Chapter 2
ADRYEL
Adryel ran as fast as she could down the alley. She squeezed her hand around the pocket with the tiny citricite crystal.
It wasn’t even worth that much, but the way the guards were acting, it was like she stolen a million credits.
If only!
They noticed faster than she expected when she snatched it. It didn't help that guards were bigger and enhanced in some way. They ran after her like afterburners.
She, however, was not so enhanced, so she had to find other ways to escape them. Like with brains and a little luck.
Adryel squeezed the small gold rock, its edges cutting into her palm. That single stone of citricite would power her apartment for another week, if not a little more. And if she can power it herself, then she wouldn't have to pay for power from the landlord.
Then she'd be able to live there longer.
She had to get there first.
She ducked behind a storage bin to hide from the passing authorities and hoped their enhancements weren't the kind that could see humanoids behind things.
They weren't going to let her get too far, going back and forth at each end of the alley like they were trying to box her in.
Stars knew, though, if she didn't get back to her home, she'd wind up in jail.
And that wouldn't go well. She wasn't going back there again.
Once was enough, thanks. She hadn't deserved to be there, anyway.
She'd just been talking. Which usually got her in trouble anyway, but that's beside the point.
The policing units on Kerde, a moon of Trinity Alpha Prime, were quick to jail someone for even presumed guilt.
A mouthy Terran girl? This far away from the Terran Empire? She was already marked. Her sketchy companions weren't much help, either.
It's not like Adryel wanted to hang out with criminals. It's just kind of where she wound up.
She learned from the best of them how to blend in.
“There she is!”
Blending in just didn’t always work.
Adryel sprinted down the alley, looking for an escape route. Maybe between a couple of the buildings? Or up onto a roof? There had to be something around here that she could get--
“Ahhh!” She cried when a man grabbed her arm and pulled her inside one of the back shop doors.
She held up her hands, ready to fight, but he pushed her away and shut the door. The door locked with a quiet, but firm click, akin to a blast door seal, but much faster, and less likely to be seen by the guards.
Adryel backed into the wall and scanned her surroundings. This province wasn't known to have nice, clean, bright shops, but that was where she found herself. In the back of a nice, clean, and bright shop.
Art of foreign worlds covered the walls. Holograms projected images of couples marrying and of babies.
Alien babies.
A cute one with little ridges and scales chomped on his fist, and the hologram next to it had to be the parents. Mom had some ridges on her face and shoulders, and Dad had the scales.
Tranquility Amongst The Stars flashed in a bright sign over some of the art. Finding the Connections Craved was posted on another wall.
What was this place?
She tried to get oriented, but what in the stars was this?
She held her position and looked back at the male--standard humanoid, bipedal, and with no obvious scales from the back.
He turned to face her, revealing a large chunk of his skull had been replaced with cybernetics, as was his shoulder, she could see the outlines of the metal under his shirt.
She took another step away. If he had enhancements, he could likely throw her through the wall if he wanted to.
The question was, did he want to?
“I think they're moving on.” A panel behind him displayed the exterior of the shop, including the alley she'd just been in.
Guards were walking up and down the alley cluelessly. She couldn't hear anything through the displays, but their body language didn't look like those who were moving on.
“Are you sure?” she asked.
He was about to answer when pounding echoed against the door. He gestured for her to back up.
She backed into a storage room and shut the door.
Which probably wasn't the wisest decision.
She realized she'd just locked herself in here with an unknown element--namely this guy.
And where was she anyway? Safety lights gave the room an orange glow.
Data pads and hard copies of information filled the place.
Everything was neatly stacked and organized.
It was obvious it had been painstakingly logged.
She picked up a piece of paper. Gah, who used physical linen paper anymore? There really wasn't a reason for that unless someone remained that connected to old things.
Galactic Alliance Science Society.
“No scientist I've ever known was this organized,” she muttered to herself. Not that she knew a lot, but the few she'd ever been around lived in a state of constant chaos that followed them, like a cloud of dust on a dry day.
But they usually had paper.
Lots of it.
The door opened and she jumped.
“I'm not a scientist,” he said. “They're gone now. I made sure.”
“Who are you?”
“I am Dane. I work here.”
“Doing what? What is this place?”
“It's a recruitment office for the Galactic Alliance Science Society's experimental work.”
She wasn't sure she liked the sound of that. “What kind of experiment?”
“Potential mates and breeders for different races of humanoids.”
She shook her head. “Yeah, um, I think I am going to go now.” She wasn't about to be hauled off into a slavery ring and wind up a breeder for some aliens out in the far reaches of the galaxy because she stumbled into the wrong place.
Nope, not her.
She knew better than to fall for this guy's tricks. She dug around in her pocket and felt the crystal, as well as her little multi-tool she'd used to steal the citricite, but it might be enough if she had to…
As If he knew what she was thinking, he stepped away, giving her a wide berth. “As you like. You're not a prisoner. I would suggest the front exit. The rear one, they're looking for you.”
Adryel kept to the one side, as far away from him as she could as she moved toward the door of the storeroom. “Yeah. It's time for me to, uh...” Because she wasn't about to be part of any of this that was going on in here.
She'd just stepped back into the hallway when a female came around a corner with curly blonde hair. “Dane, what's going on--Oh! Hello.”
Adryel froze.
Now the odds really were stacked against her.
“I'm leaving,” she said.
The female stepped to the side. “Wait, please.” She glanced back at Dane. “Who is this woman, Dane?”
He shrugged. “She was hiding in the alley. I helped her.”
The female nodded and glanced back at Adryel. “I'm sorry if he startled you. Dane doesn't care for the policing guards, and he always wants to help others.”
“I don't like them,” he said.
