Shadow Run

by Michael Miller

  Something like pain—as if it were possible for me to feel any more—spiked through me at the thought of Nev abandoning us. Maybe he’d decided he’d rather not risk his life going back for Arjan after all. I pulled my fur jacket tighter around me as I stepped outside.

  He stood near the hatch, his arms braced above his head against the hull, as if he were holding the ship up instead of leaning against it. Even if it was warmer than Alaxak, he had to be cold in his thin synthetic jacket and pants.

  I almost didn’t want to disturb him. Maybe it was the look on his face, more somber than I’d ever seen it. I took a breath with relief that he was still here, and then immediately found myself angry; I hated him for bringing us here, I hated him for leaving Arjan, and I hated him for walking away and making me worry when we had more important things to be doing.

  We didn’t have time for this. My brother didn’t have time.

  “What are you doing?” I asked, my breath billowing and my boots crunching through the snow as I made my way over to him. “We still need you on the bridge. You’re the one who would know of any weaknesses in the structure where they’re holding Arjan. Stop wasting time.”

  It came out harsher than I’d meant, but what could I do?

  Nev didn’t respond immediately. He only stared out over the landscape, his usually bright eyes as clouded as the sky. When he finally spoke, he sounded far away. “I’m sorry. I know I should be helping. Somehow, I just…I feel as useless as those drones, right now. The purpose that I had, my values—it all came from my family. And now it’s gone. Worse, it was all an illusion to begin with.”

  I stepped closer to view the scene from his angle. The Kaitan was nestled deep in an icy, mountain ravine, and massive shapes lurked around us behind a veil of snow—drones, several times the size of the ship. But they weren’t moving much, or paying us any attention. These were the drones the Dracortes had deactivated before the Great Collapse, back when they’d finished excavating mines like the ancient one that supposedly still riddled the slopes around the citadel. The Dracortes had been able to keep the drones from ruining their own planet, of course, just not most everyone else’s. And yet, here were the giant metal monsters hundreds of years later, lying in wait for an activation code that could make them tear through whatever stood in their way.

  What would Nev do without his driving purpose?

  As if we were both thinking the same thing, he murmured, “And even though I’m furious at the hypocrisy of my family, I just keep thinking of Marsius’s hugs. Even Solara’s indomitable will to get the latest and best gossip. Father, when he would give me an approving nod. Mother, always putting her hand on my shoulder whenever she came up behind me to let me know she was there.”

  It hit me, what I was asking him to do. I was asking him to attack his family, turn on his home and country, and betray everything he had been born and raised to believe. In his position, I wasn’t sure how I would bear it. What if I had always just thought that my family was good, that my people and I, in spite of our struggles and setbacks, were doing our best to follow the path our ancestors laid out for us, and that it was the right path…when, in fact, none of that was true? Even in imagining it, a part of me wanted to scream out that it was wrong, that my people were good.

  And maybe Nev had that part of himself too. Screaming inside at the lie he’d believed.

  I reached out, but only grazed his shoulder with a finger before my hand dropped. It was all I could do, all I could allow myself. I couldn’t do more with Arjan missing. “I’m…I’m sorry, Nev.”

  A laugh caught in his throat as if it had been strangled. “You shouldn’t be sorry.” He closed his eyes and leaned his forehead against his raised arm, his breath fogging around him. “Only me. And I’m so very sorry, Qole.”

  He also looked more tired than I’d ever seen him, as if he’d been carrying a burden as heavy as this ship for a long time. One his father had placed on his shoulders and wouldn’t let him set down. He looked miserable, in fact.

  He should be sorry, but not miserable. It wasn’t entirely his fault. He was a Dracorte, but he was not his family. If he’d never found us, maybe we’d all be in a similar situation, no matter what, only with the Treznor-Nirmana family torturing Arjan instead of the Dracortes, and with me still teetering on the edge of madness. But if the Dracortes had never studied the Shadow affinity of people like us in the first place, then the Treznor-Nirmanas would never have known to cut us open to investigate it. And if the Dracortes hadn’t sought all the resources in the galaxy that had never belonged to them…

  But how far back did I want to take it? How much could I put on Nev’s shoulders, when he was clearly trying to do things differently from the rest of his family?

