The Hive Engineers

by Emilia Zeeland

  This is a work of fiction. Similarities to real people, places, or events are entirely coincidental.

  THE HIVE ENGINEERS

  First edition. September 28, 2019.

  Copyright © 2019 Emilia Zeeland.

  Written by Emilia Zeeland.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Part I | YALENA

  Chapter 1. The Chameleon

  Chapter 2. The Trinity

  Chapter 3. Stealth Operation

  Chapter 4. Monster Vibe

  Chapter 5. Ice Age

  Chapter 6. The Chase

  Chapter 7. Raise the Dead

  Chapter 8. Moon in My Hand

  Chapter 9. Team Natlena

  Chapter 10. A Broken Link

  Chapter 11. Three Names, One Face

  Chapter 12. The Tests

  Chapter 13. The Mother Ship

  Chapter 14. The Message

  Part II | ERIC

  Chapter 15. Echoes of a Failure

  Chapter 16. Forever and a Day

  Chapter 17. Offensive Defense

  Chapter 18. Army of One

  Chapter 19. His Sister's Keepers

  Chapter 20. Figure Eight

  Chapter 21. All Is Fair

  Chapter 22. Like Toy Soldiers

  Chapter 23. Injection

  Part III | YALENA

  Chapter 24. In the Falling Rain

  Chapter 25. The Resistance

  Chapter 26. Stranded

  Chapter 27. The Hive

  Chapter 28. The Hive Engineers

  Chapter 29. Battle Cry

  Chapter 30. The Sleeping Giant

  Chapter 31. Proof of Blood

  Chapter 32. Engineered Chance

  Chapter 33. The Scout

  Chapter 34. The Portal

  Chapter 35. Reunion

  Chapter 36. The Crawlers

  Chapter 37. Revenge

  Chapter 38. Planet of Heroes

  Chapter 39. Daydream

  Chapter 40. Save You, Save Me

  Chapter 41. Two Years Later

  Thank You

  The Candidates

  About the Author

  ...all we have is who we are...

  Part I

  YALENA

  Chapter 1. The Chameleon

  Yalena smoothed the dark gray uniform over her body with long strokes. Wearing third-year colors felt premature. She hadn’t passed her second-year mission yet, nor had she sat the exams. She straightened up in front of the mirror. It didn’t matter. The commander had asked it of them, and they’d never let him down, even now that he was gone.

  She swept her hands over her forehead and around the sides of her head, gathering her chocolate-brown hair into a bun. It made her seem serious. Grown-up. A leader.

  If there ever was a time to inspire confidence, now would be it. And if anyone could do this, it would be Yalena—the daughter of two of the gutsiest people in the universe: a rebel Fian and an idealistic human.

  Yalena cleared her throat, even though she was alone. Every time she thought of her mother, Veronica’s face popped in first, only to be begrudgingly swept away by the image of Norma. In her own way, Norma had been brave too and a visionary in imagining a future with the Fians. But if Yalena was going to survive what was to come, she had to be more like Veronica. She had to bolt into the heart of the storm, head-first against the harsh winds, crushing every obstacle.

  Yalena lifted her chin a little and watched her expression in the mirror a second longer before leaving the dorm room. The corridor outside buzzed with nervous whispers, more than the usual first-day-at-the-academy excitement and noise.

  Jen caught up to Yalena, but their elevator ride to the STAR Academy floor was silent, save for a quick greeting. Yalena’s jaw felt stiff, fixed into a strong bite barely containing the deadly eagerness raging inside her. Despite what the others always said, she hadn’t really felt like she’d done anything of use since pulling Eric back from Norma’s ship before it exploded. She needed action and justice. Today, she was finally setting out to get it.

  The largest lecture hall had been cleared of its round table. Instead, rows of flimsy fold-up chairs had been lined up in three blocks of twenty. A sea of green to the right marked the nervous new freshmen. In the middle, some of the second-years had already taken their seats. Yalena waved to Sutton and Josie. Both looking a little blanched, they returned her greeting. It was odd to see them in the red colors she’d only recently removed from her closet.

