“Her?” I repeat. My thoughts race and a wave of heat prickles over my cheeks. What was I doing? I was just…my memories stutter and jumble. I was just flying, flying, coming here to get my sister… Frantically, my eyes search everywhere.
“Claire?” I say, looking at Rune and grabbing onto his shoulders. My head feels like it’s floating away. Rune lets out a deep sigh and looks down. My eyes follow his and find that girl who had collapsed.
I don’t understand. Nothing registers at first.
Suddenly the ground erupts with brutal tremors, shaking us off balance. On the other side of the walls the sharp pops of gunfire rip through the night. The girls scream, desperately holding on to each other, cringing and cowering in on themselves.
The girl at my feet looks lifeless. Her skin is a frightening shade of pale blue, her lips a brutal purple.
I choke on my scream.
It can’t be Claire. Claire can’t be lying there. “What? What! Why didn’t I—”
Rune scoops her listless body. Her arms dangle sickeningly toward the floor. “Go, Kate.” His face a vicious warning, “Run, now. Go.” His body pushes into mine and my feet go. Right out of the safety of the gym and into the chaos of the fight.
A huge explosion bursts through the stone wall just to the left. It rocks me sideways and I stumble into the snow. Rocks rain down around me, biting cuts into my cheeks when they land. I feel the blood trickle down my temple, a strange underwater silence filling my ears. Up ahead I see Rune through the smoke. It billows around him like he’s some god, standing in the clouds. My eyes blink slowly as I watch him mouth my name. The cords of his neck bulge out as he yells—but I hear nothing—just the thump, thump, thumping of my pulse in my ears.
Sparks of gunfire blast through the smoke. My mouth fills, thick and metallic tasting. Red saliva drips down my chest.
Alloy limbs run pass me, stained with blood and earth.
My eyes blur and I can’t see Rune anymore.
Just a battlefield of dirt and fire.
And red, red snow.
And then, nothing.
24
Kate
I’m clamped to a metal chair when I wake. My mouth is gagged with itchy twine so tightly I can’t move my head. I gag. My stomach heaves as frays from the ropes tickle the back of my throat. I’ll choke on my own vomit if I can’t control my gag reflex. I push my tongue against the rough cords but nothing gives. Gasping, eyes stinging and burning, I strain to breathe, retching thick hot saliva up from my esophagus.
I try to breathe through my nose, but there just isn’t enough air. My lungs start burning and I sob, biting down onto the binds.
“Easy, female,” a deep rumble warns from somewhere close behind me. I strain to move my eyes, which if it’s even possible, seems to tighten the gag around me. Instantly, I’m panicking and hyperventilating until big black spots are bursting in my eyes.
Then with a soft snip, the binds fall away and I’m gulping back deep breaths of air. After taking my fill of oxygen, I whirl my head around, attempting to find the person who hides behind the chair.
Shadows creep up along smooth black walls, so black it’s hard to see where the shadows end and wall begins. The room turns deathly silent; only the sounds of my shallow breaths reach my ears. I strain to hear past it, even hold my breath, which just makes me panicky remembering the gag. “Who’s there?” I ask, voice hoarse and dry. I sound scared, but for the first time I’m not. I’m suddenly, actually not afraid.
I’m fucking pissed off.
I’m tired of this shit.
I’m tired of being scared.
I’m tired of not knowing anything.
A cold wind blows through my hair. Strands of it wisp softly along my cheek, sending shivers down my spine.
Cold, steel fingers wrap around the back of my neck and I instantly freeze.
“Fascinating,” the thing behind me hisses. “The way the color drains from your skin.” The grating voice crawls long my arms, making the small hairs stand on end, and goose bumps follow after. The icy grip tightens and holds my head forcefully in place. I can’t see him, just a hazy glimmer of steel in the corner of my eye, and the intense pressure on the base of my skull. I breathe deeply, willing my body to remain calm. I decide to stare ahead blankly.
