by TJ Berry
She reached out with her invisible energy again, this time going nowhere near the Kilonova. Instead, she headed toward the field of stoneships that were hanging out above the planet.
She wrapped her energy around one of the massive ships – she couldn’t tell them apart – and dragged it toward the Kilonova, trying to heave it toward the craft with as much velocity as she could muster. A second stoneship rocketed out from its spot and also headed for the Kilonova. Jenny opened her eyes for a moment to see Bào standing next to her chair, also in the null. His intention was clear.
Bào’s stoneship came to a stop on the underside of the Reason ship. Jenny swung hers in a steep arc, lifting it high above the Kilonova.
“My gods,” said Ricky.
Jenny slammed her stoneship down so hard that it smashed clear through the Reason ship and kept going. It bounced off the hull of Bào’s stoneship. Both stoneships wobbled around as if dizzy, then flew off toward the closest moon. What was left of the Kilonova floated apathetically in two large chunks, fore and aft, with an immense debris field in between. The ship had scattered into a billion pieces no larger than a coin. They formed an expanding cloud that pelted them with frozen bits of flesh. They stuck to Mary’s exterior cameras, leaving crystals of blood and fluids clinging to the glass.
“By Unamip,” breathed Gary.
Bào rubbed his stitched up finger. Jenny put her head down. She didn’t want any of them to see the way she had to press her lips together to stop them from quivering. Or the stupid tears that were coming down her face as if she was a green recruit on her first battlefield. This was war, she reminded herself. Sometimes you had to kill people to save people. She’d dropped bombs on cities larger than this and blown up ships with larger crews. But this time, it had stopped feeling like survival and started feeling like murder. Gary rested his hand on her shoulder and she damn near took it off.
“Mary, get in there and pick up any survivors,” she snapped, shaking Gary loose. Comfort in wartime was a luxury that other people were afforded.
There weren’t many living people among the wreckage, but there were lots of body parts. She saw feet still laced into boots and whole bodies frozen stiff in climbing positions, as if they’d tried to claw their way back onto the broken ship. Jenny took Mary off autopilot and navigated through them herself. This was what she did after a battle; forced herself to stare at the aftermath so she would remember the consequences the next time a hard choice came her way.
There were a few people left in the two large pieces of the Kilonova. Jenny could see them at the windows, watching the Stagecoach Mary and the small Reason ships pick their way through the wreckage.
“We can hold at least fifty for each trip to the surface,” said Jenny. “Gary, get us a landing area on the surface for at least a few dozen small ships.”
Findae snorted and Jenny turned her chair to face him.
“Is there a problem?” she asked the king of the unicorns, who was always acting like a gigantic pain in the ass.
“You’re going to inundate our settlement with humans who want to see our Bala enslaved again,” he replied. “Not to mention this invasion that Boges was going on about.”
“We’re going to rescue survivors and get them out of the freezing vacuum of space and then we’ll worry about the sanctity of your precious baby civilization,” she said. “Lock them all up when they land for all I care, but I don’t let people die in openspace.”
Findae opened his mouth to say something, but Gary interrupted. “We’re going to give them a chance,” he said firmly.
“Fine,” said Findae with a growl. “But you are responsible for what happens to the Bala from here on out.”
“Gladly,” said Gary.
Jenny’s back twinged and she suddenly felt all of the burns, bruises, and lacerations screaming for attention.
“Gravity off, Mary,” she said. Before anyone could protest, the gravity eased and everyone floated weightless in the cockpit.
Jenny thought there was nothing so delightful as watching the king of the unicorns flail through the air.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Your World, Your Rules
In the end they were able to rescue over two thousand people from the remains of the FTL Kilonova. Bào went to the cargo hold and helped the survivors on board, handing off the wounded to Ricky, who seemed to have picked up some moderately usable first aid skills while pretending to be a doctor. She flirted with him every chance she got, which delighted Bào immensely.
