Defending the Galaxy: The Sentinels of the Galaxy

by Maria V. Snyder

  She makes a disgusted sound. “I’m not Lan.”

  “Are you sure?”

  Her withering look could be weaponized. “I’m sure.” Her tone indicates that I have insulted her. “Secure her,” she orders her entourage.

  They aim weapons at me, a silent reminder that resisting would be painful. A couple looters pull my arms behind my back and lock my wrists tightly together.

  “What’s going on? Who are you?” I’m proud that my voice didn’t squeak.

  “You don’t get to ask questions,” she says, leading the way from detention. “You get to answer questions. That’s your new role in life.” She pauses and glances back at me. “It’s the only thing keeping you alive.”

  Yikes. To see such hatred and loathing in Lan’s face shocks me into silence. We travel though the base and I search for clues as to where we are. But it’s no use. Stupid interchangeable buildings. Would it kill them to put up a few decorations that signal where we are in the Galaxy?

  I’m taken to the conference room in the security wing and shoved into a chair. Not-Lan sits opposite me. I study her features and finally spot the differences between her and Lan. Her hair is darker—more a light golden brown than blonde. Hazel, not blue, eyes scan me with disgust. And her chin is more pointed. If I didn’t know better, I’d say she was Lan’s sister, but she must be her daughter. I wonder if she’s Kate? Lan had two children, so perhaps not. And they’re older. I think. Lan mentioned them going to university. This woman appears to be only two A-years older than me. A granddaughter? Probably not.

  My confusion deepens. While joy wants to push aside my fear that she is alive and well, the fact that she’s working for the looters means a happy reunion is not in our future. At least, I have a future. For now.

  “Stop staring at me like that,” she orders.

  “Like what?”

  “Like you’ve seen a holy ghost. I don’t look that much like my mother.” She spits the word out as if it burned her tongue.

  A daughter then. But just my luck—she’s insane. “Holy?”

  “The almighty Lan could do no wrong. She was perfect in every way.”

  Oh, so it’s like that. “I wouldn’t say that. I knew her as a teenager, and, trust me, she was far from perfect.”

  She crosses her arms over her chest. “Not according to my grandparents.”

  Lots of pain in that statement. Something’s not quite right; well, the entire situation isn’t right, but I’m missing a connection. I doubt she’ll tell me. “Well, we were smart, we hid our…extracurricular activities from our parents. I’m sure you did it too, Kate.” I’m guessing.

  “Kate.” The name explodes from her with the force of an energy wave gun. “Figures you know her name.”

  Oh boy. “Lan only sent me six messages. She mentioned having two children, but I saw a message she sent to Dr. Maddrey that talks about your sister.”

  My attempt to calm her backfires.

  She hops to her feet and stalks around the table to me. “Of course Lan mentioned Kate.”

  Standing in front of me, she slaps her hands on my cheeks. Hard. My eyes water with pain as the sting from her palms remind me of the bruises on my face.

  She pulls me toward her so we’re almost nose to nose. “She was my half-sister. And if you say her name again, I’ll be referring to you in the past tense as well. Understand?”

  “Yes.” This time my voice squeaks as I grapple with the threat. I’ll deal with the dead half-sister comment later. If there is a later.

  “Good.” She releases me and goes back to her chair. Once settled she studies me. Her anger has cooled, but her gaze shows a hard bitterness. “You have done so much damage, everyone wants you dead. But you have answers, and I want those answers first. And you have skills that you’re going to use to help us.” She waits as if expecting me to ask what she’ll do if I refuse.

  Or perhaps she thinks I’ll protest and declare I’ll never help her. Plan B is to stay alive, and refusing would just upset her. I need time. Not sure if it’s even possible for my team to rescue me, but it might be possible to last until the end of Operation Strike Back.

  “What answers do you want?” I ask instead.

  “You’re going to cooperate?” It’s not really a question. It’s more like sarcastic disbelief with a touch of humor.

  “Do I have a choice?”

  “No. But I’m not trusting anything you say.” Not-Lan glances at one of the four guards standing behind me. “Decla, go see what’s the holdup.”

