Suddenly, there was a blur of flesh, and a fist connected with Cara’s eye. Her head snapped back, and she stumbled, only to take another punch to the mouth and fall to the concrete floor, where she landed hard on her ass.
“Oh, yes,” Jaxen added. “I also taught her to fight. She’s quite good at it.”
Cara dabbed at her lip, tasting blood. She glared at her clone, and Rune glowered back while angling her body toward Jaxen, clearly irritated that another girl had amused him. Cara 2.0 was a cast-iron bitch. But instead of giving in to her temper, Cara forced herself to stay calm. She doubted she could reason with Jaxen, but she might be able to stall him long enough for Aelyx and Troy to find her.
“Whatever you taught her,” she said from the floor, “she still isn’t me.”
“In time she’ll be better than you,” Jaxen murmured while preening the clone. “So much better.”
“Keep telling yourself that.” Cara pretended to rub her sore tailbone while pressing the com-sphere in her pocket, issuing a group summons. “Why are you doing this—helping the Aribol? I thought you wanted to fight them.”
“Well, that was before The Way turned against me, wasn’t it?”
“In all fairness, you turned against them first.”
“Irrelevant.” Jaxen flicked his wrist dismissively. “The point is Aisly and I had few options. We found an emissary probe, and our partial Aribol genetics allowed us to access its contact function. So we proposed an alliance of sorts. As you humans say, politics makes for strange bedfellows.”
“So you’re not brainwashed?”
He laughed. “My mind can’t be compromised, Cah-ra. It’s another benefit of my genetics.”
“But you told me you loved Earth.”
“I do. That’s why I’m here: to make sure it’s not destroyed.”
“By terrorizing my people and brainwashing the president?”
“By keeping humans compliant,” he specified, as if there were a difference. “You can’t deny mankind has a turbulent history. Once you send Aelyx and the other L’eihrs back where they belong, the threat will be over.”
Somehow Cara doubted that. She was willing to bet the hybrids’ deal with the Aribol included a position of power on Earth. They wouldn’t leave this planet so easily.
“Otherwise I’ll kill every one of them that remains.”
Now that she believed.
A beep sounded from a band around Rune’s wrist. “It’s time,” she said in L’eihr.
Jaxen nodded and told her, “Meet Aisly at the ship. I’ll be there soon.”
The clone jogged across the room and jumped out the nearest loading bay, then vanished behind the trailers parked on the lot. After she’d gone, Jaxen crouched down until he was eye-level with Cara. He regarded her with a bittersweet regret that reminded her of a guy gazing at his ex after a few too many beers.
“Cah-ra,” he said softly, reaching for her cheek before pulling back. “Despite the fact that I’ve replaced you, I still believe the universe is a better place with you in it. That’s why I’m going to advise you to leave.” He glanced at a digital clock on the wall. “Within the next sixty seconds, to be exact.” He stood and backed toward the loading bay. “I’m sure our paths will cross again.”
Then he disappeared out the bay door, and Cara thought back to the words she’d overheard earlier: put them there … along the support walls … nothing left standing.
She scrambled to her feet. It was a demolition.
Aelyx skidded to a halt at the mouth of the hallway with Troy right behind him. “You were supposed to stay …” He trailed off, squinting into the distance. “Is that Jaxen?”
Cara ran past him and snagged his sleeve. “Back to the shuttle! The building’s about to blow!”
She tore through the factory, her bare feet slapping on the floor. Boots clomped from behind and quickly overtook her. Soon Troy was leading the way while Aelyx kept pace with her. As soon as they reached the front parking lot, he threw her over one shoulder and bounded across the blazing asphalt.
Elle and Syrine must’ve received the summons, because the shuttle doors were already open. Aelyx tossed Cara into the backseat, then took his place in front along with Troy. In moments, the doors sealed shut and the craft lifted off the parking lot.
No sooner had they risen above the treetops than an explosion boomed from the factory and sent the shuttle careening in the other direction. Cara collided with knees and elbows as they rolled over and over. Once Aelyx righted the craft, they rose above the hail of flaming debris, and Cara glanced out the window at what little remained of Nitrate Solutions.