  On the left, the block of seats reserved for the third-year class was almost full. Reid and Dave exchanged bear hugs, signature handshakes, and greetings that stood out to Yalena because of the Martian accent, but it wasn’t enough to make her snicker like before.

  She scanned for the members of her Apollo crew from freshman year. Dai and Michael gave her a small nod each. Theo smiled shyly, making Yalena feel unsure if he would have preferred to remain on the Moon after his last assignment—monitoring Jea’s vitals for any Fian side-effects until she’d been cleared. Yalena tried to smile at him and Carmen, but her lips wouldn’t curve, like she’d forgotten the motion.

  She’d have to ask it of her crew again—the almost fanatical dedication she’d inspired back in her freshman year. And this time, it would place them in more danger than ever, but again, they had to say ‘yes’. She had to entice them to.

  Natalia and Nico kept frantically adjusting the settings on the holo screen and exchanging hushed questions. It was odd to see Natalia’s face blotted with red spots. She restlessly flipped her heavy black hair over one shoulder, then a minute later, over the other. Yalena was too far away to hear, but by Nico’s sullen expression, Natalia’s signature snappy remarks were less than appreciated.

  Yalena and Jen arrived at the front row, where Eric and Alec had saved seats for them. Eric pulled Jen to his side and she gave him a quick kiss. Yalena sat as gracefully as she could on the plastic chair and slipped her hand into Alec’s.

  His warm brown eyes studied her. “Please, don’t show us a second look at breakfast.”

  Yalena gave him a tight-lipped grimace in response, meant to scold him for always bringing up the time she’d vomited in front of him. She wasn’t anxious. She was restless, perhaps even a little reckless. Each thought in her head fueled a single idea—she finally had a way to hit Felix where it hurt, to find out what army he was hiding, before it was too late. The weight of saving the near worlds lay heavy on her chest, but she vowed to succeed.

  Alec tugged her hand, making her turn to him. “You do seem a little queasy. I should know by now.”

  Yalena had been set on looking confident, murderous even, but his teasing made the sides of her face twitch with the ghost of a smile. How did he always manage to steal one from her?

  Cooper and Heidi were the last to enter, both wearing the signs of sleep deprivation—pasty faces, hair a little too messy for the occasion, and red-brimmed eyes. Heidi slipped into the last seat, while Cooper walked over to the podium and joined Natalia and Nico. Natalia played with the settings one last time, dimming the lights for the presentation.

  “Settle down everyone,” Cooper said. He was so different to the late commander in the way he regarded the students—as an older mentor, rather than a strict authority figure. But the silence his voice demanded was the same.

  “Thank you all for coming,” Cooper said. “To the new freshmen at STAR Academy, I can only issue a welcome, followed by a sincere ‘thank you’ for joining us in the hardest of times.” The new faces paled, looking at him. “We rely on you to learn fast, for the enemy coming at us won’t distinguish one student from another, Martian from Moonie from Earthling.
We’re humans, and we will face them as one.”

  Cooper’s gaze traveled to the block of second-years next. “To our second-years, welcome back, welcome home, welcome to the biggest challenge of your lives. If you think your first year going by without a mission was unfortunate, just you wait. Your entire second year is a mission. Half of you will stay on Unifier to train the freshmen and the other half will run the Belt patrols, which will be instrumental in giving us early warning of the Fians’ attack.”

  In the natural pause, Cooper opened his mouth without a sound, as if in awe of them, as if they were the leaders to admire, not him. Out of the corner of her eye, Yalena watched Sutton clutch Josie’s hand, their fingers interlacing. The girls would hate to be separated, and yet that was a concern for the old Yalena—everyone’s friend. Now, she had to become something else—Felix’s worst nightmare. She forced her gaze away from them.

  Cooper turned to face the third-year class next. “To our third-year class, you’re our hope, our best chance, our fiercest fighters. You will move in the shadows. You will hunt relentlessly for the truth like you always have. You’ll leave STAR Academy behind for the mission to end a war before it begins.”

