by Gwynn White
It wouldn’t be that easy and Keva knew it.
Yling met Keva’s gaze with desperate hope. “Yes. I say yes.”
“You don’t know what you’re saying yes to.”
“Neither do you. But I want to live.”
That was true. She looked at ARO and nodded.
ARO extended his foot, inserted the needle into Yling’s leg, and went stiff. The flesh covering his metal parts slipped away and fell to the floor. His modded eyes tumbled from their sockets, hanging by a wire still attached to his skull.
The cracked and drying skin on Yling’s leg receded, becoming living and healthy again.
Yling released a relieved breath.
ARO took his human hand, grabbed something tightly, and then pressed it forcefully against Yling’s temple.
She arched her back, one hand out, her fingers splayed. Her mouth dropped open as if to scream.
Keva’s breath stuck in her throat. What was she supposed to do?
Yling relaxed, her back slouching. She took in a deep breath and pulled the needle out of her leg. Standing, she flexed her now supple skinned hands and blinked at Keva. “I’m in.”
“And Yling?”
“Is quite comfortable. Once I get us out, I will recede and let Yling take the surface.”
Resolve settled in Keva’s chest. They wouldn’t escape if Keva went with them. Poe had more things to throw at them. She had an entire arsenal of bio-weapons at her disposal. “Poe,” she said.
“Yes, Keva,” Poe said, her voice even.
“Let them go.”
“After what I just saw? I think not.”
“You want him. I know. But you let them go now and next time, you can try your hand again.”
“In exchange for what?”
Keva took in a deep breath.
ARO narrowed Yling’s eyes and nodded once, a peaceful smile on her face.
She hated that AI. “Me.” Keva took in a deep breath. “I will come with you willingly and you let them go. You let them all go.”
Poe paused. “Agreed.”
The barriers opened.
“Keva, you come back the way you left. AI, you may return to your ship.”
“I will walk with them to their ship.”
“No, Keva, you will not,” Poe said cheerfully. “I will honor my word.”
“I don’t believe you.”
The barriers stopped opening several meters in either direction.
The grate in the ceiling opened again.
Probably to unload another bio-weapon. “Fine!” Keva bowed her head in defeat. “Fine.”
ARO turned toward her as the barriers opened again along the line. “I will keep her safe.”
“You better.” Keva turned and walked slowly back the way she had come unsure what she might face or what might come of her.
But grateful that the HUMP System was safe from Batch D-65.
And that her twin was alive.
Epilogue
The trip to Kalamatra was silent. ILO refused to speak to Dottie as if she’d somehow betrayed Keva herself. Though, how that could have happened refused to present itself.
Hale and his team were silent as well. They kept Keva’s pod members on their ship, they had Reach to attend to their medical needs and enough room. They refused to even look at her.
Dottie couldn’t even bring herself to work on the short trip to Kalamatra. She’d lost more than just… Keva.
When had Dottie started seeing Keva as anything more than the pretentious bitch who had sent her sister to slaughter?
She now understood why Keva had treated her so rough. It hadn’t been cruelty, despite how it felt at the time. Keva…had been trying to teach her how to survive.
Well, now it was her chance to return the favor. All she had to do was to find a single ally, someone willing to help.
Hale wanted to help. He was all for it. Especially after a drink or four. As soon as Dottie came up with a plan that didn’t get them all killed.
And she couldn’t do it. Not without ILO’s help, and ILO wouldn’t even open the doors to her work bay. She’d turned off all occupancy sensing equipment as if telling Dottie, she shouldn’t exist. Only the doors to her bedroom and the kitchen worked, so she didn’t starve to death, but she nearly went out of her mind.
Since walking onto that ship, she had lost her family, her life, her tutor, and even the AI who was more of a brother to her than anyone else she knew. She had lost her way of thinking. She’d had to forgo the way she spoke, the way she walked. She could no longer wear cloth that didn’t chafe her skin. She had to dirty her face and pull her hair back into severe-looking up-dos.
Standing at the bar of the Jiggling Donkey, she couldn’t help but feel guilty. She had no idea where ARO or Keva were. She didn’t know if they were safe if they were alive. She didn’t know anything. All she knew was they were gone.
And Heliac Nine had been disabled and quarantined. No one could get in and no one could leave.
But she had a feeling. Keva was strong. She was easily the strongest woman Dottie had ever met. She was stronger than Odelle, stronger than that bitch of a woman Ajian Memta. And maybe even stronger than High Councilwoman Poe.
Maybe.
She hoped.
Fallow walked back to her, a stern look on his face. He reminded her so much of Sparrow, except for the blue accents on his face instead of orange. The condemnation in his heavily shadowed eyes informed her that he blamed her for Sparrow’s silence.
Keva and ARO hadn’t been the only ones not to return before Heliac Nine was quarantined.
The only person to return safely was Yling, Keva’s twin, and she said nothing. Despite looking the same, it was impossible to believe she was Keva’s sister, the way she kept all her thoughts to herself and wouldn’t tell any of them a single thing that had happened. She’d gathered with the rest of the pod members they’d saved and disappeared into the chaos of Kalamatra station as soon as they arrived.
