Nexus

by Sasha Alsberg

  “They discovered an Unaffected child last night,” the man ahead of them said. “Hiding like a city rat in the pod maintenance bay south of this sector. Said he’d been living on rodents for weeks.”

  He gasped as he said it, as if he were shocked by his own news. His hair stuck up from his scalp, glitter flecking each strand. His chin jutted out several inches, leading to a sharp point. A body mod, no doubt, that seemed popular in this city.

  “What did they do with the Unaffected?” asked his friend, a woman with purple eyelashes whose pupils were white and slitted like a feline’s. Perhaps Dex should offer her the backpack. “I’ve heard that the queen personally thanks each person who turns them in,” the woman added reverently. “That her blessing is like a kiss from the Godstars.”

  The man nodded. “Word is, they turned the Unaffected over to the Guardians manning the sector.”

  “Good riddance,” the woman said, clucking her tongue. “All glory be to the queen.”

  The man repeated her words, pressing his hands together and holding them out toward a Solis flag that hung from a building nearby. “Just wait,” he breathed. “Once she completes Nexus... We’ll root out the Unaffecteds forever.”

  Dex’s stomach clenched at the thought of more innocents dying because of this new world of Nor’s. The depth of grief he’d felt at Lon’s death had surprised him—though the two of them had bonded over their need to survive on board the Marauder, Dex hadn’t realized how much he’d come to depend on Lon’s calming presence until it was gone.

  Klarisa’s death...that had struck him with the same devastation that the death of a fellow Guardian always had. Though Guardians protected Mirabel—gave their lives up to do it—they protected each other first, always, no matter the cost. And Dex had failed to protect Klarisa.

  He could hardly even begin to imagine how Andi felt, with all she’d lost.

  “There haven’t been any other signs, have there?” the man said, drawing Dex’s attention back. “Those Unaffecteds have been leaving their mark on this city far too often.”

  “Not as many lately,” the woman answered. “Soon Craatia will be as clean as Arcardius.”

  Dex cast a glance at Andi, who was glaring at the citizens with furious eyes, as if the mention of her home planet only added to her rage.

  If only she knew just how much the mention of Arcardius made him bristle—made guilt pick at his insides, for the secret he still harbored about what he’d helped Cyprian do.

  In time, Dex would tell her. But not today.

  “Where have those scum been lurking this time?” Dex asked the duo, pitching his voice so that he sounded like a confident businessman.

  The man barely cast him a second glance as he stepped into a waiting pod. “Mostly in southern Briog, with the other scum of the city.”

  The woman tsked as she joined him, and they were off, what little bit of extra information they may have had gone.

  “Southern Briog,” Andi said. “Well, that narrows the search a bit, I’d guess.”

  The line moved forward, and they boarded a glass pod meant to hold four. “Sorry, my friend,” Dex said as a man with icicle hair tried to climb in with them. He lifted the backpack with Havoc yowling inside. “Not friendly. Pisses quite a lot, too.”

  The man’s eyes widened in horror.

  Andi kicked Dex’s heel and stepped past him, giving the man a sweet, vacant smile. “We wish to...sing our praises to the queen in private, while we ride.”

  “Of course,” the man said, bowing out of the way, careful to avoid Dex and his backpack.

  “Are you trying to get us killed?” Andi murmured to Dex.

  “I can’t have some fun?”

  Andi sighed as the door slid shut behind them, and with a quick voice command, they were off to the Briog Sector.

  A small holoscreen sat inside the pod, playing ads that were similar to many Dex had seen in his lifetime, for beauty products and restaurants and the latest transport ships. But as they watched, the city flying by them on all sides, a familiar voice suddenly spoke from the screen.

  Dex saw Andi’s body go rigid beside him as Nor Solis’s face appeared. Music played in the background, a sickeningly sweet instrumental tune.

