by Lea Linnett
“It looks as if something broke through here.”
Bree nodded, glancing up at him almost shyly. “I was thinking the same thing. They covered it up well, though. Can’t break through.”
“I believe this is an old laboratory,” Marek said. “A place to test the materials found in the earth without endangering the rest of the mine’s occupants. It is an old, but effective prison.”
“Which is what got me thinking…” She drew in a deep breath, her brow furrowed. “What Urek said about prisoners in the observation room—do you think my mom could have been kept here?”
Marek’s eyes widened, his heart lurching. He had almost forgotten about the issue of Bree’s mother, and his own decision to hide her fate from Bree. So much had happened in the days since they visited the sehela pen… “It is possible.”
Her shoulders sank. “It must have been horrible. God, I hope she got out. That she didn’t… die here.”
He should tell her.
But before he could open his mouth to even begin to explain, Bree leaned into him. “Sorry about Noe,” she mumbled. “She… doesn’t see you like I do.”
“Do not worry,” he said hurriedly. “I am accustomed to such comments. And this is not all bad. I would not want her to see me as you do.” Hesitantly, he put his arm around her waist, holding her close. “I am yours, only.”
Her breath hitched, and she turned into his touch, looking up at him through her eyelashes. “You’re real sappy once you stop focusing on your work, you know that?”
“Sappy?” he asked, grinning despite the guilt that gnawed at him.
“Yeah. Like, tree sap? Sticky, sweet, gets everywhere.”
“Sounds more like honey,” he said, trailing his hand secretively up the inside of her thigh. He was aware of Noe lying only a few feet away, but was unable to stop himself.
They were interrupted by the swish of the outer door opening, and they shot apart. Marek was on his feet first, and he stood between Bree and the forcefield, glaring at their new guard.
His eyes widened when he realized who it was.
“Silas!” Bree cried, stepping up to the forcefield as the huge solayan lumbered into the room. He carried the bag of supplies from the transport, and he dropped it on the floor by the workstation after locking the door behind him. “What are you doing here?”
“I am your guard,” he said, his usual grin marred by the knot in his brow.
He had spoken in English, so Marek did the same for the humans’ benefit. “Our guard? Urek does not know that you helped us?”
“No. He know I speak Ancient Human. Tell me to guard and listen.” He gestured up at the bare walls, waving his hand, and Marek nodded in understanding.
“Because there are no cameras. He needs a spy.”
“I am sorry,” Silas said, his massive form sagging. “The plan…”
“It is not your fault. However Urek discovered us, we cannot change it.”
His words did not seem to brighten the solayan’s mood. “If I been there with you—”
“Then we would all be in a cage,” Bree broke in. “And it’s if I had been. Your English is getting better.”
Silas’ expression softened. “When Urek cage you, I practice much with Marek.”
“It shows.” She turned to Noe, who was hovering behind them with barely concealed trepidation, her gaze locked on the solayan. “This is Noe, by the way. Noe, meet Silas. I told you about him.”
“You didn’t mention he was the size of a house.”
Silas chuckled weakly. “Your houses very small,” he joked, and Noe’s scowl deepened.
“We must get them out of here,” Marek said, drawing the solayan’s attention. “I will not allow Urek to keep them down here in the dark.”
Silas nodded. “I help you.”
“You will have to. There is no way out, and I do not know how we can escape without Urek’s notice.”
“Can we get to their armory?” Noe asked, crossing her arms. “Shoot our way out?”
“No. We are outnumbered, and levekk weapons are useless in human hands.”
“Excuse me?” the blond snapped, rounding on him. “We’re not weaklings. We’ve trained for years to fight, right Bree?”
“This is not what I mean,” Marek said, sighing. “Levekk weapons are designed for levekk. If a sub-species attempts to use them, the mechanism will fail. And I cannot shoot for all four of us.”
“You’ve gotta be kidding me.”
“What about the hangar again?” Bree asked. “The cargo elevators lead right up to it, and from there we could escape down the mountain. They’d never expect us to try the same place twice.”
“No go upstairs. Not even hangar,” Silas said, shaking his head. “Guards everywhere. Urek know you try escape again.”
“Then we won’t go upstairs.”
The others turned to Marek, their brows furrowing. There was only one option for them, he realized, and it had been staring him in the face the entire time. They were not the only ones to have escaped this place, but he had willfully ignored that fact due to his own fear.
He met Bree’s eye, already feeling the guilt roll through him as he said, “We will escape through the tunnels.”
“The tunnels?” Her eyes widened in understanding just as Silas’ did. “Through one of the mine shafts to the north? Is that even possible?”
“Yes. I know because it has been done before.” He grabbed Bree’s hand, turning her to face him. He had kept his secrets for too long now, but his heart still thumped as he said, “I know, because this is how your mother escaped this place.”
Her lips parted, her hand going slack. “My mom? Sh-she escaped?”
“Yes. To the south. The solayans of her time helped her find a way out.” He hesitated, before pushing on. “And I believe a levekk accompanied her.”
Bree’s eyes were round and blinking, her face pale. “How long have you known this?”