A sharply angled, metallic mask creeps slowly into my sight. It’s covered in intricate patterns of gold scales and serpentine features. It growls with a deep rumbling sound; half machinery, half animal. A creation forged from nightmares. “If you do not know already, I am General Pious.”
With a sudden loud clang, the metal shackles holding my wrists and ankles spring open. The hand wrapped around the back of my neck lifts painfully and my body has no other recourse than to follow the motion. My toes barely touch down on the floor, but I stretch them as far as I can, desperately trying to alleviate the pressure of being held from my neck and dragged into another room. My fingers automatically claw at the hand squeezing my skin, but I can’t find purchase. I can’t scratch through the smooth thick metal.
He chuckles and lowers his arm. My feet scrabble at the floor and slip. I struggle to gain my stability but it’s no use; my legs give out as he tugs me through a doorway and tosses me onto the floor. The cold metal of the floor is uncompromising as my body slams down. Every inch of me screams with pain.
The glacial metal of the floor rakes shivers across my shoulders and through my core. My legs and arms are bare. My torso. My stomach. The arctic chill surges through my veins and I cry out in humiliation. I’m completely naked.
My head throbs in agony as I pull myself up on my hands to lean on my palms, catching my breath. I blink up at my captor, anger boiling just under the surface of my chest.
Pious leers at me—his features though robotic in nature—express something cruel and dark. He paces in front of me, body posturing and coiling for a fight.
“What do you want from me?” I spit.
He stills. Deep-set black eye holes angle down toward me.
I watch as his fingers slowly close into fists.
Behind me there’s a spark then a buzz, and the room lights up with bright lights from an unknown source. It’s as if the walls themselves are glowing and lighting the room. I wince loudly as I swing my head around, but the sound dies on my lips.
There, behind a filthy glass panel, is Rune.
I scramble to my feet and rush up to the window.
His palms are pressing against the other side of the glass, and his eyes are locked on mine. He doesn’t notice my lack of clothing, or if he does, he doesn’t let me know, and I almost love him for it. “Pious,” he yells, his voice muted to a low roar. “Don’t do this!”
“It’s already done,” Pious chuckles, slithering up next to me.
Rune still doesn’t take his eyes off mine. They look feverish and pained.
I press my palms against the glass, the same place he has his, and warmth floods my chest. I need to talk to him. I know he saved my sister. I know it. He had to.
“Where’s Claire?” I shout. “Did you—” I bite back the words when Pious yanks my hair back in a fist. My scalp burns where he’s tugging, ripping the strands away. Tears fill my eyes.
Rune pounds his fists on the glass and shouts my name. His movements are quick and frenzied.
Pious steps back, letting me go. A handful of my hair falls softly from his fingers and lands across the pale skin of my legs. He rubs his hands together, brushing the last few strands off, and casually circles me.
Fear creeps up in a string of sweat along my brow and curdles my stomach.
“My pretty little pet,” Pious murmurs. His smile widens slowly until a mouthful of razor-edged steel teeth is all I see.
Scrambling on my hands and knees, I crawl frantically, pressing into the giant window that Rune watches from.
He’s beside himself with rage. His arms and hands are shaking violently; the muscles in his neck and arms strain and pop against his skin.
I can hear his guttural roars and feel the slam of his fists reverberate along the glass.
But standing over me, Pious laughs. A dark, ugly cackle that I know seals my fate.
“Pious, no!” Rune cries, falling to his knees.
Why would he fall to his knees?
Get up! Get up, Asshole! I scream in my head. “Get up!” I sob, breaking down.
Rune stills, his jaw clenched tight. He’s still on his knees, red bloodied palms flat against the glass. “I’ll come for you. I swear,” he says, in a barely audible grunt. “Pious,” his eyes dart up to the monster beside me, “I’m going to kill you.”
The ground trembles below me and suddenly, the entire room seems to lift up. Rune stumbles back, eyes wide, mouth screaming words I can no longer hear.
