by K. C. Cross
I slow to a stalk, on the lookout for an ambush at each intersection.
Nothing. There’s still a lot of firing happening on other parts of the station, but it’s far enough away from my present location that I don’t have to worry about it.
Yet.
I creep forward. And I know—I just fucking know, I feel it in my gut—that there’s something wrong coming.
I get to another intersection, press my body up against the wall, and peek out.
The barrel of a plasma pistol touches my forehead. I slide my eyes to the right and catch a glimpse of silver.
“Well, well, well,” the woman says. “Look who fell in the well.”
“What the fuck does that mean?”
“It means… you got what you deserve.”
I turn and find myself face to face with a silver Cygnian princess.
And I’m telling you, no matter what you say about this woman—call her crazy, call her sick, call her whatever you want…
She is fucking beautiful.
Mesmerizingly beautiful.
And for a moment I cannot move. I can’t speak, or defend myself.
But she doesn’t shoot me.
“Luck, I presume?”
I just stare at her silver eyes. Transfixed.
“You’re not Valor. I know that for sure.” Then she laughs. “If you were we’d already be doing something else.”
“What?” I say.
“And you’re not Tray. I hear he’s dark. Did you have white hair as a child?”
“What?”
“I bet you did. And obviously you’re not Jimmy. I’m already well-acquainted with Jimmy. Serpint has his princess already. Definitely not Serpint. And Crux… well, he’s a little busy these days, isn’t he?”
“Who the fuck are you?”
“Oh. I’m sorry. I’m Princess Veila.”
“Veila,” I say. “As in—”
“The one and only.”
And for a second I feel this overwhelming relief flood through my body. Because Veila is the other half of Corla. And this is the exact princess we need!
“Don’t get excited,” Veila says. “We’re not on the same side. Yet.”
“What?”
There’s firing down the hallway, and she turns.
And even though I’m so fucking confused right now, I don’t miss opportunities.
I grab her pistol, break her arm, and throw her down on the ground.
She snarls at me. But then tucks it away and begins to laugh.
I keep my rifle pointed at her head, then check the hallway. Because that firing is close. And it’s not her people, it’s mine.
Cha-Cha is yelling. A kid is screaming. And there’s more blasting.
A shot of plasma sears past me, barely missing my exposed chest.
“Cease fire, you idiots!” Veila screams, getting to her feet as she holds her broken arm close to her body. “He’s part of the program!”
I aim my rifle straight at her chest. So close, if I took this shot, she’d be cut in half.
Cha-Cha yells again. The kid screams.
“You have two choices, Luck,” Veila says. “Stay with me or save your friends. Better make a decision quick though. Because I have to go.”
I look at her, panic rising inside me. Because we need this princess. Crux needs this woman to unlock his frozen queen.
But Cha-Cha yells again and it’s not the winning kind.
“OK, I can see you’re not going to come with me. But I’m not going to take that personally because you’re not my one, after all. You have other loyalties. So I understand. If you were Valor… eh. I might be a little hurt.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” I snarl, glancing at her two borgs, still at the end of the hallway. Still in high-ready position, ready to shoot me.
“One little warning. I feel I owe it to you. Leave Delphi behind. You’ll thank me later.”
And then she smiles.
And then I shoot her.
And I run.
“Fucking suns,” Nyleena says.
“Right?” I say. “It was kinda dicey. And to be honest, that bitch creeped me out. She was not afraid of me. Not one bit. And I knew, if I didn’t go help Cha-Cha, she wouldn’t make it. No one was going to kill me that day, Nyleena. No one. I was ‘part of the program’. But Chach? And that kid she was with when I got there? They were as good as dead. So… it’s not my most heroic moment, but I did the right thing.”
Nyleena nods. “Of course. No one’s gonna call you a coward for saving your partner. But… what was that part about Delphi?”
