Nova: A Scifi Alien Romance (Rebel Lords) (25 page)

W
hen would
they ever let us go home from that freakin’ job? The edge of the habitable zone was no place for man with drastic temperature changes. Shaviro had a severe tilt, making anything that wasn’t along the equator completely frigid. However, being at the edge of the habitable zone made the days ridiculously hot and the nights freeze-your-balls-off cold. It was a miserable job, but it was the highest paying job on Shaviro—well, other than the swanky position of being a council member.

The region we were mining then was a chasm along one of the tectonic plates of the planet. I had no idea why we were even still there trying to mine, all of the ores we had found in the earth of that planet so far were common and worth next to nothing on the market. But, we didn’t really have a choice in the matter. We were being paid to mine, so that’s what we were doing.

I walked along the long steel bridge we had installed connecting the two sides of the chasm. As I passed the center, an alarm began to sound from down below. Buzzers and lights began to go off. Oh great, what did someone do now? I hurried across the bridge and then down the stairs. I rushed down several flights until I reached the massive drill. Red lights were flashing all around it. “What going on Denny?” I yelled across the sound of the machine.

“Ah, nothin’ too bad. The drill is just stuck again. We’ll get it loose in a few minutes and the alarms will shut off,” Denny called back to me as he hoisted himself up onto the machine.

“They better shut off, it’s gonna give me a freakin’ headache,” I griped, heading back towards the stairs being a little ticked off I rushed all the way down there just to find out the drill was stuck. That was something Denny and the guys could fix by themselves.

I went to walk back up the stairs when Denny yelled from behind, “Actually, Chomy, I think we gotta problem!” he yelled in a panic. I groaned and went to round the corner to go back to the machine. When I walked around, at the exact moment, the drill began to shake violently and suddenly the hole which it was drilling erupted with thick, black liquid ore. Liquid ores weren’t uncommon on Shaviro, that extreme axis tilt causing it to basically cook the inside of the earth. However, it erupting wasn’t good.

“Shut it off for Pete’s sake!” I screamed, walking towards the drill to do it myself if he couldn’t get to it before I did. Ore shot out and poured onto the walkway and began to flood it. It seeped over to where I was standing, I tried to back up quickly, knowing that the liquid ore would melt the flesh from my bones. As I backed up, I hit a railing and it gave way. My arms flailed out to my sides, trying to catch myself, but it was too late.

Suddenly I was free falling down a chasm, screaming at the top of my lungs. I was going to die, there was no way I wasn’t going to die. The temperature rapidly grew hotter and hotter as I fell in. I felt like I screamed for hours, but had been just mere seconds before I collided with a hot, stone surface. My body rolled from the impact, causing me to fall once again into a crevice in the side of the chasm. I groaned loudly from the pain of the fall, my entire body screaming from the soreness. How in the hell wasn’t I dead?

I sat up and immediately looked up. Through the crevice I could see sunlight. I hadn’t fallen very far—I had gotten lucky and landed on that ledge instead of the bottom of the chasm. I scrambled to my feet and dusted myself off. “Chomy! Chomy!” Denny screamed down into the chasm, his voice echoing. “Chomy! Are you okay!?”

I groaned and then yelled back as loud as I could, “I’m alright Denny. Get me the hell out of here! Send down a crane hook!” My head was freaking killing me. I looked around the stupid crevice to try and find something to move in order to climb up the steep incline to get back to the ledge. As I looked around, I noticed something reflective catch my eye. Narrowing my eyes at it, I walked to it. It was covered in black soot, but had a sort of luster behind it. What was that? Taking the hem of my shirt, I wiped the face of the stone off, trying to get the soot cleared off it.

It took some elbow grease, but eventually the black soot rubbed off of the massive stone. My eyes marveled in disbelief at the glowing opal-colored stone. Dremalite?! Shaviro had dremalite?! My heart felt as though it was about to burst from excitement. Dremalite was the most expensive ore in the colonies since it was used for engines that could go faster than the speed of light.

Shaviro just became one of the most important planets in the galaxy.