by Keary Taylor
“You were out there, in space, alive, glowing like a super nova.”
My heart is racing in my chest, and I can’t breathe.
Not true. It can’t be true. This sounds like a space tale you tell your children at night when you tuck them into bed.
Kings. Frozen kingdoms. Children floating in space. A planet full of Nero.
“I got you into the ship and you were sleeping, Nova, completely unharmed by the Neron, or the vacuum of space that should have killed you.”
I shake my head, just once, but my father nods his head.
“You couldn’t have been older than three solars,” he says, his voice breathy. “But you were alive.”
I feel like I’m fracturing inside. I’m cracking.
Truth. Impossibility.
Everything is different. Nothing is what I thought it was.
“I tried radioing to Glorra, but there was no answer, only silence, and I knew, because I could see it, there were no signs of life left on that planet,” Torin continues. “The minute you opened your eyes they filled with tears. You looked so scared. I reached for you, to try and comfort you, but the Neron burned me.”
He holds up his hands, and I see scars I never gave too much thought to. Arcs of red and white cover his palms, lick up onto his fingers, touching the back of his hands and his wrists.
“But then, like it was nothing, you waved your little arms, and like it was listening to you, the Neron disappeared,” he says with awe. “Like it listened to you, and you controlled it.”
He takes a sniff, trying to get control of the emotions ripping through him. He crosses his arms over his chest.
“Orhemia answers to Dominion,” Torin says, lifting his chin. “Cyrillius is a direct partner of the Supreme Minister. I knew if I took you back there and they ever found out, he would turn you over to Dominion. And there were rumors that Cyrillius had a child, the first found in decades, who was a Nero. I couldn’t let him have two.”
Pound, pound, pound. My heart is thundering. My blood is rushing in my ears so loud I feel like I can hardly hear anything else.
“So, I took you, and I ran,” my father confesses. “I pulled up the database of Neron-free planets. I wanted to get further across the galaxy, but I knew eventually Orhemia would come looking for me. So I went straight to Korpillion, and I hid us.”
It was such a risk. My father was in danger every single day.
If I was a toddler who could wield Neron, I could have killed him. I could have wiped out our entire city, just because I didn’t know how to control my abilities.
“I don’t know why, but you never displayed Nero abilities after we arrived on Korpillion. Your whole life I’ve watched you, and not once, not until today, have you used Neron again,” my father confesses the truth. “And I prayed that maybe you weren’t really a Nero, that maybe someone else had enveloped you in Neron and sent you into space to protect you.”
My entire life is a lie.
The weight of that hits me in the chest.
But when I look at the expression on my father’s face, my heart cracks.
I cross the command deck in five long strides. I envelop him in my arms, burying my face into his neck.
Torin was a soldier. He had a life; he had a job. He was from a planet a long way from here.
But he gave it all up.
To protect me. To raise me like I was his own.
“Thank you,” I say, my voice filled with awe and gratitude. “Thank you for everything you gave up for me.”
My father’s arms hold me tight, cradling me into him, just as he’s done the past nineteen solars.
“I love you always,” he says softly into my hair.
“No matter what,” I complete the promise.
I understand the promise so much better now.
Torin isn’t actually my father; not biologically. I have other parents out there, stuck on that frozen planet. I don’t know if they’re still alive, or if they’re trapped in some kind of stasis sleep.
But this man raised me. He’s taken care of me. He’s loved me. He’s kept me safe.
“This is very touching and all,” Reena says. “All this acceptance and love after learning the man who raised you lied to you your entire life. But the game has changed now. Learning you’re a Nero is a bit of a big deal. So I’ll be the first to say it: What now?”
I release my father and step back, looking out at those who surround us.
I see people. Regular people. People who have been sucked up in my life, my illegal activity, and my new identity.
“I have to believe that the rumors that the Bahiri still exist are true,” I say, meeting Zayne’s eyes, and then sliding to Edan’s. “That’s where I’ve been headed this whole time, to where we think they might be. But I understand that this is my new life now. If anyone doesn’t want to spend their life waiting around for me to figure out mine, I understand. I’ll take any of you wherever you want to go.”
I see the wheels spinning in their heads. They have to consider it. My fate might be a little clearer now, but I’ve just thrown in a major twist for each of them.
My stomach knots.
This is my little family. Reena might not really like me, and I’ve only met Edan today. But we’re a unit. We’ve stuck together. Saved each other.
And now we might all have to go separate ways.
“I think it’s time for each of us to do our own research on what we want for our futures,” Reena says, bringing logic to a conflicted moment.
I look to Zayne. His eyes are hard to read right now. His lips are set in a thin line. I want to know what he’s thinking, what he feels about this new development, but he’s so quiet.
“The most interesting person in the galaxy just saved my cack,” Edan says, looking up at me with those mischievous eyes. “I think I’d like to stick around and see what happens.”
I offer him a little smile in return, and right then, I know. I’m not going to want him to leave.
