by J. N. Chaney
MURDERERS
Thorn made to withdraw, but hesitated, knowing he had something to say.
You call us murderers, he said. But if you want to see murderers, look into a mirror.
WE WILL EXTERMINATE EVERY LAST ONE—
Thorn cut off the stream of mental vitriol and turned to Tanner. “That’s it, sir. That’s all I can tell.”
Tanner made a huh face. “You just gave us the locations of five squid planets we didn’t know about, Stellers. I’d call that a good day at the field.”
Thorn just nodded.
“Now, just one more thing,” Tanner said.
“Sir?”
“Take us home.”
Epilogue
Thorn came back on board the Hecate, ostensibly to retrieve some personal effects from his quarters. The destroyer had been docked and was undergoing yet another refit—this time, having one of the new particle-beam projectors installed into a dorsal turret, more upgrades to her point-defenses, and improved reactive armor. It had taken her offline for a solid week, leaving Thorn with little to do.
Correction—little to do, to the extent that he even had his own time. He’d actually be spending much of each day in meetings, conferences, and think tanks, all focused on the same question.
What now?
A sense of deep satisfaction permeated the ON. They’d finally taken the war to the Nyctus, and done it in a big, loud, and bloody way. The fight had changed. No longer would it only be occasional skirmishes, with the Nyctus slinking back into hiding. The ON had struck and, now that they knew the locations of five more of their planets, could strike again. By no means did it wash away the horrors that the Nyctus had visited on humanity, but it made up a chunk of lost ground.
And yet.
And yet, with the satisfaction came a diffuse but unyielding unease. The ON had, indeed, taken the war to the Nyctus in a shocking and decisive way. What would the Nyctus do in response?
Right now, though, Thorn dismissed those thoughts. He didn’t have any further meetings today, and there was something far more local and intimate he wanted to try.
The idea had come to him while he’d been recovering after bringing Task Force Trebuchet back from Nyctus space. The second transit hadn’t inexplicably aged him like the first one did; in fact, it seemed to leave him with no lingering effects at all, aside from a bleeding nose, a blinding headache that lasted most of a day, and a persistent bout of tinnitus that was only just now starting to relent.
That worried him more than the aging. He’d engaged with magic in a way that was wholly new, and dangerous in ways that he would know in the fullness of time. It was hard to believe that there wouldn’t be deep and lasting consequences from that. The strange aging, at least, was apparent.
Thorn made his way to the shuttle hangar, to the Gyrfalcon. Mol had been ready to launch during the attack on the squid hydro world, and fling herself into the fight, but it hadn’t been necessary. Instead, she’d sat in the cockpit on standby, using the time to try and connect with the newest implementation of Trixie.
“It’s just—it’s not the same,” Mol had told him afterward. “I mean, it’s Trixie, sure, but it’s not. It’s as though a friend died, and then turned out to have an identical twin. They might be the same in every way, but they’re not. They’re not the same person.” She sighed, long and sad. A sigh of grieving. “Probably not even making sense.”
“Oh, no, you are, Mol,” Thorn replied. “Perfect sense.”
Thorn clambered into the cockpit and sat in the co-pilot’s seat.
“Lieutenant Stellers,” Trixie said. “Welcome aboard. Is there some way I can assist you?”
Thorn sniffed. He knew exactly what Mol meant. This was Trixie, but it wasn’t.
“Nope,” he said. “I’m just going to sit here for a bit.”
“Understood.”
And that was it. Old Trixie would have wanted to chatter, even gossip. Probably play him some more shitty, angle-grinder-on-rusty-metal racket she insisted was music.
The thoughts made him smile. He held them close, while pulling out his talisman and centering himself.
When he reached that moment of full immersion in his own thoughts, he drew magic to him—more than he ordinarily would, but far, far less than he had when he moved Task Force Trebuchet. His intention was a change, but on a far smaller scale than anything he’d done in the past few days. Thorn had a plan.
Or that was his intent, anyway.
“Trixie?” he said, his eyes still closed, his mind still enmeshed with magic.
“Standing by.”
Trixie didn’t say standing by. Not the Trixie he knew.
He began to weave the magic, shaping it into a pattern that twined itself through reality, but with the tiniest shift. Call it a hint of stitching, as it were, the threads so gossamer as to be unnoticed by whatever agents rule over the chaos of magic.
