“You’ll find gravity is lower here than on your home world,” Sax says. “Your moves won’t have quite the same speed. Swing light and learn from each other.”

  Sax steps back until his tail touches room’s wall and waits. Viera looks at her sword, then over at Sax. “What are you wanting us to do? Whack away?”

  Sax nods.

  Malo says something then, and Viera sighs back at the warrior. Spreads her feet and sets the sword in the middle, with both hands on the hilt. Malo bends his knees slightly, leans forward and holds the sword at a flat angle. There’s time for a single breath. Viera makes the first move. Steps into a sweeping cut at Malo. But the gravity is low, and the momentum from her lunge is too much to stop.

  Viera floats as she tries to swing, tumbling forward. Malo, looking to take advantage, swipes up his sword for an overhead cut, but that motion too brings Malo up off the floor just a bit. Enough to throw him off balance and together the two of them fall gently to the ground in a crumpled heap.

  Sax can’t help it, he laughs; loud hisses ringing through the chamber.

  The two fighters untangle themselves, once again taking up their positions. Viera lets words fly, and Sax catches the name, Kaishi, of the third human. Interesting. Perhaps she is the real center of this conflict.

  Malo relaxes his guard, opens his mouth to unleash some retort, when Viera charges. She doesn’t even lead with the sword, instead she bends her right leg and shoves off, throwing her left foot into a kick that catches Malo’s face. The warrior flies back, bounces into the wall. The gravity gives Malo enough time to catch himself, plant his hand on the ground and kneel, looking up towards Viera, who’s laughing.

  “This gravity thing. It’s great,” Viera says to Sax as she hops, goes a meter in the air and sinks back down.

  Malo yells something full of heat, and then he’s on his feet rushing forward. Viera touches on the ground just as Malo arrives, the charging warrior swinging his sword in a crossing slash, with enough control not to send himself spinning. Viera manages to block the swing, angling Malo’s weapon down to the floor. Viera follows the guard with a left-hand slap, again to Malo’s face, and the warrior staggers back.

  “Don’t get angry now, Charre,” Viera says. “There’s a reason the Lunare were winning before Kaishi intervened. You’re out-dated. You’re all pathetic.”

  Sax can see something though. It’s in Malo’s eyes. In his bearing as the warrior stands back up. Viera continues to fling insults, though Sax thinks Malo isn’t hearing them anymore. He’s in the fight, as any true warrior should be, and this kind of fight ends only one way.

  Sax needs to stop this now. This isn’t a training exercise anymore.

  “I mean think about it. Your army spends all this time working with sacrifices. Slaughtering defenseless people on top of Tiers or your giant temples? How is that helping you?” Viera gestures with the sword. “Know what? It’s not. Not at all. I wouldn’t be surprised, by the time we get back, to find we have all of you in chains working our mines.”

  When Malo attacks again, he gives no signal. Only a slight tightening of his arms. Then Malo launches himself. Pushes both feet into the ground and dives forward with his blade pointed straight at Viera like a missile. A move impossible in higher gravity. One Sax suspects Viera has no training for. No preparation. No idea how to defend. She swings the sword, tries to block, but Viera is too slow.

  Malo strikes, dives the point deep into Viera’s chest.

  And Sax fears he’s killed a human.

  25 Ordinary Extraordinary

  I step through the halls. A familiar guides me. Its blue hands reach out and hold mine, pulling me along as I try to fix myself. I’m reaching through the stories of my childhood, the ones about our god Ignos, about humans and animals and survival and triumph that provide examples of how to deal with this sort of trauma.

  I find nothing.

  There’s no Solare story for this. No legend or tale told around the fire that says what to do when you find out how easy you are to break. I was poked and prodded on that platform. Tested and torn. My body made to dance for some unknown reason, for some creature I don’t know or understand.

  Which brings me to a question. Which gives me a way forward.

  “What was that?” I ask the familiar - my first words since I left the platform.

  “I’m getting to know you,” Dalachite replies from the walls around me. The familiar keeps us walking. “The start of a long and fruitful relationship for both of us.”