He’s crazy.
But I like his bizarre ways.
“For now, we need to get rid of that ship, and the bodies,” my father speaks up.
My eyes slide over to the hatch, and the three bodies lying dead between our two ships.
There’s nothing left of the man I vaporized with Neron.
It’s disgusting. Really, really gross and disturbing. I get blood all over my hands and feet. But Edan doesn’t seem phased by it. He takes care of the guts that spilled everywhere when my staff sliced through the two men. He simply scoops them up into a bag he finds aboard the other ship and then mops up the blood.
I’m a little fearful of Edan. But I’m slam grateful I don’t have to be the one to do it.
With Zayne’s help, we carry two of the bodies back onto their ship. Reena and my father get the other one.
We all shower on the other ship, leaving all the evidence and blood with it. We raid their ship, taking their supplies. Food and water stores. Equipment. Clothing for Edan.
We’re stuffed to the max on our ship. But we’re set to not have to stop for two lunars now.
When all the work is finished, Zayne takes control of our system again, and closes the hatches of the two ships. The Frank disconnects us from the bounty hunter’s, and it gently falls away from us as we set on our course again.
I pretend to need to check things in the mechanical room and no one questions me when I walk in and shut the door behind me.
Quietly, I stand in front of the Neron core. I watch its swirling mass, trapped inside the glass. I put my hands against the warm surface, and I can feel it hum. I feel its energy. I feel its size. I feel how long it will last before it’s burned up and depleted.
We’ll make it clear to the A sector before we would need to refuel. That’s the beauty about Neron cores. They last a long, long time.
My legs still feel shaky and a little numb. I head to my familiar spot, tucked out of the way. I sit, leaning my back against the wall.
But with my father’s own truth, I’m left with a million questions.
The future feels like a gigantic question mark.
I feel a little prod against my brain. Not necessarily words. More like when someone is sitting next to me and bumps their shoulder against mine, the unspoken question of you okay?
It’s been over a lunar since I last spoke to Valen. I’ve purposefully shut him out. Ignored his presence. And he’s left me alone.
But my mind is spinning.
“My whole life has been a lie,” I say the words down the connection. “My father isn’t my father. I don’t come from Korpillion. My dad always suspected I was a Nero.”
The words all come out of me in a rush, blasting toward Valen.
“But you’re not thinking about any of those things right now, Nova,” he responds.
And hearing his voice again, it sends a wave of goosebumps flashing across my whole body. Suddenly I’m back on that stolen ship. Space is at my back and his hands are on me, and his lips—I claim them as mine for forever.
I shove the thoughts aside, hoping he doesn’t get an impression of them.
“What do you know about Glorra Quin Lune?”
By his pause, I know this is the last question he expected.
“The Frozen Kingdom?” he asks.
“Yes.”
Another pause. I feel him collecting his thoughts. “I’ve seen it myself, once,” he finally responds. “It was out of my own, pure curiosity. It’s beautiful. But also terrifying.”
“Why?” I ask, my brows furrowing.
“Ten percent of the galaxy’s Neron is on or around Glorra,” Valen says into my mind.
Ten percent? Of the entire galaxy?
The number is staggering.
“No one can get within a league of the planet without burning up,” he continues. “The amount of energy radiating off it will obliterate anyone who comes near.”
“So everyone on the planet or its moons, they’re dead?” I question. My stomach knots up, and it’s over people I don’t remember. People I don’t know.
I swear I can feel Valen shake his head. “Not necessarily. When whatever happened on that planet occurred, the blast was harsh and quick enough with enough power that everything froze. The Neron isn’t arcing. It isn’t moving. Neron is in constant movement. But not on Glorra. I think everyone down there is in a frozen state.”
“What if the Neron could somehow be contained?” I ask. “What if it could somehow be controlled and released?”
He pauses for a moment. “I think everyone on that planet would wake up. I think it would be like no time has passed for them.”
I let the questions and the doubt rage through my mind. It makes no sense to me. It seems too impossible.
I get an impression back.
How is anything to do with Neron possible?
I want more answers. I want to see this place for myself. But it is at the opposite end of the galaxy from where I need to be right now.
“Are you still safe?” Valen asks into my mind.
I think over the past two days. Of meeting Edan. Doing something as reckless as inviting him to join my crew. I think of the bounty hunter, the encounters back on Laziria and here on my own ship.
I think of their attack.
And of ending three lives today.
“I killed three people today,” I say. And the words leave me feeling hollow and dark.
I sense Valen there, searching my mind. Like he’s trying to discern how I feel about it.
I thought I would feel worse about it. Because even though it was in self-defense, even though it was to save my crew, I still ended their lives. They’ll never breathe again.
But I don’t feel that bad about it.
“We all do what we have to, sometimes,” Valen says.
I do hate those words.
I shake my head. “We’re still the deciders of our fate. I could have chosen not to kill those men.”
And that. That is what makes me realize that I am no better than him.
