Chapter 77
CHAPTER SEVENTY-SEVEN
AIRIK
When he returned to the command hall, Airik was just able to save Nora’s braid from one of the cleansing robots. He tied the necklace chain around the loose end to keep the strands together, then laid it on the navigation terminal.
A maintenance robot rushed past Airik’s ankle, squealing. Its body shuddered, and a faint yellow-green glow emanated from between the seams of its small, round body, the last of the kudra it must have been tasked with cleaning.
Programmed not to harm the larger craft it served, Airik watched, rage rising, as it zigzagged wildly, crashing into walls until it reached the edge of the ramp. It chirped once, then threw itself off the ship’s entrance, in sacrifice.
A tiny robot held more purpose and honor than the man who’d created it. Airik was barely able to suppress the creeping urge to activate the drozekar’s gravity engine and destroy Ed’un right then, with all of them still on it.
Without Nora’s heartbeat above him, he might have done so.
Ed’un’s mission had been decommissioning. Now he knew that was not its true purpose but an elaborate deception by Vorn to isolate Airik and gather tools for his own cause. It didn’t matter. No kudra could leave this planet.
Vorn had failed. Airik was fully armed with a drozekar, all its weapons, and the gravity engine. Ed’un’s lasting legacy would not be more death.
Iver stood in the doorway of the ship, his back to Airik, gripping the remains of the collar with one hand, clutching the wall with the other as he swayed on weak legs.
Moving closer, Airik spotted the small bundle he had seen earlier and the woman in the grass outside, still unconscious.
Beyond her, Xallix’s headless body lay on a dirt mound, crushing flowers.
Airik drew his sword, silent.
“I’ve taken a small souvenir,” Iver said, not turning, apparently noticing Airik. “I trust you’ll understand. As for the body, I say let it rot—” His mouth clamped shut as Airik jammed the sword’s point to the base of his neck. Airik grabbed his wrist to keep him from escaping.
To Airik’s immediate fury, Iver let out a long sigh, letting himself be pushed where Airik wanted.
“There will be no time for rotting.” Airik pressed Iver forward until Iver’s chest was against the ship’s entry frame.
“This planet will be destroyed, and you will still be on it. I know your kind—you work for whoever pays the most and you sell stolen lives. You let Nora go because her life is mine and of no value to you—”
“I am sorry,” Iver suddenly said. He let his head drop, resting his forehead against the wall.
“I am sorry,” he said again after a moment.
“Though she did stab me, I let her go, and then…well, whatever happened to her next was my fault. If you think I won’t remember how she screamed that she didn’t want me to touch her—understandably so, and she’s not the first to say it—then you are woefully wrong.
Add it to the list of sins I’ll account for in Purgatory.
But—” His hand dropped to the end of his hair, over the pink ribbon that bound the braid he wore it in.
He thumbed one of its frayed tips. “You asked me if I knew the word brother—do you know sister?”
Cold gripped Airik’s limbs.
I used to be a sister.
“I have a sister—just a child,” Iver said. “Vorn still has her and dozens of other vruukar—the first step in his master plan for a singular species. Whatever you’re assuming about me, I’m sure it’s all true. But you must give me the chance to find her. To free her.”
The temptation to drive the blade into Iver’s back flared. But then Airik’s eyes fell on the scars around Iver’s neck. Nora’s heart thumped above them, twice in quick succession.
Vruukari, like those born prime, were unpredictable in disposition.
So much so that creating a vruukar was illicit under Veynari rule.
The few who existed were created in off-world laboratories, their embryos sold in war markets, and intended to be raised as soldiers, combining the best qualities of both animals and sapient species.
Just as he’d let Airik subdue him at the tip of his sword without a fight, Iver must have allowed himself to be collared. But judging by the cuts on his collar, it must’ve come at a higher cost than he’d originally bargained for.
“I’ve scrambled the positioning mechanism of the drozekar,” Iver said.
“The Veynari can’t track you anymore. Your sword is also free from tracing technology—I checked it while you attended to your human.
As for the other’s sword, I couldn’t do the same.
It’s locked to a metric I’ve never seen before.
I could maybe break it or create a masking program, but you don’t have time for it. ”
Iver turned. Airik let him push his away, but kept it pointed at his throat.
