by Lisa Lace
Heather laughed. “Probably. Let’s see. You and mom had been married for five years and you really wanted a kid, but it wasn’t happening for some reason. You talked about adoption, but you wanted to try again to do it naturally. You drove out here one night and looked up at the sky, remembering how you’d made a wish seven years before and wound up meeting the love of your life. You thought maybe it would work again.”
“That’s right,” Christopher said. “Although I thought maybe every person only had one wish to cash in on.”
“Right. But you decided to try anyway. You looked up, waiting and watching, but you didn’t see anything.”
“I sat here for hours, looking up until my neck hurt.”
“And then, just when you were about to give up and go home, you saw it. A star streaked across the sky and you wished for a kid. Two months later, you found out Mom was pregnant.”
Christopher beamed at her. “Yep. And now I have you.”
“Definitely a wish come true,” Heather teased with a bright smile. “Have you wished for anything else since then?”
He shook his head. “Nope. I haven’t had a reason to, yet. It’s not something you want to waste, you know. A wish is important.”
A wish is important. Heather tipped her head back again, wondering what would be important enough to her to wish for it. Maybe cheerleading tryouts next month? Or wanting to get the lead in the school play.
But neither of those things seemed important enough for wishing, and she wondered if it was just one of those things that you’d only understand when you were older and had more things to deal with.
“Come take a look,” her dad said, waving her over.
Heather wrapped the blanket tighter around her shoulders and hopped down from the truck. The night sky was so clear and beautiful through the telescope and she looked her fill before stepping back to make room for her father to look.
“It’s so big,” she said, voice soft.
Christopher nodded. “Yeah, it is. There’s a lot out there. We don’t even know how much. It’s enough to make a person feel really small.”
Chewing on her lip, Heather thought about that. She felt small plenty of times. Like in school where she was just one of hundreds of other kids, moving through the school, sometimes unnoticed. It made her stomach swoop unpleasantly to think about how much bigger space was compared to something like that. Her school times a hundred. A thousand? Probably more.
“That’s scary,” she said, wrinkling her nose.
Her father looked at her and placed a hand on her shoulder. “Only if you’re afraid of the unknown,” he said.
“Isn’t everyone?”
“I don’t think so. Some people probably find it exciting, the idea that anything could be out there.”
“I guess. What if it’s scary stuff out there, though?”
“They probably don’t want anything to do with us, honey. Humans are probably boring by comparison.”
Eight years later, Heather sat at her father’s bedside, her phone in her hands as she scrolled through the article she was reading to him. Christopher, once tall and proud, seemed smaller now, propped up in the bed with a pile of pillows behind his head.
“That’s amazing,” he said, and the excitement still shone through, even though his voice was weak. “I told you, didn’t I? There’s all kinds of stuff out there.”
Heather smiled. “Yeah, you did. And you were right. Seems like they’re finding new stuff every day.”
Christopher nodded and then coughed, a thick, rattling sound that made Heather’s eyes itch with unshed tears.
How had things changed so much?
They’d gone from the days when they’d go out and watch the stars together to her father not even being able to leave the bed most days.
Cancer, was the thing that had ruined everything, and Heather had to work hard not to swear and throw things most days. Her father was like one of her best friends, and the idea that he was being taken from her (because the prognosis didn’t look good) was hard to swallow.
In spite of everything, Christopher was still the same as he usually was, just diminished in what he could do. But he was still jovial, still quick with a joke or a funny story. Heather came home every weekend to sit with him and read him the latest news on space and what scientists were finding out there. She helped him over to the window from the bed where they’d set up the telescope, but it wasn’t the same. There was too much light pollution to see much.
“We’ll get back out there,” her father said every time. “We’ll see things like they’re meant to be seen.”
Heather always nodded and agreed with him and then kissed him goodbye and went to sit with her mother.
Tiffany Sutter had never been as close to her daughter as her husband was, but the two of them had grown closer in the two years since Christopher had been diagnosed with life threatening cancer.
Heather watched as her mother became more withdrawn, sadder than before, and her heart ached for her.
One night, after a long day of hospital visits and crying, Heather drove out to the clearing. It was the first time she’d been there alone, and the first time she’d been there in a long time. She’d gone to college out of state, gotten busy, and just hadn’t had the time to watch the stars with her father like she’d used to.
Now she was sad because of all the opportunities that had been wasted.
Her dad didn’t have long left.
Every day he got weaker, sicker. The doctors had told her mother that Christopher only had until the end of the month to live, maybe a bit longer if a miracle happened.
That wasn’t good enough for Heather. Her dad couldn’t die. He was supposed to be there to walk her down the aisle when she got married and hold her first child and smile with delight when they called him grandpa. He was supposed to be there when Heather passed down the story of wishing on stars to another generation. He was supposed to be there.
She remembered being thirteen years old and sitting in the back of her dad’s truck, drinking cocoa and listening to the way he talked about other life being out there in the universe.