  He beckoned for Yalena to join him on stage. She stood a little abruptly before walking to the stage in firm and decisive steps.

  “It should come as no surprise,” her voice cracked through the room, “that instead of commencing our third year at STAR Academy, we have another thing coming. We’re still STAR Academy students, but since our first-year mission, our responsibilities have stretched far outside of the Academy’s scope. Commander Marcus O’Donnell may have disagreed with our first mission, but he saw our potential in it, and he knew we had what it takes to finish this, to defend our world.” She forced each word to sound ironclad. “The Fians are coming. We don’t know when, we don’t know why, and we don’t know how they plan to attack. That’s three unknowns too many. What we need is to get these answers in a stealth operation that will run under their radar.”

  Yalena regarded Nico over her shoulder long enough to register his nod. Her words might be powerful, but they’d never be enough. Not without a grand reveal. Not without some sort of a game-changer.

  “Our mission now is simple, but its execution won’t be,” Yalena said. “When Alfimoff and Cho crossed the Belt, their ship was immediately taken down by the Fians. It shows that in Felix’s mind, that’s a border—the border between our two worlds. Despite the Belt patrols run by the second-year class over the summer, we can’t guarantee the Fians have retreated. They must also have other checkpoints. Both sides of the wormhole, for example, as well as Nova Fia border. That means any recon mission we plan is bound to get noticed and therefore probably doomed to fail.”

  Yalena let the sentence and its gravity hang in the silence for a second.

  “Unless...” Nico said, drawing all eyes to him. “Unless we can fool them into thinking we’re not there at all.”

  Stunned stares remained fixed on Nico’s reddening face. Natalia motioned upward and a holo image of an updated Eagle model lit up in bright blue.

  In the last row, Heidi leaned in. Some of the others did too, but no recognition shone on their faces. So many times before Yalena had been the one too slow to catch onto a technical improvement. This time, they couldn’t see it either.

  Natalia stepped forward. “The commander left us instructions to work on a cloaking agent that could be applied to our more robust spacecraft models without increasing their weight too much. It hides heat signatures, exhaust from the engines, and even feeds back the image of space to any observer, making it invisible.”

  Nico’s British accent was pronounced when his voice cut through the stunned tension in the room. “It’s the first true stealth ship, equipped to even trick radars. Instead of bouncing back the radar beam, it will absorb it, as if nothing is there.”

  Natalia’s fingers flew over a few buttons on the remote. The view above the round table changed from the holo model to a live stream of an Eagle in space and Unifier space station behind it.

  “We present to you, the Chameleon,” Nico said.

  Yalena held her breath, watching the Eagle’s outline in the holo model.

  “Now you see me,” Natalia said, then clicked on another button.

  As if erased with a magic wand, the Eagle disappeared, leaving only the faint purple light of the space station visible on the screen.

  Nico’s eyes sparkled in the gloomy light. “Now you don’t.”

  Yalena finally found her smile—the cold, calculating, merciless smile of determination.

  Watch out, Felix. An invisible fox is about to enter your hen house.

  Chapter 2. The Trinity

  They had breakfast as a family on the morning of the stealth mission. The commander’s apartment was a chaos of towels, baby powder, lotion bottles and clothes, piled on the sides of the changing table. Who knew babies required so much equipment?

  Yalena stirred her porridge, too restless to muster any appetite, while Alec devoured his portion. On the other side of the table, Jen nibbled on a breakfast bar and Eric followed Heidi with his eyes, not touching his food. Yalena knew what he must be thinking. It had only been weeks since baby Marcus arrived and that made it too soon, awfully soon, for Heidi to be off.

  Cooper rushed prepping baby food and feeding little Marcus, who wailed as if sensing that the day was one for goodbyes. Heidi sat with her parents, making lists of instructions for how to take care of the baby in her absence. With Cooper in command, they’d need the help. She glanced over at the baby with her eyes swollen. Judging by the bleak look on Eric’s face, he still wished he could recruit a second-year in her place.

