by F. T. Lukens
Rowan looked at them, mouth pulled in a frown. “Seriously? You’re back to fighting? I’d hoped time alone together would have led to making up.”
“That’s not your business.”
“It is my business when you two act like children and keep making me intervene. Also, when your relationship with a powerful being threatens my actual money-making business, then it is my business.”
“Can we stop saying business?”
“I swear to the stars you two will be the end of me. One of you start making sense. Now.”
“The Phoenix Corps is evil,” Ren said. He stared at the deck plate. “They killed a friend of mine. They’re looking for a way to rid the cluster of people like me. And they’re doing it by killing innocents.”
“Says your parents. Who lied to you your whole life,” Asher said, sharply.
“Says my parents and Vos.”
Asher dropped his arms. Ollie’s mouth fell open. Rowan’s eyebrows shot up.
“When the hell did you talk to Vos?” Asher demanded. He crowded into Ren’s space. His expression was flat. “Is that why you needed the beacon? To contact him? Is that why Beatrice died?”
Ren lashed out, shoving Asher away from him. Asher took a step back, and Ren followed, pushing again, with his palms flat on Asher’s shoulder. He shoved and shoved and shoved.
“Ren!”
Ollie grabbed him and pinned his arms down at his sides. Ren twisted in Ollie’s grip. His star throbbed in anger; his vision washed blue.
“How dare you?” Ren spat. “How dare you say her name when it was your beloved Corps that killed her. They killed her. Not Vos. Not me.”
“If you hadn’t turned off that stupid message, they wouldn’t have known we were there.”
“Don’t take your utter denial about your place in all of this out on me.”
“My place? What? Do you think I’m like Zag? That I went to planets and murdered people?”
“You were a Phoenix Corps soldier. How do I know what you did while under orders?”
“Do you of all people want to talk about murderers? That’s slippery ground for your kind.”
“That’s enough!” Rowan barked. Her hand splayed across Asher’s chest, keeping him in place. She looked at them with lips thinned and eyes narrowed. “Ren, stand down. Asher, go to your quarters.”
“What?” Asher’s jaw clenched. His cheeks reddened. “Why? Are you siding with him?”
“Are you questioning an order from your captain? Because let me remind you how utterly pissed I am at you and how I can have Ollie throw you back out onto that drift into the waiting arms of the Corps.”
Asher’s gaze flickered to Ollie. Ren couldn’t see Ollie’s expression, but Asher paled. Still shaking with anger, and with one last glare in Ren’s direction, Asher stalked off into the belly of the ship. His stomps echoed, and Rowan sighed. She rubbed her temple.
“Little brothers.”
Ren blinked. The phrase wiped away his anger and reminded him of his purpose. He sagged in Ollie’s arms and scrubbed a hand over his eyes. “I’m sorry.”
Rowan waved off the apology. “Just tell me the facts, and we won’t have a problem.”
Ren nodded, and after a quick walk to the common area and after sinking into the lumpy couch cushions with a cup of tea, he did. He told Rowan and Ollie everything. He talked about Beatrice and the program of Vos and the possible outpost on Crei. He talked about the ghosts in the farmhouse which could’ve been birdmen—Rowan snorted at the nickname—and the blaring message at the castle. He told them about Sorcha and Jakob and Ezzy and about Zag and the shot meant for him.
When he finished his tea, Ollie handed him a trinket from the broke-box. Ren spun the old tool in his hands and fiddled with it as he continued, fixing it with barely a thought as the words poured from him.
He talked about failure and fear and seeing Nadie driven mad and how Asher had told him he hadn’t been much different.
He talked about Liam.
He talked about his parents, about their beliefs, their warnings, about how Asher had reprimanded his mother. He talked about the story of his kind, of the star hosts, how they’d been driven to the planets to hide. And then he stopped, throat parched, with the words drying up in his mouth.
Rowan crossed from the table and sat beside Ren on the couch. She rested her hand over his; her palm was cool and comforting on his knuckles.