  Besides, if I’d never come with him, I would never have gained even the glimmer of hope—much fainter now, but still flickering—that someday Shadow wouldn’t have to drive me, my family, and others like us to insanity and death.

  And I never would have gotten to know him.

  For a second, my throat was too tight to speak while I looked at Nev’s bowed head and the snowflakes collecting in his hair.

  “I really didn’t mean to get on the ship back in Dracorva, you know,” he murmured, not looking up at me. “I was only supposed to get you on board and then stay to find Arjan and face my father, whatever the consequences. But I failed at even that.”

  The thought of him staying, even to help Arjan, and of never seeing him again, sent another bolt of panic through me, in spite of myself.

  I took a breath and forced the words out, the words I had to say to save my brother—whatever the consequences. “You can still help us. I know I’m asking a lot, but…”

  He looked up at me now, his silver-gray eyes heavy. “It’s the least I can do. No…actually, it’s the most I can do, but it’s the least you deserve. And this way, I still get to face him, and you stand a chance of getting Arjan back. Although, I warn you, it’s only the slightest chance.”

  I swallowed. “I know. But I have to try.”

  “We’ll probably all die.”

  “I know,” I repeated, the words echoing hollowly inside me. I hugged myself tighter.

  He nodded, as if he’d just been making sure, and dropped his arms, causing a gust of snowy air to swirl around him. “In any case, once we return, I won’t be coming back out.”

  My chest went tight as an airlock. “What?”

  “After this, I’ll be of no good to you. Either I’ll be dead, or I should stay as far away from you as possible. I don’t belong—I don’t deserve—to be in your life. I wanted to help you, and yet I’ve only hurt you in the worst imaginable way.” He smiled, but it was so bitter it hardly seemed like a smile, more like a grimace. So different from how he smiled when I’d first met him. “I also wanted to help my family, but all I’ve done is betray them.” He laughed, a sound that was also so different from the one I was used to. “How is it that I’ve made myself miserable trying so hard to make people happy, and yet I still haven’t succeeded?”

  It was odd: I’d always thought Nev was far happier than he had any right to be. That his happiness was a product of his privileged upbringing—privilege that had been gained by standing on the backs of others. And yet it made me sad to watch him lose something I realized I’d begun to appreciate.

  Both my sadness and my appreciation surprised me. But then, his happiness wasn’t about wealth, I knew now, even if wealth inevitably colored it. It was more about the sense of humor and hope with which he engaged the world. It was humor and hope that many in my world still had. I didn’t—for good reason—but only now did I realize this was something I’d craved without knowing it, like food or water after a long day of fishing during which I’d forgotten to eat or drink.

  I missed it now, when I could hardly stop thinking about everything else I’d lost: my path, my family, my world. Nev’s happiness gave me hope for my own. And if not for the possibility of happiness, why else was
I trying so hard to get back everything I’d lost?

  Maybe I was already lost, and I was only trying to get Arjan back. And yet, just like I couldn’t give up on my brother, part of me didn’t want to give up on myself, either.

  Nor did I want Nev to give up on himself.

  “Maybe you’re trying in the wrong ways,” I said. “You can’t always know what’s right for everyone.”

  He looked up in surprise at the gentleness of my tone.

  “You’ve trained for so long—been trained—to be a king, but maybe acting like a king isn’t always the best thing to do. Instead of making decisions for people,” I continued, “you have to support them with the resources you have in doing what they think is best for themselves. They won’t always be right, but neither are you, and you have the power to do greater harm. Or greater good.”

  His lips parted and his eyes widened, like I’d just said the most bewildering thing he’d ever heard. When he began to nod slowly, I had to fight off the utterly irrational and idiotic urge to take his face in both hands and kiss him.

