Beyond the Next Star

by Melody Johnson

  His head vaporized into a floating puff of ash. His body jerked back and fell with a hard thud, spilling a river of blood from the gaping hole at the top of his singed neck.

  Delaney bolted upright. Dizziness smacked her sideways, and she just barely braced her elbows against hitting the stone floor headfirst.

  She’d killed him. Dorai Nikiok had murdered Petreok.

  Petreok is dead.

  Delaney concentrated on the difficult task of not screaming. Those doe-brown eyes. Those expressive ears. Those hidden dimples. She remembered tricking him into thinking that Torek was the one giving him orders. She remembered his caring enthusiasm for Torek’s recovery. He’d actually puffed his chest in pride for serving Onik even if it meant serving in this shithole. Even as Dorai Nikiok was disparaging him.

  That brave, helpful, trusting young man: gone. Obliterated into ash.

  Because of Delaney.

  How was this happening again? But this time, she didn’t have the cushion of pretending stupidity to save her.

  Nikiok picked up Petreok’s limp arm and dragged his body in a slick red path to a console. She pressed his hand to its screen.

  The not-glass wall slid open to reveal a small chamber, tall and wide enough to fit one person. The chamber’s floor, ceiling, and three walls were all that same glass-like material, but the far wall wasn’t actually a wall. Delaney squinted to make sense of what her battered mind was seeing. The far wall was another sliding door, but the door didn’t connect to another hallway. It opened to nothing but water and the circling zorel.

  Nikiok strode toward Delaney’s cage, painting a blood trail with Petreok’s body behind her.

  Delaney scrambled to the far corner. “I can h—” Her words dissolved into a coughing fit. Her mouth and throat were cotton.

  Nikiok pressed Petreok’s thumb pad to a panel beside the cage, and the door slid open.

  The coughing produced enough saliva to swallow, and its hot slide eased the scratch in Delaney’s raw throat enough to speak. “I can help you,” she croaked.

  Nikiok dropped Petreok’s arm, and it splashed heavily into a puddle of his own blood.

  “No one knowing who I am. What I am. People talk in front of me. I am your eyes and ears.” Delaney’s eyes darted to the not-glass chamber that opened to death. “I report to you, and you are everywhere. Know everything.”

  “I already know everything. Why do you think you’re here?” Nikiok chided. “Torek’s about to nomaikok Keil Kore’Weidnar’s body and launch an investigation to solve his murder because of you. He wants to waste millions to send you home. Waste billions in future revenue from the other humans we’re already en route to harvest. Because. Of. You.” Each accusation was punctuated by the hard clip of her boots striding forward.

  Delaney was already pressed flush against the wall as far back as she could retreat. “You waste billions. The other humans not act like pets.”

  Her lips twisted ruefully. “They won’t need to.”

  Delaney’s breath caught on a spike of cold dread. “What have you done?” she whispered.

  “What I’ve always done.” Nikiok reached down, fisted her hand in Delaney’s hair, and wrenched her head back. “Whatever necessary.”

  “You trying to kill me for weeks,” Delaney choked out. She glanced down the hall toward the elevator. Only a dozen yards away. Maybe if she kept Nikiok talking, kept her distracted, Delaney could buy herself enough time and opportunity to make a run for it. “The lor who chase me at Graevlai. The ukok in my rainol e lokks. That is all you.”

  Faces inches apart, the foggy puffs of their labored breaths mingled.

  “We had an unspoken agreement, you and I,” Nikiok whispered.

  Delaney shifted her eyes to meet Nikiok’s accusing gaze.

  “We did!” Nikiok hissed. She twisted her hand, wrenching Delaney’s hair from the roots. “Our eyes met just like this after I’d”—her jaw ticked—“taken care of Keil. And you looked away. You remained silent.” She shook her head. “When I saw you and Torek together in Graevlai—your bond, your trust and mutual affection for one another—I knew you’d break that unspoken promise. You should have kept your silence.”

  “But why kill Keil in the first place?” Delaney rasped through her chattering teeth. “Why not just reclassify me and send me home?”

