Off Planet

by Aileen Erin

  Roan took out a small case from his pocket. He carefully opened the lid, pulled out the fingernail-size device inside, and flipped it on. Now we could safely talk. The tiny piece of tech would disrupt all video and sound recording that SpaceTech mandated for every public transportation vehicle by adding static to both feeds so that our faces were now blurred and anything we said would come out as unintelligible hissing.

  “Are you okay?” Roan said, breaking the silence.

  My breath shook as I released the air I’d been holding in. “That was too close.”

  Roan pulled me into his chest, squeezing me tight. “It was my fault. I shouldn’t have rushed through the light. And I really shouldn’t have climbed the light pole. My flirting almost got us killed, and I’m so fucking sorry. I just… That was so iced. Seriously, Maité. SpaceTech Police Force never does that. They never stop people on the street. They have bigger problems and they—”

  “I know.” That wasn’t the point. That wasn’t why I was freaking out. “How much longer do you think I can keep hiding? Really. I mean, let’s be honest here. It’s only a matter of time before I do something wrong or someone notices. I can’t change what I am. I’m terrified that—”

  Roan pulled away and grabbed my face. “You won’t get caught.”

  “You don’t know that.”

  There was every chance that sooner or later, someone would catch me. Every couple of months SpaceTech would remind the world who my mother and I were. My mother had altered her appearance some, and the aging they’d done on my toddler picture wasn’t totally accurate. It’s the only reason no one had turned us in yet. Someday someone would look at me, and they wouldn’t see Maité Martinez.

  They’d see Amihanna di Aetes. Daughter of Rysden di Aetes, the head of the Aunare military and second to the Aunare King.

  And when that happened, there would be no more running from my fate.

  Chapter Three

  I’d never been happier to be home as I was that night. Roan had paid the exorbitant cab fare and then left on foot for Starlite as soon as I’d entered the apartment building. He’d asked me to join him, but the close call with the cop was almost more than I could handle. All I wanted to do was hide in my darkened room for the next day or ten. But as I approached the front door of our apartment, voices seeped into the cement-lined hallway.

  For a second, I dismissed them, but Mom’s voice rose above a deeper one, and I stopped walking.

  We rarely had anyone over at all and never at this hour. Something was going on, and it couldn’t be good.

  I tiptoed the rest of the way, pressing my ear to the door.

  “I tried to contact you. I really did.” Mom’s voice was muffled, but I could make out her words. “But how could I know if he’d come for Maité after all these years?”

  It felt like something slithered around my chest and tightened. Someone had come for me. But who?

  Between the next three heartbeats, a few scenarios ran through my mind.

  One. The cop from earlier had sent another officer to bring me in, but STPF didn’t move fast, especially for an idiotic ticket.

  Two. SpaceTech had found us. Two of Earth’s Most Wanted. But if that were true, then there would be fighting and screaming and the sounds of my mother begging for them to leave me alone.

  Then the third idea came, and I took a big breath.

  There was only one other possibility. They were here. The Aunare were here. I’d stopped dreaming years ago that my father or the Aunare would show up to rescue us. I wasn’t sure what this meant except that my life was about to change in a huge way.

  The fluttering in my stomach started small and crescendoed into thousands of flying butterflies. I wasn’t sure if it was excitement or nerves, but specifics didn’t matter.

  Better face this now.

  I slid my backpack off my shoulders and unlocked the door.

  I expected to see an Aunare person sitting in my living room, but I was wrong. The man sitting in the metal folding chair I’d painstakingly painted my favorite rich blue-green shouldn’t be here. He shouldn’t be relaxing, his feet on our crates-and-plywood coffee table like he was chatting with an old friend. Not just because it was late and he was a stranger. But because he was SpaceTech.