“Is everyone okay?” she asked. “That was worse than I thought.”
Elle wriggled out from beneath her and rotated a stiff shoulder. “Larish said fertilizer was made here. It’s highly explosive.”
“Fertilizer?” Cara wrinkled her forehead. “Why would Jaxen care about that?”
“War strategy,” Troy said. “First you divide your enemy from their allies. Then you remove the essentials—like food. Without fertilizer, our crops won’t be able to …” He paused when he caught a glimpse of Cara. “Whoa, Pepper, who did that to your face?”
Aelyx whipped around, his silver gaze wide.
Cara gently probed her swollen eye. “Would you believe me if I said … me?”
Troy lifted a shoulder. “Stranger things have happened. A couple hours ago, the president gave you a proper beatdown.”
She told them about Jaxen and the clone he’d created with Aribol technology.
For a moment, Aelyx went quiet. Angry quiet. “The clone could have killed you. Why didn’t you wait for me like you said you would?”
“It’s a good thing I didn’t,” she argued. “Jaxen’s the one who warned me about the explosion.”
He released a breath through his flaring nostrils. “Well, regardless, now that we know he’s been to the Aribols’ home planet, all we have to do is find his flight log.”
“And then what?” demanded Syrine. “Transmit the coordinates to the Voyagers so they can go there and provoke a war?”
Cara shook her head. “So they can go there and negotiate. Or find a weakness to exploit. Or do something besides sit back and let the hybrids take over. We just need more time to—”
“What we need is to admit we’re outmatched,” Syrine insisted. “You can stay here and chase Jaxen. I want to go home.”
Cara looked to Aelyx for support and discovered one corner of his lips curved ever-so-slightly upward. She knew that scheming grin. He’d worn the same one last month when he’d tricked a group of human colonists, herself included, into believing a nutrient-rich dip called n’ala was exactly like hummus. He’d conveniently forgotten to mention the main ingredient was insect paste.
“Syrine is right,” he said. “It’s time to give the Aribol what they want. First thing tomorrow we’re boarding the transport home.”
Chapter Eight
The moon had risen in a sliver of radiance over upstate New York, but the suburban streets were no less crowded as people left their homes to enjoy a respite from the scorching heat of day. For the last few minutes, Aelyx had been watching them. Perhaps it was paranoia, but he perceived a heightened sense of alertness in their strides, an urgency when they spoke to one another. He wondered how many of them believed the president, and how many had the mental tenacity to question their leader.
He supposed it didn’t matter. Either way, he couldn’t show his face.
He turned and walked back to the shuttle, which was docked behind a thrift store. Nearby, Cara rummaged in a clothing donation bin for shoes and a more comfortable outfit to wear. Only her skirt-clad backside was visible, wriggling back and forth with each of her movements. Aelyx grinned and leaned against the hull to enjoy the view. In times of hardship, one had to appreciate the basic pleasures in life, to stop and smell the roses, as humans said. So he admired Cara’s roses until her brother approached, and then he cleared his thr
oat and pretended to inspect the shuttle wing.
Troy lifted two paper bags, each smelling of fried potatoes. “Five heart attacks in the making. I’m not a hundred percent sure the cashier didn’t recognize me, so we should probably go.”
“I’m waiting for Elle to return from the grocery.” Aelyx peered around the building and spotted her on the sidewalk, a plastic bag in hand. She’d concealed her face with a hat from the donation bin, but he recognized her brisk stride. “There she is.”
As Troy always did when Elle was near, he stiffened and made an obvious effort not to check behind him. “Hey,” he whispered, moving closer. “Can I ask you something about your sister?”
Aelyx nodded. Considering all the things he’d done with Troy’s sister, he could hardly refuse.
“Has she … you know … moved on from losing Eron?” Troy asked. “Is she seeing anyone back home?”