  “People of Mirabel. A new future awaits us all,” Nor said triumphantly. She was clad in a glorious bloodred gown, a golden crown balanced on her dark curls as a camera panned slowly from left to right, showing every side of her. “We must root out all who seek to defy me, all the Unaffecteds who cannot be convinced to see the light. We must shed our brightness across the galaxy, before the dawn of a new day approaches. Let no man, woman or child be left in the dark. Discover them. Turn them in to the authorities, who can guide them to new light. For I am the One True Queen, and I have come to bring a new dawn to Mirabel—a future that will unite us all.”

  “Turn it off,” Andi growled.

  Dex looked out the pod windows. All across the city, people had stopped moving, watching the buildings above as holograms echoed what they saw now in their pod.

  Nor’s face, magnified and on display for all to see and praise.

  A cry went out across the city as the image of the queen disappeared—a roar that seemed to make the pod tremble on its track. It silenced just as quickly as it had begun.

  “I hate this city,” Andi said. Her words came out like a curse. “I hate every part of it.”

  “We need to get to the Underground first,” Dex said matter-of-factly. “Then you can set this place on fire.”

  She sat back in her seat, but her body didn’t relax. Her hands curled across her thighs as the pod slowed, arching down toward the ground. The city changed as they approached their destination. The buildings took on a darker sheen, as if they hadn’t been cleaned or taken care of. They looked more like warehouses, or pleasure palaces packed tightly together. Music filtered out from bars with androids dancing in the windows, and fights broke out in the street. Weapons were sold in shopfronts, and smoke curled from open windows, where inside, Dex could see the shadowed outlines of people doing what black marketeers did best.

  Making dangerous—and often deadly—deals.

  “Now, this,” Andi said, as a headless droid wheeled past outside, a man stumbling after it, hefting a bag twice his size behind him, “is much, much better.”

  Dex saw her reflection in the glass then. The way her eyes had darkened. The way her jaw was hardening, her head tilting slightly to the side as if she were an animal about to choose her prey.

  “Let’s find the Underground,” Andi said. “Even if it means tearing apart every pub we see.”

  Her voice was rough, her body lithe as she opened the pod door and stepped out into the street. Dex knew what it meant, and he found himself filled with an equal amount of joy and fear as Andi crossed her arms and watched the passersby, each one a possible victim.

  The Bloody Baroness was here.

  And she was ready to play.

  * * *

  Andi and Dex made their way through the congested streets toward the Sharp Spire, the first stop on their pub crawl. Alfie had gathered a list of all the ice pubs in the sector, seven in total, his voice spouting useless facts about them from Dex’s wrist. Four of the pubs were located in the southern portion, so they’d decided to begin their search with those. Dex just hoped one of them would lead to the Underground.

  The rich smells of roasted meats and spices drifted around them, making his stomach rumble. It had been some time since their last meal, and he was starting to feel the debilitating effects of hunger. The feeling only heightened as they entered the Sharp Spire.

  The pub was scattered with patrons sprawled across ice couches and lounge chairs, droids rolling about and offering drinks on ice trays. Andi and Dex split up, moving about the place, prodding with simple questions about Nor and the Unaffected, but no one offered
any information worth their time. The entire pub had the feel of Nor’s hands on it, with patrons bearing her crest on their clothing and the queen’s face displayed on holoscreens around the room, playing the same video they’d seen in the pod earlier on a loop.

  Dex and Andi regrouped next to a dented droid offering fur blankets for rent.

  “I rented a blanket once,” Dex told her, sidestepping the little droid as its face-screen flashed him a discounted price. He was tempted to offer up Havoc in exchange for a few Krevs. Surely the Fellibrag would make a lovely blanket.

  “How’d that go?” Andi asked, her lip curling in disgust as she nudged the droid away with her knee.

  Dex shrugged. “It gave me fleas.”

  She snorted, then said, “The Underground isn’t here. Let’s go.”

  He laughed as she turned on her heel and exited the pub like it was on fire.

