Ignite the Stars

by Maura Milan

  Knives clapped his hands against the podium, the sound echoing against the ceiling. Sleep-stained eyes blinked open.

  “I get it,” he said. “You’re bored.”

  He tapped on his watch so the hologram projected above him dimmed into black, and the only source of light pooled around him.

  “Then let me tell you a story. It’s somewhat of an academy tradition. Has anyone heard of a star system called Fugue?”

  Eyes blinked at him in silence.

  “No? None of you?” he asked. “I’ll tell you why. Olympus doesn’t want any of you to know what happened there.”

  Even in the dim, he could make out a number of cadets leaning forward in their seats. At least he was getting their attention now.

  “Years ago,” Knives continued, “Fugue was the next star system due for colonization. We had just completed the Wuvryr Gate, which was set to jump straight there. Everyone was certain it would be an easy campaign. The day came, and the colonial fleets made the jump, but after a few days, there were no reports, no transmissions. No one thought much of it, just that the fleet was too busy with their campaign to report in.

  “Finally on the seventh day, a transmission came in. HQ was already in the middle of celebrating, knowing it’d be news of success. But when the Comms Lead opened the stream, there was only one short message.

  Flee.

  The cadets quieted, and he knew they were all listening. Even Ia watched him from her seat in the far corner.

  Knives curled his voice into a willowy tone, feeling the tension in the air thicken. “To dismiss their fears, they told themselves the transmission was jumbled. Most likely, a longer message came before it, gone missing due to the weak connection. But the next day, comms received another transmission. And this one had video.”

  Knives sped up the pace of his words, so each syllable fell at a running pace. “It was a simple security log, flipping through different angles of the ship’s interior. The image was choppy, but it didn’t matter. The color of blood is hard to mistake. Limbs, heads, torsos were scattered all over the cabin floor. Entrails hung from pipes in the ceiling.

  “But the bodies weren’t what troubled them the most.”

  His eyes scanned the auditorium. Some of the cadets hugged their knees up to their chests while others leaned against each other, clutching hands.

  “The longer they stared at each image, the easier it was to see him.” He pointed a finger up to a dark empty corner of the room, and he heard the squeak of metal as everyone shifted in their chairs. “There. A figure stood in the dark, staring not at the floor, not at the bodies, but at them. In the last seconds, it stepped forward, closer to the camera.

  “And when it opened its mouth, there were no words.” Knives tapped his watch, cuing up an audio file. “Only this.”

  A series of ghostly whispers hissed up into the high ceilings, rising with a haunting, pulsing crescendo. It was the sound of terror, of the unknown abyss.

  When the audio waveform had finished, sinking the classroom into a frightened silence, Knives flicked at the light sensor. All the lights above flared on. His eyes scanned the cadet’s faces, now pale and wide-eyed from the tale they had heard. Even Ia’s face had blanched white.

  Knives’s lips curved upward. “Class dismissed. Good luck getting sleep tonight.”

  As the classroom emptied, he packed up his things. A holomap of the known star systems floated above him like a cloud. He was about to turn it off when a voice rose from the back row.

  “Is that story true?”

  He looked up and saw Ia staring at him, her arms draped over the seat in front of her, that smirk rippling across her face.

  “Why do you ask?”

  “I’ve never heard of a system called Fugue,” she said. “And I’ve traveled all over the place. I bet I’ve even been to your home planet.”

  “I doubt it.”

  She jumped up from her seat and headed down the steps to the podium. “Try me. Where are you from?”

  His brow furrowed at such a personal question. “Aphelion.”

  “Is that your final answer, or do you just want me to feel sorry for you?” Her voice was laced with humor. “How about I take a guess?”

  She grabbed onto a control orb mounted on the lecture podium. Her fingers dragged across it, and above her the holomap shifted, zooming in to center on a star system and then another. Finally, she stopped on a system with nine planets.

  It was Rigel Kentaurus.

  She raised her eyebrows. “Am I right?”

  He scratched the back of his neck. “Yes.”