“I’m sorry, Ren.” She closed her eyes, took a breath, and her hand closed over his a little tighter. “One of the hardest lessons I learned when I was younger was that sometimes the people you want to believe in and look up to aren’t who you think they are. Sometimes the people you love aren’t good people. And it’s awful. It’s hard to reconcile the image you had with the things you know. But hard as that is, the good news is that you don’t have to follow in their footsteps.”
“And you get to make your own family,” Ollie added. “And those kinds of family, the ones you choose, are the best kinds.” Ollie took the now-fixed tool from Ren’s fingers and slipped another item from the box into his free hand.
Ren swallowed. He turned his hand over and gripped Rowan’s.
“Thank you.”
She smiled. “I would say it’s no problem, but you’ve been a cog in the system since you stepped on board. And I’m still angry with you, but you do have a place here, if you want it.”
“I want to find my brother.”
“I know. And you really think he’s on Crei? With Vos?”
Ren shrugged. “I’m not sure, but I think Vos might know where he is. If he doesn’t, we might be able to find a clue.”
“I’ll have to think about it, Ren. I can’t endanger the crew. Again. And I have to think about Asher, too. He’s my brother and he’s considered AWOL. We may be able to get that reversed, but I don’t know what it will cost him.”
Ren looked away. “I know.”
“I don’t think you do. Look, stars know he can be a jerk, and arrogant, and a standoffish cog. But when he ran away from our mom at sixteen and joined the Phoenix Corps, they took him in. They became his family of choice. And he needed that. So if what you say is true, about what they’ve been secretly doing for years, and with him witnessing the events with Zag, he has things to work through. You may have found out that your parents weren’t shining examples of humanity, but Asher also found out that the organization he holds allegiance to is shady and corrupt. And you know he has to be replaying all the missions he’s been on, questioning if he’s contributed to the destruction of your kind.”
That was true. Asher was probably in his room, head in his hands, eyes scrunched shut, agonizing over every detail.
“Yeah.”
“I’m going to go talk to him. Hang out here with Ollie and—” she picked up a broken spanner— “fix things. Honestly, I don’t understand boys at all.” She stood and dropped the tool onto the couch. She straightened her shirt, tugged it down, and smoothed out the nonexistent wrinkles.
Ren mustered a smile. “It seems I don’t get them either.”
Rowan laughed. “Idiot. Don’t worry. It will all work out. You’re both under stress, and I know from experience that stress makes the pair of you stupid.”
Ren didn’t argue, but history had proven otherwise. They worked well under duress. They clicked when things around them fell apart. It was all the other times when they couldn’t get along. Ren rubbed the end of his sleeve over his face. He didn’t know how they could go from kissing in the midst of a life-or-death crisis to being safe on the ship and at each other’s throats.
Rowan left, and Ollie moved from his position on the arm of the couch to the cushion next to Ren.
“So you want to go to Crei?”
Ren nodded. He handed Ollie the repaired spanner and accepted the next broken item. He was thankful fo
r Ollie’s strong and steady presence. It calmed him, and the mindless work kept his star occupied while he tried to think.
“Yeah.”
“Are you sure? What if you find something you don’t want to? Like with your parents.”
Ren shrugged. “I want to find Liam.”
Ollie nodded. He handed Ren a part from an air recycler. “I understand. If Pen were missing, I wouldn’t stop looking, either.”
“I don’t know how I’ll get there if Rowan decides she won’t risk it.”
“Rowan has two weaknesses,” Ollie said, rooting through the broken box. “Asher being one.”
“And the other?”
Ollie smiled. “Credits.”
“Well, I can’t pay her.”
“You let me handle it.”
Ren looked up from his hands and met Ollie’s gaze. “You’ll help me?”
Ollie knocked shoulders with Ren, and Ren fell sideways onto the cushions. Ollie laughed, then shrugged.
“You’re family.”
“You barely know me.”
