"Romy!" he cried again.
The cable kept reeling him upward. When Riff glanced above, he could see Piston, chief engineer of the Dragon Huntress, operating the spool. A few hundred meters above the mountaintop, Riff finally reached the airlock and climbed into the ship. Nova and Steel climbed in with him.
"Where's the damn demon?" said Piston. The squat gruffle, shorter than Riff's shoulders but twice as wide, tugged at his white beard.
Oh stars, Riff thought, sinking to his knees. He stared down, seeing nothing but fire and smoke on the mountaintop. Oh stars, is she . . .
Steel lowered his head, and even Nova was pale.
"Romy . . ." Riff whispered.
"Captain?" The demon's voice rose through Nova's communicator. "Captain, wait for me! Wait up!"
Riff gasped and leaped to his feet.
"There!" He pointed.
Rising from the flames like a phoenix, Romy flew from the mountaintop. Her fiery hair crackled. Her bat wings beat. Her pitchfork shone in the sunlight.
Nova groaned. "Leave her behind."
"Nova!" Riff glowered at the gladiator, then leaned over the ledge and reached down his hand. Romy flew up, grabbed him, and nearly yanked Riff down to his death. It took the other Alien Hunters to grab the demon and hoist her up.
"I think you burned a few leaves down there, Riff." The demon poked his chest. "You're in so much trouble, mister."
Riff sighed.
"I'm just glad you're alive, Romy." He turned toward the others. "And you, Nova. And you, Steel." He cracked his neck. "Everything hurts and there are spider guts all over me."
"Race you to the shower," Nova said.
With curses, squeals, and jutting elbows, they ran up the stairs, heading deeper into the starship.
Below them, upon the mountaintop, the alien invaders burned.
Aliens saw, aliens came, aliens conquered. Riff reached the bathroom first and slammed the door shut, sealing the others outside. Aliens were hunted.
The shower's hot water washed over his naked body, cleaning away the blood, the ash, the ooze.
After a long moment, a knock sounded on the door.
"Can you let in at least one other hunter?"
Nova's voice.
Riff reached an arm out from the shower and unlocked the bathroom door. The ashai gladiator stepped inside, her golden armor covered in smoke and cobwebs. She slipped out of the garment, the steam barely hiding her nakedness, and stepped into the shower with him.
Their bodies pressed together, and Riff wrapped his arms around her, and he kissed her.
"All right," Nova whispered into his ear, nibbling on the lobe. "I'll give you this one. You saved my ass down there."
The steam rose around them, and they kissed until the others were banging on the door.
Riff sighed as he held Nova close. "I change my mind. I love this job."
* * * * *
The attic of the Dragon Huntress was a dark, cluttered place. Boxes, tubes, pipes, and sacks of odds and ends rose all around. A single lightbulb glowed above, barely lighting the chamber. It was dingy, hot, and shadowy. It was Romy's home.
The demon could hear the other Alien Hunters below. Somebody was still in the shower, while others were moving around the kitchen and main deck. Nobody else ever came up here. This was Romy's kingdom, her little corner of Hell.
Gingerly, she reached under her shirt and pulled out the small, gleaming orb.
It was no larger than her fist. Blue mottled with gold. Glassy.
"An alien egg," she whispered in awe.
A pet would be better than all the toys in the world. Better than a million Tickle-Me-T-Rexes. Better than poodle soup. It was what Romy had always longed for.
Gingerly, as if handling a holy relic, she placed the egg on a pile of old laundry. She sat on it ever so gently, careful not to crush it.
"I'll keep you warm." She reached beneath her to pat the egg, then wriggled about. "I'll keep you safe and secret."
She thought she felt the egg thrumming, thought she heard a whisper from within. She smiled and draped her wings around herself, roosting on her prize.
CHAPTER TWO
A MESSAGE FROM HOME
Twiggle Jauntyfoot sat at the kitchen table with her fellow Alien Hunters, enjoying a feast, when the message came in from her planet, heralding the doom of her homeworld.
"Hand me another chicken leg, lassie." Piston leaned across the table, reaching a massive brown hand toward the plate of roast fowl. Like all gruffles, he was muscular and wide, his hands strong enough to crush stones, but his limbs were short.