“Since the day in the sehela pen,” he admitted. “I am sorry. I should have told you then, but I feared the news would hurt you. That it would take your fire.”
“‘Take my fire?’” She asked. Her dark eyebrows drew together in confusion. “What…?”
The words stuck on a lump in Marek’s throat, and he was acutely aware of Noe and Silas watching them. Time was ticking down, and he had so much he needed to say, but he could do no more than squeeze her hand ineffectually. “I…”
“We don’t have time for this,” Noe said, although she looked more concerned than angry. “If you know a way out of here, we need to fucking use it, quick.”
“I do,” he said distractedly, still pinned in place by Bree’s hurt expression.
“Go now,” Silas said, snagging the bag of supplies from the store. “This everything you need.”
Bree dropped Marek’s hand and rounded on the solayan. “You’re not coming with us?”
“I no belong with humans. I am solayan. Also,” he added, grinning at Noe. “I no fit in your tiny human houses.”
“What will you do?” Marek asked as Silas crossed to a panel on the wall. He waved a hand, and the forcefield disappeared. “I do not wish for Urek to punish you, solarren.”
Silas just shrugged, pulling a length of rope from the bag. “You hit me, tie up. I say cage break and you attack.” He stood up straight, his arms raised at his sides, and added in Levekk Trade, “Try to only knock me out, okay levekk?”
With his brow pinched and his heart thundering, Marek approached the large solayan. “Thank you, friend.”
24
“Did you have to hit him that hard?” Bree asked as they rode another elevator to the lowest level of the underground. She wore their pack of supplies across her back, a weighty reminder of what Silas had done for them. But the guilt was weightier, even though it had been Silas’ idea to have them incapacitate him.
At her side, Marek smiled, but the expression didn’t reach his eyes. “You have seen how large he is? You cannot
be gentle when you wish to knock down a solayan.”
“I guess.”
“Still wish you’d have let me do it,” Noe groused. “I’ve been needing to punch something. Preferably Urek’s face.”
“If you imagined Urek’s face, I fear Silas would now be dead, not unconscious,” Marek said, and Noe scowled at him.
They rode on a huge cargo elevator, which was far larger than any Bree had ridden in so far, and it rattled noisily as they descended. Then, it groaned to a stop, the doors sliding open, and Bree’s eyes bugged.
The room beyond was even darker and larger than she’d expected. She’d pictured cramped tunnels and crumbling earth, but this mining tunnel was so wide she could only just barely see the sides, which curved up in a perfect circle to a roof shrouded in darkness. Three strips of light ran along the floor and far into the distance ahead, faintly illuminating earthen walls covered in dark, metal struts, just like the ones in their underground prison.
It was also filled with machines that loomed from the darkness, their black metal gleaming, so large that their wheels appeared broader than Bree was tall. Devices sat upon them that she could hardly fathom, and many more were loaded with empty containers, many of them the size of her bedroom back home.
Beside her, Noe whistled, and the sound echoed for long seconds after. “This is actually impressive.”
“It was all built by sub-species—solayans and pindar, mostly,” Marek said, his voice solemn. “Many did not survive the cave-ins they caused, according to the records.”
Bree gulped, her heart aching. “How horrible.”
“It’s safe, though?”
“Oh, yes.”
Noe crossed her arms and worried at her lip. “So, I didn’t ask before, but… do we have to walk all the way to our destination?”
Marek chuffed out a laugh. “Thankfully, no. The tunnels are long and winding. It would be inefficient for the workers to waste their days traveling—or for them to become lost—when they could be working.” He beckoned them over to one side of the tunnel, where a large, roofless vehicle was set into the wall. It was attached to a long metal rail that disappeared into the distance, almost like the old railroad tracks Bree had once stumbled upon while exploring.
“We will ride on this,” he said, climbing into the car without hesitation. Once inside, he leaned down to give Bree a hand up.
“You sure this all works?” Noe asked skeptically.
“I have used these every day for the past five years,” Marek said, offering a hand. “It is safe.”
Noe grabbed the side of the car and hauled herself up, ignoring Marek’s help. The hybrid shrugged in response and moved to the front of the car.
He paused, looking back at them. “The path has many branches. I will need to know which mine shaft to set as our destination.”
Bree opened her mouth to reply, but was halted by Noe’s hand on her shoulder.
“You can’t tell him,” she whispered hotly, her eyes wide. “I meant what I said. He can’t come with us.”
“We need him.”
“Get him to show us how it works, then we can—”
“He’s coming with us!” Bree snapped, loud enough for Marek to hear.
Noe’s head jerked back, letting go of Bree as if burned. “You can’t be serious. Luis won’t let him stay.”
“He will. Out of all of them, I know Luis will understand.”
“He’s an alien, Bree. You heard Silas. They don’t belong with us.”
Bree got to her feet, shrugging her friend off. “He’s also human, Noe, and he belongs by my side.”
She ignored Noe’s hurt look as she climbed to the front of the car. She loved Noe—she had been there for her when many hadn’t been—but she knew her friend would never understand this. Noe didn’t understand what it was like to feel alone all the time, whether you were out in the forest or surrounded by soldiers that you were supposed to call ‘friend.’ Bree had felt that way long before her alien abduction, and she knew Marek did, too.