  “Do you know how much it costs the Federation to launch an exploration mission? The backlash that the intergalactic exploration division would receive if the public knew how utterly our technology failed to detect intelligent from animal life?” Nikiok snatched Delaney’s wrists in one hand and pinned them behind her back. She stood upright and strode from the cell, dragging Delaney across the floor by her hair and wrists. “People would start asking questions, like whether our technology had ever failed before. And that could not happen.”

  Delaney bucked and tried to kick free, but Nikiok dropped her hold on her hair. She twisted Delaney’s wrists high and to the side, forcing her to touch Petreok’s body. A stabbing pain knifed through both shoulders.

  Fuck, Nikiok could pop her joints out of socket as easily as a chicken wing.

  Nikiok wrapped Delaney’s hands around something grooved and cylindrical, then forced her fingers wide. Whatever it was clattered to the floor in a splash of Petreok’s blood.

  Nikiok yanked her head back again and dragged Delaney through that puddle, painting her own path across the stone.

  “He should have classified you correctly before diving into deep space,” Nikiok spat. “By the time I received his reclassification request, I’d already launched another ship and invested in preparations for a new animal companion breed. Humans.” She shuffed.

  “People make mistakes.” Delaney gritted through her clenched jaw. Was her scalp ripping?

  “This mistake would cripple Onik’s economy, and my duty is to Onik, no matter the cost. The lives of two lorienok and you, little one, is nothing compared to the price they must have paid after bringing home the baby zorel and its little mate all those many seasons ago. Not every creature can be domesticated.” She huffed out a bitter, self-deprecating laugh. “The biggest mistakes are often the ones you only recognize in hindsight. But the stink of this mistake is right here within my grasp.” She shuffed into Delaney’s neck, nostrils flared wide. “Besides, I am Lore’Lorien. I walk where I will.”

  Nikiok released her, and Delaney dropped to the floor, gasping. The clear not-glass floor.

  Delaney’s head whipped up. She was in the release chamber, but the elevator was right there, only a few yards away now.

  Time. She just needed a little more time.

  “Why wait?” Delaney asked. “Why not kill me and Keil together? Frame a murder suicide?”

  “And let the public question why Keil, who dedicated his entire life to the domestication of foreign animals, would kill one?” Nikiok tutted and exited the release chamber. “You were willing to cooperate at the time, so I waited, letting the news of Keil’s death settle. Letting you play your part as I played mine.” She retrieved Petreok’s body and lifted his hand toward the console.

  Delaney edged toward the exit while she wasn’t looking, but Nikiok’s gaze snapped up. She lifted the weapon that had incinerated Petreok’s head and leveled it at Delaney.

  Delaney froze, her hands raised. “I can still play along. Please, you don’t—”

  “You healed Torek, so I’m glad I waited. But now…” Nikiok sighed as if the weight of her own actions, crippling to someone else, was just now becoming a burden for her. “I’m sorry this won’t be as painless as simply shooting you. You don’t deserve this death.”

  “I don’t!” Delaney tried, grasping at Nikiok’s guilt like a sieve does sand. “Please, release me.”

  “Torek will investigate your death, and when he does, he must find evidence that supports your crimes and just punishment for them.” She grinned sadly. “I must do what’s necessary.”

  Twenty-Nine

  Delaney
hadn’t stayed in his living quarters. She wasn’t in the washroom. She wasn’t in any of the kitchens or the sitting rooms. She wasn’t in the back hallway or the surveillance hall. Torek searched the entire guard tower, sparing a moment to consider and then dismissing the lift. He needed to focus on reality and the many places she could actually be, not worry over the worst place she could possibly be.

  Torek fisted both hands in his hair and closed his eyes. His heart was about to erupt from his chest.

  Inhale. Exhale. Inhale and hold. Exhale.

  Rak! He stumbled back to his living quarters and sat down before he fell down. He could see the headline now: Torek Lore’Onik Weidnar Kenzo Lesh’Aerai Renaar Returns from Zorel Battle Unscathed Only to Die from Panic Attack over Lost Animal Companion.

  Breathe. He’d find her, but to do that, he needed to remain conscious. And to remain conscious, he needed to breathe!

