by AJ Super
A STAR REBORN
©2021 ANGELA SUPER
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Contents
Also in the Series
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Epilogue
Thank you for reading A Star Reborn
More In Sci-Fi
ABOUT AJ Super
French Glossary
Also in the Series
EREBUS DAWNING
A STAR REBORN
QUEEN OF THE BLACK
Dedicated to my two wonderful grandfathers: Grandpa Glen, who taught me kindness is the strongest weapon, and Grandpa George, who taught me what it was to fight.
Acknowledgments
There are so many people who make a book a reality. I want to thank all of those people, but specifically, Rhett, Steve, and Katrina. You have been amazing! I also want to thank my friends and family, both the in-laws, the outlaws, and the immediately adjacent; y’all know who you are. I wouldn’t be doing this without your constant support. And as always, the hubster—I love you.
1
The shuttle slewed around a spinning piece of detritus floating in the junkyard. Nyx placed a hand on the console in front of her to brace herself and swore under her breath. “Putain. Raphael, could you be more careful?”
The Lead Navigation Specialist of the Thanatos glanced at Nyx as he dodged the free-floating engine of a cruiser-class spaceship. “It’s either be more careful or look more like a piece of space trash.”
Nyx ran a hand over her cheek. The faded tattoo grazed her white skin in jagged webs across her wrist and up her arm, ghosting over her face. The AI code in her blood was changing her appearance. The tattoo wasn’t the dark black of her AI siblings. Yet. In time, she would be branded just like the rest of the Seven Stars. After all, she was one of them now, ever since Erebus woke up the AI code dormant in her blood.
Nyx gripped the safety straps over her shoulders as she sat heavy in the grey co-pilot’s chair. “Space trash. We are space trash,” she whispered. She leaned her head back with her eyes closed, bobbed sable hair pulled behind her ears. She rubbed her ring finger where her engagement ring to Kai used to rest, then quickly pulled on her spacesuit gloves. If only he had given her his resources, this would be a wholly different mission. The tension in her shoulders made her head ache.
Raphael dropped them around another large piece of space dreck that yawed wildly, and Nyx put her hand to her tattoo again. They were going to float before they even… floated. She cracked a wry smile and leaned into her tattooed cheek. The unfocused grey hologram that marked her as one of the Seven—an AI born human. Not like her siblings, who needed to download themselves into Ship Interface Androids—Sias—to interact with the world, to be truly alive. Nyx had inherited her code from her mother, who was the Star of Nyx before her. “Just get us through this defunct shipyard and to the Battle Station Andraste safely, Raphael.”
Raphael nodded and steered around another floating obstacle, making Nyx’s heart drop. Getting to where the Andraste hid quietly amidst the detritus really was going to kill Nyx and her small rescue operation. She exhaled hard. Putain de Kai. All she wanted was for the Medusa to crack a hole big enough in the Andraste’s shield for the Thanatos’ shuttle to get through. But, no. Putain de Kai didn’t want to risk his ship or crew on a mission that didn’t have much intel… Including whether or not the Battle Station had working weapons. Nyx was pretty sure it didn’t, but it was only a supposition. She had no real proof. Just rumors and hearsay.
The comm crackled on and a narrow-wave flickered on Nyx’s console screen.
“You didn’t need to sneak off the ship.” First Officer Grace Sarama shook her loose curls and yawned, her image on the view-screen wavering as they sailed closer to the signal blocker the Andraste emitted. “We all understand that this is something you need to do.”
Nyx frowned. She knew… but… “So. Quel est le problème?”
“The problem is that you took your ExO, Head Security Officer, Head Navigator, and Head Engineer with you,” the Black woman chastised Nyx in a thick Queen’s speech accent. “You don’t even trust Malcam… And you know how much I hate being in charge, too.”
“I’m sorry, Sarama.” Nyx sighed. “I couldn’t have you stop me because you dislike power. And I needed a good crew to do this.” She frowned. Despite the fact that Malcam killed her father and Red was forever loyal to him, they were still good crew members, and more than competent pirates.
“I miss Erebus as much as you. She was good. Douce. At least she still talks to you occasionally.” Sarama’s deep eyes softened.
