Chapter 1

Awake. Silence. Only the constant, quiet whirring of the engines and the gravity generators. Xander sighed and sat up, wiping sweat from his forehead, then running his hand through his short, spiky blonde hair. He couldn't remember what he had been dreaming of, but he knew it was nothing good. A nightmare, he guessed, about his family. He looked over at the quiet shape beside him and gently stroked the gentle sleeping face he'd fallen in love with so many years ago. The strong jaw, the dark brown hair which shaded the deep, sea blue eyes that held little other than love and kindness. His hand trailed down to Aaron's arm, feeling the strong, but gentle bicep. He looked around at the room, then back down at Aaron. His sudden awakening hadn't woken his husband or even seemed to affect him in any way. For an ex military man, Aaron slept like a rock.

So, Xander silently moved off the bed and pulled his robe on, deciding to check on the kids in their room. The twins they had adopted two years ago were eight years old, soon to be nine if he remembered his Earth date correctly. He looked in on the sleeping boy and girl and smiled softly. For Xander and Aaron, the happiness of their wedding day was only barely happier than the day they had accepted the smiling six year old twins into their arms as son and daughter.

As he watched them sleep, he started to remember their first tour of their new home. Jade was clinging to Xander's leg and Cain was clinging to Aaron's leg, the seven-year-old children shaking nervously as they were led into their new bedroom. It had scared them, the empty silver room, it looked large and every word echoed back at them. Xander had just watched and smiled as Aaron took both the children in his arms and promised them that they would like the room once all their things were moved in. It would seem almost exactly like home. It didn't take long for his words to come true. The ship was their new home, and the kids loved it.

Slowly, he closed the door to keep from waking them and walked out into the dim steel hallway, deciding to take a walk on the Natural Deck to work off the adrenaline rush from the nightmare. As he walked on the fresh-cut grass, he started working his mind back through the events of the night, trying to piece together the nightmare. He knew it was about his family, that much was certain, and about some unseen danger looming over them, threatening their safety. But just what it was, he couldn't put his finger on. It was just a strange, almost impending, danger.

Looking up out the windows, he didn't see stars, clouds, or anything that would suggest a planet. All he saw was white. The pure white of White Space. They had been traveling to the Andromeda Galaxy for a little over a year now and the command crew expected that they should arrive within days according to the telemetry report snagged from the last window back into normal space. He couldn't wait to see the galaxy. How many strange and wonderful new worlds would there be? Just how different would the creatures there be from the ones back in the Milky Way?

He sighed a little and started walking again, feeling the soft grass tickle his feet. He stopped and watched a small bird sing in a tree. A Robin. It had been a strange notion to bring animals with them on the ship, but the scientists who built the ship maintained that certain animals would be needed to keep the ecosystem in the Natural Deck properly balanced. Even as he watched, he saw a shadow from the corner of his eye, some sort of small predator that ate these birds. He turned to watch the small cat, looked like a bobcat or some sort of cousin, sneak up on the tree.

As his sharp green eyes watched the cat, he could feel his heart start to quicken in anticipation as he waited for the cat to attack. Like a blur, it raced up the tree and slashed out at the bright red breast of the Robin, which squealed and beat the air with its wings, attempting vainly to escape the long, razor sharp claws. But it was too late. The claws drew the bird down to the cat's teeth, which sank into the bird's neck and shoulder, shattering the bones with incredible power, and killing the innocent creature with one smooth stroke. It had all happened in mere seconds.

As a medical man, Xander did all he could to keep life going if he could, but he knew it was inevitable in this instance. Even if he had scared off the bird, it would have been caught by some other creature living in the Nature Deck. That was just the way of the wild. But not, he thought, of civilization.

With a deep breath, he decided to give sleep another try and started back to the room. When he lay down, he found Aaron's arm wrapping gently around him and his gentle lips kissing his cheek.

"Couldn't sleep?"

Xander looked over and smiled reassuringly.

"Had a little nightmare. Just went to walk on the Nature Deck."

Aaron regarded him with deep blue eyes, not surprised at the admission. Xander often had nightmares about the family's safety.

"We're just fine, you know. There's no danger here for us."

Smiling softly, Xander stroked Aaron's arm.

"I know, but I'm the nurse. It's my job to worry for others."

Aaron chuckled quietly and kissed Xander gently.

"Let's just get back to sleep, ok?"

Xander smiled and nodded as he moved closer to Aaron.

"I like the sound of that."

As Xander and Aaron closed their eyes, their thoughts couldn't help but turn to their happiness and luck. They were married, happy, and had two wonderful children. Life couldn’t be more perfect in their minds.

The next morning went as most did on the ship. The twins were up bright and early - In Earth time, that is - and jumping on their fathers' bed to wake them up. Xander and Aaron woke with bleary laughter as they hugged their children. Once the two men were awake, the children dashed into the bedroom to get dressed and ready for school. The family passed through the Nature Deck every morning on their way to their various destinations, as it acted as the central hub of their section of the ship.