  The guard leaves. And we sit in silence. The room is hot and stuffy. It’s also bare of anything other than the table and chairs. Maybe we’re on one of the closed planets. It’s not a comforting thought.

  Decla returns with a man. He’s wearing an all-too-familiar white lab coat—a medical professional.

  “Where have you been?” Not-Lan demands.

  “Patching up the injured. I’ve more important things to do, Jade. Can’t this wait?”

  Jade? The name matches the woman. She’s hard and cold. Hmmm…perhaps Diamond would suit her better. That reminds me of Lan and her obsession with Diamond Rockler. I miss Lan so much right now it burns in my heart.

  “It’ll take you ten seconds. Did you bring it?” Jade asks.

  “Yes.” He pulls a syringe from his coat pocket. A bright pink liquid is inside.

  As he approaches me, I stare at the cheery color so at odds with the situation. Another memory pops unbidden. Jarren mentioning a pretty pink liquid that they used to get information.

  The medic stops centimeters from me. “Your uniform is puncture resistant so I’m going to inject this into the jugular vein in your neck. If you struggle, the guards will hold you still, but we both know they can’t fully immobilize you.” There’s nothing kind in his smile. “If I miss, I could hit your carotid artery and you’ll bleed out and die. Or I could hit your trachea and puncture your airway. You’ll suffocate and die. Do you understand?”

  That he’s going to shove a needle in my neck? “Yes.”

  “Good.” He puts a cool hand on my forehead and tips my head to the side, exposing more of my neck. “Stay very still.”

  But when the syringe dips closer, I flinch back. I can’t help it.

  He sighs. “Guards.”

  They descend on me and I’m held tight. The doctor instructs them on how to position my head. This time when the needle nears, I’ve a brief desire to struggle, but Plan B doesn’t include tearing an important artery. I brace for the prick instead.

  A sting on the right side of my throat is followed by a strange tingle. I’m released and the doctor leaves without another word. The tingle crawls through my veins like thousands of tiny insects on their miniscule legs. They’re heading straight for my heart. A childhood song about ants marching sounds in my head. Or am I singing it? I squirm with the desire to scratch the itchy sensation wriggling through my blood. My world turns pink. It’s an improvement from the drab white walls of the conference room.

  Jade bangs her hand on the table to get my attention. I focus on her. Maybe Lan should have named her Pink Sapphire. I giggle at the girly name. But I reconsider. Pink looks good on her. Lan was a beauty and Jade has her mother’s classic look.

  “First question, where is my father?” Jade asks.

  I blink at her. She lost her father? That’s terrible. I should help her. “Where is the last place you saw him?”

  “Focus, Lyra. Where’s—”

  “It’s Ara,” I correct her. “Lyra’s dead.”

  A loud sigh. “Fine. Ara, where’s Jarren?”

  Did she just say… Does that mean… My thoughts thin and I can’t grasp them. “He’s on Yulin in detention. I hate to tell you this since you’re related, but he’s a murdering looter.” More words pour from my mouth as I disparage Jarren to his daughter. His daughter! It’s a struggle to stop them.

  “You can’t fight the serum,” Jade says. “You will answer all my questions.”


  This alarms me. I have to hide. But the walls in my head are turning invisible and soon she’ll learn everything and everyone I know will die.

  Suddenly, an escape tunnel opens in my mind and I fly into the Q-net. Instant relief flows through me, banishing the creepy invasion of the pink ants.

  Thanks, Q!

  No response, but it doesn’t matter. And whether my escape is due directly to Q or to the looters’ serum also fails to matter. The important thing is I can no longer expose our secrets and plans. At least not now. I’m not going to think about my future.

  I take full advantage of being in the Q-net. Swooping through the base, I peek into the various rooms through the video feeds. There are Warriors set up in the labs. There is no archeology lab and no pits underneath the building, which means this is a looter base and not a research base constructed by DES. I study the glyphs on the statues, noting the designation of each portal—Bozhou, Heshan, Ulanqab, Wu’an, and that new one for Yulin.