“The closest mine shaft to the Barracks is by the waterfall to the northwest,” she said when she reached Marek. “Do you know where that is?”
He nodded quickly, already punching in coordinates to the dusty console. “The Barracks… this is where your fighters live?”
“That’s right.” She saw Marek glance over her shoulder at Noe, who was grumbling again. “Ignore her. She’s wrong about them.”
“She is?”
Bree’s eyes narrowed. “Yes. Luis is tough, but he’s always done right by me. He trusts me.”
“He is only one man,” Marek reminded her as he punched in the last coordinate. “Be careful. These cars are known for their rocky starts.”
He wasn’t kidding. Bree’s stomach jerked uncomfortably as the machine lurched forward. Behind her, Noe made a noise that Bree was determined to tease her about later, but then the vehicle settled. They were soon speeding along into the darkness, leaving the elevator—and their prison—far behind.
Bree could hardly believe it. After so many attempts, and so much failure, their actual escape felt almost… lackluster. No one had chased them as they descended through the mine. No one had been waiting for them at the bottom.
And now, they were flying through the darkness, silent except for the whir of the vehicle beneath them.
The tunnel was dim and featureless as it sped by, but after a while, Bree noticed something. Tiny flashes of light all around them, blinking in and out of existence almost too fast for her to see. It was the metal struts surrounding them on all sides, the metal glinting in the meager light from the ground lights. Nothing exciting, but to Bree they almost looked like the stars she’d seen outside the hangar mere hours ago.
Stars that she might finally get to stand under again.
“It’s kind of beautiful down here,” she murmured softly to Marek, who’d settled into the seat beside her.
She heard more than saw him turn to her. “Beautiful?”
“The lights, the quiet, the coolness in the air. I can almost pretend that I’m just outside wandering under the night’s sky.”
“…I have not seen it this way,” Marek said, his eyes glinting as they scanned the tunnel. “When I was first banished here, I saw only walls trapping me in. I still do.”
“Except now, we’re going to use them to get out,” she reminded him, threading her fingers through his.
He squeezed her hand. “You still wish for me to join you, even after all my lies?”
“Yes,” she said, without hesitation. “I know you. And I know that you would have had a good reason to keep this from me.”
“I do not think it is a good reason.”
She worried at her lip, and then turned to face him more fully on the bench seat. “Tell me anyway?”
Marek was silent for a long moment, clearly grappling with himself. “I told you of my parents, yes?”
“You said they passed away.”
“Then I was not entirely truthful,” he murmured, his eyes on his lap. “My mother is dead, yes. But my father is, I think, still alive somewhere. I do not know where.”
“He…?” Bree’s eyes widened. “He left?”
“My father was not the same after my mother died,” Marek continued. “He was always a quiet man. He knew his place as a human within our world was steadier if he held his tongue in public. But after she died… It was as if he gave up. He ate less often, he stopped contacting me.”
The words moved something deep in Bree’s chest, bringing her own memories flooding back. “He was grieving. My father was quiet, too, until he and Sinead started seeing each other.”
“Yes. But soon after, when my position at the university was being questioned, I tried to talk with him.” Marek’s lips pursed in anguish. “I wished to hear his advice. Or his support, at least. But…”
“He was already gone?”
He nodded. “He left no traces. His comm was deactivated, and if there was a record of h
im leaving CL-6, I no longer had the influence to access it. Urek had not talked to my father for years, so I could not ask him. He left me alone.”
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “I can’t imagine how that must have felt.” Except, she did, a little. Her father had never left her, but when he moved onto his new life with Sinead, it had felt like he had.
“It is no excuse,” Marek said, shaking his head. “I blamed my father’s humanity for what he did. I started to believe that Constellation humans were… apathetic, passive, incapable of fighting back like the ancient humans once did. And I believed that grief affected humans differently. I have told you of chintah?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Chintah are small creatures. Like your Earth mice. They have small litters, and the mothers are known to neglect their remaining offspring when one is lost. Some even die from the grief.”
Bree’s lips parted as she realized what he was saying. “You thought I’d die if I found out my mother left?”
“Not die,” he assured her, a faint smile pulling at his lips. “But to learn that your mother escaped with one of my people? To learn she may have been able to return to you, but chose otherwise? I was terrified it would make you give up. Like the chintah. Like my father.”
“Marek,” she breathed. She realized she was holding his hand in a suffocating grip, and brought it up to kiss his knuckles, his scales smooth beneath her lips. “I’ve had people telling me my mom was dead for the past twenty years. I never allowed myself to believe it, but it would be impossible not to wonder. To think of her dying here, confused and alone and without anyone to talk with her and ease her imprisonment?” She smiled at him. “That’s what I was scared of.”
“But you have looked for her for so long. You do not resent her happiness, for costing you yours?”
“No,” she said, her heart aching at the look of confusion on his face. “She didn’t cause that. I did. It was me who pushed my family away. I was the one who chose to devote my life to finding her. I can’t blame her for that, especially if she is alive out there, and happy.”