Reflexively, Aelyx glanced at Syrine in the backseat. He advanced a few paces out of earshot and motioned for Troy to join him. Syrine had loved Eron too, and as fragile as she was, she didn’t need the reminder of another loss. “I don’t know,” he said. Elle didn’t share those details with him. “But the last time I engaged in Silent Speech with her, she seemed to have recovered from her grief, so she—”
Troy shushed him and waved at Elle as she reached the shuttle. She lowered a brow in confusion and waved back, then climbed into the backseat. “So,” Troy whispered, “she might be ready to move on?”
Aelyx was growing annoyed with this topic. “Assuming the Aribol don’t annihilate both our races, and assuming you join the colony and convince her to leave the capital, you might stand a remote chance with her.”
Troy grinned and delivered a slap on the back. “Thanks, man. Good talk.”
That might’ve been the nicest thing Troy had ever said to him.
Cara padded over, holding up a pair of simple black flats and a bundle of denim. “I won’t think too hard about who wore these before me or how often they bathed.” She sniffed the air a few times. “Do I smell curly fries?”
“And hamburgers.” Aelyx opened the passenger door for her. “Dinner awaits, with a side of cardiovascular disease.”
“Mmm. My favorite kind.”
Aelyx flew them one state over, and they ate dinner floating in the airspace above a national forest. He’d never developed a taste for American food, finding it overseasoned, but tonight he’d reached the advanced stage of hunger that made anything a delicacy. He devoured his meal and sat back in the pilot’s seat, resting a hand on his stomach.
After Cara finished eating, she changed into jeans and a T-shirt, then reached a hand toward her brother in the back. “Let me use your cell.”
“They can track us if it’s turned on.”
“One minute,” she said. “Then I’ll shut it off and we’ll go someplace else. The shuttle’s crazy fast. We’ll be in the next time zone before they notice our signal.”
Troy passed her the smartphone, and moments later, she cupped it between her palms, her face illuminated by the screen’s pale glow. Aelyx noticed a smudge of dirt streaking the length of her nose, and he reached out a thumb to clean it. He changed his mind at the last second and left the smudge intact. It made her seem younger, more like a girl of seventeen and less like a Chief Human Consultant bearing the weight of two worlds on her shoulders.
“Wow,” she breathed, gazing in wonder at the phone. “We’re trending. We even have our own hashtag.”
Having no idea what a hashtag was, Aelyx leaned over for a glimpse of the screen. She rotated the phone and showed him a picture of the two of them together, captioned by the words Aelyx is bae! He and Cara are my IRL OTP! Don’t let the government tear them apart! Let’s do everything we can to #SaveCalyx
He understood about half of that.
“It’s everywhere.” She powered off the phone, continuing to gaze at it. “The fandom’s going nuts. This could really work in our favor.”
“What’s a Calyx?” he asked.
“Cara plus Aelyx. It’s our ship name.”
“Ship? Do you mean a sailing vessel or a method of mailing packages?”
She laughed and patted his knee. “I’ll explain later. Right now you should probably show me how to fly this thing.”
As his entire plan hinged on her ability to pilot the craft, he agreed. Fortunately the controls made flying effortless; all she had to do was learn them. So they switched seats, and he spent the next few hours teaching her how to steer and accelerate, and most important, the subtle nuance of approaching an object without striking it.
She absorbed the information quickly, which didn’t surprise him. Cara was one of a kind among humans … or perhaps two of a kind now that she’d been cloned. Aelyx tried to push away the thought. It made him uneasy to know another version of her existed, even more so to think that Jaxen had warped the very best part of the girl. Passion was of little worth without love to soften its edges.
Syrine drew him back to present company with a complaint. “I wish you hadn’t told me what you’re about to do. It’s a crime against The Way. I’ll be punished when I get home if I don’t report you first.”
He turned to face her while Cara continued practicing. The others might not understand Syrine’s concern because they didn’t know what had happened last winter. He’d disobeyed their leaders, and she’d made the mistake of trying to defend him. As punishment, she’d had to administer his Reckoning—twenty lashes with the iphet.
“No one will punish you,” he told her. “Alona said we have two more days. Technically, we aren’t disobeying her orders.”
