Empress of a Thousand Skies

by Rhoda Belleza

  And then what? Even if the plan worked, it wasn’t gonna be this happy-ending-roll-credits. Best-case scenario: He got the public on his side, proved his innocence to anyone with eyes and ears and a heart—then there’d still be the Regent’s council to deal with. Those choirtois. They’d framed him, all because it dove-tailed with their screwed-up plan to launch the galaxies into war again. For what? Money? Wraetan minerals? Power, territory, silver? He didn’t know.

  What Aly did know, for sure: He’d been moved around like a little action figure, like a worthless piece of plastic you could lose and burn and replace.

  Think you’re a man? he’d heard his dad say. Think you’re a big man, don’t you?

  Aly could see him now, sweating moonshine, a crazy look in his eyes. Aly had packed up his stuff, but his dad swatted it out of his hand. I own this, he’d said. I own you.

  So he’d left that day to join the UniForce with nothing but the clothes he’d worn, as light as a feather, grin from here to there thinking nobody owned him after all. Look at him now. It boiled Aly’s blood, picturing a bunch of old men sitting around a big wooden table deciding his fate. They’d already decided Vin’s.

  The path was steep now, dirt and shale slipping under their feet as they went single file.

  “It’s a forty-two percent grade,” Pavel piped in behind them, like they needed to be reminded why they were out of breath. They were practically leaning into the mountain, scrambling up with their hands when it got tough, grabbing dead roots on either side of them for purchase. He could hear Pavel’s motor struggling as his wheels spun out in the trickier pockets.

  It had taken two days to reach Rhesto once the Gency ambulance pod zoomed out of the zeppelin bay, and another half-day hike to reach the spikes of the refinery towers in the distance.

  “Finally,” Kara said as they reached the top of the slope. From here he could see it, a thing of beauty: the broadcasting tower. In front of that, smokestacks, huddled together and backlit by the dawn, looming over a squat mineral refinery building.

  “Wraeta had thousands of refineries just like it,” Aly said. “My dad used to work in one before the evacuation.” He missed his cube for exactly this reason, because it was easy to make unwanted organic memories like this go away—just drown them out with some DroneVision channel, or set a memory of him and Vin and Jeth on constant loop.

  But now, there wasn’t one memory of that old rock that didn’t lead back to his dad, to Wraeta, to his broken and crusted past. When he was younger, the refineries used to scare him. They’d looked like giant metal monsters turned inside out.

  “We learned about your mineral refineries in second form,” Kara said, and for some reason he flinched when she said your. Wraeta didn’t feel like home anymore. How long had it been since he’d known what home was? “None of us would have cubes if it weren’t for Wraeta. Imagine that.”

  “Imagine that,” he repeated. All the first-generation cubes were Wraetan-made—all the materials mined there, all the cubes produced there. Give the universe its greatest piece of tech, and then get yourself blown up.

  She looked back at the distant steel city. He imagined her in an art gallery, or whatever they did in the Kalusian capital, that same look on her face, trying to find some higher meaning out of nothing. It was funny. Sometimes she seemed just like a street kid; at other times, like some visiting ambassador from a rich planet. He wondered which one was the real Kara.

  She started down the hill. They were halfway down the slope when Aly saw movement in the distance. Sun catching on metal. Hydraulic joints, perfectly calibrated to move as if it were a living, breathing soldier. Aly grabbed her arm and yanked her down behind a rubble pile of broken cinder block and stone. He got on his stomach and motioned for Kara to do the same. Pavel felt the urgency and compacted down so that his dome was low to the ground.

  “What is it?”

  “Shhhhh,” he whispered.

  His heart was thudding. He was clutching her arm too tightly, scared to look, like somehow it would make it more real. He counted to three, raised his head a fraction of an inch, and looked back toward the compound.

  “It’s an NX droid,” Aly whispered. It was the same model that had come after him in Vin’s room, and he remembered how easily the droid had chucked him across the room, like he was nothing but an empty tin can. “We must be out of his range. He would’ve charged us if he knew we were here. But that means the UniForce is here. They’re here. How is that possible?”

