Ceasefire_Team Orion Nebula

by Kayla Stonor

  “Leave them anyway. I will have someone look at them.”

  Ahnna’s face remained blank, but Tierc detected her discomfort. She handed the cuffs to a guard. It made sense. If Ahnna refused, the Tetriarch would know she’d lied. Right now, Xecara was their priority.

  “Now leave,” the Tetriarch ordered, “before I change my mind. Weldon will arrange air transport back to your ship.”

  Ahnna turned and hurried down the hallway, midway stooping down to sweep a lagging Xecara into her arms. She didn’t look back.

  The moment Ahnna left, the Tetriarch signaled her aide. “Contact Sorsei. Inform them I agree to their terms. The High Priestess will be released today. I want the document signed within the hour.”

  “Your Grace.” He scurried off and a guard of more senior rank replaced him.

  The Tetriarch eyed her new acquisition. Tierc glowered back.

  “So, what creature are you exactly?”

  Tierc clamped his jaw shut.

  House Verdon’s ruler smiled, her eyes devoid of humor. “Octiron Entertainment informs me you are Qui, from another universe entirely.”

  Tierc’s stomach lurched. Octiron! Skal! Fucking Crandal!

  “I have been following your story with great interest. I wasn’t convinced I wanted to exchange you for my little priestess, but,” she circled her hand encompassing Tierc’s physique, “this was a surprise and I could not resist.”

  “Octiron.” That nasty sensation in the pit of his stomach, Jalo’s unease, Octiron’s manipulation of the rules, all began to make sense. “This whole challenge was a set up. Draw Ahnna in with a political prisoner you were ready to release. How exactly will Octiron benefit?”

  “I have agreed a relaxation of broadcast regulations that will increase my popularity amongst my citizens. Octiron has granted me editorial control of this challenge. I will appear magnanimous, hospitable, ruthless, but no more or less than my reputation or galactic laws allow.”

  “The Central Alliance outlaws trafficking.”

  “Of Paragon citizens, yes.”

  Tierc’s jaw tightened. “So what am I now? A live exhibit? For your personal entertainment or the masses?”

  “Oh most definitely for the masses.” She eyed the officer guard beside her. “I suspect we will need a more secure environment for Tierc.”

  “Your Grace.”

  “What about Ahnna?” Tierc asked.

  “I don’t know. We can watch the next episode to find out.”

  “Skal.” Tierc could contain his anger no longer. Heat flooded his eyes and the Tetriarch jolted back in alarm, her mouth falling open. Tierc launched forward and thrust his hands through the energy field, aiming straight for an iron bar. An incredible force shoved him back. His wings shrank in and he rolled to his feet in one easy movement.

  “Fascinating. I so much prefer to tame a rebel.” Her eyes locked on Tierc’s, eyes aglitter. “Punish him.”

  Tierc swung around, searching for a means. Light rolled towards him on all sides and then the most utter crucifying pain enclosed him. The force-field web encased him body to toe and swept him two feet off the floor and held him there, arms and legs akimbo. He got a two second grace period and then sight and sound disappeared.

  A million needles stabbed every inch of his body.

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Z eke!” Ahnna called out.

  Jumping out the Orion Nebula, she ran to the red-headed man slowly walking towards her, ducking as a bolt of lightning lit up Primaera’s dark angry sky. “Did you know? Did you?”

  She punched him in the chest with the flat of her palm, and then again, her short angry questions reduced to gulping sobs as Octiron’s vid operator silently absorbed every blow.

  As her fury ran out of steam in the face of his calm, Zeke wrapped arms around her.

  “I saw what happened on Altaira, but I didn’t know what Crandal planned to do with the material. He’s been distracted, not himself, back and forth in meetings with the producers. I decided he was waiting for you guys to come forward with the truth. Ahnna, I am so sorry.” His hand cupped her head as she drenched his T-shirt in tears. “Please don’t cry. You’ve been so brave, so steadfast.”

  She shook her head and pushed him away. “I left him there, all alone. Did you see? What happened to you? You never came back. I had no one to talk to. Crandal wouldn’t answer my questions, said we’d brought it on ourselves with our deceit, that we’d signed up to be honest with Octiron. Couldn’t you have said something? Anything? We trusted you!”