  “Rigel Kentaurus, the central system of the Olympus Commonwealth.” She tapped her finger on the podium. “It means you come from quite a powerful family.”

  She was right. Only the most influential members of the Commonwealth lived in that star system. Governing leaders like the Royal Matriarchs, heads of major corporations, and the military elite like his father.

  “And you?” he asked, eager to change the subject. “What side of the universe do you hail from?”

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  “I’m serious,” he pressed on lightly. “I want to know.”

  Her hands spread against the orb on the podium, sweeping and circling until the map above fell on a completely dark space. Then she raised her hand, her index fingers jutting out like a gun, pointing into the black infinity.

  “There,” she said.

  His heart sank. There weren’t any planets there. All that was left was rubble floating around a shattered star.

  “What is this place?” he asked.

  “It was called the Maqronne system.”

  She raised her eyes to look at the empty map above her. “It was small. Only consisted of three planets. Broadside, Galatin.” And then her gaze lowered to his. “And Cōcha.”

  His eyes widened. So that was how she got her name.

  “It’s a tradition from my father’s side of the family to take the name of your birthplace. Our family hopped from planet to planet. Galatin was where my brother was born. And me, my planet was called Cōcha. It was where we stayed until…” Her voice trailed off as she stared off into the distance.

  Knives remembered reading about the Maqronne system for one of his history classes. Over a decade ago, the tiny solar system self-imploded without warning. Every physicist and astronomer had their own theories, but since everyone from Maqronne was thought to be dead, no one could be entirely sure.

  “Did you see it happen?” he asked.

  “I wasn’t there,” Ia answered. “My brother and I stole a jet to search for our father right after he left. It was an impossible quest. But you know, when you’re kid, you never want to believe you’ve been abandoned. Of course, we couldn’t find him. We turned back, but by then, the Event had already happened. Our mother was gone. And so was our home.” She paused, her face suddenly going red with anger. “All that was left was a bunch of space dust and Bugs sifting through the floating rubble.”

  Knives remained silent. He didn’t know what to say. But now at the very least, her hatred toward the Commonwealth made sense. And instantly, it reminded him of everything that had happened to Marnie, how one simple heartless decision cost his sister her life.

  “Miffing Bugs,” he murmured.

  She glanced at him, and then snorted. “Yeah, mif ’em.”

  His eyes traced the elegant line of her neck as she swiveled around to face him, her eyes sparking like collapsed stars swallowing up the surrounding light. She was a dark star, a black hole in the endless sky, and if he got too close, he would surely disappear.

  He knew all this, but even then, he couldn’t turn away from her.

  There was no harm in looking, he told himself. There was never any harm in that.

  CHAPTER 28

  BRINN

  IT WAS MIDWEEK, and Brinn was due at the headmaster’s office in thirty minutes, leaving just enough time to stop by the canteen. He had b
een calling her to his office on a weekly basis for the past month to go over the mysterious equations in his journal.

  She pressed her fingers over her eyelids, trying to rub the fatigue away. After her argument with Ia last week, she’d spent her nights watching the footage saved on her holopad. She played the image of the general raising his gun on that Tawny over and over. Even after watching it almost twenty times, it was still hard to believe. She was a Citizen, but would he shoot her too, if he had the choice?

  When Brinn got to the canteen, she made a beeline for the bev dispenser. Taking a sip of fresh caffeine, she noticed a group of cadets sitting around a holoscreen.

  Brinn edged toward the fringes of the group to see the screen, but lowered her bottle once she realized what was on. The verdict for the trial had come in.

  The judge, framed in the center of the screen, eyed each of the Tawny defendants. “For conspiring against the Olympus Commonwealth, I proclaim each of these defendants guilty. They are sentenced to jettison death one week from now.”

  Around her, the cadets erupted in collective applause.

  “Take that, mungbringers,” someone from the group whooped, while some of the other cadets stood on the chairs to cheer. Brinn stared at them. These cadets were her peers, her brothers and sisters of the Commonwealth. She should feel united with them, but a sliver of dread crept up her spine.