  “I can’t believe it,” Kara said. She looked shell-shocked. “The signal wasn’t broadcasting . . . I checked it . . .”

  “The UniForce probably got to it,” Aly said quietly.

  “Taejis,” she said.

  Taejis indeed. If the UniForce was here, it meant all the G-1K scientists or whoever else was in the safe house had definitely cleared out.

  Or they’d been killed.

  What next? Aly figured the manly thing to do would be to come up with some sort of plan to get them out of there. But Kara didn’t look like she wanted to run. Her hair was pulled back in a braid, the bones of her face wide and strong—like she’d declared herself, refusing to hide.

  “We need to find out whether the satellite dish is still operational . . .” she said. “We have to broadcast your playback so the galaxy knows you’re innocent.”

  His stomach sank. “We? No. No way. This is my problem. You still have at least four hours of sunlight, and if you backtrack the way you came—”

  “This is no time for chivalry, Aly.”

  “I’m trying to save your life.”

  “Don’t you get it? It’s not about my life, or your life, anymore. The stakes are too high.”

  She reminded him of Vin, of his conviction. Aly thought of the revolution he’d been so quick to make fun of. But unlike Vin’s plan, this was really happening. “We’d have to go through the refinery to access the broadcasting tower,” he said. “The UniForce will have every entrance covered, and we’re sure as taejis not going to slip in unnoticed.”

  “Good thing I have an ex-UniForce soldier to tell me their protocol.” She scanned the compound in the distance. “There’s always another way in, Aly. Always a way in, always a way out.”

  He closed his eyes, pictured the old Wraetan refineries, the sky blackened with smoke, the constant hiss of steam . . . Steam. “The cooling tunnels,” Aly said, opening his eyes. “There are tunnels running below the compound. They divert the current that runs through the refinery to cool the generators.”

  Kara nodded. “What are you waiting for?”

  • • •

  They made their way carefully and slowly through the rocky terrain, staying low in case any UniForce soldiers or NX droids were patrolling. He hadn’t been too keen on signing up for this suicide mission, but it was his last chance to clear his name. Plus, he’d already lost Vin. He wouldn’t lose Kara too.

  Aly was banking that the sheer quantity of tunnels that must be running under a refinery this size would serve in their favor: There was no way the UniForce would have deployed forces to keep them all guarded, not when there was no convincing reason for them to be on Rhesto in the first place.

  The tunnel’s entrance was tucked into the slope, covered with moss. This one hadn’t been used in a long time, but someone had artfully scrawled BALLS on the crusted walls. It was dark and coated in a slug trail of mud, so narrow they’d have to crawl.

  “Right. Okay.” Kara dropped her hand in her pocket and fished out a small bottle, emptying a pill onto the palm of her hand. She broke it in half and made a face as she swallowed.

  “What’s that?” he asked.

  “I just have a headache.” Even with her eyes all red and puffy, she had this elegant warrior look going on with the braid. He caught himself staring at her lips and quickly looked away.

  “I detect traces
of some sort of cholinesterase inhibitor,” Pavel said, his eyelights red. “It enhances neurotransmitters and affects the basic chemical messengers associated with memory. What is your ailment?”

  “Pavel,” Aly said sharply, even if he was curious himself. He looked over at Kara with a pained smile, all teeth and a tight jaw. “Sorry. Not programmed with manners.”

  “It’s okay.” She pocketed the bottle once she put the remaining half of the pill away again. “It’s just some neurological blip. Not a big deal.” She shrugged. “There’s just a lot I can’t remember.”

  “Like you forget things sometimes?”

  “Like I’ve forgotten everything from when I was little. There was some kind of problem with my cube. It was recalled when I was twelve, and I got a new one. They restored most of my old memories, but I have these bad dreams and . . . I don’t know. It all feels made up. Like I made it up.”

  “My problem is the opposite,” Aly blurted out. “All the memories from when I was a kid feel real. Too real. If I ever start to remember, I act like they’re not mine—like they’re fiction. Made-up.”