“Delphi,” I whisper. “I didn’t even know who she was. When Lady caught up with Dicker on the other side of the gate, she mentioned Jimmy was with some princess called Delphi, but I didn’t know she was Crux and Corla’s daughter. So it took me a while to actually make sense of Veila’s warning.”
“Shit,” Nyleena says.
“There’s something wrong with Delphi. I knew the moment I saw her. And after Jimmy told me that Delphi has a twin brother, most of it started clicking into place.”
Monsters.
But I don’t say it out loud.
“And Valor?” Nyleena says. “What? I thought Jimmy was Veila’s one?”
“She is. Jimmy said so.”
“So you don’t know anything about Valor?”
“I told you everything I know.”
Nyleena nods. Sighs. “This is a pretty fucked-up shit.”
“Tell me about it.”
Then she says, “I have to go. And you can’t come.”
“Go where?” I ask.
“I need to see this thing through, Luck. And you can’t be there. It’ll mess it all up.”
She gets to her feet and I sit up. Just staring up at my beautiful silver princess.
I had never seen one so close before I met up with Veila. Corla was in the cryopod. It’s hard to appreciate the beauty of a silver princess when they’re locked up in ice.
But Veila took my breath away when I first saw her.
And Nyleena is a hundred times more beautiful.
“Don’t get killed,” I whisper. “I need you, Nyleena.”
“I’ll do my best,” she says.
And then she walks out of the secret garden and disappears down the hallway.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX - NYLEENA
“What’s this all about?” Jimmy asks.
He, Delphi, and I are inside Big Dicker. It took me a whole lot of classic Nyleena tantrum-throwing to make them meet me here, but it was worth it.
“Why did we have to meet here?” Delphi asks.
“Big Dicker?” I say.
“Yes, Nyleena?”
“You know, don’t you?”
“Yes, I know. Booty filled me in.”
“You know what?” Jimmy asks. “What the hell is going on?”
“The Baby ALCOR cannot be trusted,” Dicker says.
“What?” Jimmy says. And his face goes ash-gray in this moment. If anyone understands how fucked you are when you’re on a station and the AI is unreliable, Jimmy does. I can almost imagine the sinking feeling in his gut as these six words are fully processed. “Since when?” he asks.
“Since the Succubus AI came on board,” Dicker replies.
Jimmy’s jaw clenches. He growls, “Why didn’t you fucking tell me this? It’s been months.”
Delphi and I share a look. I’m not sure what hers means. I don’t know her that well. But mine is… deference. I am not about to cross Jimmy or interfere with his anger at Dicker.
“We needed proof,” Dicker says. “And Nyleena got that for us today.”
Jimmy’s heads swings in my direction. “What did you do?”
I shrug. “Just told a little story. And the Baby fell right into my trap.”
“Explain,” Jimmy seethes.
I swallow hard and look up at the screen that simulates Big Dicker’s speech in a wave form. Help! I want her to take over now.
“That’s not important,” Dicker says. “It was just a little game of lies. Tell them what Luck told you, Nyleena. We have a lot of work to do and not a lot of time to do it.”
“OK,” I say, wiping my sweaty hands on my envirosuit. “So this scavenger hunt I was on… Crux wanted info on leveling up from the Asshole ALCOR, Valor wanted info on Veila, Luck wanted info on Valor and Tray, Delphi wanted info on Earth, and Booty wanted a flower from Luck’s secret gardens. It led me down a very interesting path that ended with me getting almost all that information and… a lot more.”
I pause here. I’ve made a decision not to tell them Luck’s secret about the spin node galaxy inside the station museum because that feels like our secret now. Not just his. But everything else needs to be said.
“But this all starts with you two.”
“Why?” Delphi asks.
“You’re not gonna like this,” I say, warning her.
“Believe me,” Delphi says. “I’ve dealt with a lot of bad news in my short lifetime. I can take it.”
“OK, then,” I say. And then I take a deep breath and start talking. “You are Corla and Crux’s daughter. Corla is a genuine silver princess. The highest rank. The seventh daughter of the king and current reigning queen.”
