we can take care of you properly. I'm less of a diplomat, politician, or scientist than my brother, and he isn't any of those things,s so it's not our place to be the ones who seek cooperation with non-humans or how to even coexist. I'm Army, I'm the one you call up to go break spines... so I guess what I'm asking is, how do you feel about the situation you are in and how can we improve it so you feel... less bad if you feel bad..."

  The woman pauses for a moment before, with a deep sigh, she answers,

  "I feel a little... out of my place to be honest... I know my duties and my role, but I still feel out of place. I know none of the references to stories or politics people make, I don't understand the...err... technology of the ship or anything like that. On top of it, I am forced to feel so drained and tired as my very being, like right now, is beyond deadly to humans. I enjoy being able to cure you all, but I always feel like an outsider as the misunderstandings go both ways; no one understands me, and I do not understand them.

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  I don't know what could be done to alleviate this issue... or these issues, and the one who I both owe my life to thanks to his kindness in freeing me from bondage and offering me freedoms that even as a noble I would rarely enjoy, he seems... so untouchable... so beyond me and my capability even though on the surface he is just any other human. He feels unapproachable, and when I do ask for context, or did back when I first came aboard, he only seemingly explained things that were needed for my duties, not for my... well, my comfort. I can't say he was mean and was in fact quite kind to me, but I feel a little lonely without him around, and with the others I know, like Lady Shariah taking on his extra duties, I feel... even more isolated."

  Malakai sits there with his lips pursed in thought. He then takes a long breath, pats her shoulder gently, and explains,

  "I don't really understand your isolation because I am not you, and I have never been in your exact situation, but I can sympathize with it and somewhat can begin to get how awful it must feel. As for my older brother... he's different... It's a long story, but let's just say he is a little sick... or maybe a lot."

  Phillia interrupts,

  "Is there another disease that affects mankind? Like the curse? I'd be more than willing to work on ways to cure it with my magic if possible!"

  Malakai feels his stomach sink as he prepares to tell an awful story, but he shakes his head and continues,

  "No... It's not a physical ailment... or it might be a little bit, but it's something that cannot be cured; it can only be dealt with."

  Malakai takes a small tablet from his hip and begins searching through some pictures on it as he continues,

  "My brother, he is strong... stronger than most, as I almost broke going through maybe a tenth of what he did through our lives, and I'm a strong son of a bitch."

  He opens the picture he is looking for and reveals a picture of a family, a mother, a father, two sons, a daughter, and a baby. Malakai explains,

  "Right here, that baby in the woman's arms, that's me, and the oldest of the boys is the Admiral. I was about one year old in this photo. I never knew our parents or two of my older siblings. All I've ever had was him. Not even a teenager and then made in charge of a two-year-old, and very few people left around to even offer a hand.

  Of course, Uriel and Josef's families helped us out, but we grew up fine, me under his guidance as an older brother, which he always made sure I knew was his role, not as my dad. Then we grew up, became members of the military, and we've suffered in our own ways. I lost my wife about two decades ago in an unfortunate accident unrelated to our curse, and that almost got me, but he remained there for me, but not as the boy, and man who raised me...

  I can't explain it, but you see that look in his eyes when he talks, and the cadence of his speech, even without the weird stuff the translators do. That looks as if he sees hundreds of you, behind and beyond, that cadence of almost manic nervousness, as if every word had been planned out to perfection, as if he had a full argument with himself before he even decided what to say.

  That's not always been him. I believe he thinks he is speaking and talking as he always had, a kind and jovial kind of guy, quick with a joke, and rarely able to take anything seriously. I fully believe in his own mind and to his own ears, he still speaks like that, he still acts like that."

  Phillia asks quietly, engrossed in the story,

  "I have noticed his differences from the other humans... even those giant... Marines... I describe it as if he is speaking as if he has had the same conversation with you before. What happened?"

  Malakai nods and solemnly says,

  "He probably has had that conversation before... maybe a dozen to a thousand times..."

  Malakai straightens up and asks,

  "Do you notice how many humans have metal built into their heads and bodies?"

  She nods, and Malakai continues,

  "My brother... he has considerably more than most, at least the last time I saw him, he was.

  Well, what I'm about to tell you isn't classified anymore, but is supposed to still stay quiet because it was morally and entirely wrong, but here we go. There was a project called Kronos, which means nothing to you, but it's an ancient mythical character that lorded over time. While during the time of his station as a ship's captain, it was standard practice to fill their heads with metal so they could connect to their vessels... which is something else I can explain, I guess, but not right now. After... his little incident where he faced our old foe, they had to pry him out of his ship, and a lot of him was left behind on that ship. It was a long list of medical terms, but let's just say there wasn't much left of him that they could get out of the ship.

  So they not only fixed what they could, regrew him some new parts to be stitched back on, but they also implemented Kronos into him, which is what I believe caused his massive change. This new technology, the way I understand it, lets him slow his perception of time down to almost nothing, allowing him to think through problems much faster and with greater accuracy than normal captains, and hopefully our enemies too. This already would make him weird, as that depth of being able to react and think would probably cause some mental distress, considering we are built to live in the moment, not the nanomoment.