  “I know. I got reassigned, had no way to contact you. I got too close to you guys. The production team figured out the sex scene. Some jerk in the audience compiled some repeated shots and—well, my fault. Should have done a better job.”

  “Do you know if he’s okay? Tierc? Is he okay?”

  “No one knows anything.”

  “But you had a vid drone in the palace! I know you were watching us. No way you left that scene to just my point of view!”

  “We had the Tetriarch’s permission to film. She edited the footage sent back. A lot got cut out.”

  Ahnna spotted dark anger in his eyes. “You saw something!”

  Zeke grimaced. “A badly edited segment, just a split second. I’m sorry, Ahnna, I won’t lie to you. The Tetriarch used the force-fields to punish him. It may have been a brief moment, but, how do I put this… it’s well known, she likes the rebellious type; gives her an excuse to indulge her tastes.”

  Ahnna smothered a cry with a hand. “Oh my god!”

  “I did hear some gossip, Ahnna. The Krakan Toll was spotted making a jump back to the Verdon sector.”

  “Jalo! He got my message?” Zeke’s dumb expression answered her, but Ahnna’s heart thudded with hope. “He must have done!”

  She and Tierc had planned to transport with Xecara to the Orion Nebula. While Verdon’s forces chased the Krakan Toll, they would sneak off to Sorsei. Ahnna had handed Jalo Vichai the key to the Krakan Toll, to give him a head start.

  Jalo had a mind of his own. If the pilot returned to Verdon…

  Another streak of lightning made them both jump. “Fuck, can’t have been fun landing in that. This freaking storm’s outta control,” Zeke moaned.

  “Zeke! What about Jalo?”

  “I don’t know. I do know the Tetriarch launched a huge manhunt for an escaped convict a week later.”

  “Zeke!” a man’s voice yelled from across the launch pad. “You coming?”

  “I gotta go. Ahnna, hold it together. Read your contract. Don’t do anything to jeopardize your freedom.” He waved at his colleague and began to walk backwards, the expression on his face telling Ahnna to heed his words. “You need that citizenship or Octiron will never let you go.”

  She watched Zeke board a transport. The hatchway closed behind him, the closest person she had to a friend on Primaera.

  She made her way to the Arrivals Lounge in Octiron’s planetside spaceport. An Octiron hostess greeted her inside. The woman needed a root pigment alteration, her natural brunette beginning to show through. So the dumb blonde act was deliberate, a stereotype that refused to die out. Everything about the Great Space Race was fake—fake, bad, and ugly.

  Xecara’s words rattled in Ahnna’s head. “I want to go home.”

  That longing spoken by the living embodiment of the Sorsei faith had reached in and grabbed Ahnna’s devotion. That longing that had captured her heart now filled her dreams and waking moments. That longing threatened to cast her into despair again and again for she was totally, utterly lost. Those moments in Tierc’s arms were the closest to home Ahnna had felt since those few precious years with Joseph.

  Home wasn’t a place, it was a person.

  A connection to another soul that gave everything and took nothing.

  She closed her eyes and dug deep for the resolve she would need to see this race through to the bitter end. I need to find him. I need to make my home. Getting her citizenship was her key
, the precious pendant she needed around her neck.

  Read her contract, fulfill her contract, and find Tierc.

  So they could get the fuck out of Paragon.

  * * *

  “So, Ahnna, it’s been awhile since you returned the High Priestess to Sorsei. What have you been doing since?” Suede Harrington bade Ahnna sit on the sofa where he’d once interviewed her and Tierc together.

  Ahnna plastered on a bright smile. “Oh you know, the usual—a bit of ribbon cutting, meeting our amazing fans.” She’d waited out the months to Primaera’s winter solstice—that marked the Great Space Race winners’ gala—earning her citizenship. Octiron had her run a gauntlet of promotion duties: corporate presentations, mall openings, evening receptions, and numerous pointless errands, the list endless.

  “No sign of Tierc Marcel? Not even a message from House Verdon?”

  Ahnna glowered at Suede with loathing, the cruel question a Harrington baiting tactic. She shook with anger, exposed to the mass media in a lilac, gem-crusted, slit to the thigh dress she couldn’t control while sat down. High-heeled glass slippers adorned her feet, and plenty of cleavage added to the bare flesh on show.