“Just like Lyra, though, right?” Jimmy asks.
“No,” I say. “Corla and Lyra are almost nothing alike. Corla is silver. I don’t think you guys understand how different we are. But that’s not the point I’m trying to make here. My point is…” I look at Delphi. “You’re it.”
“I’m what?” she says.
“You are what they’ve been trying to make all these years.”
“That doesn’t really answer the question,” Jimmy says. And his voice is low. And rumbling. And dangerous.
“You’re…”
“Go ahead,” Delphi says. “Just… tell me. What am I?”
“A bomb?” Jimmy interjects.
I shake my head.
“What then?”
“You’re the monster,” I say. Because that’s the only word I have for it. That’s the only word I’ve heard used to describe her.
Neither of them say anything.
“One half of the monster, to be exact,” I add.
“Tycho,” she whispers.
I nod. “I don’t know your brother. I barely know you. But you… you are the natural-born offspring of Crux and Corla. You are what they want. You are what they’ve been trying to make all these thousands of years since the true Cygnian and Akeelian races were destroyed.”
“Then why did they let her go?” Jimmy asks. “Why send her on that mission to kidnap me?”
“Succubus,” Dicker says. “They were willing to sacrifice Delphi for the sake of Succubus. They wanted to plant an AI on our station. And they knew Delphi would be safe here. They knew all the princesses would be safe here. That once you boys found your soulmates you’d do anything—even endanger the lives of millions of people on this station—to keep them close.”
Jimmy’s face goes hard. I know that feeling. I know what betrayal feels like. And in this moment, so does he. Because this was all a trap.
Coral. Lyra. Me. Delphi. We didn’t end up here on accident. We were sent here.
And so was Succubus.
Even worse? Jimmy was the one who brought her.
“How long have you known about this, Dicker? Do you have any idea how fucked we are?” He’s looking at her wave form on the screen when he says this. But he turns to me, so quick and so fast I take a step back. “We’re all gonna die. Do you have any idea how hard that Succubus can fuck with us? She can—”
“She cannot,” Dicker says. “She is not connected to the Baby. Her core was implanted inside the Pleasure Prison. That wasn’t her decision, it was Tray’s. Because Tray is doing something in there and he has a plan. The Succubus went in willingly because she needs something from the Asshole. He has the data she needs. He just doesn’t realize it yet.”
“The Baby,” Jimmy says. “He’s—”
“A traitor,” Dicker finishes for him. “He’s not connected to the Succubus yet. But he could be soon. He’s an infiltrator, Jimmy.”
“Sent by who?” Jimmy yells. “Mighty Minions? Holy fuck! Are we at war with Mighty Minions? Because…” He laughs. But it’s an ironic laugh. “Because I’m gonna tell you something right now. That place has seventeen—”
“Sixteen,” Dicker corrects him.
I wince. Because Jimmy glares at her with a look that says, Shut the fuck up. I’m talking.
“Sixteen,” Dicker repeats, ignoring his silent warning.
“Sixteen,” Jimmy says through clenched teeth, “fucking AI’s running that place. And you didn’t see the power it has. Delphi and I did. It took us to a fucking planet.”
“It took you to Earth,” I say. “Booty figured it all out and told me.” She told me a lot when she spilled her secrets. Maybe too much, if you ask me. I don’t know what I’m into right now, but it’s big. Bigger than I can imagine. Probably the biggest thing I’ve ever been a part of, and that’s saying a lot.
She wanted to know if the Baby was on our side. That was her main goal when she had me go ask him for the flower for Lyra. That was just an in. He already knew I was on a scavenger hunt. He knew I was trading information with pretty much everyone by this point.
All Booty needed from me is confirmation that he was lying. And when he told me he knew where the gardens were, that was the lie. My Draden scheme was just an off the cuff offer to see if he would lie about knowing the location of the gardens.