They’d also helped wrap up and dispose of the dead people floating around the Stagecoach Mary’s hold. Captain Jenny gave them every fitted sheet in storage on her ship to wrap them in because, as she put it, “Fuck fitted sheets.”
No one seemed to know quite what to do about the alleged parasite in Jenny’s brain. With no Sisters in the survivors there was no one to ask for clarification. Everyone except Gary steered clear of touching her but she seemed to be no threat to anyone. And she was so useful in a crisis that they eventually forgot about her “invader.”
When every available space on the Stagecoach Mary was filled with living humans, Jenny followed Gary’s directions and took them out of orbit. She set her ship down in a field near a quaint little village dotted with pink log cabins crafted in intricate dwarven designs. On the far side of the village, a small mountain rose out of the ground, topped by a fortress that still looked like it was in the process of being constructed.
The village had been sliced in two by the Kilonova’s laser attack.There was now a burnt swath cutting across it as wide as a Reason highway. The Bala were still putting out fires and pulling villagers out of burning structures. Wounded creatures were being dragged, flown, and magicked to a few larger buildings on the outskirts of the settlement.
The cargo hold opened and Captain Jenny wheeled down the ramp first. The Bala stopped to watch her emerge. Findae and Gary came next, walking side by side but not speaking or looking at each other.
Bào stood at the top of the ramp and peered over the edge. It was steeper than Jenny had made it seem when she rolled down at top speed. Ricky reached over and took Bào’s arm, as if she was escorting him to a dance.
“Come on, kid,” she smiled, walking him down. The rest of the humans followed them out, milling around close to the ship, outnumbered ten to one by the Bala.
Bào had advised them to remove as much of their Reason uniforms as they could, so most of them stood around in their crimson trousers and white undershirts. Jackets, hats, and other insignia had disappeared. They were still clearly human, but at least they weren’t reminding everyone on the planet about their part in the genocide.
Captain Jenny seemed to be having trouble rolling her wheelchair through the uncut grass. She put herself between the Bala and the ragtag group of human refugees. She spoke so that everyone gathered could hear her.
“Gary Cobalt and his father have given us permission to land, but we recognize that this is your world and your rules. We’re here only by the grace of your hospitality and no one here expects to be treated as anything other than a war criminal,” she said.
It was clear from the muted protests behind her that not every human in the group agreed with Captain Jenny’s assessment of the situation. Luckily, she’d confiscated everyone’s service weapons on the Stagecoach Mary as a prerequisite for being allowed on board.
A centaur galloped to the forefront of the Bala.
“Do you see what they did our town?” she flicked her head to point to the destructive path that cut through the village. “Just as Findae predicted, they’re still trying to kill us.”
“That attack was from the Sisters of the Supersymmetrical Axion,” said Gary. “They took control of the Reason ship and turned the weapon on us. They have been stopped.”
“Why would the Sisters turn on us?” asked the centaur. Bào recognized her from the vicious martial arts brawls that had been broadcast throughout the Reason. She was a champion figh
ter, beloved by humans and Bala alike. Horm was her name.
“We don’t know for certain.” said Gary.
“They were on about their ‘service to the greater future’ bullshit,” said Ricky.
A few Bala nodded. The Sisters’ ways were infuriatingly obtuse. Their sect alone could have turned the tide of the war with the humans at any time, yet they refused to openly participate. Instead, they operated as a shadowy and unpredictable force for both good and evil. Horm put her palm skyward in an exceedingly rude centaur gesture. “The Sisters can bite my ass,” she said.
Ricky grinned and squeeze Bào’s hand. “I like it here,” she whispered into his ear. His arms prickled.
“Me too,” said Bào. “I hope they let us stay.”
“Oh they’ll let us stay,” said Ricky. “Just let me handle it.”
“Were there any casualties?” Gary asked an angel in the group.
“Three dead, fifteen injured. Most had already left the village by the time the laser hit,” the angel replied. “We found a group of Bala living in a forest cave. It’s deep underground – no weapon in orbit could penetrate that far.”