This morning seemed as normal as any as they walked across the cool green grass, passing by the now empty tree where Xander had watched the cat's hunting the previous night, and prepared to separate for their destinations, saying love yous and see you laters. Their exchanges were abruptly interrupted as the ship made an unfamiliar jolt, like it was decelerating for the first time in a little over a year. All eyes turned upward eagerly as alerts began to sound, waiting for what they all knew was coming.

Slowly, agonizingly slowly, a small black pinpoint in the bleached white of White Space began to open and widen, gaping wider and wider like the maw of some giant beast getting ready to swallow them. As it grew large enough to swallow the ship, Xander felt his heart begin to pound. Not in excitement, but fear. He didn't know how, but he knew something terrible was on the other side of that maw, and the ship was flying right into it.

"We have to go. Now."

He turned to Aaron, his eyes widened a little in fear.

"We have to get somewhere safe!"

He grabbed his daughter, picking her up in one smooth motion, and just started running. Aaron called out for him to stop, but was forced to follow with their son in his arms. Xander didn't hear the worried voice, the wondering whispers, the bird song, all he heard was the thumping of his heart as his feet pounded the ground. He wasn’t much of a runner. He was more built for lifting and pushing, as that was regularly required as a nurse. But this fear was worse than anything he'd ever experienced. He felt new strength coursing through him as he held his only little girl to his chest.

He and Aaron had just reached their room when disaster struck. The ship rocked violently, struck by something large and strong, danger alarms began to blare loudly, calling all crew and military personnel to battle stations. Xander found himself thrown to the floor and he threw his hand out to keep from crushing Jade with his weight. He held her close as though trying to protect her from a villain trying to hurt her. Another blow rocked the ship. This wasn’t a mere asteroid impact. These were weapon strikes.

Xander staggered to his feet, cradling his daughter in his arms as the ship became steady. He put his hand to the communication bud in his ear and listened to the reports of what had hit them. They had jumped out right into the path of a ship. It had crashed into the Nature Deck, causing a hull breach. The further impacts were strikes from weapons fire that had gone astray. Xander looked over at Aaron, who had paled upon hearing the news in his own ear bud. They both set the children down, moved forward, and embraced each other in a brief moment of relief and guilt mixed together. They had escaped alive, yet all those others that could have followed were now dead. Then the calls started coming in for medical staff. Xander stepped back.

"Take care of the kids."

He turned and ran out, not bothering to change into his scrubs. There wasn't time. The people coming in would be seriously injured and they wouldn't have time to worry about sterilization. When he ran through the doors of the Infirmary, he was slammed with a cacophony of sounds. Mostly screaming and crying in pain. The rest was the sound of Doctors issuing orders to each other as well as anyone able to help.

Xander reacted to the first call for help he heard and ran to a doctor, who held a tourniquet tightly around a woman's severed arm. Xander quickly examined the wound, then grabbed a Dermal Simulator and fit it over her wounded stump. If her arm could be found, the Simulator would keep blood flow normal and inside her body until reattachment, but Xander could already tell by the wound that her arm was most likely long gone, so this was instead a way to keep her alive.

Xander lost track of the hours as he moved from patient to patient. Mostly the wounds were trauma from great falls, people who had fallen over balconies in the open courtyards and such. Many were crippling, most were fatal. Xander had lost count of how many lost limbs he'd covered. Almost all had no hope of ever being found.

As he moved swiftly and efficiently from patient to patient, he kept a small corner of his mind on the buzz of communication in his ear bud. He wanted to know what was going on. From what he could gather, there had been few attacks on the ship itself, but they were mainly being ignored. The communications officers had managed to tune into the channels for the combatants. They weren't going to just rush in, weapons blazing, and hope they weren't helping commit genocide.

As the hours went on, their earbuds began to translate the alien languages and discern what was being said. One side was called the Cogians, the others, Gyirks. They had no clue as to the appearance of these strange creatures, but one thing was certain. The Gyirks were on the defense as the Cogians campaigned to somehow destroy their species. The Cogians continually made mention of the Gyirks as needing to be ‘purified’, or put back in their proper place. With hardly any need for thought at all, the Commander ordered an open fire on the Cogian forces. They weren't going to sit by and let the innocent Gyirks be massacred.

The command crew had learned through their communications that they were a simple species who wanted nothing but to be left in peace. To listen to the Cogians, they were supposedly nothing but animals that deserved to be treated as such. As Xander sifted through the communications, he learned that the Gyirks had been on the defense the entire time. The attack having been unprovoked. All they wanted was to live and be in a safe corner of the galaxy.

Having learned this, Xander couldn't help but smile the tiniest bit as they accelerated and he heard the weapons open fire. His smile disappeared as he returned to his work. He had to remain focused. So many more were going to be coming in. Even more were not.