"Your beard's dipping into the gravy!" Riff said, poking the gruffle. The captain was leaning back in his seat, chomping on an apple.
Piston grumbled and pulled his luxurious white beard—his pride and joy—out of the dish. The gruffle grumbled. "That's because nobody passes me anything around here. Twig, you clod! Chicken!"
Riff rolled his eyes. "Piston, for pity's sake, you've eaten two whole birds already. I know we made good money killing those spiders, but you're eating us out of house and home."
"Gruffles eat a lot!" The engineer groaned, leaned closer, and managed to grab a drum stick. He fell back into his seat with a sigh and sucked the meat off the bone. "Twig!" He spoke as he chewed. "Twig, damn it, what's wrong with you?"
The others all turned to stare at her. Nova and Steel sat farther back, eating from plates of spiced potatoes, fried chicken, and stewed greens. Romy was slumped on the floor, crumbs on her face, her belly bulging. Even Giga sat with them, a few bolts and screws on her plate—an old joke they liked to play on the android. Everyone stared at Twig now, even the moaning demon on the floor.
"Twig?" Piston's voice softened, and concern suffused his wide, chestnut-brown face. "Are you all right, lassie?"
She was trembling. She could barely breathe. She kept staring at the communicator on her wrist, reading the words on the monitor over and over.
A message from Haven.
From her home.
A message of doom.
"It's . . . it's from home," Twig whispered. "A message from Haven. They need our help."
She leaped to her feet, trembling. Like all halflings, she stood under four feet tall, barely reaching the tabletop. She was tiny compared to the other Alien Hunters, even tiny compared to the squat Piston. She was the shortest, the weakest, the meekest, and stars above, her people were just as small. Without help, they would die.
Riff stepped around the table and knelt before Twig. He held her hand, eyes soft. "What does the message say?"
Twig swallowed. "A machine." She shuddered. "A machine with blades for arms. A robot moving through the forest, cutting, burning . . . killing." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Killing halflings, Captain."
Gently, Riff turned her wrist and examined the message on her communicator. His eyes darkened.
"They want to hire us." Riff looked back at the others. "Planet Haven needs us now. As soon as we can get there."
The others exchanged glances.
"Riff," Nova said, "we're still burnt and bruised from the damn spiders. We haven't had a day off in ages, and—"
"We have to go." Twig leaped onto her chair and stared at Nova, then at the others, one by one. "We have to. I know my people can't pay much. Only a thousand credits, barely enough to cover the cost of fuel. But . . . please. Please! They're dying." Tears gathered in her eyes. "This robot is tearing them apart. It's my home."
Planet Haven. Twig closed her eyes and let the memories fill her. The fields of corn and barley spreading into the sunset. Old Major Woodwick, the great havenwood tree that grew in her village, leaves rustling in the wind. Strawberries and cream and steaming apple pie. The little robots she would build from spare motors in the toolshed—clattering little dogs, cats, and soldiers her old gaffer would call junkbots. Twig had never truly belonged there, a mechanic in a world of farmers, and she had left as a youth, but it was still her homeland. Still the
anchor of her soul. She could not let it burn.
She opened her eyes and looked around her at the walls of the Dragon Huntress. Her new home. She looked at her fellow Alien Hunters. Her new family. But she could not forget where she had come from.
"I'll pay you myself." Twig reached into her pocket and began pulling out Haven bills. Each was printed with a holographic acorn, symbol of her people. "Everything I've saved. Please, Captain." She turned toward Riff. "Please. We have to take this job."
Riff turned to look at the others. Nova sighed. Steel raised his chin and clutched his sword. Romy drooled on the floor.
Riff turned back toward Twig. He held her shoulders. "Of course, Twig. Of course."
* * * * *
Riff sat on the bridge, staring at the head-up display, turning the image around, zooming in, zooming out, scanning it over and over.
"Frag it, Riff, you've been looking at this photograph for an hour now." Nova groaned and slumped back in her seat. "Give it a rest."