Fallow slammed a glass in front of her and barely covered the bottom of the glass with a blue liquid. He held out his hand.
She offered her wrist, knowing he was taking a full Tarn for the drink. He blamed her, just like everyone else. “It wasn’t my fault,” she whispered, her newly modded black hair cut in a harsh bob so that when she lowered her head it pointed at an angle to her chin.
Fallow leaned forward and muttered fiercely. “If she hadn’t saved you, she wouldn’t have doubted herself. My girl was good. Her and Sparrow together?” He shook his head. “Saving you was a mistake. One word, Princess. One word and I will turn you in.”
Dottie swallowed her resolve and straightened on her stool. “And when they find the ident chip you gave me. What then? I will tell them who supplied it and your entire organization falls.”
Fallow curled his lips in disdain.
“I tried to help,” Dottie said with as much force as she could fake. If Keva had taught her anything, it was that appearing weak was the same thing as being weak. “I did everything I could, even though I risked my own life to do so.”
“She risked hers to save you.”
“And with that, we are paid in full.” She picked up her glass and knocked down the liquid in one gulp.
He narrowed his eyes and leaned back in. “Then why are you fighting so hard to meet this Finn character?”
Dottie blinked, her fingers shaking slightly. “I—I think they’re still alive.”
Fallow looked around the bar and moved closer to her. “Why?”
“I don’t know.” She shrugged, hoping something she said or did would finally get through to him. How was it that Keva, so hard and rigid and unmovable, could bring people together, but Dottie, who was kinder and gentler, could not? “I don’t know. I just have this feeling. She’s still out there. For some reason, Poe wanted her and she wanted her alive.”
“And you think, what?”
Dottie’s theory was wild. “I think Poe put the station under quar
antine to protect what she’s doing, to ensure no one bothers her. With the quarantine in effect, everyone stays away.”
Fallow searched Dottie’s gaze. “And Sparrow? My sister is missing too. She’s at best dead, at worst back in some lab.”
Dottie opened her mouth to say something.
But Fallow’s eyes went dim for a moment.
The kind of dim that meant he was talking to one of his siblings.
When his eyes focused again, he let out a breath and leaned forward on the bar a tear in his eye.
“What? What did you hear?” Dottie asked, hope flaring painfully in her chest. That looked like relief on his face. “Did you find them? Are they, all right?”
“Sparrow reported into work. She has no idea why we are all worrying about her—”
Sparrow? No word of Keva? Dottie hadn’t even realized she’d been hopeful until it was dashed, leaving behind a hurt she couldn’t massage away. She smiled, swallowing the pain.
“—and no memory of even being on Heliac Nine, so we have no any idea what they might have done to her or what happened there, or to Keva.”
Raising her glass, she saluted him. “I am so very glad she’s home, Fallow. That’s what matters.”
“You truly believe Keva’s alive?” Fallow asked, filling Dottie’s glass.
“I do,” she whispered. Keva had to be. She was the only person Dottie had left in this world. Everything of Dothylian Solvei was gone. Her name, her dress. All she had was her face, and she had just come back from getting a scar permanently etched near her eye, costing her the last of her Tarn from selling her Elite fabrics. She had to get Keva back.
Someone sank onto the stool beside Dottie.
Fallow straightened, his expression somber. He retrieved another glass and a red bottle, pouring the man a drink. He nodded as he corked the bottle and walked away.
The man sipped his glass. He had the ugliest face Dottie had ever seen. His eyes were too large, as were his teeth. He looked like…well, it was impolite to say, but he looked like a living birth defect. She looked away, unable to stare at him anymore. To think such a dark thought was one thing. To continue to stare was another.
“Are you Dottie Vesbith?”
She blinked at him, trying to hide her surprise. “Yes?”
He gave her a long, slow, bored blink and focused his attention back to his drink. “What do you want?”
Dottie shook and everything inside her told her to retreat. She clenched her hand into a fist. “To get her back.”
“Who?”
“Keva.” She glanced around, uncertain. “Keva Duste. You’re Finn Wyters, are you not?”
The man looked at her critically from the corner of his eyes. “You are the girl she saved against our orders.”
Oh, great. Another person who blamed her for getting Keva kidnapped? Taken? Arrested? Reclaimed? She raised her chin. “No. I am the one who completed her mission so you could obtain the information you so desperately needed.”
He narrowed his eyes, then looked away, a slight smile on his overly large lips. “Is that so? And where is the object we seek?”
“We destroyed them. All of them.”
“The orders were for her to retrieve one.”
“So that you could replicate it?”
“Her job was not to question.”
Dottie sat back. “Then, you most definitely chose the wrong person for this mission. Because that’s all Keva does. She disobeys. She thinks. She studies and then she does what is right. And that is exactly what she did back there.”
“And now we find ourselves on the brink of a revolution. You will have to pardon me if I find that does not meet the standards required for the situation.”
Dottie opened her mouth to speak, then stopped as something struck her. His stiff speech. He was Elite. But that face. There was no way any Elite would have survived with a face like that. Who were the Codex Syndicate? And what were they after?
