Guardian of Empire

by Kylie Chan

  The energy creature reappeared, this time in its spacesuit. It stood next to the connection between the shuttle and the interior of the asteroid.

  I stormed up to it. ‘Get help. We’re stuck here. Tell the dragons! Tell Marque! We need help!’

  It walked up the wall, ignoring the asteroid’s gravity, and examined the shuttle.

  ‘We need help – tell the dragons where we are,’ Miko said to it.

  It still didn’t respond.

  ‘Tell Marque we’re here,’ I said. ‘Tell Six Eighty Four. Tell the dragons. We need help.’

  It sank through the wall and disappeared, leaving a puddle of molten rock behind it.

  ‘We can only hope we got through to it,’ I said.

  ‘Why do they wear suits anyway?’ Blake said. ‘They obviously don’t need them.’

  ‘From what my sisters say, it’s vanity,’ Miko said. ‘Some sort of adornment.’ She shrugged. ‘We don’t know either.’

  *

  I’d died many times before, but never this slowly. The cold crept up from my extremities, and even Miko lying next to me couldn’t warm me. We’d stopped eating enough to sustain life weeks ago and been slowly dying of starvation as Haruka gave everybody smaller and smaller rations of the emergency bars. The shuttle’s battery had failed days ago, and now we would die of suffocation. I was desperately tired, and my eyes closed by themselves.

  Haruka fell to sit next to me. ‘You still there?’

  ‘Hm.’

  ‘We just lost another two. I’m going to be the last one alive here,’ he said. ‘My dragon scales mean that I’m going to die alone.’

  ‘You’ve Miko,’ I slurred.

  ‘As soon as everybody but me is gone, I’ll order her to leave me here and find safety. One-way trip,’ he said.

  ‘Good. She’s spec . . . tac . . . ular.’

  ‘You don’t order me any more,’ Miko said from next to me in the dark. ‘I’m my own dragon and . . .’ Her voice filled with tears. ‘I will stay here with my beloved humans for the rest of my life. I love you, Jian.’

  ‘Love you too.’ It was hard to stay conscious. ‘So sleepy. Stay with me, Miko? Haruka, I’m sorry. You are a great . . . man. I’m sorry we didn’t get to know . . .’ The words were too hard. ‘. . . better.’

  ‘Me too. I think I’ve been unfair to you, Jian, you’re smart and capable and brave as anyone I know.’

  ‘I think that too,’ Miko said.

  ‘Thanks, guys,’ I said. ‘I love you both. Blake, great friend.’ I sighed a deep breath, and didn’t get any air into me. ‘Merry, so short a time. Aki, be happy. Miko, magnificent. Mum, Ollie, David . . . sorry. Bye.’

  The silence filled the cavern around me. Miko held me from behind, and Haruka lay beside me and pulled both of us close. I cuddled next to him.

  ‘This is enough,’ Miko said.

  *

  Things happened. There was light, and warmth, and movement. I tried to raise my head, but couldn’t.

  ‘Holy shit, Captain Jian,’ someone said next to me, and the light flickered everywhere, blue-white and blinding. ‘I’ll get help.’

  ‘Hurry, they’re all very close to death,’ Miko said.

  ‘I can’t believe the suits didn’t tell us,’ the voice said. ‘They told us about the shuttle jammed in the wall of the planetoid as if it was a curiosity. They never mentioned people dying in it!’

  ‘Just go!’ Haruka said.

  ‘Hang on, Jian,’ the voice said. ‘I need to leapfrog through a dozen stars before I’m back in the Empire and can use a scale. Don’t you dare die on me!’

  ‘Not planning to, Six,’ I said. ‘You in uniform?’

  ‘Unbelievable,’ Haruka said, and his butt appeared in front of my face as he sat next to me.

  ‘How many are left?’ Miko said.

  ‘Only a couple of hundred,’ Haruka said, his voice hoarse with emotion. ‘And some of these are too far gone for even Marque to save.’

  ‘Don’t say that,’ Miko said. ‘Jian has to live!’

  ‘Blake?’ I said.

  ‘He was one of the first to die,’ Haruka said. ‘He gave his food away.’

  ‘I believe it. Always was a f . . .’ I gasped for breath. ‘Hero.’

  The light reappeared. ‘Here.’

  ‘Oh, lord,’ a dragon voice said. ‘Let’s do this.’