  He exhaled. Aly had never admitted that to anyone, and he was terrified she would make fun of him for playing make-believe. But she didn’t.

  “Well, let’s not make up this moment then.” Kara smiled. “Let’s both agree to remember it happened this way.”

  “Deal.”

  Aly didn’t know if they should shake on it or something else, but instead he did the whole “after you” gesture. They got on their hands and knees, crawling forward through a dark maze of twists and turns. Pavel rolled ahead in his most compacted shape, a dim beam of light shining the way.

  But the silence seemed big in such a small space. There hadn’t been a whole lot of chitchat since they got off the ambulance, and he guessed it wasn’t going to start now. Aly was pissed at himself—he’d been stuck in his own head, while Kara had some brain condition and was probably worried sick about her mom. Had he even said thank you?

  They snaked around a sharp turn and hit an offshoot of the tunnel. There was a rounded grate secured with an old-school padlock, and it opened just enough for the two of them to crawl out and crouch in front of it. It was so tight, Kara’s knees brushed his, and it felt like the universe had narrowed down into the spot of skin where they touched.

  Aly tried to ignore the heat and looked through the metal grating, where he could barely make out some sort of generator in the dark. “Pavel, can you scan for NX frequencies?”

  “I detect one in proximity, but the diameter of my reach is only ten meters.”

  “Okay, not terrible,” Aly lied, since being on the same planet as an NX was terrible. They had built-in heat sensors that detected subtle changes in temperature, but Pavel had his newly uploaded signal jammer on—meaning he could clone those temperature stats to report back “all normal.” So long as no one saw them, they wouldn’t be detected by temperature.

  He waited for his eyes to adjust to the dark, straining to see past the generator. Kara shifted; a strand of light filtering in through the grate highlighted her eyes and lips, and cast a shadow over everything else. Her irises looked different, lighter. He’d never spent this much time with someone without some sort of memory trade, or a cube-to-cube transfer, so he could see and feel a piece of her life, and she could do the same.

  He wanted to know something about her, anything, before this crazy suicide mission took hold. But every question he thought to ask, every way he thought to say it—it all sounded dumb in his head. He settled for: “Are you ready?”

  When she nodded, Aly motioned for her and Pavel to follow. As soon as they were out, they made their way around the generator and down a labyrinth of alleyways, between machines the size of a small craft and conveyor belts the whole length of a football field. It was so tight they had to run single file. When they turned the corner he stopped so quickly he nearly went sprawling. There was an NX droid ahead of them, probably just outside of Pavel’s detection diameter.

  They ducked into the corner. Aly’s brain was a blur of calculations and contingencies: the angle of its vision, how to move in and out of its blind spot as quietly as possible. A cold surge of terror worked its way through his body, like a block of ice was forming around him.

  The droid kept coming. Aly pressed himself against the wall, like he could disappear into it. God, they were going to die. He’d willingly walked into a UniForce-occupied refinery and thought he could walk out with a neuroscientist and a girl on his arm. Chalk this up under worst idea ever.

  As if Kara could read his mind, she grabbed his hand and squeezed so hard he felt her nails dig into his skin. Aly’s blood felt carbonated. It ran through his body and gave him a fizzy feeling—urgent, like his muscles would pop and spring.

  Closer . . . closer . . .

  “Hey!” Someone hailed the droid from the far end of the hall. He had a crisp capital accent. “You’ve new orders to patrol the south perimeter.”

  The droid turned immediately and walked out the other way, following the man. Aly dared a glance and saw the man disappear around the corner. He was wearing khaki—the color of the Tasinn uniform.

  “Holy taejis,” Kara said, and melted down onto the floor, exhaling.

  Aly let out a deep breath. Kara started to laugh quietly—the nervous kind—and he did too. It was like exhaling all the tension stored up in his muscles, in the folds of his brain, and it felt deliriously good.

  Too good, probably. Because no one noticed when a UniForce soldier turned the corner and stood right in the center, his jaw slack.