But we got a lot more information from that scheme than even Booty thought we’d get. And now I’m afraid that he got more from my Draden conversation with Luck than I intended.
Because he has a goddamned formula for space orchid essence. And even though he didn’t admit that he had this formula because he’s part of a breeding program, he came damn close.
Somewhere—maybe not here—but somewhere out there is a pregnant princess.
And I’d bet my whole future on her being silver.
Delphi was the first monster. But something went wrong. She must be defective. She’s pink, after all. Not silver. So they didn’t get what they wanted.
But they haven’t stopped trying.
What did Luck accidentally reveal when he was telling me about Draden? I know there was something there. Luck was telling me a secret about the day Draden fell. That he saw it happen and he was just about to reveal something else about that day when I yelled and made him stop taking. And even though I don’t understand how it’s all connected, I know it is.
It has to be.
And I know that whatever that secret is about Draden’s fall, Baby ALCOR should not know it.
“I don’t think we really went to a planet, Jimmy,” Delphi says, pulling me out of my introspection. “It has to be a program. A hologram, or a virtual… or something.”
“And normally I’d agree,” I say, being careful not to divulge too much here. Booty’s plan is precarious and things need to happen in a certain order. They can’t know about the spin node galaxy. That’s one secret that Baby and Succubus can’t ever figure out. We can’t get ahead of ourselves or the plan won’t work. So I just say, “But I saw something today that changed my mind.”
“What?” Jimmy asks. “What did you see?”
“It’s not important. But trust me when I say… a powerful station like Mighty Minions—or Harem, for example—could possess a technology that enables instantaneous travel like that.”
“That was Earth,” Jimmy whispers. “That really was Earth.”
“Booty thinks so,” I say.
“Where is Booty?” Jimmy asks.
“She’s busy,” Dicker says.
“Doing what?” he growls.
“Interfacing with the Pleasure Prison.”
“Why?”
“Look,” I say, putting both my hands up, palms out. Trying to calm him down. “Somethin
g’s in motion here. I’m not a hundred percent sure what it is, but I have a part to play. OK? This is my part. Doling out all the secrets I just spent the last several days acquiring. So just stop asking questions and fucking listen to me for a moment.”
Jimmy shoots me a death glare. Clenches his jaw and spits, “Then start fucking talking.”
I nod. “OK. I’m just gonna spill it out in bullet points. Earth is real. You’re probably connected to it in some way.”
“My mother,” he says.
“Whatever,” I say. “No one knows where it is. But everyone seems to want to go there.”
“Mighty Minions knows,” he says.
“I guess,” I say. “But… if they do really have a way to take you there for real, then that’s good for us. Because it means they’re on our side.”
“How do you figure? They’re the ones who told us to bring Succubus here.”
“Because if they can get there on their own, then why bother with what we have?”
“What?” Jimmy says. “What do we have?”
“Just listen. Everyone wants to go to this place. It must hold some secret for their breeding program. So if the Mighty Minions Resort has a fucking superhighway that leads directly to it, then there’s no need to bother with planting an AI on Harem to get that final secret. So Mighty Minions didn’t plant the Succubus. They didn’t know. And… furthermore,” I say, putting up a hand. “The Cygnians don’t know where Earth is either.”
“But you and Lyra were sent there,” Delphi interjects.
“So they say. But if this place is so important, and they were sending us there, then why is everyone still looking for it?” I raise my eyebrows at them. Waiting.
They don’t get it. But I think I do. “We have the secret, you guys.”
“We don’t have the secret,” Jimmy says. “We can’t get to Earth from here!”
“I think we do,” I say. “I think we can.”
“Explain," he growls.
“I can’t. That’s something Luck and I need to discuss first. But let me just say this. What if… what if ALCOR knew something? And he left on purpose. And got himself killed on purpose. Because what if… he’s not dead? He’s just… out there somewhere?”
I motion to the small tunnel of black space that I can see from the front window of Dicker’s cockpit to indicate where out there is.