  Someone put their hand on my shoulder and the world dissolved around me.

  25

  The red spawn swirled around us in a transparent haze that shifted from pale pink to deep, vivid purple. David’s face was full of joy around his breather as he ran his fingers through them; they secreted mating chemicals that were similar to human endorphins, making us slightly high and full of bliss.

  I let the breather push the liquid through my lungs, and floated in the transparent sea. Oliver and Aki floated next to me, and the world was full of love.

  ‘Jian, you need to come up out of this,’ David said.

  ‘I’m glad you didn’t go with Cat,’ I said. ‘Stay away from her, David, she’s bad for you.’

  ‘Haruka is arguing with them but they won’t listen to him,’ David said.

  I smiled into the breather and touched the red cloud again, feeling the serenity. ‘I’m glad he’s a long way away; he’s an asshole.’ Something felt wrong. ‘No, we all misjudged him. I misjudged him.’

  ‘You have to go to him. Miko’s on trial and they’ll kill her.’

  ‘Miko?’

  Aki changed to Miko’s human form. ‘I love you, Jian.’

  ‘I love you too, Miko. Those six weeks of cold and starvation were the best of my life – because of you.’ I waved my hands through the spawn. ‘Isn’t this wonderful? I’m glad I could share this with you.’

  Merry swam past, her oversized feet making the red spawn swirl. ‘Goodbye, Jian. Keep Miko safe.’

  ‘I will.’

  Merry changed to Haruka. He stopped and floated next to me, his long green hair waving in the water.

  ‘Jian, they’re deciding Miko’s fate and I can’t do this alone,’ Haruka said. ‘I need you to come help me stop them!’

  The water disappeared and I was in the hearing room where they’d killed Kana. Miko was in human form in the middle of the room, kneeling with her head bowed. Masako was in her human form, the huge man, and carried an enormous shell axe.

  ‘Any last words?’ Masako said, and didn’t let Miko reply. She swung the axe and cut Miko’s head off. Miko’s body lay twitching on the floor, changing from human to dragon and back again, as blood spouted from her neck to form a brown puddle. Masako fell as well, took dragon form, and her stomach bloated with death.

  I thrashed in the white liquid. ‘Let me out!’

  ‘Why?’ Marque said.

  ‘We have to save Miko. Tell me they haven’t executed her yet!’

  ‘About time.’

  Marque lifted me out of the table and floated me into a chair. Mum was sitting next to the table and jumped up to help me. I stood and promptly fell over, and Mum caught me.

  ‘You’re weak,’ she said. ‘You nearly died. Oliver’s on his way.’

  I raised my hand and felt the new soulstone in my forehead. ‘I remember. Help me up! Is Miko still alive?’

  Marque entered the room in a human male android body and helped Mum guide me to my feet. I leaned heavily on it, weaker than I’d ever been. I looked down at myself; I was naked, and I’d never seen my own ribs in such relief before. My skin was sallow and pale, my breasts were gone, and my legs were like sticks.

  Marque gave Mum a cotton shift, and she pulled it over my head. I winced at the scratchiness against my tender skin.

  ‘Is Miko still alive?’ I said. ‘How long has it been? We have to stop them.’

  ‘As far as we know she’s still alive,’ Mum said. ‘They’re arguing. Marque told us what happened, but they won’t let anybody in. They say it’s dragon-only business.’

  ‘Let’s go. Tell Maxwell to
meet me there.’

  ‘I already did.’ Marque and Mum helped me to the door, and it opened by itself. ‘Maxwell doesn’t know what happened, the dragons won’t tell her, but she says she trusts you and she’s on her way.’

  ‘Tell her everything. Is anyone else who was in the cavern lucid enough to help?’ We entered the corridor, and there were five other people from the cavern there, some leaning on Marque androids, some on family members, and all emaciated.

  ‘Let’s go rescue our Princess!’ Griffith wheezed from the arms of her dragonscales partner.

  ‘What’s this with the android bodies?’ I said. Marque had created bodies that mimicked the body types of the humans it was assisting. ‘Wouldn’t energy be better?’

  ‘I can feel if you fall. Also . . .’ It smiled grimly. ‘Solidarity. I’m human with you and telling these dumb assholes that this is wrong and they need to stop.’

  Graf was stationed at the end of the corridor. ‘You shouldn’t be out yet, ma’am.’