Finn rested an elbow on the bar and turned stiffly toward her. “Keva left us with an opening.”
As if they would just allow anyone in.
“And she obviously told you more about our organization than she should have.”
Dottie took in a deep breath, biting down on her immediate reply. She wanted to tell him to…to…to go fuck himself. But that would be rude.
And wildly appropriate.
“I either have you killed to silence you or you join our organization.”
“And if I join with you, will you help me free her?”
He scoffed, then shook his head. “No. She failed to complete her mission. She went off-book. She disobeyed orders. We will clean up this mess, but it will be to kill her before she can tell anyone else about us.”
A chill washed over Dottie.
“You would do well to forget her.” He glanced at Fallow and rose from the bar, his drink relatively untouched. “Be here tomorrow, same time. We’ll begin the initiation process.”
Dottie watched him leave.
Frowning, Fallow returned. “You’re not going to do as he says, are you?”
Jerkily, she shook her head. With the quarantine in place, they had weeks, months, maybe years before anyone, including the Syndicate, could gain entry to Heliac Nine. “I’m going to join them.”
Fallow stared at her in surprise.
She was a little shocked as well. She blinked so fast, she almost couldn’t see him. “I’m going to join them and then I’m going to find her.”
Fallow knocked back the drink Finn had left behind and slammed the glass back down on the counter. “When you’re ready, you let us know.” He bared his teeth and poured himself another drink. “We protect our own. And Keva is one of ours.”
Yes. Keva was Dottie’s, too, like ARO.
And damn it, Dottie was getting her back. One way or another.
THE END
Learn More about The Black System Legends and Mind Worm Book Two in The Kalamatra Rebellion Series at www.BlackSystemLegends.com
About The Authors
Super-powered duo SM Blooding and P.K. Tyler have taken on space opera, and are prepared to rock your world.
Pew Pew Pew!
S.M. Blooding
Frankie lives in beautiful Montana with her Darling Dork, his two part-time girls, and their cat, Tesla. Frankie graduated valedictorian from the School of Hard Knocks and received a Master’s Degree of Failing Epically. She served in the U.S. Army as an Air Traffic Controller, worked as a coal miner, and finally as a project manager in construction.
She's dated vampires, werewolves, sorcerers, weapons smugglers, U.S. Government assassins, and slingshot terrorist. No. She is not kidding.
She’s currently married to her best friend and co-conspirator and absolutely loving life.
Find out more about her books at:
https://www.smblooding.co/
http://www.blacksystemlegends.com
https://www.whiskeywitches.com/
https://www.hattiehunt.com/
http://fjwolfram.com/
P.K. Tyler
P.K. Tyler is the author of Speculative Fiction and other Genre Bending novels. She’s also published works as Pavarti K. Tyler and had projects appear on the USA Today Bestseller’s List.
“Tyler is essentially the indie scene’s Margaret Atwood; she incorporates sci-fi elements into her novels, which deal with topics such as spirituality, gender, sexuality and power dynamics.” – IndieReader
Pav attended Smith College and graduated with a degree in Theatre. And is now located in Baltimore, Maryland, she lives with her husband, two daughters, and two terrible dogs.
Her writing has won multiple awards including the Next Generation Indie Awards Winner for Best Short Fiction, as well as Finalist for Best Women’s Issues. She’s also been nominated for a Campbell Award for Best New Writer two years running as well as named a finalist in the Multicultural Fiction category for the 2012 International Book Awards, Honorable Mention in the DIY Book Festiv
al General Fiction Award, and nominee for the 2012 USA Best Book Awards for Multicultural and Literary Fiction.
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Sorcery & Science
Ella Summers
Urban fantasy. Galactic consequences.
Terra Cross is just your typical paranormal princess. She plays poker with goblins and leprechauns. She savors her morning muffin from the Pacific Sunrise Bakery in suburban California. She solves galactic crime cases. And on a particularly wild day, she can even see into the future.
Everything is going so well—up until her father, the mages’ high king, betroths her to one of his allies. But playing nice with otherworldly ambassadors isn’t the only thing on Terra’s plate. A renegade mage scientist has taken up shop on Earth, whose inhabitants have no knowledge of magic or the worlds beyond.
With his forbidden experiments threatening to pierce the Veil of Secrecy on Earth, Terra can’t tackle this challenge alone. Divided by magic and technology—torn between a mage enforcer with devastating telekinetic powers, and a lethal black ops vampire soldier—time is running out. For if this mad scientist succeeds, the galaxy’s hard hand of justice will come down on them all.
Sorcery & Science is a new urban fantasy novel set in the rebooted Sorcery & Science universe.
1
Augmented Magic
Mrs. Mason’s front lawn looked like a tornado had torn through it—but only one half of it. Her flower garden was in pristine condition. Roses, petunias, carnations, and a dozen other varieties were organized into neat, color-sorted rows.
Her vegetable garden was another matter altogether. It was just…gone. Like it had been lifted out of the ground, leaving nothing but raw earth behind. Not a single leaf, root, or vine remained. In fact, there wasn’t any evidence that there ever had been any vegetables there.