  I stepped inside the apartment, closing the door softly behind me. My mother was sitting on the worn-in couch, leaning toward the man, and the look in her eyes said she was hopeful. Excited. Happy. But he was SpaceTech. His blond hair cut painfully close to his head and his rod-straight posture as he sat up, dropping his feet from the plywood, and watched me were a dead giveaway. SpaceTech guys all had the same look. Like it was beaten into them when they joined the corrupt company. But there was something different about him.

  He wasn’t wearing the navy-and-silver dress uniform of an officer or even a navy-and-gray one of a low-level SpaceTech grunt—instead just a plain white T-shirt and jeans with a little rip in one knee—but I knew what he was. Except he wasn’t arresting me. And he wasn’t disgusted, hateful, violent like other humans when faced with a halfer.

  “It’s you,” he said, and if I wasn’t mistaken, there was more than a touch of awe in his voice.

  His gaze traveled over every inch of me as if he were making sure I was here, real, and unharmed. He might as well have been touching me for all the weight it carried. And the worst thing—as he grinned, something in me softened.

  This was so iced. I couldn’t actually be attracted to a SpaceTech officer. Sure he wasn’t much older than me—maybe a year or two at most—but he was SpaceTech. They were the worst.

  His light blue eyes sparkled as he slowly stood. “You’re here.”

  “Yeah.” I let the bag slip from my fingers, thudding onto the floor. I needed my hands free in case I had to fight. “But you really don’t have to cry about it.”

  “Maité,” Mom said, but I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the guy in our living room.

  That might have been out of line, but he was making me uncomfortable. Who was he? What was his story? And why was he happy to see us?

  “Maité.” Mom’s voice was firmer. Her eyes were glassy, her hands clasped at her chest, and her face screamed that every hope and dream that she’d had for the last twelve years were coming true. We were saved.

  But I wasn’t that naïve. “Where’s my father?”

  Mom and the stranger shared a long look, and I understood completely. “He sent some SpaceTech double agent douche instead of coming himself? Classy.”

  The stranger’s laugh, a deep rolling sound, lit a flame deep inside me. One I instantly wanted to snuff out. How could I be attracted to a SpaceTech officer? It was absurd.

  I shoved that feeling down, and a new one came bubbling to the surface. Anger that my father wasn’t here.

  I knew I was being unreasonable. Of course he couldn’t come here himself. He was an important Aunare. He was the enemy on this planet. If he was caught, it’d be bad for everyone.

  But that didn’t stop me from being hurt that my father hadn’t come. And when the disappointment finally hit me, it was too much. Everything that happened today piled up to one big emotional shitshow. The implant in my finger driving me crazy. When I’d moved too fast in front of Hillary. Nearly getting caught by the cops. And now this guy was here?

  My breath started coming in bigger and heavier gasps. My emotions boiled over, and my skin started to glow.

  It wasn’t like a full-Aunare glow—the one that showed power and lit up Aunare skin with tattoos showing their paths in life. My skin hadn’t ever done that. I wasn’t sure why, but it was probably better that it hadn’t. This minor glow was alien enough that I resented it. It was a giveaway I couldn’t conceal or control. I didn’t always hate what I was, but right then, right there, I did. I never liked to show myself in front of anyone but Roan, my mother, and Jorge. This guy might not be turning us in, but he was still a stranger.

  “What’s going on here?” I needed some answers.
<
br />   “This is Declan. He’s a friend.”

  “He’s SpaceTech.” I spit the word out with bitterness even though I knew that this particular officer wasn’t a threat. I knew that he was somehow connected to the Aunare and maybe even my father in some way. But it still didn’t make any sense to me. SpaceTech officers weren’t to be trusted. Full stop.

  “I am SpaceTech,” he said. “But I’m also a friend.”

  “That’s an oxymoron if I ever heard one.” I took a breath, trying to calm down. To stop the glow. To find some kind of normal to hang on to while my world was upended. “Do we need to run? Are they coming?”

  “No.” My mom stepped toward me, and I stepped back, holding out a hand to stop her from coming any closer.

