by David Estes
She’d always been perceptive, knowing when he wasn’t feeling quite himself. Her concern for his well-being was a constant reminder of what he was, how little he deserved such love. It wore on him, scraped away at his insides day by day.
Slowly changing him.
And then he’d seen her on the holonews.
She was like him, a human now, but still he knew, could see through her transformation to the Centaurian she once was.
He’d wept tears of joy.
Later, he’d regretted them.
Still, all had gone according to plan, and he’d entered the Academy the day after his eighteenth birthday. His adopted parents’ faces had practically glowed as they’d waved goodbye, their eyes shining with unshed tears.
No one suspected a thing. Why would they? Even if someone had, who would believe a farfetched story about a god-powered ship tearing toward them at impossible speeds, devouring planets and stars along the way? No one, that’s who.
So Dacre once more resigned himself to his mission, marveling at how much Miranda had grown up, having not seen her for twelve long years. The moment their eyes had met, he’d seen the certainty and resolve in her steely gaze. She’d nodded to him and he’d nodded back, forging anew a connection based on history and purpose.
It was time to get to work.
Verity Toya had been his undoing, or so he told himself, when really he’d been unraveling from the moment he saw his first godstar.
Miranda had tried to save him, but even she had failed.
And now here he was, about to land on a dangerous planet, keeping the company of a gang of criminals and a misunderstood race demonized by Alliance propaganda.
What the Hole am I doing? he wondered, bracing himself for impact as the harsh red terrain flashed by. A jagged outcropping appeared out of nowhere and Kukk’uk was forced to yank one of the control ropes, narrowly skating past overhead before dipping once more, finding a narrow stretch of relatively flat ground to ease down onto. The ship jolted once, twice, thrice and then the reverse thrusters did their work, slowing the rig’s forward momentum enough that Dacre knew they wouldn’t be crushed by the solid rock wall they were approaching.
They came to rest a full two hundred meters before the end of the stretch, and Clay Coffee said, “Damn good flying,” which was a pretty high compliment considering how much the man seemed to detest the Jackals. Cir’u’non, Dacre reminded himself, trying to retrain his brain. Even if only half of what Kukk’uk had told him was true, no one should be called something they didn’t want to be called.
Kukk’uk clicked a short, sharp, Thanks, and turned off the engines, the entire rig sagging with a long, slow hiss.
Dacre unhitched his restraints, Coffee and his entourage doing the same. The rest of Kukk’uk’s soldiers were hanging from the ceiling, but one by one they swooped to the floor in a rustle of leathery wings.
Go time, Dacre thought. Regardless of how uncertain he was of anything, he knew he needed to find what he’d come for. What to do with it once he had it was a decision for another day.
The story of my life, he thought wryly.
“Lead the way,” Coffee said.
Dacre was prepared to do just that, when warning bells began going off all over the place. Kukk’uk stepped down from the control pedestal, clicking orders so rapidly to her soldiers that Dacre’s translator only picked up a few words—Company and Secure the perimeter.
Dacre scanned the viewport, which showed nothing but empty terrain, contrary to whatever the warning bells were trying to signal. Kukk’uk was cycling through the warning system menu, trying to locate the cause of the alarm.
“Malfunction?” Coffee suggested. “Perhaps something got screwed up when we entered the atmosphere. Or on landing.”
It was possible, but not likely. These star-rigs were designed to take a beating.
Perimeter radar shows nothing, Kukk’uk clicked. Air above us is free and clear too. No wildlife. No nothing.
Dacre frowned, his instincts telling him something was off. Through the viewport, he watched the winged soldiers spread out, forming a barrier between the ship and whatever might be out there, some unseen enemy. Coffee had sent his crew out as well, though they didn’t mix with Kukk’uk’s warriors.
All of them were heavily armed, pointing their various weapons in a wide arc away from the rig.
Dacre’s eyes narrowed. “We should—”
Kukk’uk clicked sharply, a single word that cut off Dacre’s suggestion.
Ground.
Sure enough, the ground radar was displayed on the holoscreen. Rather than black and empty, like one would expect, there was a single red dot moving across it. No, Dacre remembered. Not across. Up. The ground radar was based on elevation. Someone or something was moving up through the bedrock, heading right for them.
