Chapter 32
THIRTY-TWO
ARTURE
I should have known it wouldn’t last.
We doze into the night, her breath warm against my chest, her heartbeat steady under my hand.
She fits against me perfectly, like this was always where she was meant to be.
Where I was meant to be. I can’t remember the last time I felt this calm.
I don’t want to fall asleep. I want to hold onto this memory as long as I can.
Everything I never thought I’d have is right here, cradled in my arms.
But something’s wrong.
A faint tug brushes against my thoughts, like the lightest touch of a scalpel testing for a weakness.
My instincts sharpen, sleep evaporating in an instant. It’s a Samarastock, shifted into a Base Parthiastock and scanning mind waves.
Drok na.
I carefully shift into a purple Parthiastock, easing away from Nic-coal as quietly as I can, and slam up a shield, blocking the intruder from digging further. I can’t help that he’s noticed us, but I can give us privacy to plan.
His smooth, sharp voice cuts through my defenses. ‘There you are,’ the Samarastock says, satisfaction dripping from his tone. The pulse of his next message broadcasts wide, dropping it into everyone’s minds.
‘We’ll bomb your location to glass, unless you send out the Samarastock.’
Nic-coal leaps awake, instantly reaching for me. “Arture? What’s that?”
Juran and Ezla rush into the room, and I cover my naked female with my body. She quickly throws on her wraps, and despite the situation, the other clones avert their eyes.
“They found us?” Juran asks the wall, shoulders bunching, already bracing himself for a fight. He slams a fist into the wall, making it creak. “We won’t give you up.”
Ezla glances to the way out, then to the walls around us. He doesn’t speak, but the truth is there in his tight expression. He knows. If the Prif is desperate enough to bomb it, this old apartment block won’t last long. It's not a bomb shelter.
I’m not surprised Samara would risk destroying this relic, but the fact she’d endanger Nic-coal sends a wave of nausea through me. I push back mentally. ‘We have a female.’
There’s a pause before the Parthiastock’s voice slides into my head again, now cold. ‘You’re disgusting. We have you surrounded, you won’t escape. You’ll run out of water, and your female will suffer. Come out now, end it all quickly, and save her.’
Nic-coal doesn’t say anything, but her hand finds mine, squeezing it. The trust in her expression tightens the hearts beating rapidly in my chest.
I can’t let this happen.
‘I want the Prif’s promise she’ll leave them alone and only take me,’ I send on a tight band as I pull on my pants.
‘How dare you make demands of her!’
‘She wants me, those are the terms,’ I fire back.
There’s a beat of silence, heavy and suffocating, as the Parthiastock relays my demand.
Finally, the reply comes. ‘You have it.’
I look at Nic-coal one last time, memorizing her face, the softness in her eyes. I touch her jaw with my right arm, the metal of her jaw implant resonating underneath her skin.
When I stand, Nic-coal blocks me. “Don't you dare.”
“I’m sorry.” Lifting her easily, I take her to a shocked Juran. She fights me, wriggling to get free, but I hold her tightly without hurting her.
“Juran, this is it. I need you to stay here with her for one human hour, then take her to safety.”
The Lautostock takes her in his arms awkwardly as she thrashes. Pain crosses his face as he confronts having to hold a female against her will, but he knows it's for the best. He nods once.
“Don’t you fucking dare.” Nic-coal reaches for me, stretching out as far as she can go. “Please, Arture. Don’t do this!”
But I’m already turning away, shutting the door behind me. A few more steps and I’m out of the pristine apartment, back out into the harsh desert of our planet’s past mistakes.
Small ships land one after the other, kicking up waves of grit and heat, blurring the space between me and them. My vision is shaky, but the Prif steps out from one of the ships. So tiny compared to her Samarastocks glimmering in the sunlight, their golden hues like polished weapons.
I raise my hands as a team of six clones approach, all vengeance and fury carved into their faces. I know what’s coming, and I don’t resist.
The first blow lands hard on my jaw. The next smashes into my ribs.
They don’t hold back, shifting into stronger forms—Gerverstocks with unrelenting stamina, Parthiastocks with brute force.
I don’t shift; I stay myself. I take every hit, clinging to one thought, one anchor—Nic-coal.
Her laugh. Her touch. The way she makes me feel like more than just Samara’s tool.
When they shackle me in betrillium cuffs, the weight drags my arms like chains of lead. I’m sagging between two of them, blood dripping from my split lips onto the sand. My nanites try to patch me up, but they’ll take time.