  The bright studio lights heated her skin.

  “Good thing you no longer carry a blaster,” Suede jested, “or I think I might be toast!”

  The audience laughed dutifully.

  Ahnna bit her lip, refused to give way to tears. “I’ve heard nothing from Tierc, as you well know.”

  She understood why Tierc hadn’t contacted her. If he was alive, and Ahnna refused to believe he wasn’t, then he knew she was at Octiron’s HQ on Primaera. The whole of Paragon knew her every move! But she hadn’t heard a whisper, and Tierc was Qui. He’d contact her if he wanted to.

  Her betrayal had devastated him.

  The loss swelled up inside her, choked her throat.

  “Did you know Jalo Vichai’s plans after you handed him the Krakan Toll?” Harrington continued to pursue dangerous ground, like the bastard wanted Ahnna to lose her citizenship.

  No one knew the truth of Tierc’s escape. Unconfirmed reports from Verdazia suggested the Tetriarch continued her warpath hunt for a missing prisoner, but nothing official, nothing in sector-regulated news. The terms of her contract bound Ahnna to complicity with Octiron and the media corporation had speculated for weeks now that Tierc was either dead or remained a guest of House Verdon. The Tetriarch demanded nothing less.

  Ahnna picked her words carefully. “Jalo wanted to retire. Disappear.”

  “And he did, but he might have helped you. Our viewers want to know why you abandoned Tierc. You left Verdon so quickly.”

  Harrington tore into the gaping chasm inside her and Ahnna sat frozen in pain even as her heart quickened with guilt. She forced out an answer through chattering teeth. “My job was to get Xecara back to Sorsei. I worried the Tetriarch might change her mind.” Surprise flashed in Harrington’s eyes and Ahnna clamped down on her hatred for the Verdon bitch. “I—Axo—launched the Orion Nebula immediately I and Xecara transported aboard.”

  She stopped there, determined to protect Jalo at least. God, she hoped the pilot was okay. She monitored the news for the Krakan Toll and Jalo Vichai and had heard nothing. That could be good. It might not be.

  “You were supposed to be a team,” Harrington jibed.

  “Yes.”

  That sick feeling of being played, conned from beginning to end, wrapped around her stomach—first Human Defense-X, then Octiron and the Tetriarch. All played a vicious game for media ratings and power at her and Tierc’s expense, able to mess with their lives, because she and Tierc weren’t Paragon citizens, because in their ignorance they had signed a contract that placed them under commercial law, because they originated from another universe and had no recourse to protection under an inter-galactic treaty.

  Anger simmered inside her.

  Soon it would be over. Do this one last interview and she would be free.

  Alone in a galaxy she hated, a galaxy invaded and ruled by humankind. Paragon made the Qui Empire look almost benevolent, and she spoke as someone raised to hate the Qui.

  “What would you say to Tierc if he could hear you now?” Harrington asked.

  God, she’d thought long and hard about this question. He might be watching her right now. In the moment, with the lights bright and Suede Harrington sitting there in her face, the audience hanging on her every word with bated breath, Ahnna’s mind faltered.

  She closed her eyes, slowed her racing pulse and spoke from the heart.

  “I would say that I love you, Tierc.” She couldn’t hold back her emotion. A single tear escaped. “And that I’m so sorry. If I could have thought of any other way to handle things on Verdon… please believe me, I ran out of options. I couldn’t see a way through.” The sob burst out before she could stop it and Ahnna buried her head in her hands, unable to control the loss and self-loathing surging through her.

  Harrington handed her a folded handkerchief.

  “Beautiful,” he whispered.

  When the interminable, odious interview had finished dissecting her to shreds, Ahnna stumbled out of the studio and on to the open rooftop where the gala party was in full swing and Crandal awaited her with her citizenship credentials. Everything had been choreographed in advance. Vid drones buzzed her as Crandal made a show of presenting her citizenship credentials on a tablet. She smiled dutifully and posed for pictures, but her handler seemed distracted, checking around him. The man flinched when lightning crisscrossed the dark stormy sky.

  “Madness holding the gala here,” he moaned.

