Chapter 19 #2
“Torven, your marks changed,” Zara said, her eyes wide. “When the Kythran touched them, the patterns shifted into something that looks like—” She stopped, staring at my neck. “Oh my god.”
“What? What do they look like?”
She pulled out her portable light and shone it on my neck, her hands shaking slightly. “They look like code. Like programming code.”
“That’s not possible.”
“Look for yourself.” She found a reflective surface—a piece of polished metal from one of the dismantled devices—and held it up so I could see.
The mating marks, which had been one clear pattern before, had reorganized into geometric shapes, lines and symbols that did indeed look like some kind of written language or computer code.
As I watched, they shifted again, cycling through different patterns before settling back into their original design.
The Kythran was speaking rapidly, excitedly, his voice rising with each word. Zara listened intently, her expression moving from confusion to shock to something that looked like hope.
“What is he saying?” I demanded.
By now, the commotion had attracted the attention of the D’tran, who had been trying to put the chamber to rights while we waited for the crawler to return to bring us back to the fortress. Vikkat knelt before me, peering at the marks and then at Zara. “What happened?”
“The Kythran touched Torven’s mating marks and the pattern changed,” she told him, then turned to the Kythran who had called his brethren to his side.
“He recognized the patterns.” She grabbed my hand, squeezing hard. “They’re the same patterns used in the weather control systems. The same coding language.”
I stared at her. “That’s not possible.”
“It’s not just possible. It’s intentional.” She was talking faster now, the way she did when her brain was making connections. “The Kythrans say the ancient engineers who built the weather towers might have hidden some code in the genetics of the people that came before Destrans and D’trans.”
Vikkat shook his head at the Kythrans. “Oppressors put these marks in us. To control us. Your people were the oppressors.”
“No.” Zara placed her hand on Vikkat’s forearm.
“Don’t you see? The Kythrans didn’t force these marks on those people.
This indicates that the tech was designed for multispecies cooperation.
There was a time when Kythrans and the people who both you and Destrans share as an ancestor, were working together.
The Kythrans and this earlier people needed each other.
They hid the code. It needed a Kythran to activate it.
It’s likely there was an oppressor bent on destruction, but it wasn’t either of you.
” She raked her fingers through her knotted hair.
“This changes everything we thought we knew about the origins of both of your species. Oh, I’m definitely going for that Ph.D.
, just so I can write a paper about this. ”
“That’s great, Rivers,” I said. “But how do we use any of this?”
The Kythran was still talking, gesturing at my marks and then at his own body, at the chamber around us. Zara translated in fragments, her voice breathless.
“The Kythrans are just as surprised as you both are. They say their records were incomplete. There were strange holes in the data they had, and this explains why. With this new information, it’s possible that the access codes to interface with the weather system architecture can be used to override the towers once and for all.
To shut them down.” She touched my neck gently.
“Oh, Torven. This is what’s left of your ancient heritage from this planet.
No idea why it takes a mate to trigger it, though. ”
“You’re saying the Destran mating bond is literally a key to the weather system.”
“I’m saying it’s part of a larger key. One that probably requires activating more of the marks to get the full code.” She turned to Vikkat. “That means we need access to all the unique marks on your people.”
Dorek shook his head. “They may not touch me or alter my marks. Sacred. They define each of us, and are written in ancient language.”
It was interesting to see Zara use what was left of her patience on this hardheaded D’tran. Clearly it was a strain for her.
“They won’t be altered permanently,” she said in the same tone one would use on an errant youngling. “And the meaning given to them in the ancient language is likely arbitrary. You probably don’t want to hear that.”
Vikkat sighed deeply. “No. No one does. This will take time to…process.”
“That’s understandable,” Zara said. “The Kythrans say there’s one weather tower that is a nexus for the others.
It’s a central one that is connected to the others more directly.
That would be the location we need to go to, to input the code.
The Kythrans alone can’t make meaningful changes.
But if the D’tran markings contain control codes, then together we might be able to shut it down. ”
“Shut it down.” I felt hope stirring in my chest for the first time since the violence had erupted. “Or at least stabilize it. And we can get our people and go home.”
Zara smiled. “I’d love to go home.”
I reached up and touched the mating marks on my neck, feeling them warm under my fingers.