“Are those the people who had disappeared?” asked Gary.
“Yes. Though the Sisters who captured them were long gone,” said the angel. “We’re still searching. The addition of the necromancers will speed that search considerably.”
Bào hadn’t seen a full angel in so long, he had trouble not staring. This one had hair the color of spun gold. His skin seemed to sparkle in the sun. Bào wanted to touch any part of him to see if it was real, but that was rude beyond belief.
“The Reason ship has been destroyed. Tell those in the forest that they can return,” said Gary. The angel nodded, spread his wings, and took off toward the west. Bào couldn’t tear his eyes away until the angel was a dot in the pink sky.
“I love your planet,” said Ricky to the assembled Bala. “What do you call it?”
“We haven’t quite settled on a name yet,” said Gary. “It’s complicated.”
“There’s nothing complicated about naming a planet,” announced Ricky. Her tone had shifted. She now sounded for all the universe like she was hosting a game show. “We’ll have a contest! Winner gets to name the planet.”
Gary turned to the rest of the Bala. “There are other survivors up in orbit. I need volunteers to help collect them.”
“We don’t want them here,” said Horm.
Everyone else ignored Gary. “I want to name the planet,” said a neofelis cat with kittens spilling out of her arms.
“Me too, I have a good idea for a planet name,” said a yeti, pushing his way to the front of the group. More Bala followed him, shouting their suggestions.
“So many contestants,” cried Ricky, nudging Bào with a secretive grin. “All right. Let’s start right now.
Gary put a hand on her shoulder. “We’re dealing with the human survivors right now. The contest can wait,” he said.
The Bala erupted in a chorus of groans and protests.
Ricky plucked Gary’s hand off her shoulder and held it away from her. “Gary Cobalt, I promise you’re going to want me to run this game. It’ll take less than five minutes. Do you trust me?” she asked.
“Absolutely not,” said Gary.
“That’s fine, you’ll see,” she said, dropping his arm. “Everyone gather around,” she said, projecting her voice above all of the Bala grumbling. “For every live human you retrieve from orbit and bring safely planetside, you get one entry into the planet naming drawing. Unlimited chances, and yes, you can work together in groups and everyone in the group gets their own entry. When all of the humans have been rescued, we’ll pull one name from all of the entries.”
Gary erupted in a belly laugh so loud that the neofelis kittens started to cry. He bent over, chuckling for a solid minute. When he finally looked up, his face was streaked with tears of laughter.
“Undignified,” said Findae.
“Brilliant,” said Gary. He stepped forward and grabbed Ricky in a tight embrace. “You’re now officially the head of the Human Rescue and Planet Naming committees. Welcome to your new home.”
Findae snorted in disgust. He lifted his head toward a blemmye hovering near the edge of the crowd.
“You there, blemmye,” he called. “You started all of this with your hideous song.” He cantered toward the blemmye, who lumbered off surprisingly fast.
A few of the Bala followed them, muttering and swearing about the humans in their midst. The rest remained, waiting for Ricky to speak.
“Told you,” Ricky whispered to Bào, who was amazed at her ability to turn a crowd to her will. She would make a great leader if she weren’t so preoccupied with earning cash.
Jenny shoved her chair over to them. “Hey,” she said, interrupting the excitement that was rising throughout the crowd. “Anyone seen my wife? Cute little dryad, about twice my height, answers to the name of Kaila.”
“I know your wife. She lives in the forest,” said an angel. “I’ll have someone go get Kaila,” said Gary. She’ll be overjoyed to see you.
“I told her I’d get here,” said Captain Jenny, looking exhausted. She tilted her head, listening.
“Do you have any protein powder on your ship?” Horm asked Captain Jenny.
“I have entire hold full of food,” said Jenny. “Have at it. The village can take everything from my ship.”
“Thank the gods, I can finally get my carb ratios right,” said the centaur.