  Finally, I find the Warriors without a black portal that means it’s an incoming portal. I scan the glyphs, trying to determine my location and hoping it’s not a new combination. I’m on Planet Xinji. I’m surprised, but I shouldn’t be. It all started on Xinji. That was where Jarren and Lan fell in love. He fathered her child and then was forced to leave. No wonder he hates DES so much. By the time he arrived at Suzhou, Jade would have been around twenty-eight A-years old, if she stayed on Xinji, and he would have been seventeen. Wow that’s so messed up. Except, it appears she didn’t stay on Xinji since she looks like she’s twenty.

  After Jarren left, Lan went to university on Planet Rho. From Jade’s comments about her grandparents they must have raised her while Lan was away. There might be records of her birth in Xinji’s files, but they were all stolen. Except…I’m in the looters’ headquarters and past the blockade. There has to be a cluster here that has all their files. All their plans. I just need to find it. But first…I have to message Radcliff and let him know where I am.

  Xinji is locked down pretty tight. It takes me hours to get through. And then I find that all the escape tunnels into Yulin are blocked. A scream of frustration burns up my non-existent throat.

  Q? A little help please?

  A green line zigzags through the web of the blockade programs. Q can hear me, but has opted to remain silent. Why? I’ll have to figure it out later. For now, I follow the helpful line, weaving through the strands without alerting the looters. It still takes time, but not as much as if I were on my own.

  When I break through, I realize I can’t get into the looter base on Yulin. Beau and I haven’t been able to pierce their defenses. Not even Q has. But another line—yellow this time—lights up a path that leads to a tiny gap. It’s ringed with Beau’s fingerprints. He must have done it while inside. Thanks, partner.

  I slip through and check the video feeds in the base and wish I didn’t. Looters fill the hallways. They’re everywhere and there’s no sign of my team. Or my parents. Or any of the other officers, techs, and Bertie. I immediately jump to the worst-case scenario—they were all killed! Panic and worry and fear jumble together. My thoughts buzz and scatter and I ride the wave until reason takes over again and I calm down.

  Assessing the situation, I consider other reasons for their absence. They might have escaped to another planet. If so, then which one? It would take me forever to check them all and some of them have barricades that I’d have to squeeze through.

  I need a plan of action. First, find out what happened to my team. How? I would have groaned aloud if I had vocal cords. In my panic, I forgot that the cameras record the feed. I worm into the cluster with the video files and sort through them.

  My first shock is that it’s been two days since my capture. I go back to when the looters appeared and stunned me. Watching my body stiffen and hit the floor, I flinch, remembering the pain when I woke up.

  The looters turn all their attention on Niall, Beau, and Elese, who hold their own for a while until one of the looters lobs a stun grenade. They topple like statues. Oh no.

  Two looters approach me carefully and one nudges me with the toe of his boot. Then they turn me over. There’s a discussion and gesturing for the rest to come closer. Excitement shines and a couple of muscular looters yank me off the floor and I’m carried over the one guy’s shoulder, looking like a boneless doll.

  A small group escorts us to the lab with the portal to Xinji, while the others wait. My friends are left on the floor. My steed disappears with me into the blackness and the group returns to the lab. Another dozen looters appear through the portal. When they have over fifty people, they head out. They’re all fully armed.

  Despite knowing this already happened, the primal need to warn Radcliff and the others wells up my throat. It appears Radcliff sent a team to see why we were delayed. The two groups are on a collision course.

  Having no desire to see the outcome, I squeeze my eyes shut. However, I re-focus on the feed because I’ve no choice. I need to know what happened. It’s not pretty and the team is stunned in minutes. The skirmish in the port lasts much longer, but the result is the same. Everyone is knocked out. Radcliff and Morgan last until the bitter end.

  I speed up the feed and watch as the looters separate the security officers into smaller groups and take them through the portals to other planets. I puzzle over their actions until I realize it’s to keep them apart. Grudgingly I admit it’s a good idea. Plus the detention cells on the bases don’t have a lot of room. At least they didn’t kill them. A horrible thought pops up—why didn’t they? The looters have killed before. So why not? Or should it be why not yet?