All this time, we’d thought they were just biological phenomena.
Just the universe’s way of saying two beings belonged together.
But they were more than that. They were a solution to a problem that had existed for millennia.
“The ancient engineers were smarter than anyone gave them credit for,” I said slowly. “They built a system that would force species to work together or face extinction.”
“It’s brilliant and terrible at the same time.” Zara sat down beside me again. “Brilliant because it prevents any one group from having too much power. Terrible because it means generations suffered while species refused to cooperate.”
“Or didn’t know they had to.” Vikkat rubbed a weary hand over his face.
“True.” She gestured at the chamber around us, at the smashed equipment and injured Kythrans. “You almost killed everyone an hour ago.”
“But we didn’t.” Vikkat straightened and looked at his warriors, who were listening and saying nothing. They looked stunned, even Dorek, who was initially resistant. “And now we have much to think on.”
I squeezed Zara’s hand. “It’s the start of cooperation. Messy, imperfect, but real.”
The Kythran elder spoke again, and Zara translated. “They say they know the way and can guide us through passages that avoid the worst of the surface storms.” She looked at me, and I saw the question in her eyes before she asked it. “Can you travel? With your injury?”
I tested my back carefully, feeling the pull of healing tissue and the ache of bruised muscles. It hurt. It was going to hurt more when I started moving. But the medicine was working, and I was stronger than I’d been even an hour ago.
“I can travel,” I said.
“You don’t have to—”
“Yes, I do.” I cut her off gently. “You said it yourself. We need all of us. The Kythrans, the D’tran, you, and me. If we’re missing any piece, the whole thing falls apart.”
She was quiet for a moment, then nodded. “We’re really going to try this. Attempt to shut down a planetary weather control system that’s been running autonomously for millennia.”
“With improvised plans, hostile allies, and no backup equipment,” I added.
“When you put it that way, it sounds insane.”
“It is insane.” I smiled at her. “But we’re going to do it anyway. Because the alternative is giving up, and neither of us are any good at that.”
“No,” she agreed. “We really aren’t.”
I pulled her closer, careful of my injury, and kissed her forehead. Through the bond, I could feel her fear mixing with determination, her doubt tangled up with hope. We were both terrified. We were both uncertain. But we were facing it together, and that made all the difference.
“Rivers,” I said quietly.
“Yeah?”
“Thank you. For not giving up on us. On this.”
“Thank you for taking an energy blast for me. Even though it was completely reckless and terrifying and I’m still processing the trauma of watching it happen.”
“Any time.”
“Please don’t say that. I’d really prefer if there wasn’t a next time.”
I laughed, then immediately regretted it as pain shot through my back. “Noted. No more heroic sacrifices.”
“Good.” She settled against my uninjured side, her head on my shoulder. “Because I need you alive and functional for what comes next.”
“What comes next?”
“Saving the world. Obviously.”
“Obviously.” I closed my eyes, feeling the warmth of her against me, the steady rhythm of her breathing. “No pressure.”
“None at all.”
We sat like that for a while, drawing strength from each other while the Kythrans and D’tran moved around us, beginning to coordinate, to plan, to work together despite generations of hatred and fear. It wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t easy. But it was happening.
And maybe that was enough. Maybe hope didn’t need to be certain or guaranteed. Maybe it just needed to be possible.
Through the bond, I felt Zara’s thoughts aligning with mine. Not perfectly synchronized, but close enough that I knew we were thinking the same thing.
We could do this. Not alone, but together. All of us. Different species with different abilities and different pieces of the solution. Working toward the same goal.
Saving a dying world. Proving that cooperation was essential to survival. Showing that the marks on our skin were more than just biological phenomena—they were a message from ancient engineers who’d understood something fundamental about survival.
That love and partnership weren’t weaknesses to be overcome. They were the very things that made impossible tasks possible.
The universe had a strange sense of humor. And an even stranger way of solving problems.
But I wasn’t complaining. Not when the solution involved Zara. Not when it meant we had a chance, however slim, to fix what had been broken for so long.
“Ready to save the world?” I asked her quietly.
“With you? Absolutely,” she replied. “I give us a fifty-five percent chance of success.”
And despite the pain, despite the odds, despite everything that had gone wrong and could still go wrong, I believed her.