I could have done something different. I could have somehow pushed them back into their ship. I could have made the ports close.
I could have found a resolution somehow that did not end in death.
The vision I had comes back to me.
Of Valen. Of me. Of us, wearing those crowns, with a burning planet behind us.
I caused death today. I chose the darker path.
“Life isn’t as simple as you once thought it was, is it, Nova?” his voice echoes in my brain.
I sit there, letting those words sink in. They hit me, full force.
But I can’t let him know. My pride won’t let me show him just how much I feel his words.
I hate you.
Those three words swarm around my heart, racing through my head, and back down again.
I don’t let them get near that door, the one leading to the object of my hatred.
But right now, I do hate him.
I hate that he became my best friend. The person I always had access to. The one I could have such honest conversations with.
I hate that I became so dependent on him. I hate that I turned against all my instincts and invited him to come to me.
I hate that he kissed me or I kissed him.
I hate that it changed me. That it reached into the deepest pit of my soul and that I know nothing will ever reach as far down as he did.
I hate that he made me want him so much. I hate that I had a little bit of hope that he would walk away from everything.
I hate that I still want him.
The separation is killing me, and I hate myself for feeling that way.
“I have to go,” I think to him. There’s so much more I want to say, but I can’t get a grasp on any of them.
I feel an impression from Valen. Conflict. Consideration. Reflection. All the things he wants, all the things he wishes were a reality. But all the resignation to things the way they are.
“Take care, Nova.”
And he walks away from that door, and so do I.
My insides are shaking, but I make myself get up. I don’t want to be in here, anymore. Here is where Valen is, it’s where I’ve gone to him in secret.
But, no more.
I can’t.
Because it hurts me too much.
I walk out of the mechanical room. I step onto the command deck.
The Frank is in its position at the pilot’s seat. Zayne is in the co-pilot seat, his feet propped up on the dash. He’s looking out at the stars.
The others must be in the living quarters; there isn’t another soul around.
I cross the command deck and sit in the seat behind the Frank. I look at Zayne, studying all the panes of his face. His dark, pronounced brows. His strong nose. His face is covered with a week’s worth of facial growth.
He doesn’t look at me, but I know he knows I’m here.
“It’s really over between us, isn’t it?” he says.
I lean back in my seat, looking out at the stars. “Yeah,” I say. I feel like I should be saying more. But I just can’t find words. I’m too tired. Too exhausted.
“I knew you were changing,” he continues when I don’t have the words. “That you were doing different things with your life, that it was taking you away from me and the person you were when we were together.” He’s quiet for a moment. I wonder if his head is full of confusion, like mine is. “But it’s blaringly obvious now, Nova. You were always too big for Korpillion and the tiny life you were going to have there. You’re too much for me, for what we were.”
I should counter him. I should reassure him that I wasn’t what he’s saying.
But he’s captured it exactly with his words.
“I don’t know how it’s going to play out, but I can feel it, Nova.” He finally turns, looking at me. I see acceptance in his eyes. “You’re goi
ng to change the galaxy. You were always meant for more, and now we know how you’re going to do it.”
He extends his hand out toward me, and I take it, letting him wrap my hand in his big, warm one.
“I get it now, Nova,” he says, holding my gaze. “We were good for a while. But people change. I’m ready to find my new self, and I’m finally ready to accept yours.”
A small smile forms on my face and I lean forward. I wrap my arms around him, tucking my forehead into his neck. “You’re always going to be my best friend Zayne,” I say. “You’re still one of only half a dozen people—at best—that I can stand. But I’m still going to be there. I’m going to stick around so I can meet the new you.”
And we sit there, surrounded by the arms of acceptance. It’s the ending of an era, but the beginning of something new.
I slowly blink open my eyes.
It’s early. Way too early to be awake, I can tell. But something woke me up. A dream?
“Is someone there?”
I blink again, rolling over to my side. Maybe I’m not as awake as I feel like I am.
“Is there someone there?”
My eyes slide wide open. I’m staring at the wall. The room is quiet except for the sounds of breathing.
But in my brain, I feel a familiar sensation.
A door. And there’s someone at it, slowly, cautiously opening it.
“Hello?” I call out in my mind. My heart hammers. My palms are slick with sweat.
It isn’t Valen. I’m a thousand percent certain of that.
“Who are you?” It’s a female. She speaks calm and even, but distrustful and wary.
“Who…who are you?” I question.
“I need you to tell me first, considering we’ve just developed a link, and as far as I knew, all the remaining Nero are here on this planet with me, save the one trying to destroy the known galaxy.”
She sounds logical.
“Other Nero?” I question, because it suddenly hits me, what she’s saying.
“Who are you?” the woman in my head demands.
I feel a bristle of power coming from her. Not necessarily aggressive, but intimidating.
“I’m no one,” I respond. “I just found out I’m not who I thought I was and I…” I trail off, because I don’t know what to say. The more I say, the more all of this becomes reality. And I’m still scared to face it.