“The Way doesn’t care about technicalities, and you know it.” Syrine folded her arms and addressed Cara. “If you’re so confident, then contact Alona and tell her everything.”
Cara laughed without humor. “Sometimes it’s better to beg forgiveness than ask permission.”
“That proves my point.”
“Give it a rest, okay?” Cara called over her shoulder. “Right now it feels like the whole world is against me—because it kind of is—and the last thing I need is my friends jumping on my case, too.”
Aelyx found that a bit harsh. “She’s not against you. She’s only worried, and for good reason. You weren’t raised on L’eihr. You don’t understand what it’s like to be taught obedience to The Way from birth.”
“Please,” Cara scoffed. “I was raised Catholic. I win.”
Troy snickered and reached forward to bump fists with his sister.
“Maybe we should stop bickering and focus on the plan,” Elle suggested. “There’s very little margin for error, and if you don’t mind, I’d prefer not to die in the cold void of space.”
Syrine heaved a sigh and stayed quiet after that.
The rest of them went over the plan, and then over it a dozen more times. They covered every detail, leaving nothing to doubt, and when the first hints of sunlight began to blush in the eastern horizon, Cara piloted them beyond the atmosphere to the L’eihr transport.
She landed inside the docking bay, and they climbed out of the shuttle, taking a moment to stretch their stiff limbs and backs before making their way inside a small holding area, beyond which stretched the corridor to the main ship. Colonel Rutter was waiting there with a regretful grin on his face.
“You’re doing the right thing,” he told them.
Nobody in the group spoke, mostly because they hadn’t slept in twenty-four hours. But to the casual observer, it would probably seem they were overcome by the sadness of parting ways. Cara’s eyes were especially bloodshot and swollen, her skin blackened by her fight with the clone.
Rutter jerked his chin at Cara and her brother. “I’d like to pretend I never saw you here, but that’ll be hard if we share a ride back to the States.”
“I’m taking Aelyx’s shuttle,” Cara said, her voice cracking. Emotion choked off the rest of her words, and she hid her face in her hands.
She was good.
>
Rutter fixed his gaze on his boots and began scratching his neck as though he’d developed an allergy to female tears. “Call your parents, Sweeney,” he mumbled. “They’re frantic.” Then he wasted no time in returning to the docking bay.
As soon as Aelyx heard the rumble of Rutter’s shuttle departing, he released a breath. They’d cleared their first hurdle. Now they needed as many L’eihr crew members as possible to witness his goodbye with Cara. Pictures were a must, too. Later Cara could upload them to her blog as proof that he’d returned home.
Someone hissed his name, and he turned to find Larish approaching from the main corridor to the ship. Larish already knew the plan. They’d spoken hours earlier via com-sphere.
“You’re early,” Aelyx said. “Is the ambassador in his room?”
Larish nodded. “Under heavy guard. Whatever Jaxen did to his mind, it hasn’t worn off. But that’s not why I’m here. There’s something you should know.”
“Hey, Calyx.” Troy held up his phone. “I’m on half battery, so let’s get this photo shoot started.”
“One moment,” Aelyx told Larish. He strode away and extended a hand to Cara. “Ready?”
Her fingers were cold when she laced them in his. “Not really.”
He cradled her face between his palms, careful not to hurt her bruises, and reached out to her with his eyes. Have faith. The universe hasn’t been able to keep us apart yet. No matter what, I’ll always find my way back to you.
Instead of responding with words, Cara projected her love for him, an emotion so pure it made both their eyes water.
“That’s perfect,” Troy muttered, clicking pictures with his phone. “Extra mushy and gag-inducing.”
“I think it’s sweet,” Elle said, and ended Troy’s commentary.
The flight crew entered from the hangar and informed Cara it was time for her to leave, so Aelyx drew her body closer as she stood on tiptoe and twined both arms around his neck. He nuzzled the slope of her shoulder and closed his eyes to focus on the soft, warm curves pressed against him. Her breath hitched, and he had a feeling she wasn’t faking this time. Before he lost his nerve, he released her and faced away, then strode quickly into the main ship.
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