On Mission

by Aileen Erin

  What the hell was he talking about? “No. I’m so angry I can’t breathe.”

  “I know. I can feel it and I can see it. You’re flashing and you’re dangerous. You’ll kill everyone—me and Eshrin and Roan included—if you don’t calm down.”

  I glanced down at my flashing arms.

  Right.

  Okay.

  I took a breath, but the anger was still there. “It’s too much. I can’t—” My heart was racing and I was sweating and I knew Lorne was right. I needed to calm down.

  I stared into Lorne’s eyes and breathed in for six. Three out. Three in. The first round of breathing was hard, but I didn’t want to kill anyone except Jason.

  After a minute, Lorne let go of my face, and took a step back. “Good. I know you need to deal with Jason yourself. I understand. I can’t imagine how you must feel about him, but I can’t let you if you’re not in control. If you can hold it together, then I will follow your lead. But if you lose it, then I’m stepping in. Got it?”

  I nodded. “Got it.” I wasn’t making any promises about staying in control. I couldn’t when I knew I’d probably break them as soon as I was face-to-face with Jason.

  Eshrin and Ginu and Ashino went in first. A second later, Ginu came back and grunted before disappearing back into the room.

  Ginu for safe? I hoped so, because that’s what I was going to assume.

  We stepped through the door. The room was massive with round rows, leading down to the center. There were sections broken up by delegations. The room wasn’t full—not even halfway full. The first row of people was five rows down from us, which gave us a chance to look around the room before we would be noticed.

  Informational holos were hanging high up, the tops skimming the ceiling. Down at the very bottom, someone was talking. The translator kicked in wherever I looked. So many different languages. So many different people. So many different planets that were plotting against us.

  But the man in the center down below was speaking Earther English. I didn’t need a translator for him.

  He’d lost weight since the diner, but he still had that same sneering look on his face. His hair was cut short and he was wearing the typical SpaceTech dress uniform. A few other officers stood beside him and I wasn’t sure if they were his guards or his advisors, but I didn’t care. Not really. The only SpaceTech officer that mattered right now was Jason Murtagh.

  The rest of the alliance members were paying attention to every word that Jason was saying. They leaned forward on their desks, some taking notes on tablets, one rose from their seat and asked what must’ve been a question. The translator would only listen where I looked and I wasn’t about to move my gaze from Jason. As far as I was concerned, he was the only one here that mattered.

  The other members of the alliance were so cocky and sure of themselves that none of them even noticed that we’d entered the room. Except for a few scattered guards down below. They stood by their charge but were looking up at us, waiting to see what we’d do.

  Poor fools.

  I reached into my pockets, sliding out my faksano. Maybe it was too early for weapons, but I knew where this was going.

  I knew where this would end.

  I could feel Lorne on my right side, waiting to see what I would do. Eshrin stood on my other side, faksano in his hands. Roan was behind me, and I knew he had a gun. I just hoped this time he wouldn’t be crazy enough to fire it, but as long as he didn’t hit one of us, I didn’t really care.

  It was cold and unfeeling, but I couldn’t bring myself to care about that either.

  This was a room full of enemies, and none of them were innocent.

  “Hey, there,” I said loudly.

  A few alliance members turned, but I wanted the man in the center at the very bottom of the room.

  “I didn’t realize the party already started. Silly me.” I gave them a grin, and this time I didn’t care that it looked awful and evil. I moved to the top of the stairs and met Jason’s gaze. “And you even invited my favorite person.”

  Jason straightened. If his skin could’ve glowed like the Aunare, it would’ve been bright.

  He reached for something on the table in front of him, and I knew what he was going to do.

  I stepped closer and crossed my arms, but Lorne stepped in front of me and raised his hand.

  The device turned to ash.

  Jason’s eyes widened.

  I looked at Lorne, but he shook his head.

  Right. My aim wasn’t accurate, but I didn’t care if I took Jason’s hand along with the device. Maybe if I were a better person, but I wasn’t. I really wasn’t. Not when it came to Jason.