  I wasn’t sure what the glow was about. It didn’t happen often, but when it did, it scared me. There hadn’t exactly been any Aunare I could ask about what it meant. I didn’t trust what SpaceTech said completely, but apparently, Aunare were dangerous when glowing.

  “I know I need to find out what’s happening here, but I need a second to calm down. Clearly.” I headed down the hall to my room.

  “You don’t have to hide what you are from Declan. I promise,” Mom said, but she didn’t come after me.

  I closed my door to shut out the sound of their whispers. Air. I needed air. Even if it was lung-coating, polluted, smoggy air.

  I tucked my hands in my sleeves, pulled the hood low over my face, and went out the window. I sat on the fire escape and gave myself a second to breathe. Tonight had gone from messed up to completely bizarre. The Aunare had sent a SpaceTech guy to get us. I’d never seen that coming, not in a million years. As far as I could tell, the Aunare hated SpaceTech as much as SpaceTech hated them. Although the Aunare had a much better reason for their animosity.

  I threaded my legs through the rungs in the railing and leaned my forehead against the cool metal. From fifteen stories up, the people on the street looked like tiny toys. Cars and pods rushed this way and that. People wove through each other on their way home or to a party or a late shift at work. I was sure some of the Crew were down there patrolling. I was restless enough to join them, but I had to deal with this guy—Declan—and whatever it was that he wanted.

  Everything came at a price. Even the Crew had strings. I just had to figure out what strings Declan came with.

  Slowly, the glow faded from my skin, and I started to feel a little less anxious. I sat there, watching the movement and lights from the city below me, and for a few minutes, I could just be. But then my bedroom door opened and softly shut, signaling the end of my solitude. Someone walked through my room, climbed out my window, and settled down beside me with his back against the railing

  I glanced over. Declan. “My mom sent you to calm me down? Probably smart. Of her. Not you.” I rested my head on the railing again. “She knows better than to come after me. You should’ve definitely bowed out.”

  “Nah. I’m not one to back down from a challenge, and I figured this was a chance to start the catching-up portion of our conversation.”

  “Catching-up?” I studied his face again, and I definitely didn’t recognize him. “To catch-up implies we have a history, and I’ve never seen you before.”

  The sounds from the street below were softer from up here. We were far above even the pod lines. The wind whipped around the buildings, and the bots were tiny black dots buzzing around as they tracked movement on the streets.

  “We do have a history. But your mom told me about what happened, so it’s okay that you don’t remember me.” He grinned. The way he was looking at me like I was a long-lost friend, was actually nice. I just wasn’t sure why he seemed to feel like that about me. If I knew him, it was before Albuquerque. At least nine years since we’d had any sort of friendship, and I’d been a child.

  Maybe I was reading him wrong. I didn’t think so, but maybe. “You’re happy to see me?”

  “Yes.” His answer was so instantaneous and vehement that I knew he was telling the truth.

  This wasn’t what I pictured happening when a SpaceTech officer found me, but apparently, Declan was a different kind of SpaceTech officer.

  But why? Who was he? What was his story? I had questions, and I wondered if he was going to answer any of them. I assumed not, but it wouldn’t hurt to ask. “Why’re you happy to see me? You’re SpaceTech. It doesn’t make sense.” If the Aunare had some allies in SpaceTech, why wait until now to use them?

  “I’m not just SpaceTech, so it makes perfect sense.” Declan grinned bigger if that was even possible. “I’m immensely happy and relieved and thankful because you’re alive and healthy and God—” The grin faded as he looked away, and I missed it. “I imagined all kinds of things over the years. All the things that could’ve happened to you… I don’t have to worry anymore. That’s a really good feeling.”

  “Sorry.” Some strange guy spent thirteen years worried about me? It was kind of weird.

  “Don’t be. Rysden—your dad—”

  I huffed. “I know who he is.” I might not have seen him since I was six, but I knew his name well enough.