  Instead, I told him what he needed to hear. I gave it to him like a gift, even though the words could have been bitter, even though I didn’t feel like I had very much to give.

  Not that it would be the easiest gift to receive.

  “Greater good…one of your family ideals, hey?” I didn’t bother to hide my accent. “It doesn’t have to be a lie. It is right now, but you can make it truth.”

  Nev’s beautiful features twisted, wringing my stomach at the same time. I knew there were more than tears of sadness and loss in his eyes. They were probably tears of realizing and relief too, but it still hurt to see.

  “How can an unhappy person expect to spread joy?” I whispered, not trusting my voice. “Be happy again, Nev. What would it take to make that happen?”

  He blinked at me, looking like I had actually kissed him, or maybe kneed him in the stomach. Or both at the same time.

  I didn’t know the answer for myself, or if there was a chance for me to ever be happy again. But maybe he had a chance.

  It took him a moment to respond, afterward. He gazed out over the landscape as if seeing it differently now, his eyes as shiny as melting ice. “You’re right. Perhaps I’m not like the drones, stuck in an obsolete destructive pattern without purpose. That’s my family. And I don’t have to do as they do anymore.”

  His eyes snapped back to me, the silver-gray irises suddenly sharp and clear.

  Purposeful.

  “Drones.” He laughed, as genuinely as ever before, and my stomach did a flip at the sound, defying the gravity that weighed me down. “I know exactly how to get into the citadel…and maybe even how to get back out again.”

  The mist parted, swirling, and the Kaitan burst out of the clouds that clung to the mountains above the Dracorvan plains. For the second time in as many days, Dracorva spread before me in all its glory, the spires of the citadel shining in the sun.

  My emotions were profoundly different this time. Rather than dizzying heights of excitement, an accepting calm filled me. I knew what I had to do, and so it had to be done. Glancing at Qole in her captain’s seat, her face serious and focused, I wondered if this was how she always felt.

  I turned back to the viewport in front of us, a brighter glint of sunlight catching my attention. From the spires of the citadel, a starfighter flitted out, darting this way and that before the pilot found his course and rose to meet us. Another fighter dropped out of a spire to join the first as it passed, and then another, and another. In less than a minute, I had lost count as their number filled the sky in front of us and the weapons-lock klaxon started.

  “For someone who was a peaceful fisherwoman just a couple of weeks ago, I think I’m beginning to get used to that sound,” Telu observed over the comm.

  “Kaitan Heritage, you are in violation of royal airspace, are harboring known fugitives, and have kidnapped Prince Nevarian Dracorte.” The latter assumption was generous of them, but what followed was less so. “Proceed to Containment Block One immediately, or you will be disabled and boarded.”

  Qole and I glanced at each other and she raised her eyebrow. I nodded, and with an almost imperceptible adjustment on the controls, she put the Kaitan into a near-hover.

  “Now, Eton,” she ordered.

  In the turret, Eton locked his own weapon systems onto the lead fighter, and I didn’t have to hear it to imagine the warning that sounded off in the pilot’s helmet. That’ll wake them up.

  As we had hoped, the starfighters slowed to nearly hovering themselves. I doubted they were eager to attack the ship they knew carried the royal heir, traitor or not, and I was sure there was a great deal of uncertainty about how to proceed.

  I pressed the inter-ship comm button at one of the empty stations on the bridge. “Thank you for your suggestion. This is Prince Nevarian Dracorte. Please listen very carefully to what I have to say.”

  I paused and took a deep breath. If Telu had been successful, this wasn’t only broadcasting to the fighters in front of us, but to every comm channel in Dracorva that she could get us on. And what I was about to say would be treason, pure and simple. I could still go back, right now. I would face consequences, but it would be possible.

  Looking at Qole, her gaze fixed on me, I realized I had no desire to go back to the way things had been.