Now more than ever she felt tiny and insignificant in the face of all that sky. But she knew she had to try.
She remembered her father’s story about standing in this very spot, wishing on magic dust for a child. She remembered his faith that it was the wishing that had done the trick.
It was fall now, so it wasn’t as cold, and Heather stood there under the inky blackness, head tipped back, eyes determinedly watching. All she needed was one star. One bright flare of light to streak across the sky and give her a chance.
“Please,” she whispered. “Please. Come on.”
Before she knew it, she was crying, tears falling down her face in a hot rush, and she wrapped her arms around herself, sniffling coming as close as she ever had before to praying.
Her eyes were tired and sore some time later, but she was determined to stand there until the sun rose if she had to.
She didn’t have to. A star, bright and blazing, arched across the sky, so fast she almost missed it.
“Please,” Heather said again. “Please let him get better. Let them find something, anything. Just please don’t let him die.” She said it over and over again, wishing so hard she could feel it in every fiber of her being. Long after the star had faded from the sky, she was still wishing.
It didn’t help.
A little of her wonder in the universe died with her father.
Chapter 1: It Begins
There was a saying among the inhabitants of this quadrant that transcended race and clan and species and even language. It was one of the only things that could boast something like that, and the reason for it was fear. The saying was: there’s no way to prepare for the Nine.
Someone uninitiated might ask “the nine what?” with a confused look on their face, head tilted to one side.
Sabin envied anyone who was uninitiated when it came to som
ething like this.
The Nine (always with a capital ‘N’, always) were the stuff of legend. They were both ghost story and genuine fear. Parents told their children stories of the Nine before they went out into the world, not to scare them or manipulate them like some other stories were used (for instance: if you don’t eat your water root, the bog worms will come for you). No, these stories were meant to prepare and warn.
No one wanted the Nine to come for their child. Because they wouldn’t stop at just the child. It would be a whole village, town, or city. Entire areas wiped out in the span of a few days just because of the Nine’s might.
No one who had ever seen them had lived to tell the story. No one could say for sure what they looked like or how they moved or where they came from. There were hundreds of different stories from all over the quadrant, trying to explain the phenomenon of these deadly creatures.
Some said they were born from a black hole, a dead star that coughed up these horrible things in its last moments. Others maintained that they were immortal creatures, sent to punish wrongdoers. The most popular theory was that they were the last remnants of an ancient race, clinging to life and feeding off those that they killed.
Whatever they were, they were horrible and deadly and once they set their sights on a particular place, that place was as good as done for.
Sabin knew that. They all knew that. But still they fought on because they didn’t have any other options.
“How many dead today?” Lilera asked as she walked into the room.
She was their late leader’s daughter, practically the leader herself now, and where she had once been a bright, vibrant young female, now she looked older and more drawn. Her hair was longer than Sabin had ever seen it, hitting the backs of her knees even while pulled up into a ponytail. Her red eyes were shadowed and had been since her father had died.
Well.
Since she’d been forced to kill her father.
Sabin looked up from his tablet and sighed, running a hand through his snowy white hair. “Seven,” he replied. “So far, at least.”
“Down from yesterday.”
“Yes.”
There were no flickers of hope in their voices anymore. After six lunar cycles of watching their people drop and having no way to stop it, there wasn’t much to hope for.
At first, when the number was down, they’d assumed it meant that the worst was over. After all, the number dropping from a hundred to six in the course of a week looked like progress. But the longer things went on, the more apparent it became that they were being toyed with. Some days no one would die, other days hundreds would. Their numbers were dwindling, and Sabin wasn’t sure what to do.
Technically, he wasn’t in charge. Lilera’s late father had lead their clan for as long as Sabin had been alive, but when he’d fallen prey to the madness and tried to take his daughter’s head off with an axe, she’d been forced to shoot him.
His second in command, Bristel, was now the leader, but no one had much faith in him. Bristel’s father had been a great general in their ranks, and Bristel had the makings of one himself, but he was too hot headed. Every time they met to discuss the current situation he called for more and more violence, which was just met with opposition.
There was no way to fight the Nine. No one knew where they hid. They manipulated the people, just the way Sabin’s mother had always warned him they would.
Disease and madness swept through their ranks, sparing some for the moment and taking others instantly.
For all intents and purposes, the people looked to Lilera for guidance, and since Sabin was always by her side, they’d started looking to him, as well. They both understood that they couldn’t come at this head on, but unfortunately there weren’t many other options.
“Has anyone been to explore the ruin?” Lilera asked.
She spoke of the great stone ruin in the center of town. Their little chunk of the planet was built around it, and it was almost sacred in the eyes of the Samis Das. Legend had it that while it was currently a moldering pile of stone and glass, it had once been a great structure and it was there that the first Samis Das warriors had trained and served.
Others of their kind from far reaches of the planet made the journey to come see the ruin and stand in a part of their history.