  “Of course you do. Stupid. Sorry. I’m just nervous. I finally found you, and it’s like a weight that I’ve been carrying for thirteen years has finally eased. This nightmare is almost over, and fuck if I’m not excited right now and making a total ass of myself.”

  The click happened. Right then. Just like it had with Roan years ago. Call it intuition or a gut feeling, but he was being truthful. I didn’t think he could fake that rambling admission.

  “You might be handsome—”

  “That’s nice to hear.” The megawatt smile was back.

  “But I honestly don’t think I know you. I don’t remember anyone named Declan from my past.”

  “You’re wrong.” He shrugged. “Or wrongish. I lived next door to you a long time ago.”

  “How long ago? We’ve been in Albuquerque for nine years.”

  Before then we never stayed in one place long enough to make friends. Some people made an impression along the way, but most of those early years we spent running from one place to the next were a blur. It didn’t help that I’d been so young, too.

  “It’s been four thousand, seven hundred, and thirty-two days since I last saw you.”

  An exact count in days? That wasn’t what I expected. I did some quick math in my head. “Before Liberation Week? You knew me from back then?”

  “Exactly.”

  “And you’re old enough to remember me?” He didn’t look that much older than me. A few years maybe.

  “Calling me handsome and young? Careful. You’re going to do all kinds of things to my ego.” He tilted his head as he watched me as if trying to get a read on me.

  I just stared at him for a minute. My gut said to trust him, but I still wasn’t sure what to make of him. He thought he knew me, but he didn’t really. I was barely a person at six.

  “I was ten when you were born,” he said, finally. “That makes me thirty now. And you’re turning twenty in a couple months.”

  He was right about my birthday, but he could’ve learned that from Space Tech records.

  “So, yeah, I remember you, but I don’t take it personally that you don’t remember me. You were just a kid when everything went to shit. Plus, your mom helped those memories fade.”

  “Right.”

  My mother had my memory wiped when we first started running. I was having a hard time not speaking in Aunare, and she said I kept talking about things that would get us caught. So she took me to a doctor to help me forget that part of my life.

  I wasn’t sure how to feel right then. It was weird that someone besides Mom, Roan, and Jorge knew who I was, especially when I didn’t really know him.

  I stared out at the skyline, not wanting to hold his gaze anymore, but I could feel his eyes on me. Watching me. Waiting for me to ask another question.

  I had to get up the nerve to talk about the one thing I didn’t
want to talk about. After a minute of quiet, I finally asked him. “My father sent you?”

  “Among others. There are a lot of people looking for you.”

  So it wasn’t just my father. I shoved down the disappointment and asked another scary question. “SpaceTech? But you’re not going to turn us in.”

  “Exactly,” he said. “SpaceTech is looking for you, but there’s not a chance in hell I’d ever turn you in.”

  I gripped the railing a little tighter to keep from running. It was one thing to assume SpaceTech was still after me and another thing to have confirmation.

  “But that’s not who I meant,” he continued.

  “Who? Besides my father and SpaceTech, who would care?”

  “It’s a long story, and I’m not sure now is the time.”

  No. That wasn’t how this was going to go. “If there’s someone after me, then I should know about it. Now.”

  “He’s not after you. Not like you mean. He’s not a danger to you.” His cheeks turned the slightest bit rosy. Good. He should be embarrassed by all his rambling, especially if he wasn’t going to spill.

  “Now I’m really confused.”

  “I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  “I guess not.” Because now I wanted to know, and that he wouldn’t tell me was annoying. But there was one question that was possibly more important.

  “I noticed your room is a painted deep blue-green, same as that chair.”

  That was an odd thing to bring up. “Yeah. It’s my favorite color.”

  He gave me a funny look, one I didn’t know how to interpret. “It doesn’t remind you of anything? Anybody?”

  “No. I just like it. Makes me feel calm.” I shrugged. “So where is he?”

  “Your father?”

  Oh my God. Was he trying to annoy me? If he wasn’t going to tell me who this other person was that was looking for me, then he needed to drop it. “Yes. My father.”