  The footage panned down the line of Tawny prisoners, and as the camera settled on each face, the cadets booed. Brinn stepped backward, trying to sink back to the corners where no one would notice her.

  Her eyes turned to the face that was projected on the display. It was the same boy from Ia’s footage, the one the general had pointed his gun on. He couldn’t have been any older than fifteen, her brother’s age. But this boy was so different from Faren. Life and all its cruelty had made him that way. It had forced the boy’s mouth into a hard line, molded his eyes into hopeless pits, painted scars where the skin should be soft.

  And she knew now that this boy was innocent. That he wasn’t the one who had fired first. Yet, Brinn couldn’t say anything. She couldn’t do a thing about it.

  She backpedaled out of the canteen until she could no longer hear the news anchor’s voice reverberating through the hallways. She pulled up her primary contacts and tapped on her brother’s name, wanting desperately to hear Faren’s voice. She wondered what he thought about the trial, and she still hadn’t gotten a chance to tell him about what had actually happened on the Tawny ship before Ia was captured.

  The stream connected, but instead, a woman’s face flickered onto the surface of the display, her visage round, with soft wrinkles feathered at the outer edges of her wide eyes.

  Brinn froze in the middle of the hallway. “Mom? Why do you have Faren’s holo?”

  Faren never took off his holowatch. He was too obsessed with tracking the Poddi League for updates.

  Her mother’s voice, which was usually smooth, was now pitted with cracks. “We’re at the hospital.”

  Brinn felt a shock run through the entire length of her body. “Is everything all right?”

  She noticed her mother’s hair was uncovered, her navy blue tresses swept up into a tight, clean topknot. Everyone in the hospital would be able to see she was Tawny.

  Brinn made her way to a more private corridor and glanced to make sure no one was there to hear. “Why are you with him? People are going to link the two of you together. They’ll find out.”

  Her mother shook her head. “They already did. That’s how this happened, Brinn.”

  “What?” Her eyes sharpened. There was no way Faren would have told anyone. “Is he there? Let me talk to him.”

  Her mother looked to the side as she spoke to someone offscreen, and then finally she slid the screen over to face Brinn’s brother. Both of his eyes were black, his nose broken. The sight of him made her shake. She backed herself to the wall to find her balance.

  “Hey, Fare. You okay?”

  He nodded with a wince.

  “What happened?”

  “I got in a fight. They were picking on a Makolion boy in school. He wasn’t doing anything wrong, just going to the bathroom. People cornered him. I had to stand up for him, Brinn.”

  She remembered the night of the Provenance Day parade, when the bystanders had turned on the refugees in the crowd. Faren had told her he wanted to help them. Brinn was the one who’d said no.

  Her hands started to shake. Perhaps if she was there, none of this would have happened. “I told you to be careful.”

  “It’s gotten bad here, with the trial and the Sanctuary Act hanging by a thread. There’s so much hate.”

  “And that’s why you don’t get involved.” She wanted to grab him by the shoulders, to make him understand.

  He shook his head, and his voice was firm. “No. This is why we should get involved.”

  The image of the general raising his gun seared into her vision, but instead of the young Tawny boy on trial, she saw Faren’s face. Ia was right. It didn’t matter that she was a Citizen. Her whole family was in danger.

  “Mom said they found out you’re Tawny.” She wanted to scream at him, but she couldn’t, not in these hallways where everyone could hear, so her voice remained hushed yet sharp. “Seriously, Faren, you’re just going to get yourself killed. How could you be so careless?”

  Her brother looked up. “I told them, Brinn,” he said. Even with the bruises, Brinn could see the deep-gray eyes that they both shared. “I don’t want to hide who I am for the rest of my life. We shouldn’t live like that.”

  Brinn felt the air in her lungs grow heavy, and all she wanted to do was lay her head on her brother’s shoulder.

  “You should rest.” She heard her mother’s voice offscreen. Faren smiled a farewell to Brinn before the screen flipped back to their mother.

  “Is he going to be all right?” Brinn asked.