The room rises higher off the ground and the window view becomes bigger. I think I see Claire and my father through the smudges of Rune’s blood smeared across the glass. They’re shielding their eyes from the wind. He saved her! I think it’s her, it has to be! I swallow back a gasp and nod. Everything will be okay now. I can deal with anything after this. Claire is safe. My father is safe.
Higher and higher we get until Rune is nothing but a small speck on a ruined ground. My eyes stay focused on him and when they finally lift, I struggle to breathe because the horizon straight ahead is nothing but smoke and ash.
We’re airborne. Drifting over what’s left of my planet, my home.
“Where are you taking me?” I ask through gritted teeth.
Gears move and shift on his faceplate and what seems to be a smile slashes drastically across his face. Behind us, the blue sky blurs from light to dark and stars sparkle and glitter across the vastness of it. He points out across the glass and taps a finger against it. “There,” he says, chuckling. “Your new home.”
Part II
25
Kate
I am so screwed right now.
Apparently, my new home IS the aircraft.
Yes, my new place of residency is an enormous metal coffin zooming through the cosmos. Just that one thought makes me feel like I’m going to shit all over the floor, right here in front of him. I curl into myself more and keep my eyes facing out the window. I don’t want to show him any respect, it’s bad enough I’m on the floor at his steel feet.
“There’s no way I’m going to be able to stay in this tin box,” I say, in a shrill shaky voice that doesn’t even sound like me.
“It’s quite humorous to me that you think you even have a say in the matter,” the huge space alien asshole answers back.
I want to scream. I want to wake up from this horrible nightmare and go back to living my nice boring life.
“Why me?” I ask, whirling around to face the monster. He’s covered from head to toe in that strange suit of armor they all wear. It makes them some sort of cyborgs or something. I’m not sure if they’re human or what. I keep repeating things I know, because I think I’m literally going crazy.
Rune said he was just as human as me. And Rune helped me. I think he even helped me save my sister from boarding this tin can. But now I’m here instead.
“Don’t misunderstand yourself as anything special. Your body was just compatible with our armor and you’re a prime candidate for breeding. Nothing more.” The gears and plates shift noiselessly along the bottom of his jaw. Smooth matte alloy clings to him like a layer of skin. I know how deep the metal runs, it sinks through your pores and fills the marrow of your bones with ice. It makes you a monster. Does something to your brain letting you override your own humanity.
“Pious. That’s your name, right? Take off your faceplate,” I say, tightening my arms over my bare breasts. I’ve been leaning against the window, curled into a ball covering all my important parts with my clumsy limbs, loose and stringy feeling since we vaulted into the atmosphere.
The creature steps back, his metallic fingers crunching into fists.
“Rune told me about you,” I lie. Rune pretty much evaded every question I ever asked of him, but this guy-alien-whatever doesn’t have a clue.
His metal mouth might be smirking at me. I’m not sure. There’s one thing I learned while being stuck with Rune for the last few days, these creatures really think they are superior. Of course they do, since they’re a race of only men. The women seemed to have vanished. Gee, uh, duh, I wonder why? What could possibly be bad about living inside a cold gray metal ship with a merry little gang of arrogant assholes? I’d go and get myself extinct too.
His icy metal fingers are on me before I can even process he moved. They clamp like vise grips around my throat. “Get up,” he says, lifting me with one hand.
I have no choice, my body just goes. Sharp white-hot pain rips beneath my jaw as he pulls me. My calves and thighs strain to keep the tips of my toes on the floor to relieve the pressure. Spit and gasps choke out of my throat as I try to suck in air that’s being blocked by his strong grasp.
“So fragile, your kind are,” he murmurs, pulling me closer to his dark-holed eye sockets. I wonder what his mask is displaying as it analyzes my emotional and physical status to him. I instantly heat with fury. I can feel my skin tighten and pinch. I don’t want this asshole to be able to read what’s going on in my body right now. There’s no way I want him knowing I’m scared out of my damn mind. My hands slam at his elbows, trying to make his hold less harsh, but all he does is chuckle.