He sighed and gave the image one last look. A grainy photograph from Planet Haven. Black and white. Smudged. Barely more than shadows. In the center, Riff could just make out the figure. A robot, vaguely humanoid, with chainsaws for arms. Its white eyes blazed as if staring out of the image, staring right at Riff, vowing to cut him too.
"Giga, run another scan," Riff said. "See if you can find who built this machine. Whatever factory it came from, even whatever planet is a lead."
The android sat to Riff's left, filling the third seat on the bridge. She tilted her head. "Already complied, Captain. Five times now. No record of any similar robot in any known star system, Captain. This machine was built off record or on a planet we're unfamiliar with."
"Alien robots." Nova flicked her whip. "Lovely. If there's anything worse than giant spiders with wings, it's alien robots with chainsaws for arms. I miss the days when we were fishing fuzzballs out of silos."
Riff turned toward her, finally looking away from the photograph. "Nov, you used to be a gladiator, fighting massive aliens in the Alien Arena."
"Aliens." She nodded. "Not robots."
"I'm pretty sure aliens built this robot. It still counts." Riff sighed and turned off the HUD. "And Twig's people need us. How often do we get to be heroes?"
"Every day?" Nova said. "Whenever we do a job?"
"Well, this one job will make us heroes to Twig. We send the little mechanic into snot-monster nostrils and down tardigrade throats. Piston even had Twig crawl in to unclog the plumbing the other day. It's time we do something for the halfling."
Nova groaned. "Fine! We'll smash the damn robot. A few grenades will do the job."
"You're not bringing grenades down onto Haven."
"Riff!" Her green eyes flashed. "Can't I ever bring grenades anywhere?"
"Not onto inhabited planets! We're pest controllers, not space marines."
He looked out the windshield. They were traveling through hyperspace, their engines warping spacetime around them, letting the Dragon Huntress fly at many times the speed of light. The stars streamed alongside as lines, white and blue and purple, and between them floated glowing smudges. Somewhere out there in the distance, orbiting Teegarden's Star in the Aries constellation, spun the planet of Haven. And somewhere farther out there, maybe only a few light-years past Haven, maybe galaxies away, somebody had built this machine that was destroying Twig's home.
"We've colonized dozens of planets," Riff said softly. "We've explored thousands of stars. Yet we've seen only a tiny fraction of a percent of our cosmos. What's out there?"
Nova yawned. "Pillows. Lots of space pillows. That's all I can think about right now." She rose from her chair and stretched. "I'm off to bed. Gig, be a dear and wake me up when we're near Haven." As she walked by Riff, Nova mussed his hair. "Coming to bed?"
He stared out into space. "Not yet."
She yawned again. "Good. More room for me."
The ashai gladiator stepped off the bridge, leaving Riff and Giga alone. For a long time, the two sat in silence, staring out into hyperspace.
Finally, Giga twisted her fingers in her lap, turned toward Riff, and spoke in a low voice. "Captain? You don't think that . . . that the others think all us robots are evil. Do you?"
"What?" Riff frowned, reached over, and took her hand in his. "Giga! Why would anyone think that?"
Giga lowered her head. "I am a robot too, Captain. A Human Interface Android, not a metal warrior like the one on Haven. I look human, but still a robot. Still a machine." Her eyes shone with tears. "Will Twig fear me now? Will her fellow halflings . . . will they hate me?"
Riff rose to his feet. "Giga, come here with me."
She stood up too, and they walked together to stand by the windshield. They stared out into the lights and darkness.
"What are we looking at, sir?" Giga asked, voice soft.
"What do you see, Giga? What do you see out there?"
She bit her lip, staring out into hyperspace. "I see . . . streams of photons distorted in warped spacetime, flowing uninterrupted through the Higgs field. Lights. Pretty lights. Streams of white and smudges of blue and purple like watercolor stains. I see millions of stars and millions of planets. I see countless lives, souls born crying, growing, loving, building, fading away and rising again as new light. I see hope, Captain." She turned toward him. "I see wonder."
He nodded. "I had a little robot dog as a kid. You know what it would see, if it were here? Not a damn thing." He squeezed her hand. "Gig, you are more than just a robot, more than just a machine. You have thoughts. Feelings. A sense of wonder. You are alive."