  Her mother sighed as if trying to expel all her worries, but then she answered, her voice sure. Certain. “He’s a Tawny. He’ll survive.”

  But how could she be so sure? His eyes were black and swollen. He was beaten to a pulp. Brinn saw people like that on the movie streams, maybe even on the news, but not her brother. She regarded her mother, a face of steadfast calm despite everything.

  “Aren’t you scared, Mom?”

  Her mother lowered her eyelids, thinking. “Do you know why I decided to keep my hair blue?”

  Brinn thought about all the times she asked her mother why, and she remembered her answer. “As a reminder. Of everything that happened in the past. Of Tawnus. The war. Of all the people lost.” All those sad memories.

  “No, Brinn. That’s not it at all,” her mother replied. “It reminds me that after everything that’s happened to us, we’re still here. Our people are still alive.”

  When she met with the headmaster, Brinn was surprised to find he had no follow-up questions about Ia. Instead, he got straight to business and tasked Brinn with looking over a few equations. Numbers and patterns usually comforted her, but her mind was elsewhere, replaying her conversation with her brother and mother. Instead of feeling a sense of duty toward the Tawny people or betrayed by her own blind loyalty in the Commonwealth, she simply felt like she had been drained empty. Her sense of purpose was gone, as if all the direction signs had been uprooted and now she had to decide which way to turn. But all she could do was stand in place until she made a decision or until someone pushed her.

  The headmaster, noticing her absentmindedness, excused her and sent her off with papers filled with the equations for her to finish on her own time. When she returned to her dorm, the room was empty.

  Brinn placed her homework on the table and changed into a comfortable pair of black polymesh shorts and a light-gray tank top. When she was done, she sat down at the center table, her head in her hands. She couldn’t stop all the questions crowding her head.

  Brinn had always believed in Olympus and its ideals. Of Progress. Of Prosperit
y. Of Proficiency. It was the first part that haunted her. Her brother lying in a hospital bed after admitting he was Tawny. Was that progress?

  Violence was an ugly thing. Usually she would tell herself that it was also a necessary one in order for the Commonwealth to be as powerful as it was. But she couldn’t do that today. Because when she thought of Faren, she grew angry at herself for even trying to justify this in her mind. She couldn’t patch things together, and now there was a hole she didn’t know how to fill.

  The door slid open, and Brinn pushed the palms of her hands onto her closed eyelids. She heard Ia enter, her boots clipping against the metal floor. The noise made Brinn’s head thud harder.

  “What’s wrong with you?” Ia prodded.

  Brinn angled her head so only one eye peeked out at her roommate. Ia sat across from her, taking a quick glance at the papers shuffled across the desk before grabbing for the open bag of chocofluff.

  Brinn shook her head. She didn’t want to tell Ia any of this. She would scoff at her and finish it off with a very smug I told you so.

  “I don’t feel well,” Brinn answered instead.

  Ia leaned forward and brushed her fingers against Brinn’s forehead. Brinn glanced up at her. Ia could crack her skull open if she wanted to, yet here she was being gentle, being kind.

  “You have a fever.”

  Brinn chuckled softly to herself. Of all the times, this would be when her body crumbled. “I don’t even remember the last time I was sick.”

  Ia smirked. “I wonder why.”

  Brinn angled her head. “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “Tawnies never get sick. Or, well, never stay sick.”

  Brinn stared blankly at Ia. She felt a thrum of guilt at just how much she didn’t know about herself, but then she remembered what her mother had said earlier about Faren. He’s a Tawny. He’ll survive.

  “Are you saying I can heal myself?”

  “It’ll take a toll on you, but it’s possible. I’ve seen it before,” Ia explained. “I fought a war with Tawny soldiers. They healed full plasma wounds to their heart tissue, lacerations to major arteries. One soldier I knew was caught in an explosion and lost his eye. It was the ugliest wound I’ve ever seen. The next day he showed up on deck with a face as smooth as a baby and a brand-new eye in his socket.” Ia leaned in, her eyes wild. “You can do it too, you know?”