He was about to shout a warning when another red dot appeared. Then another.
Oh crap.
“Move!” Coffee shouted just as the first—Dacre wasn’t sure what else to call it—thing, burst from the ground, savagely ripping into one of the Cir’u’non’s legs. The creature, monster, thing…had no head, and yet bore a dozen mouths filled with rows of sharp teeth.
The Jackal managed to release a short, high-pitched shriek before it died.
The ratatatatat of rapid gunfire accompanied the shouts of the crew as more of the many-mouthed creatures erupted from the ground.
Coffee grabbed Dacre by the arm and dragged him toward the rig’s exit. Kukk’uk was just behind them, her leathery wings beating the air into a frenzy. What are those things? Dacre wondered as they ran. They weren’t Gremolins, that much was certain.
Just before they turned the corner and galloped down the ramp, Dacre drew his mag-blade, his blood beginning to hum in anticipation of processing the aura flowing through his veins. A blast of exceptionally hot wind hit him full in the face, almost as if he’d stepped into a massive oven.
But that was a minor concern next to what he saw outside the rig.
All ideas of doing something heroic vanished as he watched one of Coffee’s crew members, a large, scaled Grobnik male, get ravaged by a dozen hungry mouths. The sheer intensity of the violence stole his breath.
Coffee leapt forward fearlessly, dropping to one knee as he fired the two-handed railgun he’d unstrapped from his back. The hailstorm of bullets tore into the monster, wounds blooming on its dark skin like blisters, and Dacre was surprised to find that a creature so alien to him would bleed red.
Other than being headless, the creature was humanoid in form, with two legs and two arms. Its skin was as black as midnight but dusted with a layer of red soil. Its mouths were located on each thigh, each forearm, and even each hand, tiny chompers that looked capable of tearing through bone if not stone. Perhaps that was how it moved through the ground, by eating its way through. It also had three mouths on its chest and stomach, and as its body was riddled with bullets it spun around to reveal three more on its back.
Godstars save us all, Dacre thought, unable to look away as the creature finally fell, its mouths still biting at the air for a few moments longer before going still.
More screams tore him from his stupor, and Dacre followed Coffee as he ran around to the front of the rig, where it was a bloodbath. Two more Cir’u’non had been massacred before they could take flight, as well as one of Coffee’s huge Bronzians. The crew had managed to eliminate one of the monsters, but more were emerging from the ground, the landscape dotted with holes.
One charged at Dacre, swinging a mouthed fist at his head. He ducked, stabbing his mag-blade into the mouth in the creature’s belly but flinching away as the two mouths in its chest gnashed at him. He tumbled back, and the blade came free, slick with gore. A river of blood poured from the mouth he’d stabbed into.
“Ahh!” he screamed as something hit him from behind, a hot flash of pain erupting in his shoulder. Relying on instinct alone, he dove forward, twisting his body in a manner designed
to dislodge his foe from his back. More pain lanced through him. His ankle was on fire. His arm too. He was being eaten alive.
The weight of the attacker had him pinned to the ground as it tore into his flesh.
And then the weight was suddenly gone, though the splashes of pain remained. “C’mon, mage knight, you gotta do better than that,” Coffee said, peppering the monster he’d knocked aside with railgun fire. The first creature backed away but was too slow and met the same fate.
Dacre dragged himself to his feet, managing to mutter, “Thanks,” while cringing from the pain. More than a dozen of the creatures were still standing.
“Don’t thank me,” Coffee said, cautiously aiming his railgun only at those monsters that weren’t too close to his allies. “Kill some of these freaks.”
Dacre nodded, impressed by the man’s composure. He spotted Kukk’uk, who’d fired three magic-laced darts into one of the “freak’s” chests. The thing was unfazed, releasing a shriek from all twelve mouths at once and charging toward her. Kukk’uk seemed to realize another dart wouldn’t make a difference and leapt into the air, her wings unfurling in a desperate attempt to escape. The creature jumped too, its powerful leap launching it far higher than Dacre expected, latching onto her clawed feet with both its hand-mouths, dragging her back down to the ground in a tangle of wings, claws and teeth.