"He's contained," one of the Samarastocks says, gripping my arm tightly as if I might still find some hidden reserve of strength.
The sand clings to my skin, the sun beating down.
The Samarastocks hold me firm, their golden scales gleaming as they prepare to march me toward the ships.
The Prif looms in the distance, a figure of untouchable authority, her cold expression unshaken.
My legs wobble under me, but I refuse to fall, even though my body screams for relief.
The Prif steps closer, her voice cold and commanding. "Good. Now retrieve the others."
The Samarastocks hesitate. For the first time, they seem unsure, glancing at one another.
“You… promised…” My voice is a rasp, hardly audible.
Her sneer is a dagger through my chest. "A promise to a clone?" She laughs coldly, her voice like shattering ice. "All of you, obey me."
Four of them peel away, heading back toward the apartment. Two stay with me, holding me steady, though my knees threaten to buckle under the weight of the cuffs and the beating.
I try to pull myself free, try to take a step toward the apartment, toward Nic-coal. My weak thrashing against the hands holding me isn't enough.
She screams, and my head snaps toward the sound, hearts kicking against my ribs. It’s filled with a terror I never wanted to hear from Nic-coal, and it pierces through the haze of pain clouding my mind, sharper than the beating, louder than the blood roaring in my ears.
“Nic-coal!” I rasp, my voice shredded and useless, drowned by the desert wind and the distant commotion of approaching clones.
Samarastocks yank me to my knees, their hands clamping down like iron. My muscles burn as I strain against them, the betrillium cuffs biting into my wrists.
“You promised,” I spit at the Prif, blood dripping from my lips. “You said—”
"And you believed me?" Samara’s gaze is colder than the depths of space. "I don't make promises to property."
I pull against my captors again, but it’s useless. My body betrays me, torso sagging under the weight of exhaustion, but my mind burns.
I made the wrong choice.
Samarastocks drag them out, sand swirling around their feet and kicking up a haze of heat and grit.
Two Samarastocks restrain Juran, though he thrashes against them with wild strength I didn’t know Lautostocks had.
Another holds Ezla, their grip tight as he struggles, his usually calm demeanor cracked into a frenzy trying to help Nic-coal.
But my eyes go straight to the tiny human. Her face twists in fury, and even with her wrists bound, she’s a force to be reckoned with, struggling and kicking. The moment she sees me, dangling uselessly from the arms of two Samarastocks, her resistance doubles, a raw scream tearing from her throat.
Blood Feather rears up, darting toward the Samarastocks. One snatches at him, clipping a wing, and another grabs the tiny horse.
Nic-coal screeches. She’s still fighting. Of course she is. Her eyes lock onto mine for a fleeting moment. “Arture!”
I don’t move. I don’t flinch. I lock everything down, pushing every ounce of my rage, fear, and guilt deep into the void inside me. I am cold. Calculating. The perfect Samarastock. The one Samara forged.
“Katyen told me you needed me,” I say, my voice flat, devoid of emotion as I lift my head to meet the Prif’s icy stare. “What for?”
Samara doesn’t respond, but her gaze flicks to Nic-coal.
I continue, “She said I was the first, the one you tested everything on. Your true creation.”
Still, she says nothing. Nic-coal’s furious struggles, panting and screaming, are the only sound.
“You do need me, don’t you?” I press, my voice steady. “Otherwise, why not use one of the others for whatever it is you want?”
The Prif’s gaze pierces through me, her words sharp enough to draw blood as she finally speaks. “Because you were the first. Perfected so much, you could kill a female.”
My scales go cold despite the heat of the desert beating down on me, my mind leaping ahead. “You made me to kill a female. The All-Mother.”
The Samarastocks behind me flinch with the horror of it. Because they're right, it's unfathomable. A female, hurting another precious female, is as unnatural as a clone able to kill one.
“You worked it out. Good.” Her lips curve into a mockery of a smile as she points to the shocked Samarastocks holding my arms. “You think I haven’t ordered one of the others to kill her?
They jump off buildings with their nanites switched off.
You’re the only one I tested and broke so completely that you can kill. My greatest, most perfect weapon.”
My head rings. She wants me to kill her sister. She built me to be her ultimate tool, and she’s going to use me against her rival.
Nic-coal’s voice cuts through the impasse between me and my creator. “Don’t they prove that clones can’t hurt anyone? If you couldn’t order them to go against that single rule, doesn’t it prove they’re safe?”
The Prif’s jaw tightens, but she refuses to answer her, and the powerful woman’s silence speaks volumes.