  In silence, rather than the usual chatter, the four finished breakfast and said their goodbyes. Yalena placed a small kiss on baby Marcus’ soft head, barely covered in mossy hair, making him wail a little in protest. Jen held him in turn while Eric stood glued in place like he might stay behind. In the end, they all cleared out before it was time for Heidi’s goodbye. None of them would be able to take it.

  Despite the early hour, the STAR Academy floor was bustling. A crowd of new freshmen nervously started whispering to each other as soon as they saw the four of them enter. Eric gifted them with a polite smile that nonetheless seemed forced. Yalena still had a lot to learn from him about always having the spotlight like a target on your back.

  The second- and third-year classes had already gathered. Yalena exchanged quick greetings with them, then signaled Sutton and Josie over. They leaned in, but amid the chatter they didn’t have to lower their voices to keep the conversation private.

  “Are you ready?” Yalena studied Sutton and Josie in turn.

  “Readier than you two.” Josie nodded at Yalena and Eric.

  Sutton elbowed her playfully. “Please. The worst fight will be right here at STAR Academy, I tell you. The freshies seem like a handful and I’ll be all alone with them.”

  “Karma works that way, doesn’t it?” Yalena said, fighting a smirk. “You’ll be fine. STAR Academy students tend to only disobey when they want to be given a real-life task. This year, it just so happens that you’ll have plenty to keep them busy with.”

  “Get them ready for a fight for Unifier.” Eric’s voice was more serious than ever.

  Yalena let the image seep in for just a second. Guns blazing at the purple shield. Small cells blacking out one after the other; Bluedrops launching fire at a monstrous Fian ship. She squeezed her eyes shut, and with a breath that was as forceful as a huff, she chased the image away. She wouldn’t let it come true.

  Yalena placed a hand on Josie’s shoulder. “If we haven’t sent back any intel by the time the Fians cross the Belt, you will need to watch what they do and report back to Earth, Unifier and the Moon. Avoid an open conflict if the army really looks unbeatable. You’d best fight with the rest later.”

  Eric gave both Sutton and Josie a sturdy handshake, after which Yalena hugged them
in turn. Without any specific announcement, the third-years squeezed out of the room, hoping not to draw too much attention to themselves. That was the deal with stealth missions—there was no big send-off. Only high-ranking officers across the near worlds would ever hear of it. That way, if it failed, it would be forgotten.

  Eric didn’t seem to mind though. He left without a second look at the first- and second-year STARs, so Yalena marched right out too, and hurried to catch up to him.

  At the send-off, Cooper stood in the middle of the Unifier hangar with Chris, Jea, who Heidi threw occasional sullen looks at, and a burly Martian they introduced to Yalena as Bako Ataikiru. Eric gave Bako a small smile, like they already knew each other.

  “Eric O’Donnell,” Bako said, his white teeth sparkling against the deep color of his skin. “It’s been too long.”

  Eric leaned a little toward Yalena. “Bako was in my first round of Academy recruits. He’s a strategist and a pilot.”

  That translated into Yalena’s mind to ‘a military leader’, but back then, STAR Academy had been more focused on research. “How did you get the board to take him on as a recruit?”

  Eric made a face, swaying his head from side to side. “I had to push them to reconsider Bako, but they never regretted it.”

  Yalena didn’t doubt that.

  With Cooper in command, it wasn’t surprising he’d chosen Bako, Chris and Jea as his trustees. A trinity of STAR Academy alumni—one from each of the near worlds—to lead the collaboration between Unifier, Mars, Earth and the Moon in the conflict to come.

  “I hear you’re headed to the belly of the beast,” Bako said. “God be with you, my friend.”

  “Thanks, Bako.” Eric emphasized the “ah” in the name, true to the original Nigerian pronunciation. “Stay safe here, too.”

  “You needn’t worry about me, my friend.” Bako raised his bushy eyebrows high. “Mars’ orbit won’t be in the way for months to come. I’ll work on the Martian council, try to get them to send fight squads to defend Earth when the time comes, but they’ll want to keep most of the fleet in defense mode around the red planet.”