“What’s been happening on this season of Dungeons and Diamonds?” asked the yeti. “Last I saw, Zizzurath was about to ask Paladryl to marry him.”
“Do you have any condoms?” asked the neofelis cat.
The Bala were exceedingly creative in ways they came up with to rescue the humans. Besides the stoneships, and the hippogriffmermaid combination from Copernica Citadel, they also came up with pairs of angels (who didn’t need to breathe) and phoenixes (to keep them from freezing), and a sixteen-pixie team that turned out to be excellent at finding people trapped in the wreckage and handing them off to the ships.
Each human who arrived on the planet was briefed by Gary and Captain Jenny on how to behave on their new world. Nearly everyone agreed immediately. The prospect of dying in orbit was enough to scare consideration into anyone.
An eager kappa provided an empty rain barrel for the voting. As each rescue party came back with a live human, Ricky handed them slips torn from a prescription pad she’d found in her jacket pocket. With the only pen on the entire planet, each Bala wrote their name carefully on the paper and tossed it into the barrel. Bào swirled them around, mixing the slips.
A screech in the distance froze a few of the Bala in their tracks. A dryad ran through the grass, which was incredible, as dryads usually took days to cover that much ground. This dryad took a running leap at Captain Jenny and landed directly in her lap.
Captain Jenny gasped.
“Oh gods you’re heavy. Must be good water on this planet,” she said.
“It’s sour,” said the dryad, leaning down to kiss Captain Jenny. Both of them ceased complaining.
“Splinters,” warned Gary.
Neither of them stopped. Ricky collected the last of the planet name suggestions. “Everyone gather round, we’re about to find out where we live,” she called. The Bala milled around, buzzing with energy. They whispered their best suggestions to each other in various degrees of confidence.
Ricky gave the barrel to the two juvenile elves, who rolled it between them exuberantly as the crowd gathered. Gary and Findae came to stand near Ricky to lend authority to the event, though Findae was still skeptical.
“This is an inane way to name a planet,” said Findae, snorting his displeasure as usual. Bào was starting to think this great unicorn king was all bluster and no bite.
Ricky fished around in the barrel. As she leaned down, she gave Bào a wink. She pulled a paper out of the barrel and unfolded it. She showed i
t to Bào with a secret smile.
Planet McPlanetface.
In one fluid motion, she pivoted toward the crowd, tucked the paper into her waistband and pulled a different folded sheet. With a flourish, she held it above her head for all to see.
“Welcome to planet… Anjali.”
Findae dragged a hoof across the dirt and walked away from the others. The other Bala cheered and clapped. The crowd chattered happily. Bào leaned over to Ricky.
“You cheated,” he whispered, simultaneously horrified and amused.
“I asked Gary what he wanted to name the planet. You never leave the winner to chance,” she said.
“You are incredible,” said Bào.
“Thank you,” said Ricky.
Jenny wheeled over to them and the unicorns as the Bala celebrated their new home.
“I think we have one last thing to do,” she said, nudging Gary with her footrest. “What we talked about on the way here.”
Gary stepped forward until he was in front of the Bala.
“There’s one last thing we need to do tonight,” he called out to the crowd. “Many of you have expressed concerns about bringing people into our settlement and those concerns are valid. We are going to ensure that every human brought to live on Anjali will not harm our Bala. To that end, we are going to hold investigations and trials for every person who wishes to join us. Starting with this one.”
Gary turned to Captain Jenny, stared out at the Bala with an unreadable expression. The Bala were silent. Gary continued.
“Captain Geneva Waimarie Perata, you are under arrest for war crimes against innumerable Bala individuals and you will be detained until the extent of the damage is determined and an appropriate consequence is determined.”
A few of the Bala cheered. Most stood in upset and uncomfortable silence. Jenny nodded in agreement and held out her crossed wrists. The Bala looked at each other awkwardly. There were no handcuffs on their world.
