Chapter 16 Julie
The room plunged into darkness again, and I exhaled sharply. I’d learned quickly that the moment I stopped moving, the damn lights cut out. The automatic sensors in this maintenance closet were far too sensitive, snuffing out the illumination the moment I stood still.
Normally, I wasn’t afraid of the dark. Back on Nova Vita, I’d lived in a sector that had to deal with rolling blackouts during the summer to save power.
But this? This was different. This was a cramped maintenance closet on a strange space station, and whatever was scratching at the walls didn’t sound friendly.
Back in the stronghold on Vokira, scratching sounds on the walls always meant there were cookis near.
But this wasn’t Vokira or the stronghold.
The sounds here weren’t random. They were slow.
Deliberate. Like something dragging itself along the other side of the metal, back and forth, back and forth.
My skin prickled. I pressed myself against the shelf behind me, as if I could melt into the shadows.
I was too terrified to meet whatever crawled in the darkened recesses of this station. And so, every time the light turned off, I’d wave my arms around like an idiot, flailing until the sensors picked up my movement and flooded the room with harsh, artificial light again.
The buzz of my device startled me, and I yelped before I could stop myself.
My heart hammered in my chest as I fumbled to pull it out of my pocket.
It was Sergio with a message, his words flashing across the screen in urgent, blocky text: TURN OFF YOUR DEVICE.
THEY MIGHT BE USING THE SIGNAL TO TRACK US.
I frowned, my thumb hovering over the screen.
What if Grtirr tried to contact me? What if something went wrong and I missed it?
The thought of being cut off, even for a little while, made my stomach twist. And how were they tracking us with our phones anyway?
It didn’t really make sense to me. But before I could decide, another message popped up, this one from Grtirr himself: Julie. Turn this device off. Now.
So off the device went. I suddenly felt very much alone. I didn’t think I’d purposefully turned off my device in all the time I’d been alive.
The lights were off again when I heard the door open.
I ducked instinctively, hiding behind one of the overstuffed shelves as the lights flickered back on.
I stared at the door, holding my breath.
But there was no one there. The doorway was empty, the park beyond it green and lush and nothing like the rest of the station.
I frowned, confused, even as the door closed on its own.
What in the—
Grtirr suddenly appeared in front of me.
The space, which had felt cramped before, now felt ridiculously small. He filled it with his presence, his broad shoulders nearly brushing the shelves on either side of him. His golden eyes locked onto mine, and for a second, I forgot how to breathe.
“How did—” I started, but the words died in my throat.
He lifted up a thin, shimmering piece of fabric. “Cloaking technology.”
The fabric looked almost weightless, like liquid silver woven into threads. It shimmered faintly, catching the light in a way that made it seem like it wasn’t entirely there.
Oh! Penelope had told me about that. She and Vostak had used something similar to sneak into an Exotech facility, back when they were trying to expose the corporation’s illegal experiments.
“We cannot head back yet. They are still looking for us. There are still hostiles outside in the park. And the cloaking can only do so much.
“What are we going to do?"
“We go somewhere they will not look for us.” Grtirr reached into his pocket and produced a keycard. The edges were worn, like it had been used often.
I stared at the card. “Where did you get that?”
“It doesn’t matter. It has access to the workers’ tunnels. We will use it to travel.”
I crossed my arms. “You stole someone’s keycard?”
“We need it.” He didn’t even flinch. Then, before I could protest further, he pulled me close, his arms wrapping around me as he draped the shimmering “cloak” over us both. The fabric settled around my shoulders, cool and weightless.
I frowned. “Why can’t we just hide with the cloak?”
“Because it only hides us visually.” His breath was warm against my ear, and I let out a little shudder from our closeness. “They can still see us with infrared and heat sensors. The tunnels are our best chance.”
He pressed his ear to the door for a moment, listening intently before he opened the door and we stepped outside.
I was still shocked at how realistic the park was, how much it felt like I was outside on a planet.
I could swear there was a breeze carrying the scent of green and flowers to my nose.
My Kadrixan warrior moved quickly and deliberately, his arms still around me, as he led me toward a maze of hedges.
Once we stepped out from behind the bush, I saw dozens of station visitors enjoying the calm of the park, staying mostly on the path that went around the pond and to the pretty gazebo.
None of them noticed us, despite Grtirr’s red skin, horns, and wings.
At least we knew the cloak was working. We continued toward the hedge maze, which had a CLOSED FOR MAINTENANCE sign put up in front of the entrance.
“The door to the tunnels is at the back of the maze. There’s a shortcut behind a gate,” Grtirr whispered into my ear.
There, trimming the hedges, was a young man wearing a bandana. He did not have his key card hanging from his hip, and I had a sinking feeling I knew exactly who Grtirr had taken it from. I hoped he wouldn’t get in the trouble for losing it.
“They have to still be here. That fucking demon can’t fool us. Spread out!”
I stiffened at the voice, but didn’t dare look toward it.
Grtirr’s grip tightened on my arm, and his hormones did their best to calm me. “Just keep walking.”
Squeezing past the sign at the entrance, we entered the maze undetected.
He turned right immediately, his strides long and purposeful as he led us down the winding path.
The maze was a labyrinth of greenery, the hedges tall enough to hide us completely from view, even if we didn’t have the cloak.
My heart pounded in my chest as we hurried along the path.
At the end of it was a locked gate. He tapped the stolen keycard against the panel, and with a soft click, the gate swung open.
We slipped through the gate, and it creaked shut behind us.
The unmistakable sound of a drone filled the station sky. Back on Nova Vita, they used drones to watch and control the masses. If these were anything like the ones back at the colony I used to call home, then they had heat sensors too. No wonder we couldn’t just use the cloak.
I wondered if these had tranquilizer darts meant to subdue their target. The thought had me walking a little faster, not wanting to chance it. We had to get to safety inside the workers’ tunnels before they detected us.
The path here was narrower, the hedges pressing in on either side, but it led straight to the back of the maze. There, with its metal standing out against the green, was a door that reminded me of the one leading to the storage closet, except this one was much larger.
“Hey! You can’t fly that in here. Station-sanctioned drones only,” yelled an authoritative voice from somewhere outside of the maze.
What wonderful luck!
We didn’t stay to see how it panned out. Another tap of the keycard against the sensor, and the door hissed open, revealing a dimly lit corridor beyond. The air that rushed out was cool, damp, and more than a little stale.
The tunnels were nothing like the beautiful front-facing part of the station.
Old, with peeling paint, and a little grimy, it was comparatively depressing.
And I take that back about the air being cool—it wasn’t.
It was downright freezing. So that was how they saved on fuel; they only heated the parts of the station they had to.
I shivered, and Grtirr pulled me tighter to his body.
“We should move from here before they come in to check.”
Grtirr started moving in the pitch black, and I stumbled to stay with him.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“I… I can’t see. I don’t think the sensors are picking us up with the cloak.”
“I forgot humans have inferior night vision. I will be your eyes. Hold onto me.” His hand found mine in the dark, his fingers warm and callused as they wrapped around my wrist and guided me to his arm.
I did just that, latching onto his arm with both hands and a grip tight enough to leave marks. If it did, he didn’t complain.
Then we were moving into the tunnel. And there was nothing for me to rely on but my alien warrior.