“No one does, I don't think,” Adryel huffed.
Dane smiled. It was somewhat soothing to see it, but he still unnerved her. She wasn't sure why. Maybe because half his face was metal.
“Again, I do apologize. He was only trying to help, so I hope he didn't frighten you.”
“No more than usual,” Adryel muttered. She noticed she'd gotten closer to the front of the store, though really it looked more like a medical office than anything. “What is this place?”
“We recruit females who want to participate in the Galactic Alliance's experiments. Primarily their inter-species mating experiment.”
That gave her a cold shiver.
Wasn’t this basically selling breeders to the highest bidder? What the heck was the government thinking? How were they getting away with this?
She glanced out the window.
They were getting away with it because of where they were recruiting. Here on Kerde, where so many were repressed. Females didn’t have as many options here. It was a hard place to live.
This would be the perfect place to find women who needed to get away. Disappear into the galaxy.
Not a bad idea, she thought. Would solve a lot of her problems.
She wanted to slap herself. The idea was terrible. Just run off and be a child creator for some humanoids on who knew what world? Just living here on Kerde showed her exactly how many species treated their females.
She had the scars to prove it.
So to the tiny part of her had an inkling of how this could help her, that part could just step into an air lock.
She didn’t need to run away. She was doing just fine without running and hiding. She needed to get out of here, but she had to do it casually.
She didn’t want this lady to turn her into the authorities.
“So, you kidnap people and sell them to alien worlds?” Adryel crossed her arms. And made a couple more steps across the empty front part of the store.
The woman's eyes widened. “No! Not at all! We are a legitimate part of the Galactic Alliance Science Society! Sanctioned by the government, we bring humanoids together that may not have the ability to come together on their own.”
“And what is your goal, your mission?” Adryel asked, pretty sure this sounded like a cover-up for slave trade. Regardless of all the official-looking logos and decorations.
“To test the bonds of mating across different cultures, and to determine the feasibility and likelihood of different species of humanoids to interbreed.”
“But humanoids already do that, all the time. What’s the point of this?” Lots of humanoids met and married other species of humanoids. It wasn't uncommon.
This sounded more like arranged marriages than slave trade. But really, was it that different? Girls given in trade to males for some sort of payment, this one being to produce children.
Adryel shifted so she was more in line with the door in case a quick escape was necessary as the lady kept talking.
“In a way. There are plenty of species out there. Many more than even the Galactic Alliance realized when they began exploration and unifying the worlds. Some are very xenophobic. Others are more open to interrelations, but no legitimate science has properly studied the mating aspect. The medical needs of interspecies mating alone make this a necessary test.”
“You're creating dating opportunities?”
“In a matter of speaking. It is all voluntary, of course.”
“And what do you get out of it?”
“We ask that the participants allow us to study their results of the mating, especially if a child is conceived. We would like to monitor the development and growth of the child.”
She blinked. “Huh.” she said. “And that’s it?”
“That is it.”
Because what else was there to say? Seriously.
It sounded far too wild for her.
"I'm back," Adryel said as she walked into her unlit apartment.
The smell hit her before she'd taken two steps inside.
Vetiver and ash.
Her stomach dropped. No. No, no, no.
She froze in the doorway, her hand still clutching the tiny citricite stone she'd just stolen.
That smell—deep, earthy vetiver cut through with cold ash, like a fire that had burned itself out.
She'd only smelled it once before, in the back room of the club when they'd brought in a body for disposal.
The Rhysgarrds' signature.
"Sret?" Her voice came out strangled.
Light seeped through the open door behind her, barely illuminating the trashed apartment. The place looked like a storm had torn through it. Furniture overturned. Belongings scattered everywhere.
And that smell. Clinging to everything.
Her fingers shook as she threw the security locks. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe someone had just burned incense. Maybe—
She needed light. Now.
Adryel stumbled through the darkness toward the power center, kicking debris with every step. Her heart hammered so hard she could barely breathe. The apartment should have had some power left. Sret was supposed to keep things conserved overnight.
Unless Sret couldn't.
The power conduit chamber was empty—completely clean. Someone had taken even the dying citricite stone. Her hands trembled as she dropped the new stone inside and sealed it.
The lights flickered. Brightened.
And Adryel saw her roommate.
Sret lay crumpled near the kitchen, her body twisted at an unnatural angle. The cauterized blaster wound in her gut was black and cold. Hours old, at least.
But it was the moonstone fragment that made Adryel's knees buckle.
A small shard of pale stone, placed deliberately on Sret's chest. Moonstone from Orlicia—the same kind her archaeologist friend had given her on a necklace years ago. The planet was gone now, blown apart, making the stones rare. Expensive.
The Rhysgarrds left them at completed contracts.
This wasn't a robbery. This wasn't the policing guards.
This was a message.
Contract complete. You're next.
"Oh stars." Adryel backed away, her hand over her mouth. The vetiver and ash incense had been burned here, in her apartment, while they killed Sret. While they searched for—
The safe.
Adryel bolted for her bedroom, vaulting over overturned furniture. They'd torn the room apart looking for it. Drawers emptied, mattress shredded, every panel pulled from the walls.
Except the one.
She shoved debris aside with shaking hands and palmed the hidden scanner. It stung as it verified her identity. The tiny compartment opened.
Still there. The data chip. Everything she'd heard, every name, every deal. Her insurance policy that had just become her death warrant.
She yanked it out and shoved it into her underwear, tucking it where no one would find it without a full search.
No time. No time to think, to grieve, to call anyone.
She grabbed a long coat, twisted her wild red hair into tight knots, and pulled the coat on.
They'd found her again. They'd killed Sret to send a message.
And Adryel was next on the list.
She ran.