The day Nyx left Erebus and Queen Phoebe, her sisters, on La Terre, the North American Union and the African Continental Governance enacted a quiet coup. The NAU and ACG took the Queen of the Protectorate, also known as the Star of Phoebe, and Nyx’s other AI sister, the Star of Erebus as prisoners. With Phoebe’s help, she had es
caped so she couldn’t be identified as Nyx Marcus, daughter of the late Xaoc and Nue Marcus, pirate princess, and the ultimate of the Seven Stars, then held by the NAU and ACG in the name of the new Protectorate. But it had made her uneasy. She didn’t like leaving her sisters behind.
Sarama stared at her over the narrow-wave. “I still don’t understand why la reine though. She nearly had us all killed. I understand Erebus’ avatar, but not son Altesse.”
The coup took Erebus’ Sia avatar as well as Queen Phoebe, and while Erebus’ main consciousness was safe on the Thanatos, Erebus had taken losing her Sia extraordinarily badly.
“I can’t leave either of them behind, Sarama,” Nyx said haltingly. “Phoebe’s a Star, too. She’s family.” The Star of Phoebe, the god of intellect and prophecy, the god of war, she was important as the queen. She was also dangerous. And she was family. Nyx couldn’t abandon her, despite her nefarious personality.
Sarama’s narrow-wave jumped with static.
“I’m going to lose you.” Nyx grimaced. In the months that she had been looking for Phoebe and Erebus without her crew’s knowledge, she hadn’t expected them to completely jump on board with this plan to rescue them. Especially not the queen, since she had taken the Thanatos and held the crew prisoner when she had wanted Erebus for her plans to stop the North American Union and the African Continental Governance from taking over the Protectorate.
“Be safe, mon capitaine,” Sarama drawled in her Queen’s Speech accent.
Nyx nodded and ended the wave. She gripped her shoulder straps, white hands sticky with sweat. If only Queen Phoebe had told her what she had planned from the start, what she needed to do. The crew of the Thanatos may have helped.
Nyx pressed her lips together. Then again, maybe they wouldn’t have. Erebus was a dangerous weapon when all was said and done. Her consciousness spread quickly and easily into any technology she chose to infect, and her control was absolute. Since Erebus used Nyx’s blood to essentially jumpstart the AI-code hidden in Nyx, it meant that Nyx could control Erebus and Erebus’ code as well. The two of them were formidable.
“I don’t see any waves,” Erebus whispered through the comm disk behind Nyx’s ear. “I can’t ride onto the ship.”
Ever since Erebus had lost her tattooed avatar, she had been riding in the Thanatos as an incorporeal consciousness, talking only to Nyx, and rarely at that. She was scattered and scared, identity-less without her primary Sia unit to communicate as a human—her chosen identity.
Nyx put a hand to the light grey mark breaking down her cheek and neck, ending on the back of her left hand. What would Erebus think of her new AI identifying tattoos slowly forming like tiger’s claws across her body?
“I told you before we left,” Nyx said. “You won’t be able to access that ship until we get on it and plant a signal booster. You’ll have to access its mainframe in engineering with Red and Falak’s help.”
“I don’t like it,” Erebus whispered across the comms.
“I know. But it’s expected.”
“I want out of this black box. I want my Sia back. The people who took me keep pulling me into my avatar. But where they’re keeping it is no better than being a voice in your ear. The darkness swallows me whole. And the waves are silent. There is nothing but cold and metal.”
“Erebus, we’ll find you…” It was the most Erebus had ever said about where her Sia was being held, or what was happening to her through the avatar. Nyx gripped the armrests of her copilot’s chair. It sent a chill through her heart.
Raphael cleared his throat. “Plan is to stop in about a hundred meters. I’ll turn about there and open the back hatch. You all are going to need to finish suiting up and be ready in five,” he rumbled in one of the many thick Latin American Continental Federation accents. The mission was for the four of them to infiltrate the Andraste quietly and find Phoebe and Erebus’ Sia, take down the security and shields, have Raphael land the shuttle in one of the bays, and leave quickly. In and out.
Raphael flipped his black ponytail over his shoulder and glanced behind him at the jittery, carob-eyed engineer shifting in his white space suit. “And you better bring him back alive.”
“I wouldn’t have even brought Falak with us if I didn’t need his engineering talents to shut down the security and shields so you can come in and be our ride out once we get Phoebe and Erebus.” Nyx smiled at Raphael and looked over her shoulder. “Don’t worry, your boyfriend will be safe with Red.”