  Perhaps he was expecting too much of her. Was it too much to expect his lover, posing as his animal companion, to remain safely ensconced in the luxury of his private living quarters while he battled the zorel? Was it too much to expect her to leave a message on his daarok, detailing her whereabouts so he didn’t panic upon his return? Was it too much to want to bury himself and his exhaustion in her soft body, to hold her in his arms and be reminded of the treasures that made life worth living rather than embarking on a futile hunt that would at any moment result in his heart failure?

  Granted, he hadn’t actually protected Onik from anything this time. The breach had been a false alarm. He’d need to investigate and reprogram the Zorelok sensors if they were failing. But Delaney didn’t know that. For all she knew, he was risking life and limb for her at this very moment, and what was she doing? Who knew, because she wasn’t anywhere to be found! By Lorien’s horn, he’d skewer her himself when he did. And he would. He would.

  He was Torek Lore’Onik Weidnar Kenzo Lesh’Aerai Renaar, captain of Onik’s Guard as was his father, grandfather, and their many forefathers for generations. He commanded officers into battle. He protected all of Onik from the zorel. He had clearance to every Federation room, sensor, camera, and mission file. He had—

  He had the security cameras.

  He lunged for the daarok, waved it to life, and keyed through the series of coded passwords to access the security system and, specifically, the hallway camera outside his living quarters. He rewound the footage. A flurry of activity blurred his doorstep after he’d left, and then there he was, leaving the room.

  Torek stopped the footage and started it from there. He watched himself leave, and then the hallway was empty. A full minute later, it was still empty. Torek drummed his claws against his jaw. He didn’t want to watch this in real time. He didn’t want to miss anything either, but it could be hours until Delaney stirred from the room. He didn’t have the time or the patience to watch security footage for that long. Rak, maybe he could—

  The hallway washroom door was ajar. It had been shut a moment before. He’d blinked, and now, the door was cracked. Not being opened by someone—just open. The movement was minute, a blip, but the sliver of daylight between the door and its frame was unmistakably absent one moment then there the next.

  Torek scowled and double-checked the time stamps. They continued ticking as if the door had glitched in real time.

  Someone had tampered with the security footage while he’d been called away to battle the zorel. The zorel that hadn’t needed to be battled.

  Torek took note of the time stamp, then switched views to the adjacent camera at the far hall. He watched and waited.

  Nothing.

  He cut the feed and tapped into the camera on the opposite side of the hall, then watched and waited some more.

  Fekok. This was insane. Who would tamper with the security feed and to what purpose? Was he really suspecting that someone under his command had—

  There. A shadow in the corner by the lift was there—barely, but there—then gone.

  Torek switched feeds to the cameras in the lift, rewound to the appropriate time stamp, and waited.

  Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

  He was insane. Besides himself, no one had access to the security footage except Filuk Renaar and Dorai Nikiok Lore’Lorien.

  His stomach soured even as he rolled his eyes at himself. He was a lovesick idiot if he suspected either of them of…of what? Foul play with his animal companion? Who would he suspect of foul play next? Zana, risen from the grave? He trusted Filuk Renaar with his life, and Dorai Nikiok was the Lore’Lorien. She was his commander and leader, and she—

  She was the only lorok who could feasibly tamper with the security footage.

  On a leap of dread-filled foresight, Torek left the room, ran down the hall, caught the lift just as a pair of guards were exiting, and jabbed the deporak’s combination into the console. The doors closed, and the lift descended.

  Torek seethed. His hackles were raised on an ill feeling and a hunch, but his instincts had never failed him before. His fists clenched. He deliberately opened his fingers wide and then clenched them again in torn uncertainty. Had he suspected anyone else of what he suspected from Dorai Nikiok—and what did he really suspect?—he’d be calling on his guard for reinforcements. His hand hovered over his daami. Could he call reinforcements against Dorai Nikiok Lore’Lorien? It was unheard of, completely unprecedented, but then so was the act of robbing his private living quarters of his animal companion. Assuming that was what she’d done. Assuming he wasn’t jumping to rash, emotional conclusions based on what? A suspiciously timed skip in their security footage? Maybe their tech was just glitchy today. And maybe Delaney was mistaken about Keil’s murderer. Maybe she’d overreacted when the lorienok had chased her in Graevlai. Maybe the ukok in her rainol e lokks had been an accident.