  Fruitful.

  Long.

  I’m not sure I’ll last through more of those.

  As if it’s reading my thoughts, Dalachite continues, “These first conversations might be difficult. Painful, even. But that’s natural. What discoveries happen without such hardship? Where would we be without the willingness to endure strife to gain what we need?”

  “I don’t see you enduring anything.”

  Careful, Kaishi. This one has the power to kill us at any moment it chooses.

  Which might be a relief. In any case, I’ve said the words, so, while we walk, I wait for the voice to respond.

  “I’ll forgive you that one, specimen.” Dalachite chooses not to use my name. “What I’ve endured is beyond your comprehension. What I have lived through, sacrificed for the good of the galaxy, is so far beyond your short trial that it doesn’t bear mentioning. Go now, recover, and know that you have much more to give before you can claim yourself a martyr.”

  I don’t want to be a martyr. I don’t care about the galaxy - something I didn’t know existed until hours ago. I just want to go home.

  Then fight your way back.

  I will.

  We’re not heading back to my room. I only notice - as most of the hallways look the same - because we’ve been walking longer than it took to get to that terrible platform.

  “Where are we going?” I ask, but the familiar doesn’t stop and Dalachite doesn’t respond.

  Eventually we reach another door and the familiar opens it with a blue palm on a black box to the door’s right. A whoosh and its open. I freeze. A creature stands on the other side. The pink and gold one. Outside of the jungle, of the panic that consumed us all that night, I can see how beautiful those scales are, even as clenching fear tightens my throat.

  Is this another test? Has Dalachite decided it’s my time to die after all? But the creature only stares at me for a moment, then gestures at a high, silver table. On it, piled like small buildings, are stacks of thick, colored bars. Oranges, browns, yellows - it’s like a warm- colored rainbow. The familiar, I notice, disappears as I step in and shuts the door behind me.

  “They will fill you up,” the pink gold creature says once we’re alone, its voice a soft hiss. “Provided, of course, your body functions like ours.”

  “My body ‘functions’?”

  It’s not a term or phrase I’ve heard before, but I’m thankful for something to take my mind away from the tests and terrors I’ve been through.

  “Yes, functions. Surely you know and understand that all things are a product of what lies inside them. The ever present motion churning to keep the those eyes of yours blinking, that mind thinking.” The creature’s voice is a mix of hisses and growls. It sounds strange in my ears, but then so does everything else on Cobalt.

  “How does yours function?” I ask.

  “I am Bas, an Oratus. As is Sax. We are living weapons,” Bas says. “We exist to enforce the laws of the galaxy. To keep it stable, harmonious and peaceful for those who live in it.”

  “That sounds like a speech,” I say.

  “It is,” Bas laughs, a sort of half hiss, half snort. “Now, sit down. Eat. We can’t have our prize specimen dying on us.”

  I follow Bas’ orders. Or rather, try to. The table doesn’t have chairs, and it’s far too tall for me to eat at. The colored bars sit at the level of my eyes, and I’d have to reach up and over to get to them. I do notice, though, that there are gray-shaded plates in the floor alongside the table. I walk over to them, and glance at Bas, hoping she’ll give me the answer.

  “Simply sit.” Bas provides. “They will rise to greet you at whatever height is most appropriate.”

  I do so, bend my legs and my knees, as if I’m going to sit down. Something rises from the floor, forms a perfect mold, and pushes me up to meet the table. The nutrient bars are now perfectly positioned for effortless snacking.

  “That’s neat,” I say.

  Because it is.

  “Try them. When you’re done, you can use the facilities there,” Bas points to a small door off the kitchen with a green frame.

  I devour three of the bars - hunger rising in me at the food, even if it tastes dry and dull, to demand I stuff myself full. After, I use what Bas calls a lavatory, a strange experience where, once again, smooth shaping molds move to accommodate my needs without my asking. Eventually I rejoin Bas at the table, where she hands me a large bowl full of water and bids me to drink.