  “You.” He was looking straight at Aly with wide-set eyes that wrapped halfway around his head.

  Aly could hardly believe it.

  “Jeth?” The microscopic scales on his gray skin, shoulders as big as barn doors, gills that flared on either side of his neck when he laughed. “It’s you!” He took a step toward him.

  “Don’t come any closer!” Jeth pulled his stunner out and aimed it at Aly, his huge eyes narrowing to slits and his skin turning a shade of crimson. Aly took a step back as Jeth panned it between him and Kara and then at Pavel, then back again. “Don’t you choirtoing move, Alyosha.”

  “Are you serious?” Jeth, Vin, and Aly had come up together in boot camp. They’d been inseparable. Three stars in the same constellation, Jeth’s mom had called them.

  “Shut up. And you,” he said to Pavel, who rolled alongside them, “you try anything and I’ll run an EMP that will fry you beyond recognition. Now turn around,” he said, and motioned for Aly to put his hands behind his back.

  “You are serious,” Aly said as Jeth snapped cuffs on Aly’s wrists. He had tiny suction cups on his twelve fingertips, and they popped when they separated from the metal cuff. “You choirtoi.”

  “Shut up and start walking.” Jeth cuffed Kara, too, and shoved Aly to get him to start moving.

  “What happened to the safe house?” Kara asked, as Jeth frog-marched them down the hall. “What happened to everyone?”

  Jeth didn’t answer. He shoved them into what looked like an old office, with a holo projector so old you could call it vintage and sell it in the city. He turned and kicked the door closed behind him with his enormous boot. Jeth was a head shorter than Aly but three times as strong. “Of all the luck . . .” He shook his head, raked a hand over his bald head. “What the hell are you doing here?”

  Aly looked at Kara. She nodded. “We came to find her mom,” Aly said. “We thought she’d be here.”

  Jeth shook his head. “There were fifty squatters when we came,” he said. “But the camp was cleared out days ago.”

  “Where?” Kara asked, and Jeth snorted through his gills.

  “Think I’m going to tell you?”

  “Don’t be a dick,” Aly said. “She didn’t do anything.”

  “Well, where have my manne
rs gone?” He bowed his head to Kara with a whole lot of flourish. “Begging your pardon, and your girlfriend’s, except I don’t give two taejis.” Aly wished his hands were free so he could clock his old friend right in his stupid snout.

  “If you’ve already cleared the place, what are you still doing here?” Aly asked.

  “Great question. Because they needed a skeleton crew for this outpost assignment hellhole and I was their top candidate.” He started to pace. “On a radioactive moon where I’m scared to even touch anything. Look at me, Mom! A shining choirtoing star . . .”

  It was almost comical, hearing him cuss up a storm in that wholesome Chram accent. But Aly knew what kind of assignment this was. The UniForce had tons of old bases and “key strategic locations” where they posted a dozen soldiers, tops—far-flung locations that weren’t all that relevant, and soldiers they were trying to punch. And Chrams were the bottom of the barrel when it came to the hierarchy of Kalusian allies. Of course Jeth would be one of the first ones on this taejis of an assignment.

  Jeth kept eyeing Pavel, who was draining his battery over in the corner like a little dunce. Jeth knew the droid was sending out a signal jammer, and the fact that he hadn’t powered him down meant Jeth was on the fence about reporting them.

  “How long has your unit been here?” Aly asked. Maybe there was still a chance to get Jeth on their side.

  “This isn’t my unit, Alyosha.” Jeth glared at him, and for a second he looked just like the skinny punk Vin and Aly had adopted on their first day in boot camp. “It’s me, with a bunch of godsdamned security guards on a power trip.” He was talking about the Tasinn. “We’ve been here two days. And get this: Our orders are coming from a piece of taejis DroneVision host! Nero is dictating military strategy now. Dude has never even touched a uniform,” Jeth spit. Aly thought of the big man on the train, squeezed into his expensive suit. Aly wasn’t feeling too charitable seeing as his hands were cuffed, but he’d give Jeth this—he should be pissed. They all should.