  Ahnna stared at him. She’d assumed a reasonably good forecast had decided the gala would continue on the rooftop as planned. Hard to spot a clear night sky from a stormy one for the brightly lit orbs splashing the rooftop with color. They were so high up the orbs could be floating amongst the stars, Octiron’s HQ a skyscraping tower, one of the tallest in the city.

  She refused a cocktail, watched the drink-bot target Kayana, a crimson-skinned flame-throwing Malebranki standing with her partner. Ahnna scanned other contestants, admired the way the orbs lit up Mia’s golden dress, loving the Tygean’s feline grace and the way her dress looked one with her skin, or had Mia produced fur? Ahnna wanted to find out. She’d avoided Mia and Kayana at the opening gala—suspicious of anyone not human. So stupid.

  Shame warmed her cheeks.

  Meeting the teams as they trickled home to Primaera had opened her eyes anew. She could have made friends here.

  An Octiron guard approached and whispered in Crandal’s ear. Her handler paled and leaned towards Ahnna. “Don’t go anywhere. Octiron still needs to talk with you.”

  What? Fuck that. She nodded at Crandal, unwilling to jeopardize her freedom until her citizenship was in her hand, but surely the deed was done. She watched him leave via the elevator, frantically reviewed her contract in her head trying to work out whether Octiron still had a hold on her, a hold she hadn’t realized.

  She shuddered, scanned the guards as she let her eye casually rove over the party crowd.

  Guests were cheering. Mia’s teammate had joined her, the pair so different from each other. D’Arek wore an expression that came close to an outright scowl. Easy on the eye in all other respects.

  Soon they would be formally announcing this year’s winners.

  Without Tierc, Ahnna could lay no claim to the prize. They had completed their challenges, they might have won. Instead she had no prize and no ship. Just the brief sight of a document confirming her Paragon citizenship, a bitter consolation without Tierc beside her. How everything changed.

  Streaks of lightning rent the sky, momentarily blinding her and causing consternation amongst Octiron’s security. A nearby orb spat out a fireball of light and those nearest squealed. Ahnna slipped into the elevator. Her duties were at an end, she had fulfilled every condition of her contract, and she didn’t like the way security congregated near her.

  Wit
hin seconds, the high-speed elevator deposited her in the reception foyer. She barged past a group of guests coming in, heard someone shout, “Ahnna, wait,” and lengthened her stride, cursing her high heels.

  Outside, she looked back, saw security moving towards the glass doors and panicked. Ripping off her shoes, she gathered her skirt and ran down the widely spaced steps to the boulevard. She veered to one side, aimed for a side alley, spotted Luc Amaveo in black fatigues and Amy in a long tunic, her legs and arms covered, an unusual look for an Octiron gala. At least Amy was warm. They were engrossed in conversation, and Ahnna didn’t want to stop. She thought they saw her, couldn’t be sure, and ran smack into a group of menacing-looking guys. Ahnna gasped, backtracked, and flinched at a rush of air, the flap of wings a flashback to the bat-like creature in the tunnels. She ducked and covered her head.

  An iron band wrapped around her waist and hoisted her upwards.

  Her stomach swooped. She squealed.

  Lightning flashed again as she inhaled his scent, a spicy exotic hint of cinnamon she had craved to smell one last time.

  “Tierc!”

  * * *

  “I love you too, Ahnna,” Tierc murmured against her ear, voicing the words he had been desperate to say ever since her interview with Harrington.

  Flying up and out of the alley, Tierc turned the startled woman in her arms so she faced him nose to nose. He’d needed to hold her close for so long. Waiting had nearly killed him.

  “Tierc?” she squeaked again. Her eyes were wide. She looked pale, frozen.

  “You’re okay.” He watched her panic subside, dropped to the rooftops where they’d be less likely to be spotted, darting aside every few seconds to avoid an electrical discharge. One wing brushed a parapet. They couldn’t fly long, too risky in this electrical storm. He detected screams from Octiron’s building, glanced back briefly and caught sight of more orbs shorting out in the storm’s electrical discharge. They needed to land. He touched down in the commercial district, deserted this time of night.

  The ground rumbled underfoot. Now that was unusual.

  The moment her feet touched down, Ahnna rose up on her toes and locked her lips to his. She kissed his mouth, his nose, his cheeks, and his eyes until he was forced to grab her hands and push her away so he could get her attention.