  “Alfie,” Dex said to his wrist once they were back out in the street, hiding in the deep shadows cast by the towering buildings overhead. They could see the top of the dome from here, where night and the storm darkened the outside world. Dex thought of Klarisa and her comrades, their bodies now frozen and covered by the snow. He sighed deeply and looked back at his watch. “Where to next?”

  “Dragon’s Breath,” Alfie’s voice said.

  “That’s very rude, Alfie.”

  “I do not compute.”

  Andi rolled her eyes at him. “He doesn’t understand jokes. You know that.”

  A group of people approached them, hefting a Solis banner over their heads as they cheered Nor’s name. Dex plastered on a smile and took Andi’s arm, and they both waved at the silver-veined citizens.

  “It was worth a shot,” he murmured to her as they made their way to Dragon’s Breath.

  Over the next couple of hours, their visits to the other pubs offered little to nothing, and Dex began to feel like their efforts to find the Underground were doomed to fail. They had hardly any information to go off of, and the longer they stayed out in the open, the more dangerous their situation became. At some point, he knew someone would see the truth written across their faces, behind their false smiles.

  “That’s it,” Dex said wearily. “We’ve checked them all.”

  Alfie spouted off the list of pubs again, and sure enough, they’d been to them all. Yet there was no sign of the Underground.

  “We’re not going to find them, are we?” Andi said, stopping short before a narrow entrance to an abandoned stone storefront, its sign barely visible under the awning.

  Iceman Antiquities.

  Dex leaned against the frosted glass shop window, eyeing the pile of strange old antiques. Rusted old war helmets and ancient-looking weapons, broken bottles of Griss long since forgotten. The place had clearly gone out of business ages ago.

  It struck him suddenly that he was standing with the General of Arcardius. Andi had no idea of the truth yet, but when she did, she’d have the resources of an entire planet available to her. How different their situation would be, if Andi had gained the title another way, instead of in desperate response to Nor’s attacks.

  They certainly wouldn’t be hopeless and shipless, hungry and without any Krevs, hiding in the middle of some dingy street outside an abandoned shop in Solera.

  He needed to tell her. Lon’s last words still haunted him. Tell her the truth. Tell her what she is.

  But not now.

  Not until they had a moment to regroup. To recover. He knew the news wouldn’t be welcome. She hated Arcardius, hated the people who had chased her from it years ago. No, the secret would remain his for a time—and the guilt over not telling her would remain, too.

  Another demon to hang on Dex’s back.

  Something in the shop window caught his eye. “Andi,” Dex breathed. “Look at that.”

  She turned to face him as he pointed through the frosted glass. Inside the old shop window, hidden among the strange, useless items, was a painting. Everything else was old and covered in dust, but the painting was new.

  A spider’s web, painted in bloodred against an expanse of black.

  Klarisa’s words suddenly came back to Dex. Then Arachnid will welcome you into a tangled web of...

  She’d never gotten to finish that statement, for the ice dragon had broken through the ice moments later. And then she’d died.

  “That’s interesting,” Andi said. “It could mean nothing, but... Alfie, what is this place?”

  “Out of business,” Alfie’s voice said a moment later. “Though it is labeled on the Craatian feeds as a speakeasy.”

  Dex barked out a laugh. “Alfie, you idiot. That’s a pub. Just a hidden one.”

  He smiled as he pushed away from the window and tried the shop’s ancient door handle. The door creaked open, revealing a tunnellike hallway. Inside, the shop itself was cold and empty of items. The rows of metal shelves had been cleared away, nothing but dust and empty boxes for the taking. But Dex was certain there was something else here. His spine tingled in anticipation, as if he were fresh on a blood trail.

  “There,” Andi said. She pointed to the floor, where a mess of footprints had disturbed the dust. They led toward a heavy metal storage room door at the back of the shop. Just beneath the handle of that door was another small painting of a spider’s web, no larger than Dex’s fingertip.

  Dex’s heartbeat was heavy in his chest. He looked over his shoulder, back at Andi. She nodded, her face barely visible in the shadows of the abandoned storefront. “What’s the matter, Guardian? Scared?”