  “You’ve always been a coward, Jason,” Lorne said. “You use something like that on her after you’ve already poisoned her, and she’s standing here doing nothing? You think that’s going to make everyone here think you’re a good person to follow? A coward who is so afraid of Amihanna that you’ll kill her before she’s within ten feet of you.”

  He sighed as he looked around the room, and I could feel his disappointment.

  I understood it. Some of the people here were people he’d thought were his friends. Even Vyic was sitting off to the side, but when I saw him, he waved as if he’d come for the show.

  Or possibly he’d come to collect souls. I wasn’t sure which.

  I took the first step down, and glanced to my right. It was only then that I actually looked at the holos hovering over the desks matching the giant holos in the room. All of them showing Aunare territories. Our trade routes. And what were those lines crossing our borders on the maps? Were those weak points or places that they were planning to hit? Or both?

  I saw a seal on the bottom of one of the holo images, and I wanted to scream. It was something leaked from a High Council meeting. I should’ve gotten rid of them sooner. The information on those charts and graphs shouldn’t have been outside Aunare hands. I didn’t need a second glance to realize they were planning an invasion. It wasn’t just SpaceTech invading. It was all of them.

  I’d bet money that the no-show Supreme Leader didn’t want to go along, so they got rid of her. I wondered how much money it took to get Beta Omo to play their game.

  Lorne huffed as he scanned all the information. “Roan.”

  “Yeah?” Roan looked at Lorne.

  I was glad Roan didn’t have the gun in his hand.

  “Do you have one of your cameras?”

  “Yep. On it.” He tapped on his wrist unit and pulled a small disk out of his pocket. He tossed it into the air, and it turned on, spinning around and flying through the air. “I’ll get everything.”

  Good. We needed to know where the leak was. We needed to know who was here, what information they had, and trace it back.

  We’d find the traitors, one way or another, and we had to shore up our borders where the weak spots had been found.

  Lorne crossed his arms as he looked down at the members of the alliance gathered around the room. “The Aunare are officially leaving the alliance. Effective immediately. Everyone in this room is now considered an enemy.”

  Weapons were drawn on us, and Lorne’s skin brightened.

  There were more of them than us, but that didn’t mean that we were going to surrender. Not when we had abilities they didn’t.

  Lorne scanned the room once and then he closed his eyes. His power rose so quick and fast that my ears popped and then he shoved his hands away from himself.

  The energy leaving him had me stumbling back a second, and in a flash, every weapon in the room turned to ash. Every weapon except ours.

  I didn’t realize he could do that with his eyes closed. What a show-off.

  The scent of burnt metal and plastic filled the room. Smoke spread to the ceiling and the lights dimmed, lights flashed and a siren sounded.

  The fire alarm was going off and sprinklers sprayed small drops of water down on us.

  Good. That was very good. If someone had a lucole-based weapon h
ere, the water would help pull the poison from the air.

  I flicked my wrists, lengthening my faksano, and whipped them together. Clack-clack.

  One man stepped onto the stairs, yelling something at me. I didn’t get my translator tuned toward him in time, but whatever he’d said, Lorne didn’t like.

  Lorne shook his head. “We spoke only days before leaving for Telnon, but now I know why you were cagey and hesitant. You’ve already aligned yourselves with SpaceTech.”

  Everyone turned to look at Jason, who had been slowly backing out of the room. Typical. Coward.

  More people started talking all at once, but I didn’t care. I wasn’t listening to the translator anymore. I didn’t care what anyone else said or did. All I cared about was Jason Murtagh.

  Killing him wouldn’t change what had happened. It wouldn’t change the minds of the alliance members. But it was justified.

  I started running down the stairs, putting all the power into making my next step faster than the last.

  I could hear my guards moving to keep up with me and dealing with anyone who tried to stop me, and I knew I’d get to Jason first because I was the fastest in the room.