“I know you. I know you want to do the right thing and you want to protect the people closest to you, even if that means giving yourself up. And I know if Asher decides to expend energy and emotion on you, then you must be someone worthy of it.”
Ren blushed and ducked his head. “Even if that emotion is anger?”
“Anger isn’t the opposite of love. Indifference is. He wouldn’t be upset if he didn’t care for you.”
Ren didn’t quite buy into Ollie’s logic, but he appreciated the sentiment, and he was buoyed by the fact that Ollie wanted to help him. He’d have to repay Ollie’s kindness, if he ever could. He sat up from his sprawl.
“How do you know?”
“Because I’m old and wise.”
Ren scoffed. “You’re not old.”
“I’m old enough to have a younger sister who is married and to have experienced lots of things, some even weirder than you. So trust me, okay?”
“I do,” Ren said.
“Good.” Ollie looked into the box. “I’ll go add this to your pile of sellable junk. And I’ll restock the box up here for you.”
Ollie stood. He ruffled Ren’s hair, grinning down on Ren as an older brother would.
“Don’t worry, Ren. I’m sure we’ll get everything sorted.”
“Thanks, Ollie.”
Ollie waved him off and lifted the box. He left the common area, and Ren leaned back on the couch.
Lighter now that he had revealed everything to Rowan, Ren tipped his head back to stare at the ceiling. Sharing his burdens had eased the tightness in his chest and the tense line of his shoulders. However, he couldn’t shake Nadie’s prophecy. Somehow, Asher and Ren would cross each other, and Ren didn’t want to believe it would be intentional, but Rowan confirmed his fears. Asher had lost his chosen family, his purpose. That would be difficult to get over, even if the Corps proved to be as sinister as Ren believed.
* * *
Ren’s quarters were as he had left them. The blanket was halfway off his bed, trailing on the floor. A pile of clothes in a corner needed to be washed. His sparse belongings were on the shelf, and his pillow was a misshapen lump on the bunk.
He reached into his jacket and pulled out the crumpled picture he’d found in his family home. Amazed it had lasted through the time on the planet, Ren smoothed it out on the top of his dresser. The cheap comic book Ren had taken from the remnants of Liam’s room hadn’t fared well. The pages were bent and the ink had bled, but he set it next to the picture.
Ren toed off his boots and jumped on the bed, shoved his face into the pillow, and inhaled its familiar scent. It wasn’t until he was wrapped in the blanket and staring up at the picture Jakob had drawn that he realized how much he had missed his bed.
He missed Jakob, too. The sharp pang of loss made him gasp as he thought of his friend, but at least Jakob was with Sorcha and Ezzy. The three of them would be okay as long as they looked after each other. He clung to that hope.
Ren was half-asleep when his door opened. He sat up, startled, as Millicent walked into the room. Her long hair hung in limp strands to the small of her back. Her feet were bare as she picked her way into the room, toes sliding along the floor, always connected to the ship. Her eyes were large and faintly glowing, and she stared at Ren.
“A knock would have been polite,” Ren said.
She tilted her head, watching him. Her lips were pale and chapped, and Ren watched her with narrowed eyes. He gripped his pillow with fingers curled tight in the fabric.
“Millicent?”
“The ship missed you,” she said.
“I missed the ship.”
She swayed where she stood; the hem of her dark dress brushed her ankles. “You were disconnected. I couldn’t find you in the wires, but you’ve returned. Do you feel it? How the systems longed for you?”
Ren pressed one hand to the hull. “When I came back on board.”
She took a step closer to him and then another. She pressed her face to Ren’s neck and inhaled.
Ren tensed and sat still as stone, unsure how to respond. He was used to her being odd, but this was… this was above her usual level of weirdness.
“Millie?”
“You smell like dust. Like planet.”
Ren scooted back, uncomfortable, and she followed, her knees making indents on the mattress. “I showered on the drift,” he said.