  If that wasn't enough, it also built some sort of strange software... or... I guess... computer programs... no... hmmm... basically the way those mechanical thinking devices we have, how they think themselves... eh whatever I'll give you a write up on what computers are later..."

  Phillia shrugs and says,

  "All I can understand about them is that they are artifices... or a technology, that can think... somehow... and don't have trapped souls..."

  Malakai gives a light laugh, but one without much humor in it as he continues,

  "Yeah, that's about right. But they installed a thinking component of a computer that uses his reduced perception of time to make future predictions based on information he already knows."

  Phillia interjects,

  "So he can see the future? How is it that things can go wrong?"

  Malakai shakes his head, stating,

  "No. The program was cancelled after a few other people were given the device because actually seeing the future is impossible. The device was limited in that it only worked with known information to the user or the database they are connected to if they are hooked up to their ship. It allows for predictions of specific futures based on the current situation and the knowledge of the user. So he can see dozens if not thousands of different possibilities, but all of them could be wrong because let's just say, he's having a conversation, he can predict pretty well what you might say or ask based on how well he knows you, but you could always ask a random question he isn't prepared for because he can't read your mind or your inner dialouge.

  Another example is if he is fighting me for fun. If he really focused down, I could never land a blow since he has decades of experience fighting me, and that time slowdown thing that goes on in his head means he can read every variable of my motion to predict where my punch is going before I even really think about it. It's scary when he truly goes all-out on it, but he usually doesn't."

  Phillia then questions, leaning forward,

  "So he's odd because he is so much further ahead than us?"

  Malakai gulps, his mouth feeling dry as he feels his heart somewhat break as he shuts this down,

  "No. He's odd because people aren't made to think like that."

  Malakai shrinks into himself slightly, his normally imposing form now looking small as he keeps going,

  "He can't turn it off, he lives not in the moment like we do, he lives in nanofractions of seconds, and is constantly bombarded with future predictions, according to him, they are so real that he can experience the same situation hundreds if not thousands of times before it actually happens, and only when the specific action happens and he experiences that situation no more, he knows he is in the present again, only to have the next second predicted before him again.

  As an example, lets go back to our fights, and lets just say I do land a punch because he ignored a prediction, well he doesn't just feel the hit and nothing else, due to his perception shifting he experiences every instant, every nerve firing in pain, and feels it slowly inch up his body as he gets to feel the pain over a near eternity of a moment, the same goes for the predictions as he can practically feel any of the pain he predicts.

  Luckily, he did figure out a sort of workaround rather quickly; rather than going completely crazy, he can force the device to his will by focusing hard on a single situation and cutting down as many variables to the future as he can, mostly through direct action. Like a conversation prediction can be prevented if he simply speaks before thinking, and the conversation is steered away from millions of potential futures. This works somewhat, but it does let him... focus in on a situation and only on what matters, like a fight, he can focus entirely on the fight and can accurately see what will happen, rather than having his mind overloaded in an instant through the many different futures.

  But right now... the version of him you know is his final adaptation to it... he figured it out a decade ago, I think. I mostly believe this is his mind trying to protect itself, or he may have gone fully crazy, but he basically no longer perceives it, sets all the slowed-down information and the predictions into the unconscious part of his mind... or that's how he explained it to me. His forward mind, the part living in the moment, feels as if everything is normal. Maybe he is a little more perceptive than most, but it's mostly normal, but in reality, he does process every nano-instant in painful detail; it's just that he has somehow blocked it... But it still happens, and that's why he acts and talks so weirdly, because unconsciously he is still living each moment many times in slow motion, taking in every detail that can be perceived; he just simply ignores it, but it does still take a toll on his mind.

  Hence, why he has a taste for alcohol like no one else, it makes it quiet for a while, as when he gets drunk enough, he can no longer comprehend the device's impacts, and so they mean nothing. Supposedly, sleep isn't much better as he cannot actually dream; he is stuck reliving old memories as the device in his head helps him scrutinize every detail of anything from his past."

  Phillia stays quiet for a moment before stating,

  "It must be so hard."

  With a slightly quivering voice, Malakai responds,

  "He is in Hell..."

  They sit quietly together for a while as the scientists do their strange experiment, the large device buzzing like a beehive, before Malakai takes a deep breath and in a more chipper tone, says,

  "Sorry about that! I rarely get to talk through that, and I let you take the burden upon yourself too.... well,l my point to start this conversation is that if you ever need anything, and I mean anything, ask for me and I'll have it to ya on a silver platter. Even if it's just me coming over to explain some things to you."

  Phillia smiles and responds,

  "Sure, I do have a few questions... mostly about computers..."

  Malakai laughs and nods along, agreeing before Phillia asks,

  "So... Colonel, why is it that you feel the need to do this?"

  Malakai gives her a sheepish smile before stating,

  "Well, you kinda remind me of my oldest daughter... in an alien way, and I haven't seen her in person in years since she had her third kid and got that new job."

  Phillia seems surprised before she asks,

  "Wait, you are a grandpa?"

  Malakai nods, beaming with pride as on that same device, he finds a folder full of pictures of his kids and their kids. Despite Phillias wish to talk about computers, for the next four hours, proud grandpa Malakai Hollander shows off all the pictures of his family and shares stories... even the more embarrassing ones...