  I was the fastest Aunare.

  Fifty feet.

  Twenty.

  Jason started to run, stumbling back into the SpaceTech officers behind him. They didn’t move to help him. Instead, they let him fall to the ground.

  Smart of them.

  Ten. I leaped for him, and then I heard the tone.

  It hadn’t come from Jason or his men, but it didn’t matter.

  Air rushed from my lungs as the ringing echoed through my head and then the pain hit. The lucole activated and it felt like thousands of tiny shards of glass were vibrating inside my brain, slicing it from the inside.

  My foot missed the landing, and I was falling, screaming, knowing that this might be the end and that Jason was going to win.

  My shoulder hit the floor first, and then there was something on top of me—someone. Hands pressing my shoulders flat against the floor.

  I tried to open my eyes so that I could see, but I couldn’t open them. They wouldn’t open.

  I thrashed and screamed but I couldn’t hear my own screams.

  I felt something cold touch my forehead and I jerked, but strong arms pressed me against the floor.

  There was a hum drowning out the ringing and the pain got worse.

  My back bowed off the ground as I screamed, trying to get away from whoever was holding me.

  And then a body was on top of me.

  Fear froze me until I realized that I knew that body. I knew the smell of him and the shape and if he was there, then I was safe.

  Or safeish.

  The hum changed, lessened and then turned off, and I could breathe again.

  “Lorne.” I took a breath and the weight on me shifted. Fingertips brushed my cheek.

  “I can’t see or hear.” I said the words, not knowing if I was screaming them or saying them so soft that no one would hear me.

  The ringing in my ears was too loud and getting louder. It hadn’t turned me into minced meat yet, but that was the only good thing I could think of right now.

  The weight shifted again and the hum grew louder, higher pitched this time and the crystals in my head dug deeper.

  I thrashed, breaking the grip of whoever was holding my shoulders, and gripped my head. “Turn it off. It’s not working. Stop it. Stop it, please.”

  The hum instantly stopped.

  I was panting, sweating, and trying not to think of the pain and fear that this would kill me.

  I stopped struggling but the pain was getting worse again. The ringing was getting louder. Last time it stopped before it got this bad, but not this time.

  God, help me. I’m sorry for wanting Jason dead, but I don’t deserve this. Help me. Please.

  The ringing didn’t die down, and I could feel tears on my cheeks. I knew I was crying, but I couldn’t stop.

  And then, through the ringing tone, I heard a voice whispering to me. I could feel myself being moved, but the voice wasn’t coming from the room. I couldn’t really hear it, but it was coming from somewhere.

  Where?

  I shoved away the pain and tried to focus on it, and it was gone.

  The hum came back and I sucked in air, bracing for the pain to get worse again, but this time it got a little better.

  Not much, but enough. Enough so that the panic could settle a little and I could realize that I wasn’t dead yet. That the hum was the device Audrey had given Eshrin. That I was safe and with Lorne and my guards. And I knew that whatever Audrey had done to the lucole in my brain had helped enough that I didn’t immediately die, but I wasn’t okay.

  Nothing that caused this much pain was okay.

  I felt something hot run down my nose and another soft thing brushing my skin just under it.

  Another nosebleed. This was bad. The ringing was still there, but so was the hum. I couldn’t see or hear and it wasn’t dying down like it did before.

  This was—

  The whisper came again. Amihanna.

  It was soft—so soft that I shouldn’t have been able to hear it—but the feminine voice wove through the pain and ringing and hums, almost as if it was luring me away from all of it.

  I felt a tugging along my soul like I did when we jumped through space, but different. More. Bigger.

  Amihanna, remember. The voice was louder now, and the pain started to dissipate. Come to me, Amihanna. I knew that voice. It was Jesmesha. The Aunare High Priestess. I’d only met her one time, but she’d changed my life. She changed who I was and how I looked at my future.

