Eight
THE SHIP’S LANDING alarms abruptly cut out. For a moment, silence echoed off the metal. Then the emergency broadcasts started.
Every speaker aboard the vessel erupted at once. Conflicting orders. Evacuation notices. Military commands. Civilian distress calls.
The voices overlapped until they became a wall of panic.
Threx flinched. “The network is failing.”
Willow looked at Renjik. “Good.”
Neither of them liked how quickly she said it. Chaos meant people were dying. It also meant the Vekh were losing control.
The ship lurched. Something struck the vessel hard enough to send everyone stumbling sideways. Red emergency lights flooded the corridor.
A voice barked over the speakers. “External infrastructure failure. All personnel maintain station.”
The next sound was a scream. The transmission cut off mid-sentence.
Willow swallowed. “That’s not helping my stress levels.”
Renjik checked the nearest access panel. The lock had disengaged. The ship’s systems were too busy failing to care about stowaways. “Move.”
They followed Threx through another service corridor.
The farther they descended, the louder the panic became. Doors stood open. Crew ran through corridors. Officers shouted contradictory instructions.
Twice they passed Scozid staring at displays showing contamination spreading through nearby districts. Nobody paid attention to them. The disaster was finally bigger than protocol.
Threx pointed at a door. “Communications.”
Willow pushed ahead of him despite his attempt to stop her. The room was abandoned. She went straight to a console and sat, pushing buttons and scanning the screen. A symbol appeared, and she started talking.
“If you’re hearing this, the Vekh are lying.
Leave any structure showing green contamination immediately.
Don’t gather in large shelters. Don’t touch affected infrastructure.
If someone tells you everything is under control, they’re wrong.
” She paused long enough Renjik almost grabbed her to leave.
Then she added, “My name is Willow Benally. I’m an anthropologist you’ve been told is an enemy.
I don’t care if you believe me. I care if you survive. ”
She stood and their small party rushed from the room. They’d done what they could on the ship. It was time to leave.
A final hatch separated them from the outside. Threx hesitated. Then pressed the release. Heat rushed inside.
Willow stopped dead.
The city spread before them. It had been beautiful from orbit. From ground level it was terrifying. Silver towers rose into the darkness. Transit lines crossed overhead like glowing veins. Thousands of lights stretched toward the horizon.
And everywhere they looked, Scozid were running. Emergency sirens wailed. Entire sections of the city had already gone dark. A cluster of towers three kilometers away flickered and failed one floor at a time. The darkness spread downward. Like something eating civilization alive.
Willow’s mouth gaped as she stared.
Renjik stepped beside her. For once, he didn’t have anything sarcastic to say.
Na’ashq’ii emerged from her collar and stared toward the city. Its plates shifted black. The creature clicked softly. Reacting.
A mechanical sound rolled across the skyline, powerful enough to vibrate through the pavement. Every Scozid nearby stopped. Every head turned upward.
Renjik followed their gaze. The planet’s orbital elevator dominated the horizon. The structure vanished into the clouds above. It was a monument. The first thing the Scozid built when they conquered space travel. It told the universe they were superior even to gravity.
Several bright streaks appeared high above it. Tuppu. The projectiles descended like artificial meteors.
“They’ve fired it.”
Renjik’s expression hardened. “They had no choice.” He pointed midway up the elevator, where a contaminated ship had docked, the streaks of green already moving along the restraint arms.
The first impacts struck near the elevator’s base. The bottom of the elevator went dark. Then the next section. Then another. The darkness climbed upward.
The effect spread through the massive structure like extinguished stars. Entire segments vanished. Lights failed. Transit platforms stopped. Emergency beacons activated. For one impossible moment the city held its breath.
Then the sound of grief rolled through the streets. The Scozid weren’t watching infrastructure fail. They were watching history die.
Threx sank to his knees.
Willow looked at him.
The soldier stared at the elevator, clearly heartbroken.
The realization hit her hard. The Vekh had done this. Not the Alliance. Not the civilians. Not the people running through the streets. The Vekh.
But everyone else would carry the cost.
A new emergency transmission erupted from nearby public speakers. “Citizens are ordered to remain within designated infrastructure zones.”
Willow barked a laugh.
Several Scozid nearby ignored the order and kept running. Good. Maybe some of them were finally done listening.
Na’ashq’ii clicked sharply. Then again. The creature twisted toward a cluster of towers deeper inside the city. Its black plates shifted. Blue light appeared beneath them.