  Too many maybes.

  Delaney’s soft, sweet voice echoed in his mind: “No one knows the truth. If they did, I’d already be dead.”

  Before he could settle on a decision and act, the lift doors slid open, revealing the deporak: a long hallway of one hundred and fifty-seven containment cells, seventy-three of which were occupied, the viewing wall opposite the cells, and the release chamber.

  Delaney lay on her side within the release chamber. She was struggling for purchase, trying to crawl toward the exit, but her efforts, though valiant, were in vain. Her limbs were unsteady—sluggish, and uncoordinated—and she kept slipping on the slick of her own blood.

  Her forehead was split and swollen to the size of his fist. Tears had cleaned twin tracks down her blood-smeared cheeks. The desperate grunts of her ineffectual escape made him flinch, but that shameful movement finally jarred him enough to notice the room beyond Delaney.

  Dorai Nikiok was standing at the release panel, holding the wrist of a headless lor. His mind stuttered on that for a wasted, critical moment—who’d been on duty tonight, Kialok or Petreok?—as Nikiok lifted the dead guard’s hand to the console.

  She was about the close the release chamber with Delaney inside.

  But Nikiok wouldn’t. There was another explanation, because Dorai Nikiok was not a murderer.

  Nikiok pressed the hand to the console.

  The door began to slide closed.

  Torek reached for his RG-800, but Delaney was faster. She wiggled her head between the door and the jamb, preventing the chamber from sealing shut.

  The alarm buzzed, and the door reversed its slide, reopening.

  “Fekok,” Nikiok hissed. She dropped the guard’s hand. His body slumped to the floor, and Nikiok strode into the release chamber.

  “Please!” Delaney begged. Her voice was both hoarse and wet at the same time. “We can—ahhhh!”

  Nikiok fisted her hand in Delaney’s hair, yanked her head away from the door’s sensor, kicked her ribs twice, and slammed her face into the wall.

  Delaney’s scream cut short. She collapsed, unmoving—horribly, completely unmoving.

  Torek unstrapped his RG-800 and leveled
his sights. “Dorai Nikiok, stop. Raise your hands where I can see them.”

  Nikiok froze. She turned her head slowly and locked eyes with Torek. At the sight of his weapon, she raised her hands above her head. “Stand down, Commander. She’s been charged and convicted of Keil Weidnar’s murder.”

  Torek exited the elevator, his aim steady. “Step away from her. Now.”

  Nikiok withdrew slowly from the release chamber but crouched, reaching for the guard’s body. Petreok’s body, he realized.

  “Stop, or I’ll shoot,” he growled.

  Nikiok stood, holding Petreok’s wrist at her side. “And I said, stand down. That’s an order, Commander.”

  She raised Petreok’s hand toward the console again. Delaney was still curled limply on her side in the release chamber, and Dorai Nikiok was, beyond all doubt, going to kill her.

  Lorien, lend me your steady breath. Torek squeezed the trigger, and Dorai Nikiok’s right hand burst into ash.

  Petreok’s body fell to the stone floor.

  Nikiok didn’t fall. She didn’t even scream. She whipped to face Torek, her face blazing. “Stand down!”

  Delaney still hadn’t moved. Was she still breathing?

  Nikiok bent and grabbed Petreok’s wrist with her left hand.

  Torek re-aimed. “Stop. Step back from the console, or I’ll shoot your other hand.”

  Nikiok didn’t move.

  Neither did Torek. He kept his eyes carefully trained on her, resisting the urge to check on Delaney a second time.

  “This is treason,” Nikiok hissed. “If one of our guards walked in at this moment, what would they do?”

  “Dorai Nikiok.” Torek snarled. “Step. Back.”

  “She’s a murderer.”

  “You can’t put down an animal companion without her owner’s signature.”

  “She’s not an animal companion. She’s a person.”

  Torek blinked, taken aback for a moment. Nikiok knew, just as Delaney had claimed.