NOMADS CHAPTER 19

Dominic was taking a break and standing in the doorway of his small battle pulpit with a mug of coffee when he noticed the Zora losing speed. He downed the lukewarm coffee, climbed into the pulpit and looked out the window. He knew the glint that shone in the darkness far off the bow of the ship. They were sibis - silverbeams. Strange little creatures that glided through space like shiny fish and that had appeared in the solar system at the same time as the aliens. They followed the paths of Keymon and Akkato ships and were harmless, at least from what was heard. However, a lot was heard and mostly it was conjecture and wild speculation. Some scientists thought it possible that the creatures, which ranged in size from two to four meters, came from hyperspace. They had been torn from their sphere of existence between dimensions by the aliens' space curvature generators, the scholars speculated. And that was the reason why they followed the emissions of the interstellar traveling ships, they further claimed.

Whatever the case, for Dominic the only thing that mattered was the fascinating sight of the shimmering swarm gliding through space in smooth motion. But as beautiful as the image was, he could not imagine that Perk had slowed down the speed of the Zora to give himself and the crew a nice moment. Even as Dominic pondered this, sirens blared and Rosslin's voice squawked through the speakers.

"Battle drill!" he announced levelly. "Take Sibis under fire."

Instantly, all stations on the firing line reported combat readiness. Dominic saw the green-backed squares with the gunners' names on the display. He would have liked to protest the order, but he didn't want to risk his post because of a few Silverbeams. After all, there was also the opinion that the Sibis were not living beings. They were just energy-filled dimensional bubbles that followed lines of force, generated by the hyperspace generators of the alien ships.