His fingers open without warning and I stumble trying to catch my balance. As soon as I’m steady, I cover my body with my arms and hands. “I need clothes,” I spit out. My voice is husky and dry. “And a glass of water, asshole.”
The metal latches on his mask lift at the corners of the dumb hole he has for a mouth. He is smirking at me. “Why don’t I show the princess to her new palace?”
A section of the flat gray wall opens and a long bright corridor spreads out behind it. “You will follow with no resistance.” It isn’t a question, but a bold statement with what sounds like a threatening snarl at the end.
Inside my head I scream FUCK YOU!
“Clothing?” I ask, before taking a step forward. “You want me to walk through that hallway naked? On a ship full of men who have never seen a naked woman before? Uh, that would be a HELL NO!”
He yanks my arm by the elbow and drags me through the door. “Stupid girl, the Caelum are wearing their faceplates and their view of you is being overridden. I don’t even notice your state right now.”
“That doesn’t make me feel any safer to walk naked through a hallway, Sir Douchalot,” I grumble, trying to pull my arm away.
Pious ignores my ribbing and pulls me past dozens of doorways and walkways, everything as far as my eyes can see are in shades of dull matted gray or black. I’m already depressed by it. “This place sucks,” I say.
“Only when someone opens the exit hatches,” he says, fixing his dark eyes in my direction. I think he’s smirking at me again. This is ridiculous. I’m going to find a way to blow up this ship. Boom. Gone. Alien problem solved.
He stops abruptly at the end of a small alcove he just turned into and a narrow door slides open to reveal a small cell-like room. It’s the same size as my bathroom in our apartment back home. The walls are pale gray and a small bunk juts out from the farthest one. To my right and left the walls are covered with strange machinery. Buttons of various shapes and small lights blink along the expanse from ceiling to floor. As soon as Pious shoves me inside, my head feels full of cotton. It’s the same feeling when you stick your fingers in your ears and you hear that soft rumble of white noise.
The door hisses and slides closed behind us.
Slowly I spin around to take in my surroundings. Pious is pressing buttons on a small red console by the door; it’s the only thing besides the little blinking lights with color. He pulls open a small drawer and reaches inside.
“Yeah, so…There’s no way I’m staying in here,” I say, facing him. “Not in this poor excuse for a room and definitely not on thi
s…” I point and wave my hands all around, “whatever this is. Not happening.”
A scratchy wool blanket slams into my face. It launched so fast out of his hands I didn’t even register it flying at me. “Hm. Is that so?”
I wrestle with the blanket until it’s wrapped around my shoulders and covering everything but my ankles and feet. “Yes. It is.”
“And how will you leave? Do you think it would be simple to just open an airlock and step outside? Or do you think someone is coming to get you? Who will come to save you?”
“Rune said he would—”
“Why would Rune come for you?” he cuts in, stalking closer to me, devouring the small distance between us until his cold armor is cool against my skin. “Interesting, how very emotional you are. Believe me, girl, Rune has no care or use for you.” His dark holes eerily stare down over me. He pulls himself straighter and seems to take a deep thoughtful breath in. “I would welcome his attempt, though.”
“Yeah, so would I,” I snap, huddling myself onto the cold flat poor excuse for a bunk that’s protruding from the wall. “I hope he kicks your ass, too.”
“Your mouth is disturbingly archaic.”
“Your whole race is disturbingly assoholic.”
“Your entrance mechanism locks from the outside,” Pious mumbles then pivots on his feet and storms out of the small cell. The door opens and closes quickly, leaving me inside, alone.
“Hey!” I yell, jumping off the bunk. “What if I have to pee?”
His metallic flavored laughter echoes down the hallway as his footfalls trail away from my door. I spend a good five minutes pounding my fists against it, then press every button and light I find, and lift every lever I can. Nothing happens.
Eventually I bundle myself on the icy flat shelf and fall into a restless sleep.
I dream about home and fires and war raging miles below us.
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