  “There is a man from Alaxak being held prisoner in my family citadel. His name is Arjan Uvgamut, and he came here to help us of his own free will.” I paused again, my chest constricting. “Now, through no choice of his own, he is being detained as the subject of inhumane experiments.

  “We all believe that we stand for something greater than ourselves. I know that every one of you is loyal to my family. But cruelty isn’t an ideal any of us believe in. And his family is here, now, and they are willing to lay down their lives to bring their brother home, just as you would for yours.” I glanced at Qole. Her eyes were staring straight ahead, bright with unspilled tears, and her knuckles were white on the controls.

  “So today you have a choice, and it will be one of the most important you ever make. You can let us pass, and the systems will know that the Dracortes do not stand for cruelty, that we are true to our ideals, and that we believe in justice, not expedience. Or…” Now it was my turn to clench my fist so hard my knuckles turned white. “You can fight me. But if you fight me, ask yourself what you are standing for. And be prepared to face the full consequences, because we will not hold back.”

  I turned off the comm, my heart beating faster. I’d just told the world that I was prepared to hurt the people who had served me, who had grown up with me, who had raised me. That I believed my betrayal was justified.

  Father had felt his betrayal of our ideals was justified too. But Qole had made me see the true meaning of those ideals. I had to act on what I believed was right and leave others to choose their paths for themselves.

  Those men could choose; I had just given them that chance.

  Arjan’s ability to choose had been taken away by my family. And it was high time we gave it back.

  The Kaitan tilted, and we plummeted toward the starfighters below.

  “Remember, everyone,” Qole said, “they’ll probably only try to disable us because Nev is on board. Eton, get their attention and keep it. Hang tight, it’s going to be a rough run.” She jerked her head at me. “You should get to your station.”

  The gravitational dampeners hummed and rattled as they desperately fought our descent. I moved to my own station on the bridge, strapping myself in. Qole was right, they would probably use photon guns that were dialed back, chipping away at us until we were forced to land. Probably.

  Like a swarm of insects, the starfighters filled our viewport and a hail of energy bolts lanced out toward us.

  The Kaitan was already corkscrewing out of the way before the fighter pilots had even finished depressing their triggers. Timing it perfectly, Qole brought us under the formation and dr
ove for its center.

  I heard the grating roar of Eton’s mass driver, the shriek of photon interference, and was thrown against the back of my seat as Qole swept us away toward the citadel.

  “Nev, I need eyes. Are they buying it?”

  I scanned the feeds that were normally used for Shadow fishing. “Affirmative, Captain. We’ve got a dozen very angry rapier-class fighters about to chew our engines apart.”

  “One of our aft stabilizers is disabled.” Basra’s voice was calm as always, but there was an edge to it. “I’m routing more power to the others, but I don’t know if they’ll handle the strain.”

  Qole rolled out of the sweep and climbed straight into the atmosphere above the citadel, the Kaitan’s engines howling at maximum thrust. “Telu, this would be the perfect time. They aren’t paying attention.”

  “Hold on, Captain, there’s a tiny glitch. Two more seconds.”

  “Glitch—you were supposed to be ready!” Eton yelled, his voice almost drowned out by the continuous bellow of weaponry. “We’re going to be a glitch in another second!”

  Qole idled the engines and the Kaitan looped around in the sky, juking to avoid the fire directed at it as we pointed straight down.

  “Your two seconds are up,” Eton growled.

  “Drink it in,” Telu replied smugly, and through the viewport of the Kaitan I saw what she meant.

  The citadel and the mountains were spread in vivid sunlit relief before us. Smoke trailed from a spiraling starfighter that Eton had somehow managed to shoot down.

  And then the drones arrived, scores of drones. Mining drones, transportation drones, drones covered in trees and vegetation, decommissioned so long ago I couldn’t recognize the models. They streamed underneath us, descending from the mountains straight toward the citadel in a terrifying river.

  “Great Collapse,” someone—maybe me—breathed over the comm.

  “Yes,” Qole hissed as she poured power into the engines. “Telu, you are the best.”