  “You and Sax have strange names,” I say after I take a full gulp, with some of the water splashing over the sides onto the table.

  Bas doesn’t pay any attention to it, so neither do I.

  “Stranger still to give them and not receive one in return?” Bas says to me and I blush.

  “Kaishi,” I say. Bas smiles at me, which, with her rows of sharp teeth, makes me twitch.

  Bas watches me take another drink, and when water splashes again, this time bouncing off of the edge of the table onto my clothes - still the cape and robe I’ve been wearing since we left home - she laughs a second time.

  “I usually drink from something smaller?” I ask, nodding at the bowl.

  “I’m sorry, Kaishi. It seems Cobalt is not ready for your presence,” Bas replies, spreading her claws in what I think is a shrug. “I’m sure Dalachite will strive harder in the future to accommodate your species.”

  It’s an admonishment. I can tell that much by her tone. Still, I shelve my pride to ask other, more important questions.

  “What is this place?” I ask. “A station? What’s Dalachite?”

  “A creature you don’t know,” Bas replies. “If we are the weapons of the galaxy, Dalachite and its brethren are its mind. Amigga run stations like this, control our governments. Lead teams searching for scientific discoveries, and determine what we should do with them.”

  “You obey them?”

  “I enjoy slashing my claws through an enemy, exploring a new world, or diving into a battle to see it won,” Bas replies. “The Amigga like none of these things. So we make ideal partners.”

  “And one of them runs this station?”

  “One of them is this station. When an Amigga chooses a home, like this one, it’s built around them. They are literally embedded inside so that they can see and sense everything. It’s why we brought you here.”

  “So it could study me.”

  “So it could find a solution,” Bas reaches over and rests a claw on my forehead. I should jerk back, but I’m too tired. If this Oratus feels like killing me, I won’t have the energy to fight back.

  “You mean the thing inside my head. Ignos.” I decide to stick with the name. Ignos hasn’t offered a new one, and I don’t care enough to change it anymore.

  “What you carry is the galaxy’s greatest enemy, and we will do anything to stop it.”

  She doesn’t know what she’s talking about. Her kind, and these Amigga, they are the galaxy’s true demons. They rip apart any who think differently, who stand before them. Do not trust them, Kaishi. Do not, or you will wind up their toy to twist and turn and poke and prod until you are nothing.

  Bas tilts her head at me. Watches my eyes. “It’s talking to you, isn’t it?”

  I nod.

  “Sevora, I know you’re listening.” Bas is talking to me, and yet not. “Do not harm this one, or I will taste you between my jaws. And I will chew slowly.” Her eyes narrow on mine. “As for you, Kaishi, know that you have friends on the station. Those who will protect you.”

  I’m about to thank her, then I remember that Bas and Sax brought me here, want Dalachite to test me, and I say nothing.

  The door opens behind me, the noise saving me from an awkward silence. A familiar stands in it, gesturing at the both of us to stand and follow. Dalachite’s voice crackles around us, “A specimen has been wounded. Until the situation is contained, please return to your quarters. Immediately.”

  26 Worth A Life

  Viera is light in Sax’s midclaws. Barely heavier than a furry Flaum. The weight means Sax outruns Malo, leaving the warrior behind as he dashes through the hallways. Dalachite already knows what’s happened, and panels in the floor change green in front of Sax to guide him towards Cobalt’s medical bay.

  When he needs to move, Sax can be very, very fast: His claws bite deep into the floor, leaving scratches but propelling Sax forward in long heaves. His tail catches lips in hallway intersections and pushes Sax in the right direction. Even his foreclaws, empty, grab what they can and push.

  All the same, Viera is losing a lot of blood. It splashes and leaves a brutal trail. Sax feels the thick, hot liquid on his skin, and he resists the urge to lick it away. To take a small bite of the specimen so vulnerable in front of him.

  His mission is to protect, not destroy.