  “As hell,” Dex said, thinking honesty was always the best policy. But he stepped forward anyway and, with a deep breath, turned the handle. He heaved, pushing the heavy door inward...

  And was greeted with a cold kiss of icy air, cool blue lighting and the rhythmic pulsing of dance music as the hidden ice pub was revealed.

  It was stuffed full of people, all of them wearing the thick furs of Solera as they milled about. The dance floor was littered with giant icicles that resembled stalactites, and the bar itself was an entire wall of ice, holes carved out to fit bottles within. Drones strung with old, twinkling holiday lights soared around the ceiling, casting the entire pub in a flickering glow. In the corner, a fireplace from frozen blocks of ice boasted a purple fire within—some sort of chemical substance that looked pretty, but did nothing to chase the chill away. Patrons lounged before it, laughing as they enjoyed their drinks.

  “Damn,” Dex muttered. A woman waltzed past, her hair piled on her head and braided in the shape of a snowflake. With a start, he noticed that her veins weren’t silver. Her skin was blessedly free of Nor’s stain, and as he looked around, Dex realized with glee that everyone else was free of the veins, too.

  “I think we may have found the Underground,” Andi breathed. “What now?”

  Despite his better judgment, Dex reached up and removed his helmet, gulping in the cold air. The whole place was thick with the smell of smoke and Griss. Someone shouted in the corner of the room, where two mini-droids were boxing in the center of a carved, frozen table. A large crowd surrounded it, throwing in Krevs and spilling their drinks as they clashed their ice mugs together, sealing bets.

  “We look for another sign,” Dex said, scanning the pub. “A spider’s web, maybe painted somewhere, or on a bottle of Griss, or—”

  “There,” Andi said, grabbing his shoulder tight. Her helmet was off now, too, and nobody looked twice at the two of them.

  She nodded in the direction of the bar, where a woman sat with her back to them. Woven into her clothing, as if a spider had stitched the design right into the fabric, was an intricate black web.

  “We question her slowly,” Dex said. “We feel her out first, just a gentle nudge, and if she gives any indication that she’s one of the Underground...”

  “Godstars be damned,” Andi said, cutti
ng him off.

  The woman had turned, the side of her face visible now as a droid refilled her cup.

  Dex almost couldn’t believe his eyes. It felt like he was having a very real case of déjà vu—or like he’d been thrown back into one of his worst nightmares.

  For it was Soyina who sat at the bar, a finger lazily tracing the rim of her glass. Her tattoos swam around her skin like fish in a pool of water as she surveyed the room.

  “What are the chances...?” Andi started.

  “What the hell is she doing here?” Dex wondered aloud. The last time they’d seen Soyina, she’d put a bullet through them both and dumped their bodies—and Valen’s—on a Lunamere corpse ship.

  Of all the people in the galaxy, it had to be her.

  Soyina turned around as they approached the bar. “My, my,” she said, eyes just barely widening in surprise at the sight of them. “If it isn’t Dextro Arez and his pretty Baroness, back from the dead.”

  “Thanks for the warning about that, by the way,” Andi growled. “I’m pretty sure I still have a bruise on my chest from your stunner bullet.”

  Dex glanced between the two of them as they stared at each other, a mirror image of the night they’d first met with Soyina at Dark Matter, when they’d asked her to help them break into Lunamere and free Valen.

  She couldn’t be trusted, Dex knew.

  Yet she had Arachnid’s mark stitched plainly across her back, and there was no sign of silver glowing beneath her skin.

  “Before you speak, I’ve a question to ask of you, dearies,” Soyina said as she signaled for the bartender droid to return. It rolled over, offering two frosty mugs full of liquid. Neither Dex nor Andi took them. Soyina only shrugged and smiled up at them as she added, “Be careful how you respond, for it will decide your fate. Who do you serve?”

  Neither of them answered. But Andi’s face, so full of hatred at the mere thought of Nor, gave the answer away.