Dacre raced forward, his training finally kicking in in earnest. Gripping his blade with four fingers, he traced a glyph on its hilt with his thumb, a technique that was even more difficult than it sounded, but one he’d been forced to practice thousands of times back at the Academy.
Icepick.
He shoved the magically charged blade into the monster’s back, between two of its shrieking mouths. Where the blade entered, ice immediately formed, racing outward across its skin, mouths, and throughout the whole of its body.
The beast continued moving, but only because Kukk’uk was struggling beneath it, shoving it aside as she rolled away. The frozen creature hit the ground and shattered into a million crystalline fragments, many in the shape of teeth.
Kukk’uk deftly regained her feet, clicked a warning, and fired a dart that zipped past Dacre’s head just as he had the presence of mind to duck. In the same motion, he spun around and stabbed, catching the monster where its sternum should’ve been, entering its largest maw, which clamped down on his weapon. A dart was poking from one of its other mouths.
Like its buddy, ice formed swiftly through its body, which was already collapsing.
Dacre raced on, shards of ice crunching underfoot, already beginning to melt into a large pool in the oppressive heat. Steam was rising from the heated water.
Things got slightly easier after that, as Dacre fell into a rhythm. The creatures were deadly, but not especially intelligent, their mouths snapping recklessly about without strategy or coordination. He used two additional spells in the melee, one that drew a frozen path across the ground to one of the monsters, causing it to slip and fall—Coffee finished it off with his railgun—and the other to shield Kukk’uk from an attack from behind, giving the creature several mouthfuls of ice.
Once the creatures were all dead, Dacre stopped to catch his breath, surveying the scene. Kukk’uk had lost at least three soldiers, and one was in bad shape, half her arm chewed away and a wing badly damaged. Coffee’s crew was worse off, with six down and not moving. Another three were staggering about bleeding profusely.
“I’ll get the med-bot,” Dacre said, turning away and feeling slightly ill.
They’d finally made it to Urkusk.
But they were not off to a good start.
Chapter 24
A coming storm
Verity was speechless. She’d loved Dacre. She’d kissed him, been with him, had his child. And now this woman—alien—was telling her he wasn’t human? And worse, that he was a forward scout for an alien race that was plotting to destroy their entire galaxy?
Frank Stallone said, “You mages. Godstars. So dramatic. Can we cut to the chase? When are the rest of your Centaurian pals going to arrive?”
“Four days,” Miranda said without hesitation. “Well, slightly less now. That’s why we don’t have time to play these games anymore. We have to catch Dacre before it’s too late.”
Vee narrowed her eyes. “If your people are coming to destroy us, why do you care? You’ll survive. Hole, you’ll thrive. Am I right?”
Miranda nodded slowly. “Yes. I was a believer for a long time, as devout to the cause as any of the other scouts. That’s why I sabotaged your relationship with Dacre. I thought he was straying, that he would ruin all our plans.”
Vee’s lip curled as bitterness flooded her mouth. Memories assaulted her. Dacre’s hand, so gentle as it pushed a stray lock of her hair aside. His eyes, bright blue pools, seeming to drink her in. His lips, tasting her at first and then later devouring her. He’d been her life, her future.
And he was a lie, just like all her other hopes and dreams.
“That’s why Dacre protected you,” Vee said, her voice a low growl. “Because you were his kind. His fellow spy.”
Miranda nodded. “To be honest, I was surprised he did. I was worried he was too far gone. That his love for you had erased any sense of duty and commitment to the Centaurians. But then you…”
She trailed away. If Vee didn’t know any better, she might’ve thought the woman she’d hated for so long looked sad. The day—the act—she was referring to was the biggest regret of Vee’s life. After she’d caught Dacre in bed with Miranda, she’d lost her mind, gone nuclear. The two had sprung from between the sheets and Dacre had put up his hands, his eyes wide and afraid. He’d said something about wanting to explain, that it wasn’t what she thought it was. In that moment, however, Vee only wanted to hurt the woman who’d ruined the beautiful future Vee had painted in her own imagination. Miranda had been standing behind Dacre, wearing nothing but lingerie, her cadet jumpsuit in a pile on the floor. In a fit of rage, Vee had whipped out her mag-pistol and traced a glyph. It was a Class 5 spell, not only illegal for a mage cadet to use but deadly and unpredictable. She’d taken a step to the side and fired around Dacre, her aim perfect. Miranda Petros was going to hurt, to burn.
