24. Poppy
POPPY
The second we open our eyes the next day, the luxury suite pulls a full vanishing act with a loud hydraulic snap. One minute I'm enjoying Vael’s warm body against mine on a perfectly firm mattress, the next, the bed is gone and we're lying on nothing.
Vael helps me to my feet, and I instantly look down at myself.
My grey tech suit is completely gone. In its place is a replica of my pink lingerie slip, along with the sad ruin of my marabou heels. One heel is snapped clean off, the fabric is soaked, and the fluffy feathers look like a drowned rat dipped in mud.
“I’m really glad we took the time to dress before we went to sleep," I mutter, trying to balance on one shoe. "Really made a difference this morning.” It’s utter bullshit I can’t wear the ugly but safe tech suit, and a pit of worry opens in my stomach, because what fresh hell does Ken the artificial idiot have planned today?
“You look beautiful, even in your strange fur shoes,” Vael tells me. He tilts his head, staring at the muddy marabou. “I still fail to see the purpose of this.”
I pat his hip, comforted and scared and deeply sick of this entire show.
We aren't in some clean white room. A colosseum grows out of the ground, completely surroundinf us with a sea of boiling, roiling magma.
The heat hits my face like a wide-open commercial oven.
There's no roof, just a fake cloudy sky moving way too fast overhead, looking like an aggressive screensaver made in the uncanny valley.
The floor hums with static electricity, zapping my bare foot and making the hairs on my arms stand straight up.
I cling to Vael like a lifeline as the arena takes shape.
Before I can even process the geological nightmare, the ceiling opens up.
Lily and Zan drop straight through the shaft in a chaotic, headfirst emergency roll. They hit the ground too fast, and Zan slams down hard, his wing making a sickening popping sound as the outer bone breaks completely.
“Oh my god, Lily, are you guys okay? Your partner’s hurt,” I yell, rushing over. The guilt swallows me whole, and suddenly I’m bawling, my face turning bright red as the tears stream down. “I don’t know what’s happening here, and I can’t tell you how sorry I am that I ever got us into this mess.”
Vael doesn't hesitate. He grabs my hand, yanks me close against his chest, and blocks Lily from view with his red wings.
“Do not blame her for what has happened,” Vael barks fiercely at them.
Lily looks totally exasperated. “I literally didn’t! Can we all just focus? My partner’s hurt, Poppy is in no way mentally ready for whatever horrible thing Ken has planned, and I hate to break up this conversation—”
"Welcome to the floor is lava, Alien Edition!" Ken’s voice booms, his hologram flickering to life in front of us. The stone benches rising around the cavern are packed with thousands of roaring spectators, a mix of real Roth aliens like the producer Billie, and weird holographic crowd fillers.
Ken starts pulling out prizes like a space-age QVC host, bragging about corporate sponsors in a literal murder pit. He waves around a pink graphic blanket robe, a comms tablet, and a pair of fuzzy slippers.
“All right, Zan, you’re going to have to rely on me for this one," Lily tells her partner, completely ignoring the gift basket. "I am not leaving you behind.”
"At the sound of the gun," Ken calls out to the arena. "The race will begin. On your mark. Get ready."
The starting gun cracks, a deafening noise that rattles my teeth.
Vael doesn't wait for a strategy meeting.
He hoists me onto his back, anchoring my thighs against his side, exploding into the obstacle course at record speed.
He tears across the black volcanic rock, instantly leaving Lily and Zan in our dust. I cling to his neck for dear life, my pink slip whipping in the hot wind.
We are flying through the turns when the ground beneath us violently shakes.
With a harsh lurch, the volcanic highway fractures. The stone splits completely, separating Vael and me onto two individual pillars of black rock drifting rapidly apart over the boiling lava.
“Oh shit!” I scream, losing my grip on his shoulder. I drop to my hands and knees, clawing at the hot stone with my fingernails so I don't get cooked like a medium-rare steak.
Ken’s hologram floats down right between our separating pillars, looking like an evil glitch. The roaring sound of the colosseum crowd cuts out completely, replaced by a heavy, suffocating digital hum.
"And now we come to the emotional portion of our task," Ken announces dramatically.
"This section of today’s entertainment is taken from an old human tradition known as Two Truths and a Lie.
My neural scanners have mined your memory archives.
If you fail to identify the lie, the neural feedback fries your brain. First up: The Veteran."
The arena drops into total darkness around my isolated column of rock. A hologram explodes into life right over the lava, projecting Vael's history directly into my retinas.
A pint-sized version of Vael-Torin—barely a hatchling with soft pink scales—is getting violently dragged away from a sobbing Draegon female by two armored guards.
A tall Draegon male stands in the background, his head bowed in silent grief.
Baby Vael screams, his small claws reaching back toward his mother before the iron doors slam shut between them.
"The Selection," Ken narrates. "Separated from his parents at seven cycles due to high spatial intelligence metrics, forced into military service for the crown."
The memory shifts with a nauseating blur, the outpost melting into a smoking battlefield.
A lower-caste squad is pinned beneath a stone archway while heavy fire rains down on them.
A cowardly commander stands at the rear, wings tucked in terror.
A young adult Vael charges forward, hands raw, screaming a strategic retreat plan to save his men.
But the commander handles his fear by pulling a total bitch move—he seals the iron doors early, locking his own squad outside to save his own skin, leaving fifty warriors to get pulverized by enemy artillery.
The scene twists a third time, plunging into a dim command tent.
An older Vael, closer to the age of my alien, stands over a map table, fury twisting his face.
A general is shouting at him, gesturing aggressively at a casualty report.
Without a single word, Vael lunges across the table, his ruby wings flaring like bloodied sails as he drives a blade directly through the general's chest, watching the guy choke on his own blood with cold eyes.
The projection shatters, dropping us right back into the blinding white light of the arena.
I stand on my shaky column of rock, my lungs seizing up as a heavy lump forms in my throat.
I look across the fiery gap at the real Vael standing on his own drifting pillar.
His jaw is locked so tight his neck scales look rigid, his fists clenched until his knuckles are white.
The raw vulnerability of his past is totally exposed on his face, but beneath the anger, a deep wave of dread radiates from him.