"But . . . Captain, I was never born from a womb. I was built in a factory only sixteen years ago. I'm a machine."
"We're all machines of a sort. You're made of synthetic parts, and I'm made of organic molecules, but we're both machines, and we're both living, thinking, feeling beings. Nobody is going to hate you because of one bad robot, Giga. The same way nobody will hate me because they once met one bad human. I promise you."
She embraced him and laid her head against his shoulder. "Arigato, Captain." She touched his cheek. "You are right, sir. I can feel. I can dream. I can lo—" Giga looked away. "I can love. I'm sorry, Captain." She returned to her seat, eyes damp. "I have to keep an eye on the controls. I have to make sure we get to Haven on time." She looked back at him, tears on her cheeks—synthetic tears on synthetic skin, released by an algorithm, yet real tears nonetheless. "You should return to Nova. You should get some sleep."
Riff looked at her, suddenly not sure what to say. He thought back to how Giga had kissed him above Planet Cirona a few months ago, how she had felt so human to him, so fragile, warm, needing him. How he had felt strong, a man who could protect her, even love her.
He lowered his head. Yet I gave my heart to Nova. The woman I've loved for years. The woman who followed me across the galaxy, who broke my heart, then mended it again.
"Goodnight, Giga," he whispered. It was all he could say, perhaps all he should say now.
He left her on the bridge and, when he reached the doorway, looked back once. Giga stood by the windshield again, staring outside, a lonely figure, so small by the vastness of the cosmos. Riff's heart twisted to see her there, and he longed to rush back to her, to hold her again, to comfort her. Yet he could not.
He turned away. He walked downstairs. He entered his quarters.
Nova was sprawled out on his bed, sleeping. Their bed now, he supposed. Her hair spread out around her, a puddle of gold. Her chest gently rose and fell. Riff stood for a moment, gazing at her freckled face, her high cheekbones, her pointy ears. She had left him two Earth years ago. She had only begun sleeping in his bed again because, she claimed, the others in the crew quarters kept snoring.
Yet somehow, over the past few weeks, Riff and Nova had found themselves making love every night. Found themselves living almost as they had years ago, as a couple in love. Perhaps they were a couple again. Perhaps she loved him again. Perh
aps here on this starship—not on her planet, not on his planet, but here within the belly of a dragon—they had finally found a home.
He climbed into bed with her. She moaned and nestled against him, but she did not wake. He held her close as she slept, but he could find no rest. He lay awake, staring up at the shadowy ceiling, thinking of halflings, of robots, and of a lonely soul on a dark bridge.
CHAPTER THREE:
FIRE OVER HAVEN
With a pop and flash of light, the HMS Dragon Huntress glided out of hyperdrive above Planet Haven.
Standing on the bridge, Riff stared down at the green homeland of the halflings. It was a small planet, not much larger than Earth's moon, orbiting a small sun called Teegarden's Star. Even from this distance, Riff could see forests, squares of tilled farmlands, and many snaking rivers.
While he stared down at the world, the other Alien Hunters stood behind him. Giga's voice rose among them.
"Three thousand, two hundred, and seventeen Earth years ago, human colonists reached the Aries system and settled on Planet Haven. The planet is much smaller than Earth, the gravity weaker. Over time, the human colonists evolved, shrinking in size to match their smaller world. Five hundred and twelve Earth years ago, the Humanoid Academy finally granted the denizens of Haven the status of sub-species, naming them homo sapiens havenis. Or halflings, as we call them, though some have argued that the term halfling is derogative, that—"
"Boring!" Romy's whine rose over the android's words. "I don't care about no damn history lessons, Giga. I want to go kill robots! I mean . . ." The demon gulped. "Not kill you, Giga. You're a good robot, mostly. You never stink up the bathroom or anything. Not like Piston over here." The demon turned to glare at the gruffle.
Piston blustered. His white eyebrows bristled, and he tugged his long white beard. "Stink up the—" The squat gruffle trembled with rage. "Why you— good for nothing, confounded—"
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