  There are three familiars already in the medical bay when Sax arrives. All of them looking vaguely like humans, or Flaum. Two arms, two legs and at various heights. The number of blue figures stops Sax. It confirms what he fears; that Dalachite has far more familiars running around the station than it’s let on thus far. Any or all of them could come after Sax with swords or miners.

  But that’s not important. Not right now.

  What’s worse is that Cobalt is old, and its treatments out-dated. The medical chamber is a single large room with a split bed in the middle. It’s large and wide, with thin lines visible where, if necessary, the platform can break apart to hold multiple patients. Right now it’s as one, and it’s where Sax lays Viera.

  As the human body hits the bed, lights above Viera grow bright. Machines and equipment wheel forward from the corners the room under their own power. They stop at the optimal length for Viera’s mass and width. Programmed to optimal efficiency. Except nothing happens. Viera groans, and the deep gash beneath and to the left of her neck continues to leak.

  “We have no protocols,” Dalachite says overhead. “There are no standards for this species. No commands to follow.”

  “It’s a carbon-based form. Scan and repair,” Sax hisses.

  “Why risk damaging the specimen further?” Dalachite replies. “If it dies, then we can still harvest it. We can still learn. Or you can try to save it, ruin it with some ill-conceived attempt. Then what would we get? Nothing.”

  The mission is protection.

  Sax steps forward to the split bed, towers over Viera. There’s one common rule when dealing with injuries like this, and that is to stop the bleeding. Then restore fluid and blood, if possible. Sax barks the orders. The familiars don’t move, but the machines, programmed to respond to vocal commands, leap to action.

  The bed itself flashes blue beneath Viera for a second, running a scan of the human’s anatomy. Immediately after, a robotic bundle of thin spindly arms, each with a different tool on the end, bursts into activity. Reaching forward with a dozen different tiny appendages to snip and snap and sew until the gash disappears under a cascade of stitches.

  Another mobile rack with various bags of hanging fluids and drugs, shifts near Viera, adjusts itself and aims a syringe. It stabs Viera’s left forearm. The syringe pulls back some of Viera’s blood and, like the bed, flashes blue for a microsecond. The bags shift on the rack, one with a deep crimson coming forward and slotting into the tubing leading down to the syringe. Synthetic blood.

  It’s strange that Cobalt would have the necessary fluids for a new species, but Sax is glad of it all the same. Still other robots tend to Viera’s needs. They dive down from the ceiling to clip away clothing, to measure heartbeats and breath. To make sure that he’s warmed with heated rays from above and below.

  Sax watches with the familiars. Old medicine. On a modern ship or station, Viera would be dunked into a bio-tank and regenerated through its mixture of nutrients, nanobots, and living cells ready to substitute for what her body could not do for itself.

  Cobalt is an old station, and old methods must suffice.

  Malo bursts into the room, finally. Sax notices the warrior is still carrying his sword and, before Malo can make another move, Sax reaches over and tears the weapon from him. Malo barely reacts, his eyes on Viera.

  “Alive?” The warrior asks.

  “Too soon to tell,” Sax replies. “Your attack was good. A clever move.”

  From the horrified way Malo looks at him, it’s clear the warrior can understand Sax, even if he doesn’t quite know how to speak in common tongue.

  But Sax isn’t a much of a talker anyway. They settle in. Stare at the buzzing machines.

  Watch a human’s life creep back from the endless abyss.

  27 The Empress, Alone

  Bas ignores the familiar, brushing by its blue, protesting arms. She says she knows the way to the medical bay. But after the third turn, after we see our first splotch of dropped blood, two familiars come out of the hallway ahead of us and block the path.

  Point us back.

  “Both of you to your respective chambers please,” Dalachite - says. “There’s been an accident, and while cleanup is underway I would appreciate it if everyone kept themselves out of this mess.”

  It isn’t a request.

  The familiars split Bas and I, the pink-gold Oratus giving me one last wave of her claw as our familiars lead us in different directions. We make our way quick back to the rooms I suppose, now, belong to Viera, Malo, and I. Both of theirs, I notice, have glowing red lights above their doorways. Locked, or absent.

 

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