The petite muscular woman with copper hair looked up at the mention of her name. She sat relaxed in the bank of seats lining the side of the shuttle, her ice-blue eyes alert. Malcam hulked in the seat next to her, hands hanging onto the harness around his shoulders loosely, with a small grin on his face.
Nyx unbuckled herself and grabbed her EVA helmet off the bench behind her co-pilot’s seat.
Of course, getting through the shield was the first obstacle, and extra vehicular activity and liberal use of handheld energy weapons was the only way to get to the Battle Station through the ship’s energy shield without anyone noticing anything other than a small fluctuation in power. They couldn’t afford to shoot their way through without bringing a lot of attention to their entrance. If they had more people, a small army or the Medusa and the Thanatos, they may have stood a chance shooting their way in. But they couldn’t do that now.
Red turned to Falak and helped him pull his helmet over his spiked head. Nyx slid her helmet on, securing it at the collar of her white suit. She was thankful the gloves allowed such dexterity in her fingers. Historically, spacesuits were wide and cumbersome, but these were nearly fitted to the bodies of the individuals wearing them. The newly purchased helmets were small bulbs of clear, unbreakable plasteen shot with nanotech, allowing for a voice-activated heads-up display of anything from Nyx’s companions’ health stats, to the star charts for the system they were in, to what little they had of the layout of the Battle Station Andraste.
“Ready?” Raphael rolled over the comm.
Nyx lifted her hand and looked at the three other helmeted humans. She lowered her hand and turned to the back of the shuttle. “Close up the cockpit and open the back hatch, Hernandez.”
“Closing cockpit doors. Remember what I said, Cap.”
“On my life, Raphael. On my life.” Nyx smiled.
Heavy metal doors slid shut between the cockpit and the back of the shuttle.
“Love you, Falak,” Raphael’s voice boomed over the comm.
The EVA-suited Falak stiffened, and his face turned as red as his hair. “Do you need to say that so publicly?” he whispered.
“Always,” his boyfriend tittered.
The back of the shuttle cracked open and the air pulled out with a rush.
Nyx’s gravity boots held tight to the furrowed metal flooring. The three others stood firm as well, grav boots on. The crack in the back hatch widened, maw gaping open into the black of space.
The environmentals of Nyx’s suit kicked on, warming her and recycling her air, sweat, and, if they waited much longer, other body waste as well. Her catheter pinched uncomfortably, but for the amount of time she would likely be in the suit, she might be happy she had one.
The hatch door opened completely, the shuttle hovering fifteen meters from the shimmer of an energy field. The Andraste listed to the side, playing like it was a dead and drifting ship at their twelve o’clock, about ninety meters inside the energy field.
That Raphael could drift in and out of the trash floating around the Battle Station, look like a random piece of debris, and not get detected was a testament to his piloting prowess. Now he would just have to hold still long enough for them to jump to the energy field, then he would drift until they deactivated it, and find a shuttle bay to land in and be their ride out.
Nyx clomped to the edge of the hatch ramp and took a deep breath. She’d done EVA jumps before, but she’d always had a safety cable, so she didn’t go spinning into the black. This time she w
ouldn’t have that precaution. No one would. All she had was the energy weapon strapped at her side and the small CO2 jets in the suit.
She pulled out the energy weapon.
One second for every five meters she would sail through the black. That was the estimate. So, she had three seconds before she had to fire to make a hole in the energy field, or she would burn up on the shimmering gold shield. She held the gun with her left hand and breathed deep, walking back to the cockpit doors. Then, she pivoted back to the gaping black of the hatch.
She pushed off and ran as hard as her thunking grav boots would pull from the corrugated floor. She hit the release button on the datapad strapped to her arm to deactivate her grav boots, shooting from the back of the hatch, holding the gun in front of her as if she had dived into a pool of black water.
Nyx flew through the black. Her hand extended in front of her, finger around the trigger of the energy weapon. Un. Five meters. She inhaled. Deux. Ten meters. The gold shimmer of the Andraste’s energy shield glittered in front of her as she sped closer. Trois. Fifteen meters. Nyx tightened her finger, pulling the trigger. The energy weapon erupted with a wide, electric-blue burst. It splattered across the gold field in front of her, static erupting in sparks. A small hole burned through the sparking shield.