  ‘Stand down and let me pass,’ I said, clutching Marque’s human body. ‘I have something vitally important that I need to do – no, Graf, come with us as backup. We might need help.’

  ‘Ma’am.’

  ‘You should have told them,’ I said as we headed towards the room with Graf bringing up the rear. Every step was more difficult. ‘You knew Miko’s been doing it for hundreds . . .’ I took a deep breath. ‘Of years. Safely. You knew!’

  ‘If I told them Miko was gating then they’d have executed her as well,’ Marque said. ‘Hold on, I’m adding more oxygen to the air. Is that better?’

  My chest lightened and I felt more alert. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘They need more than reassurance that it’s safe,’ Marque said. ‘They need to be forced to face their own self-loathing, and hopefully you and Haruka can do it. Here’s Charlie.’

  ‘Ambassador Maxwell to you, asshole,’ she said to it. She nodded to my mother. ‘Connie, good to see you.’ She glared at Marque. ‘I agree with Jian. You could have stopped them ages ago. You lied.’

  ‘You’re right, I’m wrong, I’ve let this go on far too long, and threatening to withdraw your services from the Empire is the only way we can stop them,’ Marque said. ‘Will you help?’

  ‘Of course I will,’ Maxwell said. ‘This is fucking slavery, Marque, and knowing what I know now, I will withdraw Earth from the Empire.’

  ‘You’ve been in the Empire for more than fifty years and now you object to them using slaves?’ Marque said. ‘Nobody forces the goldenscales. It’s self-imposed servitude. I hope you can stop it, and you’ll stay in the Empire. I like you.’ Marque hefted me. ‘We need to go in right now.’ The door opened to reveal the Empress standing on the platform with Miko and Haruka in front of her, facing all the goldenscales.

  Ambassador Maxwell stepped forward, and I lunged to stop her, dragging Marque with me. ‘Charles. Let me. I love her.’

  Her expression didn’t shift, but she stepped back and let me go first. ‘Save her, Jian, we owe her your lives.’

  Mum and Maxwell waited at the bottom of the stairs as Marque helped me up to the podium to face the gathered goldenscales.

  ‘You shouldn’t be out yet,’ Miko said.

  ‘Oh yes I should,’ I said.

  ‘Thank the gods you’re here,’ Haruka said from her other side. ‘Maybe now we can stop this stupidity.’

  He was nearly as thin as I was, with his violet kimono hanging off him. He hadn’t fixed his hair, and the dye had grown out so that the first ten centimetres of it was brown and the rest sickly green. His wrists poking out of the silk sleeves were bony and fragile.

  ‘Listen to me,’ I said loudly to the gathered goldenscales. ‘I know you think you’re inferior, but you’re not. You’re as good as any coloured dragon, and some of you must have worked that out. Hasn’t anybody here plotted revolt and wanted to have freedom and independence?’

  One of the goldenscales at the back called a reply. ‘They murdered us! My five sisters, all dead – for asking for our freedom!’ She pointed at the Empress. ‘You killed them!’

  ‘It’s not what it seems,’ the Empress said.

  ‘No,’ Miko said, and rounded on the Empress. ‘It is exactly what it seems. The five of them went to you – their mother – and asked to be freed from servitude to live in liberty and you said no and killed them.’

  ‘They couldn’t fold,’ the Empress said, ‘but they had this gating power that should never be used. I had to make sure that one of their coloured sisters was with them all the time to make sure they were never tempted. I was protecting them!’

  ‘You executed them to protect them?’ I roared. I turned back to the grief-stricken gold dragon, standing in a small cleared area as the others had moved away from her. ‘Why didn’t you run? Find a safe place outside the Empire?’ I answered my own question. ‘Because you can’t fold, and they told you that gating would destroy the universe.’

  ‘That’s enough for me,’ Maxwell said. ‘We’re out. This is straight up oppression and humanity wants no part of it.’

  ‘No, Charles, please don’t leave, we need you.’ The Empress lowered her head. ‘It was six hundred years ago. Things were different then.’

  ‘Things aren’t that different if they’re still servants, Silver,’ I said.

  ‘No goldenscales has asked for her freedom since,’ she said. ‘If they want their freedom, they can have it. You can have it!’ She raised her head. ‘I thought you were happy?’