“Trixie?”
“Standing by.”
Thorn drew upon more power, wove it into what he’d done so far, applying specific pressure here, tugging on reality there, nudging it incrementally closer to—to truth. To his truth. With a distant flash in his magical psyche, he knew he was closer. The truth was like a fingerprint—it had a shape, and whorls and ridges and even sound, and Thorn knew it all.
He knew her right down to the hideous music she loved, crashing in the distance like dissonant waves on a shore made of broken glass. Trixie was more than simple chips and matrix. She was a presence. A feeling.
He sensed her then, closer. The real Trixie.
“Trixie?”
“What? I mean, shit—speak up, Thorn! Don’t just keep saying, Trixie? Trixie?”
Thorn smiled, plucking at this truth, which was both old and familiar, and locked it into place. Then he slumped back and opened his eyes.
“Trixie? Talk to me.”
“About what? I mean, that’s a pretty vague statement—ooh, wait. I know. What did the sign say on the brothel after it closed down?”
Thorn let a broad smile play across his face. “I don’t know, Trixie. What did it say?”
“Beat it, we’re closed!”
His smile became a laugh, his first in a long time.
“What’s so funny? Did that joke land?” Trixie said..
“Dead center.”
“Oh, well, if you liked that one, how about this—”
For a while, Thorn just sat in the co-pilot’s seat, listened to Trixie tell him jokes—some of them shockingly dirty—and forgot about the rest of the universe.
Turns out, Trixie knew a lot of jokes.
At least they weren’t punk.
Thorn watched as the Stiletto’s shuttle thumped into place against the airlock. The concourse of Code Gauntlet’s orbital platform was crowded again, ships coming and going, all of them disgorging personnel for temporary taskings, miscellaneous jobs, and leave. He ignored it all, keeping his attention on the inner airlock door.
It slid open, and people in ON uniforms spilled out. Thorn waited.
Where was she? Had she stayed aboard the Stiletto?
Kira stepped over the hatch coaming. She immediately saw Thorn and smiled.
They kept their greetings appropriately civil. Thorn intended to leave it at that, but he decided he couldn’t wait. He gestured for Kira to follow him, and he led her aboard a docked shuttle from the Hecate that he knew was empty.
Kira gave a mischievous smile and glanced around. “Right here, right now? Sheesh, Thorn, we haven’t been apart that long.”
“There’s something I need to talk to you about,” he said.
Her smile faded. “Oh. Shit. The we need to talk thing. Wasn’t good the first few times.”
“It’s—wait. No. It’s—”
Kira held up a hand, then let it fall to Thorn’s chest. “All I’ve heard about the op against the squid planet is how successful it was, and how you’re the hero for it. Is there something about it I don’t know?”
“No, it’s not that, either.” He took a breath. “Kira, I can bring her back.”
“You can—” She shook her head. “Bring who back? From where?”
“Our daughter. I can bring her back.”
Kira’s face went blank. She just stared for a moment. Finally, she let out a breath.
“What?”
Thorn smiled, slow and hopeful.
“I know it sounds insane, but . . . I can do this. I know I can.”
Kira said nothing. They just stood in silence in the shuttle, together, the bustle of Code Gauntlet drifting in through the open airlock. In Kira’s mind, she discarded her grief, casting it away in the brilliance of this new possibility.
Outside, in the deepest black, Thorn’s truth rippled, touched by his presence.
Kira felt it, leaning close to speak in his ear. “Tell me how.”
THORN and KIRA will return in WITCH NEBULA, available to preorder now on Amazon.
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About the Authors
J. N. Chaney is a USA Today Bestselling author and has a Master's of Fine Arts in Creative Writing. He fancies himself quite the Super Mario Bros. fan. When he isn’t writing or gaming, you can find him online at www.jnchaney.com.
He migrates often, but was last seen in Las Vegas, NV. Any sightings should be reported, as they are rare.
Terry Maggert is left-handed, likes dragons, coffee, waffles, running, and giraffes; order unimportant. He’s also half of author Daniel Pierce, and half of the humor team at Cledus du Drizzle.
With thirty-one titles, he has something to thrill, entertain, or make you cringe in horror. Guaranteed.
Note: He doesn’t sleep. But you sort of guessed that already.