“I know you have no reason to trust me, but every moment you’re wasting with me, you’re robbing her of the chance to survive.
Take her to a non-Veynari world—at this point, all anyone can do is clean her blood and hope.
A terrible strategy, but all you have. Maybe Mehrooj still has the technology.
I’ll dare say even humans might still have the capabilities to help her. ”
Airik stepped back, the tip of the sword dropping. His heart kicked in his chest as an impossibility took shape in his mind.
Other humans.
Nora’s world. Humans lagged far behind in every technology, but whatever they had, they had designed themselves—unlike the Veynari, who stole and corrupted.
Nora’s best chance of survival was with her own kind.
“How…how do I get to Mars?”
The vruukar’s eyes snapped to his. “You cannot possibly be serious—”
“How do I get to Mars?” Airik asked again, the impossible sharpening into something that could be real.
Iver cocked his head with a half smile. “Do you know what humans did to the two morazir who’d been sent to them for a first attempt at contact?
I thought that was one of your earliest lessons in diminishing compassion for others.
” Iver shivered at whatever thought he’d just had.
“They beheaded them, then worshipped their skulls—I believe they still do, as the Veynari couldn’t recover all of their bodies.
” He made a sound—something between a laugh and a scoff.
“Believe me, humans are considered lost for a very good reason—one of the few things I’ve ever agreed with the Veynari on.
If you go to them and they don’t kill you immediately, you’ll be their first true contact.
It’ll tear their civilization apart. They’re not yet ready to know they’re not alone—”
“I was not ready, either.” Airik stepped closer, narrowing his eyes. “But it happened, and I survived—better for it. Tell me how to get to Mars. Is there a path—one that is fast?”
Iver’s gaze crept to the woman outside. “Untouched. Untaken. Unconquered.” He let out a short laugh.
“The Veynari’s greatest mistake—that’s what they’ll be calling you soon.
” His eyes shifted to the collar in his hand.
“But—and this is an irresponsible assumption on my part—I imagine you can get there however she was supposed to. The portal is faulty—miscoded. That’s how she got here, isn’t it?
The solar storms have been wreaking havoc on all systems, but maybe, in this very specific case, they’ve charged the portal, allowing an opening where there once couldn’t have been. ”
A thrilling hope thumped in Airik’s chest, amplified by the sound of Nora’s heartbeat. He’d use the portal. Maybe the next jump would be to Mars.
“Leave the human,” Airik said, returning his sword to his hip. “I will return her to her people.”
“No!” Iver took a step down the ramp, then froze. “I mean…I’ll return her to wherever she wants to go, but unfortunately she’s got a tracer implant. Removing it without the proper tools will kill her.”
Airik stifled a gasp, glancing across the field at the small mound of cloth, beneath which lay a woman.
The Veynari sometimes tagged high-value livestock—those bred as part of genetic melding experiments to exhibit favorable traits—with tracers in case they were stolen and could be recovered.
But as Iver had said, tracers were permanent and could be retrieved only after the specimen was killed.
Nora’s heart beat again, urging him to move, but it could not shake his suspicion.
“Drozekar, confirm this man’s claims that the human is implanted with tracing technology.”
The drozekar threw out a beam of light, capturing the woman in its stream.
His stomach tightened waiting for the response.
“Confirming a Veynari-encrypted tracing module. One unit is embedded in the neural-bone complex at the base of the neck.”
Airik flinched, his hand flying to the back of his neck where the tracer implant would’ve been. Could a human, with their thinner bones and stunted healing, withstand the tracer’s removal?
“Fuck,” he groaned, to the surprise of Iver, who turned back with a questioning look. If Airik took her, he’d be leading the Veynari to Nora and the rest of humanity.
“Drozekar, initiate our own trace—I want to be able to check where this human is.” He gave Iver a hard stare. “I want to know if I am being deceived and if the vruukar has no intention of freeing her.” For now, this was the best he could do for her.
Iver rolled his eyes. “How gallant of you. I’m sure your little doll will simply swoon.”
Airik stepped back, giving him room to descend the ramp. “Get off my ship. If I ever hear your name again, I will hunt you through every galaxy and end your freedom myself.”