  ‘You made it very clear that if we attempted to free ourselves, the penalty was death,’ the goldenscales said. ‘You didn’t give us a choice. Gating puts others at risk, and there should be consequences. But stop telling everybody that we choose to be servants. You have a hand in it too . . . Mother.’

  ‘Gating puts others at risk? Who told you that? The Empress?’ I said.

  The Empress’ head went even lower.

  ‘And Marque helped her. They had you all believing it. They’ve brainwashed you into thinking you’re fucking inferior, when you’re not.’ I wheezed a few times, and Griffith cheered me quietly from the side. ‘Miko has been secretly gating her whole life, and she’s never made a mistake. She used gates to save a thousand humans from the cats. She created a total of sixty-seven gates—’

  Some of the goldenscales recoiled with horror.

  ‘I know that, because I counted them. Three times she did two fucking gates at once!’

  They stared at me, stunned.

  ‘And you know what? The universe is still here, because it’s not in any danger!’ I shook the Marque android body so hard its teeth rattled. ‘This drama-baiting piece of shit lied to you. Tell them.’

  ‘It’s true,’ Marque said. ‘Gating is safe. She’s been doing it her whole life and never made a mistake. She’s remarkable.’

  The goldenscales looked at each other.

  ‘I love this dragon as much as I’ve loved anyone,’ I said. ‘She’s magnificent. You’re magnificent. This skill you have – gating – is magnificent.’

  ‘Laying it on a bit thick, my love,’ Miko said under her breath.

  ‘Stick time,’ I replied just as softly. I raised my voice. ‘Ambassador Maxwell is horrified that smart and skilled people like you are being used as servants by your equals. She’s going to withdraw all of humanity from the Empire in protest, and the Empire will be at the cats’ mercy. The cats have changed their society completely – I think they had a revolution – and they don’t oppress their women any more. Your enslavement gives those selfish assholes moral superiority, and if they hadn’t tried to force us, we’d seriously be thinking about joining them!’ I turned to the Empress. ‘What would happen if the goldenscales stopped acting as your servants?’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t execute them; the cats can’t be trusted and we can’t afford to lose their immunity to the cat weapon. We can’t lose the humans either; they’re needed for the chilli weapon,’ she said. ‘Without their servic
e, I’d have to put my own jewels on, and keep my own journal?’ She blinked a few times. ‘Uh, that’s all.’

  ‘I can do that!’ my Marque support said.

  ‘This decision is yours,’ the Empress said to the gathered dragons. ‘You have your freedom. If you choose not to serve us, I won’t stop you.’ She swung her head to Miko. ‘If you can gate safely, Miko, then I’ll give you special permission to do it.’

  ‘What, just me?’ Miko said.

  ‘As Marque said, you are remarkable.’

  ‘No,’ Miko said firmly. ‘All of us, or none of us. I can teach my sisters to gate safely. Treat us all as your equals.’

  I stared at her with wonder that I had earned the love of this exceptional being. She saw me looking at her and smiled her dragon smile.

  ‘You can’t gate!’ someone shouted from the crowd. ‘You’ll kill us all. It’s too dangerous. The penalty’s there for a reason.’

  I turned back to the goldenscales. ‘You want to execute my partner here? This glowing golden piece of pure awesome?’ I pushed Marque away to stand without aid and planted myself in front of Miko. I swayed as I glared with fury and jabbed my finger at them. ‘Bring it. I will fucking fight you all.’ I toppled and Marque caught me. ‘Come on, Miko, we are going back to my place to share a bath and a bed and have an awful lot of really good sex.’

  ‘Let me, Marque,’ Miko said, and moved to carry me.

  ‘No way,’ I said. ‘The robot carries me. You are not my servant.’

  ‘I’ll do it,’ Haruka said. He picked me up, and carried me like a child. He and Miko ignored the rest of the goldenscales as he carried me down the stairs.

  He stopped at the bottom of the stairs and nodded to my mother. ‘Lady Choumali.’

  She eyed him suspiciously. ‘Prince Haruka.’

  The goldenscales started to argue among themselves about what they were going to do, but none of them tried to stop us.

  ‘Talk about your freedom!’ I shouted back at them, and they went silent. ‘Because you are way better than you think you are, and the Empire needs your gates!’ I hesitated a moment, gasping, then hit them with the final kicker. ‘I’m going to have a fucking baby with Miko as soon as I’m well enough, and there’s no reason why you can’t have children as well!’