Willow stared. “That’s not random.”
Renjik followed her gaze. “What is it?”
Na’ashq’ii clicked again. The same direction. The same rhythm. The same insistence.
Willow slowly smiled.
Renjik immediately looked concerned. “That’s becoming a problem.”
She pointed. “I think it’s reacting to the strongest signal from the network.”
Threx looked up. “The civic relay.”
Willow turned. “The what?”
“The original emergency network.”
His translator struggled. “Built before the Vekh. Before modern command systems.”
Willow’s eyes went wide.
A communications network. One independent of central authority. One connected to the entire city. Maybe the entire planet.
Na’ashq’ii clicked again. Blue light pulsed beneath its plates. The creature wasn’t guessing. It knew.
Renjik looked at Willow. Then at the crowds. The spreading contamination. The dying city.
Then at the direction Na’ashq’ii indicated. His grip tightened around his weapon. “Please tell me the relay is nearby.”
Threx pointed toward the darkening skyline.
It wasn’t nearby.
Willow sighed. “Of course it isn’t.”
Renjik started walking. “Come on.”
“That’s your entire plan?”
“Yes.”
“It’s a terrible plan.”
He glanced back. “You already said that.”
“Because it keeps being true.”
The orbital elevator continued going dark behind them.
Ahead, the city burned with panic.
Na’ashq’ii clicked impatiently.
And together they ran toward the heart of the collapsing empire.
WILLOW SHOULD’VE GUESSED that panic translated across species.
She didn’t need a translator to understand the mother dragging two children through the crowd. Or the elderly refusing to leave a darkened apartment block. Or the transit operator standing on top of a disabled vehicle screaming evacuation instructions into a portable loudspeaker.
Fear looked the same everywhere.
The city had become a river of moving bodies. Most were running away from the orbital elevator. Some were running toward family members. Others were simply following the crowd and hoping someone else knew where safety was.
Renjik stayed close enough that she could feel his presence even when she wasn’t looking directly at him. His good hand never strayed far from his weapon.
Threx led them through side streets and maintenance corridors whenever possible.
The fewer people who noticed an injured Rucieth, a human, and a lower-caste Scozid traveling together, the better. At least she assumed that was the theory.
The theory lasted twelve minutes.
Then a terrified Scozid child pointed at Na’ashq’ii and yelled. Three dozen nearby civilians stopped.
Willow froze.
Renjik muttered something that was probably not diplomatic.
The child pointed again. Then made a series of clicks.
Na’ashq’ii immediately clicked back.
Silence followed.
Willow blinked.
The child clicked again.
Na’ashq’ii answered.
The child’s eyes widened. The child pointed toward the communication tower. Then pointed toward Na’ashq’ii. Then clicked again.
Willow stared.
The child’s mother grabbed them and fled before anyone could ask questions.
“What just happened?”
“I’ve absolutely no idea.”
“Comforting.”
She snorted.
Na’ashq’ii clicked softly. Then turned a tentacle toward the tower. The creature’s plates shifted blue.
Willow followed its gaze. There was a ring of contamination between them and the tower.
Her stomach dropped. “That’s contamination.”
Threx looked. His eyes widened. “There’s no other way.”
Renjik was already moving. “Of course not.”
They stuck to the shadows as they passed a transit station. Several civilians stood nearby arguing with local officials. The officials were trying to maintain a perimeter. The civilians were trying to retrieve family members trapped underground.
Willow caught fragments of translated speech. “...My mate is still inside... ...elevator failed... ...authority says wait... ...authority can go drown...”
That last one sounded universal.
The crowd shifted as another section of the orbital elevator went dark. The entire city seemed to flinch.
Willow looked upward.
The structure dominated the skyline. A dead line cutting through the clouds. The sight made her chest ache.
Then Na’ashq’ii hissed. The creature practically launched itself off her shoulder.
Willow barely caught it before it hit the pavement. “What?”
Na’ashq’ii twisted toward the tower. Every plate on its body flashed black. Then blue. Then black again. Like it couldn’t decide.
Willow’s brain finally connected two pieces she’d been staring at for hours. The ceremonial broadcast as detonator, Na’ashq’ii listening, and learning. The contamination was carrying communication.
Na’ashq’ii wasn’t controlling it. It was responding to it.
“Interesting.”
Renjik heard the tone immediately. “No.”
She pointed at the tower. “Yes.”
“No.”
“I figured something out.”
“That’s exactly what concerns me.”