  In some ways, she’d given me a future because it was only after I saw her that I decided to give Lorne a real shot.

  And Lorne made my life worth living again.

  Jesmesha and her glowing orange eyes had changed the course of my destiny. If there was one person who could save me now, it was her.

  There was a bright flash, and when the light died down, I could see.

  Except I wasn’t in the meeting room with the rest of the alliance anymore. I wasn’t in Yhonie-atala’s capital building either. I wasn’t even on Telnon.

  All I could see above me was inky blackness dotted with a sea of stars.

  Around me were thousands of different sizes and shapes of glowing candles.

  Under me was a thick, cushy mat, and below that was a wood floor.

  I was in the geodesic dome—Jesmesha’s geodesic dome.

  Amihanna, remember, her voice came again, but it still sounded impossibly far away.

  “Remember what?” I screamed.

  Shhh. No need to yell here. I can hear you just fine. But you must remember to focus on the present. Focus on the lucole here and now, and destroy it.

  “Destroy it?” How was I supposed to do that?

  Destroy it now.

  Was she completely nuts? How was I supposed to destroy tiny pieces of lucole lodged in my brain? I didn’t have that ability. If I did, I’d have destroyed it the day after the Ra’mi market disaster.

  Who was I kidding? I was probably dead. Again.

  Except my head was aching, and I didn’t remember pain after I died last time.

  You’re not dead, Amihanna. Do it now. Time is running out. You felt nanos in your body. You can feel the lucole pieces if you focus on them. Picture them like you’d picture the nanos. Find them. Send your power into the lucole crystals and destroy them.

  “Won’t I just explode?” And where in the hell was she? Why was I in this room by myself?

  I am here, but you are not. I told you this plane would exist for you no matter where you were. All you had to do was come when you needed it. When you needed me. Right now you’re at the threshold, so you came. You are passed out on the meeting room floor in Yhonie-atala. Do what I said. Do it now or die.

  Fuck.

  Fuck. I was losing it, but then I closed my eyes again and I could feel the p
ain rushing back and I knew I was screaming. A hand gripped mine, and I could feel Lorne and his panic and fear and anger.

  So much anger.

  More anger than I’d just had for Jason.

  If you don’t do this, Jason wins, Jesmesha’s voice taunted me.

  Bitch.

  Manipulative bitch.

  She knew what that would do to me.

  I closed my eyes and pictured that room in the capital building again. That body.

  All the air left my chest as the pain hit me. I hadn’t thought that anything could be worse than nanos, but this—this—was worse than nanos. It was as if the thousands of shards of glass were driving farther and farther into my brain with every second. I knew each glass shard wasn’t glass—it was crystal. It was lucole. The tiny little bits that I’d breathed in from the lucole-bullet.

  The thing that Jesmesha wasn’t understanding was that if I messed this up—if I blew up the lucole—it wouldn’t just kill me. It would kill the man holding my hand—Lorne. It would kill everyone in this room—and I was pretty sure that meant Roan, Eshrin, my guards, and anyone else within range.

  But if I didn’t do it, I was going to die. I could feel that now. I’d felt death come for me before, but Audrey wasn’t here this time. No one was here that could save me.

  And if I died, then I wasn’t sure what would happen to Lorne. To the Aunare. I didn’t want to think that it was my ego driving this because I didn’t feel important.

  Except I was.

  I was the High Queen, wife to the High King, and if I died now, then the worst of Jesmesha’s predictions would come true.

  It wasn’t a mistake that I’d gone to the dome now. It was a warning, and the only one that I’d get.

  There was no one else that could save me.

  I had to save myself.

  I had to try.

  If Jesmesha said I could do it, then I could do it.

  I started small at first. I touched just a tiny bit of my power to one of the shards in my brain. The pain got worse for a second as I felt it bursting into nothing in my brain, but I didn’t stop with one. There were so many to get rid of.

  I kept feeding my power carefully against new shards. I hit one more. And then another one. And another.