I'm a monster, she thought. I killed Elvis. I'm a freak. I'm a murderer. But she could not bring that to her lips. That pain still ran too deep.
Marco stared at her, silent, and sighed. It was a long moment before he spoke. "I did hate you. For a long time. I had two years on Haven to hate you. But that's over now. Whatever love we had, whatever animosity that followed . . . it's over. It's a new reality now. There's no more room for hatred."
"And love?" Lailani whispered. "Because when you look at me, I still see it. It's still the way you used to look at me when we were eighteen. Do you still love me, Marco? Even after what I did?"
He hesitated as if considering his words. "How I feel is irrelevant to this mission."
She barked a laugh. "That's Captain Ben-Ari speaking. Not the Poet." She stepped toward him and took his hands. "Marco, listen. I want you to understand something. I love you. I still fucking love you with all my fucking heart, and I always will. Always. You're the only boy I ever loved. When I left you, I . . ."
"You don't have to say anything."
"I do!" Lailani's eyes flashed. "Don't take this away from me! Because this tore at me for two fucking years, and I won't let you silence me now. When I left you, I broke your heart, I know. But I also broke my heart. My heart shattered that day. I had a terrible choice. Between a life with the man I love and a life serving my country, my church, my soul, saving those children who lived like I had lived. I could not take you with me. I could not see you wither there, see you slowly decay in the slums. I had to go with Sofia. Because Marco, after the war, I vowed something. I vowed to God. To my dead mother. To the cosmos itself. I made a vow that I could not break."
"What vow?" he whispered, eyes damp.
God damn it. Lailani had not wanted to share all this. Not here. Not now, with the enemy pursuing them. Yet, yes, the floodgates had broken. All her truths were spilling out with her tears.
"For years, we killed." She spoke softly, as if speaking to herself more than to Marco. "They trained us to be killers. They took eighteen-year-old kids, tearing us from our lives. They tossed us into a camp in a desert. They broke us, then reformed us into killers. Ben-Ari. Sergeant Singh. Corporal Diaz. All of them. They gave us guns, they made those guns become parts of us, and they sent us to kill. To destroy. To bomb. To ruin. And we did all those things. We killed the scum in their hives, and we ravaged their ships, and we bombed their home planet, and we became agents of destruction. What else could we be? We were born into such a cosmos. A cosmos at war. A cosmos where only killers survived, where the strong preyed on the meek. So we became strong. Or we died."
Marco lowered his head, perhaps remembering their fallen friends. "Or we died. Even many of the strong."
Lailani nodded, thinking of those she had lost. Of Caveman, Sheriff, Jackass, Beast, all the rest of them. Of dear, beloved Sofia, forever in her heart. Of Elvis, his blood on her hands.
"I escaped death in the war," Lailani said. "I should have died so many times. When I sliced my wrists. In the inferno of Fort Djemila. In the underground of Corpus. In the hell of Abaddon. Yet I kept escaping death. And I wondered, Marco. I wondered so many times why I lived while others died."
"Luck," Marco said. "That's what Addy always told me when I felt guilty for surviving."
"Luck? Maybe." Lailani gripped the cross she wore around her neck. "I wore this cross through the war. And I wore this in the shantytowns, places of as much misery as any battlefield. And I often doubted my faith. The priests taught me that a benevolent, all-powerful god looks out for us. And I wondered how that could be. How God could be real when teenagers died on battlefields on alien worlds. When children in slums were sold into brothels. When children lived on landfills, eating the trash, diseased and dying. How could the priests be right? How could God be good and powerful and yet allow all this pain? I asked that every day."
"Did you find an answer?" Marco said.
"Not in any church. Not from the mouth of any priest. And so I made a vow after the war. I'm not all-powerful, but I can be benevolent. I can, with what little power I have, provide some of the mercy I kept praying for, that I was always denied. If I was losing my faith in God, I would seek faith in my own soul. I vowed that I would devote my life to healing, not killing. To building, not destroying. And when I looked at you, Marco, it hurt too much. I saw the war again. I saw all those we lost. I saw my old life, the life of a killer." She sighed, smiling through her tears. "So I left. I went to follow my vow. To build and heal. And I know, Marco. I know that the inequity in the world is great. That there are so many who hurt. That I could never heal them all, never help all those who need me. But if I could help just a few, fix just a little, then I would serve a purpose in this life. That this gift of a life, almost snatched from me, would still have meaning. That I would find redemption."
