Chapter 2
Chapter Two
QUIN
Eight weeks on this planet, and I still bolted upright in the night, heart hammering against my ribs.
The nightmares never fully faded. Those bulbous eyes and clicking mandibles of the creatures who had kept us in cages before Vala orchestrated our rescue.
Our escape had lasted only a few hours. Just long enough to taste freedom before our ship lurched sideways, metal screaming as the prismatic distortion swallowed us whole.
I could still feel that sickening drop in my gut when gravity abandoned us right before we slammed into this godforsaken rock.
That first night, I had stared up at the aurora-streaked sky and thought we'd found paradise. The dancing lights had painted the heavens in impossible colors, ribbons of emerald and violet twisting between stars I didn't recognize. Lila had said it looked like the Northern Lights on steroids.
"It's breathtaking," I'd whispered at that first sunrise. The air was thick and sweet, laced with something close to honeysuckle, drifting through a forest so lush and ancient it felt like it had been waiting for us. Blue-green foliage pressed in from every direction, layered and dense, the canopy broken only where the suns’ rays filtered through.
Scattered among the trunks, pale crystalline formations spiraled up from the forest floor, twisting toward the light like frozen smoke, scattering the twin suns into soft ribbons of color across the undergrowth.
None of us had known then that the beauty was just another lure, like everything else here.
We had been so naive. Two hours later, one of those elegant spirals had shown its true nature when Dana wandered too close and brushed it with her bare arm.
What had looked like an upside-down icicle discharged on contact, firing a spray of near-invisible barbs into her skin.
Vala and Mehr had found her body contorted and swollen, her skin mottled where the toxin had spread.
By then, we'd already lost Tessa to what looked like ordinary berries.
Her throat had closed so fast she hadn't even had time to scream.
I pushed myself up from my makeshift pallet, shaking off the remnants of sleep. Vala was at the battered command console, his white hair and silvery skin catching the cool glow of a holographic display. I moved carefully, threading between the sleeping bodies sprawled across the floor.
The loose white top shifted against my skin as I moved, the unfamiliar fabric hanging well past my hips over equally shapeless trousers tucked into sturdy boots that had never quite fit.
Every woman aboard wore the same plain garments we'd been rescued in, clothing provided by our abductors before Vala found us.
Practical. Durable. Utterly devoid of anything that reminded us of home.
"Can't sleep?" Vala asked as I dropped into the seat beside him.
"The singing trees have started again," I murmured.
The trees weren't trees at all but carnivorous plants that could uproot themselves and relocate overnight.
We'd woken once to find one had moved fifty yards closer to our crash site, its roots trailing wet earth like tentacles.
The first time we'd heard them mimicking voices, Mara had walked straight toward the sound before Mehr tackled her to the ground.
We'd watched in horror as the trunk split open, revealing rows of glistening teeth where it had settled, waiting.
Two women were lost when we’d first arrived. This planet didn't just exist. It hunted.
"They won't breach the perimeter," Vala said. "The sonic emitters are functioning perfectly."
I nodded, though the knot in my stomach didn't ease. The emitters were just one more piece of salvaged technology that Vala and Mehr had pieced together to keep us alive.
"You need your rest," Vala added, his luminous gaze cutting to me. "As our only apex-interaction specialist with xenobiotic pattern recognition abilities, we need you sharp."
I let out a short laugh. "You make me sound way more important than I am." Back on Earth, I'd spent my time tracking endangered apex predators through ecosystems balanced on a knife's edge. None of that had prepared me for an alien world where even the flora wanted to eat me.
"You underestimate your worth." His long fingers moved through the holographic planet rotating above the console.
Heat signatures bloomed across its surface, red and amber against cool blue terrain.
"Without your catalogs of which flora paralyzes and which fauna hunts at night, we would've lost more than two.
" He zoomed in on a bright flare. "Speaking of unknown species. We have visitors."
"What is that?" I leaned closer.
"A Moktian Galaxy Cruiser. It went down two Earth miles southeast of here."
Yet another alien species I'd never heard of. "Are they dangerous?"
The corner of his mouth lifted. "All lifeforms from other worlds are dangerous. It depends on who you are to them."
"And all of them hate Mannocks," I said, using the alien term for humans. "Even you, once."