Sabin shook his head. “No one wants to think about the possibility of them hiding in there.”
Lilera scowled. “And why not? Because it’s old? Because it’s dark and scary?” She fumed, arms crossed across her chest. “We are facing the end of our lives here! Does no one understand that?”
“We understand it, Lilera,” Sabin said gently, taking one of her hands and pulling her arm away from her chest. “We fear it, and you can’t blame us. This isn’t something we know how to handle. The Samis Das are not used to losing.”
“We aren’t losing!” she hissed, yanking her hand back.
Sabin held up both of his in a gesture of peace. “Lilera,” he said softly. “We might have to accept the fact that…” He trailed off, not wanting to say it out loud. That felt too much like admitting defeat, and that wasn’t something that any Samis Das had ever been able to do. But this was different. This was a whole other battle that didn’t seem to have an end. How could they fight something they didn’t understand?
“Sabin, please,” Lilera said, eyes large as she looked up at him. “Please don’t say that. If you give up then… Then I don’t know what I’ll do.”
He sighed. Usually he was more discreet with his feelings for her. They both had responsibilities and things they had to do, and this was hardly the time to start getting involved more heavily than they already were, since it wasn’t promised that they would even wake up tomorrow. But he couldn’t just stand there and see that dejected look on her face.
She was one of the strongest people he knew, warrior or not, and he didn’t want to see her like this. Carefully, giving her plenty of time to pull away if she wanted to, he put his arms around her.
Lilera was tall, but Sabin was well over six feet in height, so he had several inches on her. When his arms went around her, she stiffened for just a second and then seemed to melt into him, resting her head against his chest and putting her arms around his waist.
Sometimes, you just had to take comfort in the fact that you weren’t alone, and more than anything, Sabin wanted to provide that comfort for her.
He stroked his fingers through her hair and then pressed a kiss to the top of her head. “It’s…” He wanted to say that it was going to be okay, but he knew better than that. There was very little he could do to actually make sure that was the case, and he didn’t believe in false promises. “I’ll do my best to keep you safe,” he settled on. That he could promise.
“I’m not worried about myself,” Lilera murmured. “I’m worried about all of us.”
Morale was low among the Samis Das these days to be sure, and some people had already started talking about killing themselves before the Nine had a chance to do it for them. Or before one of their loved ones did.
It was usually such a shameful way to go, but in times like this, exceptions apparently had to be made.
“We’re strong,” Sabin said. “We won’t give up.”
The more rational side of him was screaming that they needed to flee. They needed to find somewhere to go where the Nine wouldn’t find them, somewhere that would be safe, if there was even anywhere in the universe that qualified. Presumably, anywhere they could go, the Nine could go as well.
“What do they even want here?” Lilera asked.
“No one knows. It’s not like any of us have gotten close enough to ask,” he pointed out, a little bitterly. “I think they just want to cause destruction. I think they feed off of it.”
“What horrible creatures.”
“Captain!” the shout came from outside, and Sabin and Lilera let each other go. “Captain, we need you!”
Sabin sighed, dragging fingers through his hair. He’d
made captain of the guard, which should have been an honor, but now it just seemed to consist of cleaning up messes and counting the dead.
“Go,” Lilera said. “I’ll be fine.”
“I never doubted it,” Sabin replied, leaning down to kiss her cheek before he fastened his sword and his blaster at his hips and strode outside. One of his men was there, eyes wide with fear, skin coated in sweat. “What’s happened?” he asked.
“It’s Osu,” the man said. “He’s gone... mad.”
There was a pang at that. Osu was someone he’d known since he was just a little boy with dreams of standing in the uniform of the guard, and now he was probably going to have to kill him. “Creators, help us,” he murmured. “What do you mean, mad?”
“He’s waving his blaster around and screaming. Just...screaming, sir. No one knows what to do.”
Sabin rubbed at his face and nodded. He squared his shoulders and set off towards the stone gate. “I’ll handle it.”
Every forty or so days, the moon made its way around the planet Samis. That constituted one lunar cycle. Six cycles ago, all of this had started.
It was impossible to understand an attack from the Nine until you were under attack by them. People on the outside just saw a destroyed village or town and assumed that there had been some bloody battle, but that was never how it happened. They moved quietly, slipping in amongst the people before they even noticed there was anything wrong.
One or two people would get sick, but no one would think anything of it. Disease was a fact of life, and it happened. They’d be treated, and maybe when it became apparent that there was no cure for the illness, people would get suspicious.
That was how it had happened for the Samis Das, at least.
It had started with the elderly and the already ill. They’d gotten worse fast, and died quicker than normal, but no one had assumed the worst.
Porkoi, a once center of trade for their planet, was now a wasteland, unfit to be reinhabited. People who went out there to investigate said there seemed to be some sort of dark presence hovering over the place, and no one wanted to settle there after what had happened.