He looked at her, eyes damp. "You always had meaning to me, Lailani. And you always will."
She nodded. She felt so weak. So drained. Her eyes kept watering.
"I want you to hate me," she whispered. She stepped toward him, hesitated, then embraced him. When she laid her head against his chest, and when he wrapped his arms around her, she could still feel so safe, like in the old days. "You're too damn good to me."
"No more hate," Marco said. "No more destroying. It's time for forgiveness. For healing." He touched her cheek. "Lailani, I'm sorry for your loss. Truly. I lost somebody on Haven, somebody I loved. The pain is almost too great to bear. But what we're doing here, this journey into the darkness—this is healing. This is building. This is helping. We might just save the cosmos. Perhaps this will be the greatest thing we ever do."
She smiled, tears on her lips. "Let's focus on fixing the small things first. Like those connectors I broke. Will you help me?"
He nodded. "I will help you." And she knew he was speaking about more than connectors.
They knelt around the equipment. They kept working. As they slowly brought the systems back online, Lailani felt as if she were piecing together her soul, her cosmos.
Fixing, she thought. Putting things together. Healing. She looked up at Marco, smiled, then looked back at her work. When the world is falling apart, fixing little things is all we can do. May that forever be my life—a life of fixing what is broken.
CHAPTER FIVE
Heat.
Scuttling in the dark.
Pain—throbbing, pulsing.
Screams and clatters and grunts.
Her eyes fluttered open, saw blood and skin, and closed again.
Sharp agony on her cheek, and claws shoving her down. Addy coughed, gasping for air, struggling to reclaim consciousness. She blinked, her vision hazy, slowly coming into focus.
"Grant!" she tried to shout, but only a hoarse whisper emerged.
She tried to rub her eyes but could not. She realized her arms were bound. She wasn't sure how long she had been unconscious. Meanwhile, the marauders had moved her. She hung like a fly in a cobweb, trapped in a rusty metal room. Several other prisoners were here, sticky strands gluing them to the walls. There were no portholes here, but she was clearly still on the transport ship; she could hear the engines rumble below her, and the chamber vibrated. From above came the muffled cries of the thousands of human captives.
"Sergeant Linden?" One of the figures in the web stirred, coughed, and gazed at her with one eye. "Sergeant?"
"Grant!" she cried. He hung across the chamber. Addy struggled, tried to free herself from the web, but only entangled herself further. "I can almost free myself. We're near the engines. We can still fight. We . . ."
Shadows stirred above, and Addy's voice died.
Creatures were moving across the ceiling. Legs—serrated, clawed, rising, falling. Eyes—peering, mocking, glistening black. Jaws—smacking, drooling, fangs glistening. Abdomens—bloated, sprouting spikes, clattering with skulls. Hunters. Apex predators. Like spiders, they wove their webs, endlessly patient, hungry for their prey.
One of the
marauders descended, hanging on a strand of web, and spun lazily, facing the prisoners on the walls one by one. A crown of horns grew from his head, and a parasitic twin twitched on his side, opening and closing small jaws. The marauder had only three eyes; the fourth dripped across his face, exposing a red socket. One of his teeth was missing, and the gum still bled. That missing tooth was now pinned to Addy's side, trapped in the webbing like her arms, cold and sharp against her thigh.
Dear Orcus is still alive, but we hurt him, Addy thought, chest swelling. Good.
The marauder's jaw unhinged, and he spoke, voice like sheets of metal scraping together. "You . . . will . . . pay . . ."
"Do you accept MasterCard or Visa?" Addy said.
The marauder spun toward her, shot out a web, and swung closer. His jaws opened, and he hissed in her face, his breath assailing her.
Addy cringed. "Lovely mouthwash you use. What flavor is this? Rotten carcass or rancid trash heap?"
"I will feast on your flesh," the creature hissed.
"Try a mint instead," Addy said.