"That is no longer true." Vala's tone sobered. "Universeval Rule dictates that Yulineon patrollers are ordered to kill off-world humans on sight. Unless the Yulineon is me, he will kill you."
"What changed you from executioner to savior?"
"Not what. Who." He traced a faint scar along his silvery forearm.
"A human female named Layla. I was injured on Valose.
She dragged me to safety and kept me alive, risking her own life to do it.
After Layla, I could no longer follow Universeval Rule.
I challenged it openly and was branded a heretic.
Now I'm hunted by the same patrollers I once commanded. "
"She must be one hell of a woman."
"She is." His luminous eyes softened. "You'll meet her once we reach Valose."
"If we can get off this deathtrap," I muttered.
Vala tilted his chin toward the sleeping Nomadican. "With Mehr's help, I'm confident we can repair this craft. When my Yulineon Star Chaser overtook the Xegnot ship, I hadn't planned on a Nomadican being aboard."
"Then it's a good thing Elishbeth is bonded to one," I said, using Mehr's pronunciation of Elizabeth in his heavy Nomadican accent.
My gaze drifted back to the holographic display, where the crashed ship's engines glowed against the cooler landscape.
"In the meantime, what do we do about the newcomers? "
"The long-range scanners are still malfunctioning," Vala replied, adjusting something on the console. "I can identify the craft but not detect the lifeforms inside. We'll need to get closer to the wreck."
"Closer." I barely suppressed a shudder as a distant note drifted through the forest beyond the hull. The haunting melody rose and fell like a chorus of unseen voices, beautiful, hypnotic, and deadly. The singing trees were calling their prey within reach.
Mehr joined us, rubbing tired eyes and squinting at the display. "What have you got, Vala?"
"A Moktian vessel." Vala zoomed in on the crash site. "There might be fuel sources we can salvage."
"Moktians aren't just going to give you their fuel," Mehr said, his voice gravelly with sleep.
"If there are no survivors, we take what we find," Vala stated flatly.
"And if someone's still alive?" I asked. "We all survived our crash."
Vala gave me a hard look. "Recall when you asked if the Moktians are dangerous? We are just as dangerous to them as they are to us. And we need their fuel."
"So you plan to kill any survivors and take what you want?" I asked, appalled.
"If they aren't willing to help us," Mehr said with a shrug. "Survival of the most savvy."
"You mean the most treacherous," I huffed.
"Get your analyzer ready," Vala said, his tone leaving no room for argument. "We leave at first light."
Sunrise broke over the horizon in ribbons of rose and amber, casting our shadows long across the lush landscape.
We slipped from the ship's hatch into that brief, merciful window when the planet's predators retreated to their lairs and the carnivorous flora hadn't yet unfurled to full hunger.
These precious hours, when death merely whispered instead of screamed, were our only window for safe travel.
I clutched the bio-spectral analyzer, its familiar weight the closest thing I had to a security blanket on a world where knowledge was the only edge that kept us breathing.
Vala moved at my side, his silver skin catching the early light in ways that made him look like a living weapon.
Fluid. Controlled. His nutrone blaster raised and ready.
Behind us, Brooke and Mara moved with the practiced silence forged in eight weeks of survival, where noise drew predators, and hesitation got you killed.
Brooke's fingers twitched against the contours of her blaster.
Mara kept adjusting her grip on hers, eyes darting to the glowing power indicator pulsing against the casing.
"The analyzer's picking up increased bioactivity to the east," I murmured, keeping my voice low.
"Stay on course," Vala replied.
We picked our way through the dense, pulsing foliage that tracked our movements. Plants here didn't just grow. They hunted. I swept the analyzer in wide arcs, watching for the telltale spikes that meant something was about to make a move.
"Movement at two o'clock," I whispered.
Vala shifted instantly, placing himself between me and the threat. We froze as a cluster of what looked like innocent flowers shuddered, revealing rows of needle-sharp barbs glistening with venom.
"Nobody breathe," I ordered.
Thirty agonizing seconds passed before they folded back into themselves, returning to their deceptively innocent state.
"Clear," I murmured, checking the screen. "They emit a paralyzing toxin when they detect carbon dioxide."
"Another delightful discovery for your catalog," Mara muttered behind me.