Dacre, however, had managed to ruin her revenge. To this day, it had confounded her how he’d done it, how he’d moved so quickly, grabbing the mag-shield from where it was propped against the wall, forming a counterspell.
He’d blocked her purple ball of fire with a blast of icy breath, sending it back toward her. Technically it couldn’t have hurt her, and she’d simply absorbed it back into her body. But the worst injury of all was that Dacre had made his choice, and he’d chosen Miranda.
That’s when Vee had been grabbed from behind by one of the instructors, who’d witnessed the entire thing. She and Dacre were expelled from the Academy. They’d broken a major rule, attacking a fellow cadet. Though Dacre hadn’t really tried to hurt her, it didn’t change the fact that he’d used magic to send a spell in her direction outside of normal training. There were no exceptions.
Vee had thought about that horrible, awful day so many times she couldn’t count, examining it from all angles, trying to make sense of the senseless. Regretting the fact that she hadn’t just walked away.
Now, however, one single detail stood out above all else. Dacre was fully dressed when he’d stood between her and Miranda. Vee frowned, cycling back to the moment she entered the room to her worst nightmare.
And her breath caught. Sometimes what your mind sees is different than what your eyes see, her father had once told her when speaking about his work as a scientist. You must learn to separate the two. To see the truth and then analyze it afterwards.
She’d seen exactly what Miranda had wanted her to see. An affair.
In bed, with Miranda half-clothed, what else could she see but her fiancé groping another woman?
Now. Now she saw something else entirely. Dacre was trying to fight off Miranda’s un
wanted advances, gripping her wrists and trying to shove her back. He’d been trying to escape.
“You,” she said, her teeth clenched as tight as her fists. Burning with anger, it was the only word she could come up with, so she said it again, spitting it this time. “You.”
“I—I’m sorry,” Miranda said. “I regret what I did each and every day. If I hadn’t intervened, everything would be different. I’ve tried to reconnect with Dacre ever since, to apologize, to explain that I’ve changed, that I understand him now. But he’s a man who hasn’t wanted to be found.”
“Sorry?” That word had no meaning to Vee, not when it came to this. Some cuts ran too deep for apologies. Afterwards, Dacre had tried to contact her on numerous occasions, to plead his case. But she hadn’t wanted to listen. She didn’t want to be the fool who allowed herself to be sucked back into a life that had been reduced to rubble.
“This is my fault,” Miranda said, taking a halting step forward. “So I have to fix it.”
Terry finally spoke up. “What changed your mind, Centaurian?” Vee half-turned toward her old friend, whose small, amphibious head was still bandaged from the knock he’d taken. “You were so committed to your people’s cause that you were willing to destroy Vee’s life. So why are you on our side now?” There was no anger in the Chameleot’s tone, only calculation.
Miranda hung her head. “My cover was perfect. I was anointed a warrior mage, with the full authority of the Alliance backing me. I could’ve singlehandedly sabotaged the Alliance defenses well before my homeship arrived in this galaxy. But my first mission as a green warrior mage was to a small planet in the Godstar VI system. Ventros? You might have heard of it.”
“One of the mining planets,” Vee said numbly.
Miranda nodded. “The Mech War had destroyed the planet’s largest city. Alliance forces had arrived in time to push the Mech army back, but not before they’d killed thousands. The carnage was shocking to me. It wasn’t something we learned about in the Academy. There it was all ra ra, how we were protectors of the galaxy, Alliance peacekeepers that did what no one else could do. This city was reality. No matter what we did, innocents would die. Innocents. That word struck a chord with me. Was anyone truly innocent? Was I innocent? Was one life worth more than another? I already knew the Alliance had secrets. I’d heard rumors and gossip.”