The marauder's jaws opened wide, and he howled, blowing his breath and saliva on Addy's face.
"You are nothing but meat," Orcus said. "You rose up against us. I will make sure you can never rise again. Watch." The alien grinned. "And await your turn."
The marauder swung from Addy toward the prisoner beside her, a muscular man with several stars tattooed on his arms. The veteran thrashed in his bonds, gritting his teeth, veins rising across his neck. Orcus crept closer, dangling on strands of webs.
"The human body," Orcus said. "So weak. So frail. You may have risen to dominance on your world. But in space, you are nothing but prey." The marauder's nostrils flared, and he sniffed the veteran's head, then shuddered in delight. "Your brains—so soft, so delectable. They are not ours to eat. Not yet. Not here. They are food for my master." Orcus licked his chops. "But you don't need your hands."
The marauder placed his jaws around the veteran's left hand.
"No!" Addy shouted.
The veteran grimaced, struggling to free himself, unable to move in the web.
The jaws snapped shut.
Orcus yanked his head back, gulping down the severed hand.
"You bastard!" Addy thrashed in her web.
The alien ignored her, closed his jaws around the man's second hand, and bit again. The veteran screamed.
Blood on his teeth, Orcus worked quickly, spinning webs around the spurting stumps. The veteran gave a last scream, then lost consciousness and hung limply.
Orcus turned toward Addy and grinned. "He will never more fight marauders."
The alien crept toward the next rebel, a woman with many stars tattooed onto her arms, a veteran of the butchery on Abaddon.
When the marauder bit off her hands, the veteran screamed.
One by one, Orcus moved between the veterans, the squad that had rebelled against the marauders. Snapping his jaws. Swallowing hands. Binding the stumps with webs. Even the parasitic twin fed upon a severed finger. As he worked, Orcus chuckled.
"Nobody will miss your hands when you're butchered. But they too are delectable." The marauder licked blood off its teeth. "And once we reach Earth, I will dine with Malphas himself. I too will taste brains."
Earth, Addy thought, trembling in her web. They're taking us to Earth.
Even with the horror of this chamber, her mind reeled. She wasn't sure whether to be elated or horrified. They weren't taking her to their own planet; that was good. But if they were traveling to Earth, did that mean her homeworld had fallen? Did humanity still fight? Could Addy still fight?
Grant's scream shattered her thoughts. The marauder bit off his hands and gulped, and the aging veteran—among Addy's closest friends from Haven—passed out.
Finally, after mutilating all the other rebels, Orcus turned toward Addy.
"Your turn." The marauder crept closer.
Addy winced, turning her head away from the alien. She could still see fingers stuck between his teeth.
"You might want to reconsider, buddy boy," Addy said.
Orcus laughed—a sound like bubbling death. "Good. Beg. I love to hear it."
His parasitic twin cackled, blood on its little jaws. "Beg, beg!"
"Oh, I won't beg," Addy said. "But you might. You'll beg for mercy once your superiors hear that you mutilated me. I'm prime meat, buddy. Check out my hip." She wriggled in her bindings, revealing the brand on her skin. "See that? I'm fucking filet mignon. I'm a meal for Lord Malphas himself. How will he feel, knowing you nibbled on his feast?"
The marauder screeched so loudly Addy thought her eardrums would rip. She refused to wince.
"Lord Malphas doesn't eat the hands!" Orcus said.
Addy smiled. "I don't eat pizza crusts, but I'd be pissed if my delivery guy ate them on the way over."
The marauder screamed again, but she saw the fear in his remaining eyes.
"Very well." Orcus panted, glaring at her. "You are a feast for Lord Malphas? Then we will prepare you for the feast!" He cackled. "You will wish I had taken your hands."
The marauder turned toward a tunnel and called out in his language, voice echoing through the ship. Grumbles and clatters rose from above. Marauders laughed. Addy winced.
"Stay strong, Sergeant," Grant said, raising his head. Blood dripped from the webs around his stumps. "Whatever they do, stay strong. You are a soldier of the Human Defense Force."
A second marauder emerged from a tunnel into the chamber. The alien dragged a bloated sack tipped with a hose. Blood on his teeth, Orcus helped carry the sack. The aliens approached Addy with their burden.