“You don’t belong with the dust. You belong among the stars. In the ship. In the wires. Free in the circuits.” She hovered over him, straddling his legs, her hands on his chest.
“Um… this is weird and inappropriate.”
“There you are!” Penelope’s voice was loud, and Ren sagged in relief.
“Pen!”
She entered the room, and Lucas popped his head around the door frame. His red hair stuck up everywhere; his complexion was even paler than usual. Ren had never been more relieved to see the goggles on Lucas’s head and Penelope’s unimpressed expression.
Penelope gently took Millicent by the bicep and pulled her off. “Now, now, Millicent. That’s not polite.”
Ren mouthed a thank you to Penelope as she guided Millicent away.
“Are you okay, Ren?” Lucas asked.
He cleared his throat. “Yeah,” he said, his voice coming out far higher than he would’ve liked. “What’s going on?”
“She’s been a little out of sorts since you left,” Penelope said, smiling tightly. “It’s been a challenge.”
“Yeah. Thanks for leaving me with her for those first few days,” Lucas said, also wearing a forced smile. “It was a laugh a minute.”
Penelope shot him a harsh look with her dark eyes narrowed. “Are you going to bring it up constantly? Because we’ve apologized. Several times.”
“And you’ll continue to apologize, because it was quite a traumatic experience.” Lucas kept his frozen smile, but twin spots of red appeared on his cheeks.
Ren didn’t want to know.
Millicent blinked for the first time since she had entered Ren’s room. She looked around. “How did I get in here?”
Penelope’s expression softened. “Oh, dear.”
Millicent’s gaze found Ren and she smiled the little half-smile she usually wore. “You’re back.”
“Yeah.”
“Welcome home.” Her smile became sharper and knowing, and a chill worked down Ren’s spine.
“Ren must be tired. Let’s leave him be until dinner.” Penelope tugged on Millicent and pushed her out of the room. Penelope shared a wide-eyed, exasperated look with Ren before stepping from the room.
“Glad you’re back, Ren,” Lucas said, waving.
“Thanks. Me, too.”
Ren stood and crossed the room and closed the do
or behind the trio. He engaged the lock, though it wouldn’t stop Millicent if she wanted to come in again.
What had happened while he was gone? What had pushed Millicent to be stranger than ever?
He flopped onto his bed and stared up at the picture. Ren closed his eyes and relaxed into the bunk. There were so many things to figure out—Liam and Crei and Vos and Millicent. Asher. Ren didn’t have the energy, and let his mind and power drift until he fell asleep.
* * *
“Weeds, you are a hard person to get in touch with. It’s easier when you’re connected to your own power.”
The area was low-lit, and Ren squinted. The floors were metal as were the walls. The only light came from tech in the ceiling. Ren could see a shadow in front of him and walls to the sides, and when he looked behind him, he found another wall. He couldn’t discern a door.
“Where am I?”
“I don’t know.”
“Liam?” Ren stepped forward. The light overhead followed him; the darkness receded as he walked, as if fleeing from his footsteps.
A few more paces, and Liam appeared in front of him. He was fair-skinned and freckled; his red hair was slicked back as though he’d been swimming in the lake.
“Hey,” Liam said, a smile breaking over his face. “You look awful. Seriously. When was the last time you ate anything? Or had a haircut?”
“You look the same.”
“Well, I’m a projection. I’m letting you see what I want you to.”
“Are you saying you’re not well?”
“I honestly don’t know.”
Ren crossed the space between them. He brushed his fingers over Liam’s hand, and he felt solid, corporeal. This wasn’t a program like Vos, and Ren looked around and reached out with his star to find the trick. But there was nothing. No tech. Even the light in the room didn’t respond to him.
“Is this real?”
“It’s a dream.”
“You’re in my dream?”
Liam smiled. “Yeah. It’s kind of my thing.”
Ren’s eyes widened. “It’s your power. Your star. You can enter dreams?”
Hands in his pockets, Liam shrugged. “I’m still figuring it all out.”