  It’s that yet that spurs me to start a new file to list everyone along with where they were taken, even though there is no guarantee that was their final destination. With the Warrior Express, they could be anywhere. I need to check the camera feeds on all the Warrior planets and looter bases—a daunting and time-consuming task. Despair drags at me, but I’ve no choice. Their locations are important.

  No, I don’t have some grand plan in mind. There’s nothing inside my head except a smaller version of me running around in panic. For now, I just need to see that they’re all right. Starting with Niall, Elese, and Beau, since they were still together, I track them to Planet Suzhou. It doesn’t have a barricade so worming into the base’s camera feeds is easy. Huh. Too easy. I check and sure enough the feeds are years out of date. Probably from before Jarren took over. I carefully find and access the live feeds to see what’s really going on.

  The looters are using the research base. I wonder briefly if all the scientists are working with the looters. Or maybe only some. And what happened to any dissenters? Something to investigate later. For now, I check detention. The ten cells are filled—two people in each cell.

  Niall and Beau share cell number five. They’re awake and look healthy. Although it appears they’re arguing. Figures. The desire to hug them both pulses in my non-existent heart. I wish I could communicate with them. Maybe they’ll have suggestions for Operation Grand Plan.

  Elese is sharing a cell with Officer Kingston. They’re ignoring each other. Officer Cole is with one of the techs. And Gavin is with another tech. The rest of the cells are filled with people I don’t recognize. Perhaps Suzhou’s original security team. I list everyone’s name in my file, then reluctantly move on to another planet. But Q takes over and my list fills with names and planets in a fraction of the time. Gratitude and a kernel of hope rise within me.

  I scan the list. My parents are in the Yulin looter base with Bertie, Rance, Bendix, Vedann, Zaim, and the other security officers. Radcliff and Morgan are on Xinji—I never thought to check detention!—with Ho and Tora. There’s one empty cell—must be mine—but the others have people I don’t know in them. Everyone is bruised and battered, but they’re breathing, and all forty-two of the surviving attack team are accounted for in the file Q has made for me. While I’m glad they’re alive, I still wonder why. The looters have no
problems killing people. Unless they’d rather let the HoLFs do the dirty work.

  Now what? I could find the codes for all the bases and unlock the cells. Except my people are unarmed and outnumbered. Unless I cause a distraction. Even then, they’d only be able to hold the base for a short time. And I would need to let them all know what’s going on.

  How can I do that? There’s no terminals in detention. No portables. Nothing but white walls and white lights. The lights! I can control them. Too bad I can’t read lips.

  …waste of energy, Beau says in my ear.

  Easy for you to say, Niall says also in my ear. You don’t have—

  Watch it, Beau just about growls. They’re my family, too.

  I’m confused until I remember that the cameras in detention also have audio feeds. Prisoners don’t get any privacy. The fact Q read my mind and helped is a very good sign. But the fact that Q took the initiative means time must be really critical. I put that dire thought on my to-be-worried-over-later list and focus on the positive. Operation Grand Plan has its first ally.

  Thanks, Q.

  Worming into the lights for just that single cell is difficult. I’m about to give up when I find the correct subroutine. Then I have to block the camera and audio feeds in such a way that the looters guarding detention don’t suspect what’s going on. At least if I do this again, Q will be able to take over.

  Once I have control, I dim the lights. They stop talking and glance up, but then resume their conversation. I pulse the lights—bright, dim, bright, dim, bright, dim. It’s one of the signals Radcliff devised for when we’re in a dark pit and can only communicate with our flashlights. It’s rather basic, but it’s all I have. Three flashes means need assistance.

  Did you see that? Beau asks Niall.

  Yes.

  Do you think it means anything?

  I pulse twice for yes.

  Niall stands up. Maybe an attack on the base? He’s hopeful.

  I pulse once for no. Sorry.

  They’re quiet for a long moment as if waiting for more flickers. Then Beau says, We’ve no idea where we are. It could be HoLFs trying to cut the wires.