"Uhm, fellas," Addy said. "You know, I'm quite delicious as I am."
Orcus shook with deep, cruel laughter. He lifted the hose. Brown, lumpy gruel spilled from it.
"We will fatten you up," the alien said. "More flesh for Malphas."
At his side, his parasitic twin laughed. "Flesh, flesh!"
Orcus brought the hose close to Addy's mouth.
Cringing, she turned her head away. "Boys, boys! Malphas enjoys the brain. Why don't you bring me some science books? I can get nice and smart for him."
Orcus grabbed her cheeks, forcing her jaw open. "Lord Malphas does not eat the hands, perhaps. But he will still enjoy meat for dessert." Orcus grinned. "Just pray he eats your brain before your meat."
He shoved the hose into her mouth.
"Just feed me hot dogs!" Addy said, coughing, trying to spit out the tube. "I'll eat them!"
Orcus shoved the tube deeper. Addy screamed, floundered, desperate to escape the web. She would have better luck breaking iron shackles. She gagged, tried to spit out the hose, could not. The marauder kept shoving it in—to the back of her mouth, into her throat, down her throat. Addy vomited, choked, nearly passed out.
"Fatten her up!" said Orcus and squeezed the sack.
On his side, his parasitic twin cackled. "Fat, fat!"
The gruel began flowing into Addy's stomach.
She struggled, unable to stop it. Tears flowed down her cheeks, and the marauder licked them off.
"You took my eye," Orcus said. "So now I will take all of your humanity, all that you were. You are meat. You are pain. You are misery. Nothing more. Enjoy the rest of your flight."
The aliens crawled out of the chamber, leaving the rebels dangling there—the others without hands, Addy with the feeding tube down her throat.
Earth, she kept thinking as the ship flew on, as the screams still rose, as the gruel kept flowing down her throat. We're going to Earth. On Earth we will fight. On Earth we will rise again. On Earth we will kill them all.
The hellish journey through space continued, and Addy closed her eyes, tears on her cheeks, and thought of home.
CHAPTER SIX
They limped on through space, trapped in an alien vessel, hungry, weary.
Before them spread the dark vastness. Behind them, twenty ravagers roared in pursuit.
"They're
getting closer." Sitting on the floor of the Anansi's bridge, Lailani looked up from her array of monitors, keyboards, and sensors.
"They're always getting closer," Marco snapped, recognized the harshness in his voice, and softened it. "I'm flying as fast as I can. The Anansi is just too slow. Or none of us are good pilots."
He had been flying the ravager for hours now. They had been taking shifts; Ben-Ari had insisted the entire crew learn to fly the alien starship. The pilot's seat dangled in the web. Before it spread the alien controls: spheres instead of screens and strands instead of keys or buttons. Shower curtain rings dangled from the alien strands, providing grips for human hands. Kemi had labeled many of the alien controls, attaching pieces of paper with their functions. A hundred notes hung before Marco: increase thrust, decrease thrust, roll left, roll right, yaw left, yaw right, raise nose, lower nose, open claws, close claws, fire plasma. Dozens of others.
So far, Marco only needed to reach for a handful of shower curtain rings, tugging a handful of strands. He hoped it didn't come to battle. He doubted he could defeat a single enemy ship, let alone the twenty that followed. He had used the ship's cannon once before, firing a stream of plasma into space. They all had; Ben-Ari had insisted they train for battle.
Though if those ravagers catch us, it's a battle we can't win.
He glanced again into the sphere that showed space behind them, the alien equivalent of a rear viewport. The twenty specks—the enemy ravagers—were still there. Even closer. Closer every day.
"They'll be on us in two more days at this rate," Lailani said.
"I know," Marco said.
"The Ghost Fleet is still months away."
"Lailani, I know!"
"We'll starve to death before—"
"Lailani!" Marco spun toward her, still holding two plastic rings. "Yes. I know. I forgot the food. You've been reminding me for four days now. I'm sorry, okay? I doomed us all to death. I know. But maybe we'll be lucky and those ravagers will burn us before we starve. Fine? Happy?"
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